Arrogance & Ignorance
together in perfect harmony
Obama - September 19th, 2001 - Hyde Park Herald
...We must also engage, however, in the more difficult task of understanding the sources of such madness. The essence of this tragedy, it seems to me, derives from a fundamental absence of empathy on the part of the attackers: an inability to imagine, or connect with, the humanity and suffering of others. Such a failure of empathy, such numbness to the pain of a child or the desperation of a parent, is not innate; nor, history tells us, is it unique to a particular culture, religion, or ethnicity. It may find expression in a particular brand of violence, and may be channeled by particular demagogues or fanatics. Most often, though, it grows out of a climate of poverty and ignorance, helplessness and despair.
...we will have to devote far more attention to the monumental task of raising the hopes and prospects of embittered children across the globe—children not just in the Middle East, but also in Africa, Asia, Latin America, Eastern Europe and within our own shores.
O rlly? So why aren’t we being attacked daily by the empathy challenged of Appalachia and Arkansas? Of Alaska and California?
And what has raised “the hopes and prospects of embittered children” across the globe for centuries? The replacement of human labor through cheap energy.
No matter how ya look at it, poking holes in the ground with a sharpened stick, raising your own food and livestock and having to spend 25 hours a day just feeding yourself is somewhat limiting to the study of literature, philosophy and technology.
But poverty is not an inherently embittering state. There has to be some other idea added to the mix; like Marxist class envy or Islamism. Both those ideologies have inherent strategies to purposely embitter the educationally challenged in order to use them as shock troops in their bid to become the dominant culture.
At least Islamism turns its dumb ‘n’ poor into maddened killers which is somewhat less distasteful than Marxism’s useless, gelded, whiny little victim class. Islamist fascists are fighting for an idea—their ideal of a Caliphate run by the rules of their religion which would enslave or kill the rest of us. You can respect a maddened killer with an ideal as you beat him back into the Stone Age.
But O’Possum seems not to connect with the concept that Islamists have an ideal, much less that it’s vastly different from his own. I think the only empathy challenged people in this discussion are coming out of Chicago.
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