Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

I was wondering more If NI is referred to - or if they refer to themselves that way.>> ^papple:
>> ^heathen:
However, it is British.Would you refer to Chilean nationals as "American", simply because they reside in South America? You're very, very wrong.
But by all means, don't take my word for it. If you're ever in Ireland, please visit Cork and refer to the locals as "British". Please.
Also, this is not a 24hr news station, merely an excerpt from a 30 minute bi-nightly news programme.
>> ^dag:
How about Northern Ireland then- would we say that's British?

Yes, Dag, NI is within Great Britain. The Republic, however, gained independence in 1921 and severed all Commonwealth ties in 1949. The Republic of Ireland is in no way British.
/history lesson

>> ^heathen:
However, it is British.Would you refer to Chilean nationals as "American", simply because they reside in South America? You're very, very wrong.

But by all means, don't take my word for it. If you're ever in Ireland, please visit Cork and refer to the locals as "British". Please.

Also, this is not a 24hr news station, merely an excerpt from a 30 minute bi-nightly news programme.
>> ^dag:
How about Northern Ireland then- would we say that's British?

Yes, Dag, NI is within Great Britain. The Republic, however, gained independence in 1921 and severed all Commonwealth ties in 1949. The Republic of Ireland is in no way British.

/history lesson

There is an optical illusion that occurs when a person looks out to sea from the British coast whereby everything appears to be British. On a clear day the effect can carry beyond India

>> ^heathen:
Dublin is in Ireland which is one of the British Isles.
It is not Great Britain, which consists of only England, Scotland and Wales. Nor is it part of the United Kingdom, which is Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
However, it is British.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

How about Northern Ireland then- would we say that's British?

"The British Isles are a group of islands off the northwest coast of continental Europe that include Great Britain, Ireland and over six-thousand smaller islands.[7] There are two sovereign states located on the islands: the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and Ireland

The term British Isles is controversial in relation to Ireland,[7][11][12] where there are objections to its usage due to the association of the word "British" with Ireland. The Government of Ireland discourages its use,[13][14] and in relations with the United Kingdom the words "these islands" are used.[15][16] Although still used as a geographic term, the controversy means that alternative terms such as "Britain and Ireland" are increasingly preferred"

it is from wikipedia though, so it might be completely made up...

>> ^Fade:
Um...what part of Britain is Dublin in exactly?
Might be an idea to change the British Tag before you get slapped by an Irish man.


Dublin is in Ireland which is one of the British Isles.
It is not Great Britain, which consists of only England, Scotland and Wales. Nor is it part of the United Kingdom, which is Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
However, it is *British.

As sepatown pointed out, Switzerland is nowhere near the safest place to live, with 63 other countries having lower murder rates including England, Ireland, Canada, France, Spain, Italy and Australia. It seems the only wealthy western nations with higher murder rates are the US and Northern Ireland.


Obviously there are a huge number of factors that will contribute to a country's murder rate, the availability of military training and guns being just a couple. Median income, population density, effectiveness of law enforcement, and education come to mind as equally important. If you want to test the effect of just military training and gun ownership, compare groups that have only that differences within the same society.

>> ^EndAll:
Ireland ≠ England


You're correct that Ireland is neither in, nor part of, England. However it's still part of the British Isles.

It can get a little confusing, but breaking it down as follows helps:

Great Britain consists of England, Scotland and Wales. (But neither Northern nor Southern Ireland.)

The United Kingdom includes England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. (Southern Ireland being an independent country called the Republic of Ireland, also known as Eire.)

The British Isles, however, are made up of the islands of Great Britain, Ireland and the several surrounding smaller islands.

So although Ireland is not part of Great Britain it is still part of the British Isles and therefore "British".

I'm not privileged and can't re-add this back into the * British channel, (Not to be confused with the English Channel with the tunnel going under it), so hopefully someone else will.

This guy is Nabil Shaban - Writer, Director, Actor and Film maker

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nabil_Shaban
http://uk.geocities.com/jinghiz53/

Nabil Shaban was born in 1953 in Amman, Jordan and arrived in England when he was three for treatment for his osteogenesis imperfecta (brittle-bone disease). In 1980, he and Richard Tomlinson founded Graeae (pronounced Grey Eye), a professional theatre company of disabled performers.

