[zozbot234]

Democracy is meaningless without liberal values. So no, there is no "fundamental right" to a tyranny of the majority that oppresses minority groups and opinions. This was very well understood in the West; it's why many Western countries have Bills of Rights that cannot be overruled by the ordinary democratic process, including the United States.

[quetzthecoatl]

are you even aware of your own history? Genocide, slavery, segregation, oppression of religious and sexual minorities etc ? You did wars to spread christianity. Even now gays don't have equal rights. Whatever little rights they earned was just recently. Bill of rights was in the 1700s. Genocide, slavery and all that rest happened while your bill of rights was in full force.

How do people write these shit with a straight face knowing western history? especially United State's history.

As for the topic in hand, the Bahraini govt is accused of doing to select people what US govt does to everyone, and you are getting self righteous? Lmao this is hilarious.

[stickfigure]

This is a twisted form of whatabboutism. Every lineage of humans has a sordid history. None of those people are alive now; what matters is what the people who are alive today do.

The crusades a thousand years ago do not justify jihad today. "The West" has come a long way. It's not hypocritical to want the rest of the world to catch up.

[shkkmo]

How is it "whataboutism"? This isn't saying "america is bad because history" it is saying that the history of america shoes that democracy can function even with pretty limited application of liberal values.

[shadilay]

It seems the crusades are always referenced but rarely in their historical context.

[quetzthecoatl]

>This is a twisted form of whatabboutism.

As if that's a valid criticism. What about your whataboutism? hehe.

You wrote about western countries and especially US having protections that make your democracy enlightened - especially citing bill of rights that protects the rights of everyone. To which I pointed out that you had genocide of natives, slavery of Africans, oppression of women, sexual minorities etc when bill of rights was in full force. Point being that not only are you wrong about west being equal, but also about having these protection would actually mean anything.

>The crusades a thousand years ago do not justify jihad today.

No where did i say it does. You are literally making stuff up. How does you lot doing genocide and slavery in US justify Taliban blowing up whatever they find unislamic in their narrow definition of pure islam? None of the examples I used went far back to 1000 years, why even bring it up?

As for ignoring this happened in the past - Axe doesn't remember, the tree does. You can conveniently forget horrific events in the past when you benefited from it or you did it (whatever that "you" identity is). You might say the genocide of natives was in the past, so shouldn't matter, but the native americans would definitely beg to differ.

btw where do you draw the line? 500 years? 100 years? 10 years? yesterday? Of the genocide, slavery, segregation, wars to spread christianity and/or stop communism - what according to you is beyond the statute of limitations on moral responsibility?

>"The West" has come a long way. It's not hypocritical to want the rest of the world to catch up.

It really hasn't. The latest nightmare that is unfolding in Afghanistan, is created by west. The rest of the world can't catch up when you keep destabilizing it.

[benque]

What exactly do you want to do with past events? At least in the west (I am a South Asian) they document it and possibly learn from it / incorporate it in studies (Germany). Would you rather have the Chinese method of whitewashing or completely censoring past (bad) events? There is pretty much no empire in history which hasn't tried to expand, coerce, or otherwise influence weak states, so going back hundreds of years is pure uselessness. Take China for example - Do you think the current generation of Chinese bother about failures of CCP during the cultural revolution or would they be happy about what the CCP has achieved in the last 30 years?

Also, learn about what happened in Afghanistan from 1975 - You'll find that it has evolved into a proxy war between many parties, but was started by an Afghan president seeking help from Soviets.

[quetzthecoatl]

>What exactly do you want to do with past events?

Reconciliation, reparations and justice.

>Lot of talk about China

Why is it US or China? It's just two countries. There are so many other way to do things. Why do you conclude that other than US' way, the only other way is China's way?

>Also, learn about what happened in Afghanistan from 1975 - You'll find that it has evolved into a proxy war between many parties, but was started by an Afghan president seeking help from Soviets.

Good one. How does Afghan president Soviet help justify America and Pakistan creating Taliban to destabilize Afghanistan? How is it America's business? Every sovereign nation has the right to seek help from whosoever they like. It's none of America's concern. But no, that won't be. Taliban has to be created to bring down a government that dared to seek Russia's help. I am not saying then afghanistan govt was all good. I am saying that doesn't justify US/UK destabilizing Afghanistan and creating Taliban with the help of Pakistan.

I have no idea what your identity has to do with your points. So, i am just gonna ignore all that except the "South Asian" bit. It's hard for me to take anyone seriously that uses that term. South America and North America actually mean something. They are real geographical entities in the south and north. It's just plain stupidity to call India, Pakistan and Bangladesh as "South Asia". All of Arab states, Iran, Pak, India, Bangladesh, Myanmar all the way to Vietnam is South Asia.

[benque]

Where did I say that any of the events in Afghanistan is justified? My point is, the reality in Afghan has many sides, and none of them look good. Blaming one party is stupid. Also America didn't "create" Taliban - again you make inaccurate points. One faction fighting the civil war eventually became the Taliban and then were supported by ISI. The US had no role after Soviet withdrawal (until 2001).

