Hateful words a war crime

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Hateful words a war crime
33
Thu, 12-04-2003 - 10:34am
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20031203-113817-3449r.htm

With a trio of guilty verdicts yesterday, the U.N. tribunal for Rwanda has established that men armed only with words can commit genocide.


NPR had a good story on it yesterday, too.

rtsp://real.npr.na-central.speedera.net/real.npr.na-central/atc/20031203_atc_08.rm

Renee

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-31-2003
Thu, 12-04-2003 - 6:49pm
Why do you think I don't know what happened? I read the full article in the Washington Times and the New York Times. I've read about the terrible massacres in Rwanda for years. People hacking eachother to bits with machetes. Do you think that people just wake up one day and decide to do that? No. They're fed a steady stream of hatred, thinly disguised at the start as commentary or sarcasm. From today's NY TImes article:

"The judges found that the station and newspaper branded all Tutsi, armed or unarmed, as the enemy. They quoted a witness who testified: "What RTLM did was to spread petrol throughout the country little by little, so that one day it would be able to set fire to the whole country."

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/04/international/africa/04RWAN.html

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-06-2003
Thu, 12-04-2003 - 8:07pm
>>These were not hothead commentators spouting off sarcastically.<<

Given that Coulter's 'spouted off sarcastically' on more than one occaison (maybe even a regular basis), I wouldn't just dismiss her as a hothead commentator. Where does the line get drawn? Do actions by listeners have to occur before one's public commentary is examined in this light?

Not that I'm necessarily comparing her words with those of the Rwandan news commentators...

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Thu, 12-04-2003 - 10:55pm
Because that's the only way I can rationalize your asinine comments.


The NPR story goes further and describes how a reporter found a ragged desperate group of tutsis who had been hiding in a mosque for days. Within the hour, the radio station announced their location and said something to the effect that their listeners knew what to do. None of the tutsis survived the night.

Renee

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-31-2003
Fri, 12-05-2003 - 12:17am
<>

Yes, I know. I think it's you who is not getting it. It's easy to be against hate that's oceans away and years ago. What are you doing about the hate that is here now, where you live?

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-31-2003
Fri, 12-05-2003 - 12:41am
<>

Then you need to open your mind a bit to what I'm saying. I've put it all out there for you. I can't make you understand. I'm not directly comparing Coulter's speech to the terrible results of the Rwandans' speech. I'm saying that's exactly how it starts. Coulter is desensitising Americans to hate speech and incitement to violence.

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Fri, 12-05-2003 - 9:38am
<>

That's exactly what you were doing.

Renee

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-25-2003
Fri, 12-05-2003 - 10:43am
What she does it turn around the ideology and language that is being used against us which we are ignore and don't take seriously. That is why she only uses that language when discussing the war on terrorism and Islamofascism.

She is not calling on anyone to kill Muslims. She is making She is using a well known literary device that is particularly suitable for political statements called irony. Johnathan Swift did the same in the 18th centerury when he called on the starving Irish to eat their babies. You should have heard the uproar that one created, but luckily, it didn't lead to an upserge in cannibalism.

If you want to really talk about hate speech and inciting violence in domestic politics, there are some jaw dropping quotes from Democrat POLITICIANS during the Clinton administration that I could dig up.

Renee

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2003
Fri, 12-05-2003 - 11:54am
<>

You've convinced me! I had just dismissed her as "entertainment" but you are right; I better get sensitized.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-18-2000
Fri, 12-05-2003 - 12:01pm
Ann Coulter: Too Extreme for Most Conservatives in Touch with Reality.

 


Photobucket&nbs

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-31-2003
Fri, 12-05-2003 - 1:44pm
Jonathan Swift did not do the same...in A Modest Proposal, he satiricaly proposed eating poor Irish children in order to CRITICIZE England's cold hearted response to the plight of the starving Irish. Are you suggesting that when Coulter proposes to "invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity" she is really criticizing America's over-aggressive, crusade-like response to terrorism? I'm sure she's not. If verbal irony is saying one thing but meaning another, what exactly is Coulter's opposite meaning here?

I think there's another term that fits Coulter's style here: ad hominem: appealing to a prejudice, emotion, or a special interest rather than to intellect or reason.

Here's some more of the "irony" of the apparently bloodthirsty Ann Coulter:

"We have a national debate about whether Clinton 'did it,' even though all sentient people know he did...otherwise there would only be debates about whether to impeach or assasinate"

(Remember that one everybody as conservatives are appalled by Eminem's new song in which he raps that he's rather have a "dead president")

"When contemplating college liberals, you really regret once again that John Walker is not getting the death penalty. We need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals, by making them realize that they can be killed too. Otherwise, they will turn into outright traitors."

So she wants to keep liberals in line with the threat of death? And who the hell ever said John Walker was with us? If you're sticking him in a liberal jersey, then we're suiting up Hitler for your team.

Whren, you can feel free to dig up the whoppers you promised me from democrats, but please limit them to ones that actually are about killing people, be they political opponents or just entire religions.