en-us https://www.intensedebate.com/users/2397961 Comments by SpeedMan100 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/19/what-americans-fear/#IDComment145268124 I want us to look at the question at different view. US have military bases around those countries. Why don’t we put our foot into their shoes? We may afraid of another 911 but think about this: if Iraq has a military base in Mexico and have hundreds of missiles aiming to major cities of US. Would you fear every day? So we can imagine what they’re feelings about us. And this video, it’s made by Americans and showed to us, but it just a video collection full of US ideology. Have you ever thought about why those attack only aiming to US and US allies? I know it has a long history, but the basic thing is the ideologies are so different. And all the governments and Medias are fomenting heating and misunderstanding. The only difference is that US is rich and have well equipped army and they are poor and can only use suicide bombers to kill innocent citizens. Sat, 23 Apr 2011 01:57:22 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/19/what-americans-fear/#IDComment145268124 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/19/what-americans-fear/#IDComment145268105 Few years ago I’ve read a report about the conflicts and suicide bombers of all these years. And most of them are related to Muslims. The basic reason is that in Muslim dogmatic they think if you are not Muslim you must be a heathen and heathen are bad. I used to have a roommate who is Muslim, and at first when some Christians talk to him, he was so frightened. He thought they might kill him. So he didn’t talked to them and be so cold. But I know, he’s a good kid and also a very pious Sunni Muslims. He prayed five times a day, and never wanted to do bad things. But in the situation above, like instinct, he wanted to self-defense. Muslim is not like other religious, it’s not only a religion but also a way of life. In Quran, it also teaches people how to live and how to celebrate. The Muslim is a complete social system. In another word, those people are been “brainwashed” and hard to change. They have a different moral system. So Jihad is a part of their life. It not fit in the cosmopolitan values today but might useful in ancient times. Obviously, it’s so bad that they can’t reform Quran and make it more updated. Sat, 23 Apr 2011 01:57:13 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/19/what-americans-fear/#IDComment145268105 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/11/the-cost-of-empire-soc-001-blog/#IDComment143216527 Some people may think that if we just cut 10% of the military budget and use that money to do some good things would be perfect. But the fact is, if that got cut, can you make sure we won’t get another “911”? The fact is nobody can. What we see, we heard, we read, are all from the media. On the other word, all of them are not 100% right. You have no idea what’s going on, even somebody think they “have” some ideas. Like the title of the video, US Army is an empire. All empires will eventually end. The only problem is when. I can say the system right now is not good. Most people don’t like it; parties use it like a bargaining chip. And like we heard from today’s class even troops built roads, hospitals for local people, they still hate US Army. Like an old saying, war is always a bad thing. I think maybe some robots like the Terminator can be made in the future, that make things a little easier. Those Terminators are not belonging to any country but just to keep peace. On the other word, they are real world office. Fri, 15 Apr 2011 20:54:36 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/11/the-cost-of-empire-soc-001-blog/#IDComment143216527 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/11/the-cost-of-empire-soc-001-blog/#IDComment143216483 Like the pie graph we saw in class, the military fee of US is nearly half of the whole world. And US have the most powerful troops all over the world. From my point of view, the military is necessity for a country but now the problem now is we spend too much on it and utility is decreasing. The few wars these years seem hard to define as defensive wars. For many countries, US Army is like a “world cop”. US troops are everywhere in the world. Don’t you think it’s ridiculous? Why there’s US Army in Japan, Iraq, German, Kyrgyz Republic, etc. It doesn’t make sense. Like the governor of Kyrgyz Republic said in the video, how about we send some troops to Miami? What would America people think? Obviously, people have no idea why government doing this. I think there got is a solid reason. For us, it at least makes us feel a little saver. But people are worry about the budget or humanitarian crisis in those countries. Fri, 15 Apr 2011 20:54:27 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/11/the-cost-of-empire-soc-001-blog/#IDComment143216483 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/03/women-and-war/#IDComment140919681 Obviously, the speaker tried to raise social concern about “another side of war”. But honestly it’s not good “news content”. It’s happening every day and can’t be called “news”. And in information age, they can hardly arousing people’s interest. When talking about money for war or women, she just compares the amount of money. I’m not a bellicose elements and my major is economics, so in my opinion, to start a war is more profitable for government than just give them to people. For instance, Iraq war cost more than 300 billion at the same time