"Reconciliation, reparations and justice" - yeah ideally. But how many years will you go back? And who exactly will accept their mistakes and fix? I mentioned China, US because these are the powerful entities now, along with Russia. If these countries can't accept responsibility for the issues they created, then no other country will because its politically infeasible.

Identity doesn't relate to my points as such. But you are simply blaming the "west" for all troubles and ignoring the acts of others in these conflicts. I mentioned "South Asian" as an addendum to point out that I am not merely defending my region.

First understand the complexities involved, rather than making absurd statements such as "America created Taliban". Then argue your points.

[whycombinatore]

The events in Afghanistan started from Sour revolution, which went sour. That's when USSR was invited to the scene by the Afghan president. So is it east or west that started trouble? In general, its empires that attempt to take of advantage of weak states - be it USSR, US, China. If you go back arbitrarily in time, then, yeah, everyone were barbarians.

[quetzthecoatl]

Yeah, USSR's help was sought out by Afghanistan. How does it concern US? As a sovereign republic, it's Afghanistan's right to self govern seeking help from whoever she pleases. It's none of US' business.

As for history and barbarians. In the last 300 years, US have eclipsed whatever injustices others have done in thousands of years. If we include the whole of western hemisphere, it's not even comparable. There is no other civilization that matches the horrific evils that the "enlightened western civilization" did even remotely. You lot wiped off entire natives from multiple continents. Did mass murder in other continents. Followed it up with slavery. I could go on, but even chengiz khan looks like an emo kid if you look at the evil and barbarity of western history.

[ecnerwala]

And yet you stand in a 1 KM queue to get a visa to the "west". :P

[masterof0]

When you point out hypocrisy in HN, you will get downvoted and comments on how you are using "whataboutism". Most of the traffic to this website comes from the US, so you probably understand the clear bias. You will also see how people love to bring(rightfully so) Hong Kong crackdowns on protesters but willingly ignore what is going on in other countries (and have been going for longer) like Venezuela, Cuba, etc... Is just how it is.

[whycombinatore]

More than half of the countries in existence are poor places to live. Generally if conditions deteriorate in a country it attracts attention - so in Hong Kong people clearly lost rights which they had because of CCP policies. Its not that people willingly ignore Cuba - its more to do with reaction to change which is perceived as negative.

[verall]

Hong Kong is an extremely international and technically advanced city that freely accepts American passports for visits. Many on HN bring up the HK crackdowns because they have personal experiences with the city.

Its unlikely that on a majority-American forum you will find many people with personal experiences in countries that the USA has put under embargo.

[masterof0]

So, countries under embargo are doomed to apathy and disregard from the American public? Their people suffering can be safely ignored , just because their country is not "international"(whatever this means) or "technically advanced" enough? Your comment shows the sentiment I was describing. Is never about being fair, or about freedom, etc.. Is just about what can I say to make people like my comment. But anyways, I get your point, is just sad.

[quetzthecoatl]

It's "people like us". Always been. What's changed is how the "people like us" is defined. It used to be race, then skin color, then religious belief, and now it's class. It's still us vs them, only "us" is not defined on racial or religious lines.

[whycombinatore]

Strongly disagree. I am not an American, but I am aware about Hong Kong, but know nothing about, say, Burkina Faso. The reason is pretty simple - HK is going downhill (from my perspective) while there isn't much of a change in Burkina Faso, although I would rather be in HK than Burkina Faso. In other words we react to what we see as "negative change" from our own perspective.

[verall]

> just because their country is not "international"(whatever this means) or "technically advanced" enough

I think you're misunderstanding me - it is much more likely, due to those qualities, that people on a majority American forum have personally lived in or met people from Hong Kong. An embargo heavily reduces the ability for Americans to visit or meet people people from that country. This obviously makes those people "feel" further away.

This reduction in cultural exchange between America and communist countries is a key goal of the embargo. Between propaganda and the embargo, the average American public has no chance of realistically meeting, visiting, or understanding these people and places.

[quetzthecoatl]

that and they really are unaware of the horrible things their government/country did and still does. In my view, every good thing/ideal has been corrupted and weaponized by the west. Be it women's rights, civil liberties, human rights in general - whatever. West uses this as a means to pressure other countries to achieve west's foreign policy goals. It's just a stick to beat others with - not an ideal to uphold. So, what you have is a few in the west setting the narrative, and the rest mindlessly dancing as per the narrative believing it. What you see in HN/Reddit etc are the people who believe the propaganda as they being the good guys despite the ones doing the horrible things all across the planet for the last few hundred years. It's hypocrisy when the ones setting the narrative peddle this nonsense. I don't think that crowd comes to HN/Reddit. They are more in nytimes/wapo/economist opeds and columns. The ones you find here are genuinely clueless and/or can't think for themselves. As punishing wrongthink becomes the norm, it's going to get worse.