[All Systems Go]

Originally Posted by Newt

The human desire to conquer has been with us since forever.. why do you think its wrong?

Apart from the fact that aggression by a nation state against another is prohibited by international law, there a a couple of erasons.

1) I find the killing/maiming/blowing the shit out of people to be morally abohrrent.

2) Imposing your will on others by means of force because we think it is 'better' is just as abhorrent.

3) The idea that because something is claimed to be 'natural' that it is somehow automatically justified is pure bullshit.*

*not going into detail, this has been handled elsewhere in this thread

People may join the army to defend the country.

Then they are idiots with little understanding of what the army is actually used for.

But once in the army you can't just go "WAHWAHWAH I REFUSE TO FIGHT ABROAD!!" - they do what the government, which we the people have elected, tells them to do.

Which other profession can't you leave if ordered to something which you consider to be morally objectionable?

Any other system where the army somehow did only what they think is ethically correct, ignoring the government, monarchy and so forth would be insane. But feel free to try and explain how such a system could be implemented, and then actually be a good thing for the country.

There are a number of potentials, depending on what type of political system you would like to have. If you are interested, read up on them.

The first step would be to use the army for purely defensive reasons (i.e. not going to Iraq), which doesn't seem too challenging an idea.

One alternative*** to control by the government would be to hold a referendum and allow the general population decide if we should send our troops to war. Now, this could only be implemented if the there was not a national emergency (with executive powers in such times of strife).


***purely hypothetical, this is not necessarily an idea I support

I'd also like to add that the Queen doesn't actually have any power.**

**in the sense that her actually proclaiming anything would result in a constitutional meltdown

Until you come up with such a system, we'll keep labelling you as a moron for thinking soldiers are murderers.

People who sign up to an organisation to learn to kill people (and then do so) are murders, or at least killers if that makes you feel better.

If anything its us the people who are the murderers for electing a shit government.[/quote]

I'm sorry, I don't recall 'blowing the shit out of Afghanistan and Iraq' being in the 2001 Labour Manifesto.

Its your blinkered views on the BNP like this which really makes your contributions to this thread pointless.

It's policies are racist. It's leader is a self-confessed racist****. If there are any benefits to it's policies (which I largely doubt) then that is entirely coincidental.

I don't think it's 'blinkered' to have concerns about openly racist & fascist political parties. The concept that 'it can't happen in our time' is so unbelievebly nieve.

****he once derided the BBC for 'giving racism a bad name'