oil price increased rapidly and the government and enterprises earned more than 300 billion from stock, bonds, manufacturing, etc. While, nobody would send troops to Africa, there are only jungles. Human rights crisis are just excuses. People may care about it but the government won’t. Fri, 8 Apr 2011 05:22:21 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/03/women-and-war/#IDComment140919681 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/03/women-and-war/#IDComment140919667 War is always related to death. Like the speaker said, people are not fear about dying; they’re fear about losing loved one. I think the atmosphere would change if a community has too many people losing their relatives and finally lead to the source of most of the conflicts today “revenge”. As the topic here is women and war, it reminds me the shakhidki, the feminine Russian variant for the Arabic word meaning holy warriors who sacrifice their lives, known as “black widows”. Usually their husbands or children have been killed in the war and the whole community turned them into suicide boomers. They are living in lots of “revenge invisible strings”. They been trained to carry out attacks, and they’re proud of it. It makes sense but it not normal. Like the speaker said the society fiber has been tore. Most of the women in the war are just like she said; they’re trying to living and hoping one day they will have peace. Fri, 8 Apr 2011 05:22:12 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/03/women-and-war/#IDComment140919667 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/03/women-and-war/#IDComment140919644 When I was a child, I thought it’s quite peace now a days. But few years later, I found out that I was wrong. Wars are happening every day. Right now there’s a modern warfare in Libya and many armed conflicts in Middle East and Africa. There are many people living there and like the speaker, “woke up in the night and heard a big explosion”. I haven’t experience war myself and I’m not sure about the statues of people in there. Due to the speaker, they seem living in both silence of war and “singing and dancing everyday”. I think the “silence of humanity” is been used by the speaker to describe the most hard time of the war. Fri, 8 Apr 2011 05:22:03 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/04/03/women-and-war/#IDComment140919644 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/30/so-what-your-take-on-those-inequality-classes/#IDComment139209476 ......From my point of view, I can accept that few rich people have more incomes than others. What I want to say is those people are not only rich guys they also became famous, powerful, influential, and symbolized. For example, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett. They’re rich and they also use their knowledge and money to do charity these years. And I believe they did much better than some of the ordinary NGOs or government. Because they’re talented people which can rationally allocate resources. On this aspect it’s not bad. You can’t blame somebody only because his rich, right? And I believe most rich people are hardworking and did a great job. Fri, 1 Apr 2011 22:15:09 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/30/so-what-your-take-on-those-inequality-classes/#IDComment139209476 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/30/so-what-your-take-on-those-inequality-classes/#IDComment139209413 .....But overall, it’s bad for the society, and I believe it’s one of the major differences of developing country and developed country. The problem is more common in developing countries. I think the best way to deal with it is to improve the legal system and law enforcement system. Obviously, US have one of the best legal systems in the world. But they still have to improve it to prevent “cheating” in the politic or finance system. With certain laws, government can easily eliminate irregularities. One the other hand, the law enforcement need to be more effective. Like some rumors, law enforcement might be bribed sometimes and make those “cheaters” at large...... Fri, 1 Apr 2011 22:14:47 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/30/so-what-your-take-on-those-inequality-classes/#IDComment139209413 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/30/so-what-your-take-on-those-inequality-classes/#IDComment139209380 I know that wealth is unequally distributed in the World. But the world is like this, isn’t it? It reminds me the famous quotation "All men are created equal". But actually it’s not. People have different background, different IQ, different EQ, etc. So everybody is in an unequal world. Although US may be the most equal country in the world, but there’s still inequality classes in here. Like Sam said in the article he’s struggle with people who cheat and “game” the system and give themselves and their friends and companies unfair advantages. I think it’s common in every country. In any country you can find a group of people who are taking advantage from policies and they are trying their best to protect the situation. Although it’s unfair, from aspect of economic it makes sense. Those guys who cheated in the society took adventures while others don’t. What’s more, they may have cost more money on bribe. It makes sense from the quotation “high input high output”...... Fri, 1 Apr 2011 22:14:33 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/30/so-what-your-take-on-those-inequality-classes/#IDComment139209380 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/23/managing-crowds/#IDComment137594100 .....I believe that in some hard time like what we read from the news, what people need is a reliable government which can gave them safety and fair resource allocation. That’s the basis we can make everything works. However, the existing transportation system is not prepared for evacuation so the evacuation drill is pretty important. On the other hand, whole US need to have an emergency response plan for all kinds of disasters. I think it won’t be harder than start a war in another half of the earth. Comparatively disaster warning system is less important, like in Japan people may get warning about earthquake 3 times a day. So maybe in future scientist may discover an accurate way to forecast disasters, but before that, we can’t count on those “warnings”. What people need to do is to trust the government and learn more survival ability. Fri, 25 Mar 2011 23:36:05 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/23/managing-crowds/#IDComment137594100 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/23/managing-crowds/#IDComment137594039 As everybody focus on earthquake and tsunami in Japan some ridiculous are happening in China. On March 17, salt in most stores in China are sold out. No one can find even a bag of salt in market. It’s all start from a rumor that the nuclear matters from F island nuclear station are leaking out to the Pacific Ocean and the salt will not save anymore. Plus, salt in China have iodine in it so it can protect people from I-131 radiation. I think the worst part is that even the government and media continuously telling people iodine in salt is not enough to absorb radiation and on the other hand 80% of salt are from salt mine which have not related to the ocean, people still rush for the salt in market. Which means that the media and government have lost they’re credibility. As an environment like this and the most population in the world, any disaster is difficult to handle. On the other hand, there can’t be any evacuation in Southeastern China. Because even a medium sized city have at least 2 million people. Any nuclear leakage is destructive to the whole country. So eventually the only way to solve this problem is education and increases the credibility of government, just like Japan did these years........ Fri, 25 Mar 2011 23:35:49 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/23/managing-crowds/#IDComment137594039 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/14/kids-getting-life-how-is-this-serving-us-really/#IDComment135910020 ...... Our ultimate goal is to never let a bad man escape. But we have to face the fact that we may put some good guy in prison. In order to crack down on the illegal crime powerfully, maintains the social order to be stable. We have to pay for it. Not only the money from tax payers, but also some of the freedom of the “good guys”. On the other hand, maybe adults do not deserve a second chance, but young kids should be helped. They are the future of our world and I believe that every teen has made mistakes. They should be treated more humanistically. Fri, 18 Mar 2011 21:06:53 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/14/kids-getting-life-how-is-this-serving-us-really/#IDComment135910020 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/14/kids-getting-life-how-is-this-serving-us-really/#IDComment135909992 From my point of view, I tend to think it’s kind of unfair to put those kids into prison, especially prison without a chance for parole. It is not a suitable environment for youth or adolescence. Kids are just like a piece of white paper, what they did are mostly come from what they’ve learned from the environment. In psychology, it’s called modeling. Some kids just made a mistake that everyone could. Kids may learn bad things and achieve psychological illness by spend their childhood in prison. Because of many reasons, it is hard to find a reasonable solution in this country to making a life sentence decision. At what age do we feel that is too young to be sentenced to death? That is hard to rationally deal with. But then we look at other countries and we simply shake our heads. We must consider that other countries also may simply cut off the heads of those that break the law. I think the judicial system in this country is a relative good system...... Fri, 18 Mar 2011 21:06:45 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/14/kids-getting-life-how-is-this-serving-us-really/#IDComment135909992 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/01/lighting-our-way/#IDComment134013940 .........Fortunately I’m not in Finland. Due to the video since about 40% of this town’s population has experienced some form of depression due to the lack of sunlight, city officials have done their part to add many enhancements to the public streets in hope of cheering up the citizens. It is very interesting to see how a town can reconstruct itself, in a way, around the patterns of the sun. The people of this town seem to really appreciate the lights lining their streets and plants. In relationship to the “invisible strings,” I’d say that the strong depression that these people must have felt before the lights were in place drove them to restructuring the town. Almost every person who was interviewed talked about some form of depression due to the lack of sunlight. I really can’t believe how many people are affected. Fri, 11 Mar 2011 02:04:55 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/01/lighting-our-way/#IDComment134013940 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/01/lighting-our-way/#IDComment134013757 I think sun light have something to do with people’s mood. For example, in the morning after I see something shining I can suddenly become clear-headed. And think about the people living in the past without light or candles. They can just simply wake up after sun rise and go to sleep after sun set. So I thing the sun is almost an imperative part of living. According to the video, people suffer from a certain disorder, depression, weight gain, and fatigue due to the prolonged darkness. The lack of sunlight is not only taking a toll on people's physical health, but their mental health also. I knew that people tend to stay in the light then dark. Because It’s kind of human intuition. Usually, dark means dangerous.......... Fri, 11 Mar 2011 02:04:29 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/03/01/lighting-our-way/#IDComment134013757 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/02/21/stranger-kidnapping/#IDComment130688483 ....In my opinion, parents would like to prevent something bad happen but not to teach the child to do the good thing. Do you familiar with the sentence start as “Don’t”. “Don’t play over there!” “Don’t play with fire!” “Don’t talk to strangers!” All of these from sociological aspect are BAD ADVICE. Yes, I think it’s can’t make things right. When a child got lost, don’t talks to strangers can’t make sure he is safe. And of course, can’t let him find the way home. So like Sam said, the best way is to talk to the first stranger and ask for help. A save society like US, 99.9999..% strangers are nice. People would like to help others. Of course, he might meet a bad person. But the chance is low. Lower than a car accident, lower than to win a lottery. But, the safest way is don’t get lost. So I agree the woman in the video, told her child “hold Mommy’s hand”. For me, I will told my child, “Hold Daddy’s hand, but if you got lost, talk to the first stranger you met!” Fri, 25 Feb 2011 21:30:43 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/02/21/stranger-kidnapping/#IDComment130688483 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/02/21/stranger-kidnapping/#IDComment130688436 What I want to say is that people are usually tended to amplify the horror. They often focus on the bad things and keep thinking about “what if”. “What if it happens to my child?” “What if something bad happen to me?” Because of this, people may think the world is not safe. And safe is the basic need of a human. But people usually don’t do the statistics. Like the case in the video, it happened randomly. And, yes, it may happen again. But the probability is pretty low. Think about the strangers walking on the road, any of them would molest your child? The answer is close to zero. On the other hand, the most of child molestation cases happened in their own home or relative’s home. However, 10am at the main street might be a pretty safe place for a child. He or she has dozens of “uncles” and “aunts” can turn to. And of course police officers. So maybe like an episode in Southpark, some parents want to send their kid away from home. ....... Fri, 25 Feb 2011 21:30:27 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/02/21/stranger-kidnapping/#IDComment130688436 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/18/suicide-in-japan/#IDComment127422874 ...Like I wrote above, it’s a little bit harder to help them. But still, I can use basic sociology rules to bring them back. I can tell them that they are not alone and that this is not the only solution. There are forces at work that are out of their control that I’d like to help them. How they feel right now is not permanent. I will let them to know that I care about them as a person and want to help in every way. I will let them to understand that their reasons for feeling so depressed are caused by outside forces, many of which are outside their control. Just because they live in a society like this. Instead, you should be taking it the opportunity to assess what will make you happier in life, whether that peoples a certain job you never considered, being closer with family and friends or whatever else makes YOU happy. In short, think about all the things you have to live for before you let society tell you whether life is worth living or not, because someone can easily find a reason to live at least one more day. And you have much more to live for, but you just haven’t realized it yet. Fri, 11 Feb 2011 22:45:06 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/18/suicide-in-japan/#IDComment127422874 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/18/suicide-in-japan/#IDComment127422836 As far as I know, why Japan have a high suicide rate is because that Japanese culture is really different from other countries. Japanese are collectivist, so once they had been kicking out of the group, they may feel very frustrated. So during the financial crisis, it’s not because that they lost their job but they lost sense of belonging. On the other hand, they are not like Western people. They are lack of optimism. It’s made them easily feel hopeless. And not like Chinese people, they don’t have the social cycle system in China. What’s more, Chinese think a lot about the whole family, tight family bond usually give people hope to live. While in ancient Japan, suicide is a glorious way to die. Like the Yokosuka MXY-7 Ohka suicide flying bomb in World War Two. .... Fri, 11 Feb 2011 22:44:52 +0000 http://www.worldinconversation.org/2011/01/18/suicide-in-japan/#IDComment127422836