A writer and performer with many film and television credits, he is probably best known to television viewers for his role as ruthless intergalactic businessman Sil in the Doctor Who stories 'Vengeance on Varos' and 'Trial of a Timelord' (BBC, 1985 and 1986).

Nabil Shaban is a political actor and has worked in Theatre Workshop plays about Palestine, and about the State murder of Northern Ireland lawyer, Rosemary Nelson. He also acted and collaborated in Ghazi Hussein’s 'One Hour Before Sun Rise' in 2006, about the journey of a young poet named Moneer and his torture in a Syrian prison.

Shaban, who has a degree in Psychology and Philosophy, was awarded an honorary doctorate in 1997 from the University of Surrey for the achievements of his career and his work to change public perceptions of disabled people.
http://www.scottisharts.org.uk/1/artsinscotland/drama/features/archive/profilenabilshaban.aspx

1972 was regarded as one of the bloodiest years during 'The Troubles', with the formation of the Provisional IRA that sought to use extreme forms of violence to protest the occupation of Northern Ireland. Both 'Bloody Sunday' and 'Bloody Friday' happened in this year.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Troubles

They basically are taking a Pew survey on "how religious are you" and mapping that to some IQ crap.
http://hypnosis.home.netcom.com/iq_vs_religiosity.htm


The source for the "IQ chart" is a study written by two semi-retarded professors..
Dr. Richard Lynn, Professor Emeritus of Psychology at the University of Ulster, Northern Ireland,
and Dr. Tatu Vanhanen, Professor Emeritus of Political Science at the University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland.

It is either from the 2002 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IQ_and_the_Wealth_of_Nations
or the non-science followup http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IQ_and_Global_Inequality

Interesting to sample

>> ^Yehoshua:
Ok, so you added some good details to this unilateral plan for peace; the UN comes in and enforces it, the US and EU broker the agreements. At what point would Israel be justified in ending a peace in response to an attack?

This is a wrong way of looking at the situation as you are searching for some kind of allowance to when Israel can use it's military power in response to an attack when we are discussing a peace deal. Such terms can never be defined and have never formed any part of a peace deal. Cessation of terrorist activity yes but not a stipulation of when retaliation can occur. Its unrealistic.

I find it best to look at parallels in other conflicts and how the peace treaty was worked out, in Northern Ireland you had a concrete disengagement from both sides, an agreement to end hostilities, a firm declaration of no favored status from the UK which ultimately lead to peace. This is now the kind of situation we require in the Middle East peace process.

Previous peace engagements have failed due to forced concessionary actions by Israel towards Palestine. In the 2003 Road map for peace article 1 stipulated an end to settler expansions in the West Bank, this was refused by Sharon who claimed that settlements cannot stop in the West bank. Then we had numerous 'reservations' put in place by Israel towards the peace plan - http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=297230

One of which was a complete dismantlement of terrorist organizations before the implementation of the rest of the articles of the Road map to peace, something I always found an unrealistic expectation as its impossible to control the numerous groups that hold extremist views against Israel ranging from pure jihad against Jews to complete annihilation of the State of Israel. The Palestinian people do not have the refined policing force that could prevent and guarantee such action.

Furthermore it stipulated the complete need to disarm the Palestinian people, which is a completely unrealistic thing to ask towards a people that have been fighting a war against occupation. You cannot expect them to suddenly trust your 'word' that you will remain committed to the articles that relate Israeli concessions to Palestinian. All of which were laced with phrases like "Subject to security conditions, Israel will work to restore Palestinian life to normal: promote the economic situation, cultivation of commercial connections, encouragement and assistance for the activities of recognized humanitarian agencies."

This is not a peace process, this is forced concessions on the Palestinians. Bush left the region, the IDF entered Gaza and killed a Palestinian and the cycle of violence escalated again.

Suicide bombing or a rocket barrage, which has been accepted as a valid tactic by the vast majority of the Palestinian people.

Unfortunately the Palestinian people do not have the military assistance and help of the US to allow them to purchase F-16s, Apache attack helicopters, M-16s and other weapons. Israel launched countless rocket attacks over the areas designed to essentially assassinate leaders. What kind of impression does this create in the Palestinian people?

The Palestinians have, in my experience, more often had leadership interested in pursuing military action.

The Palestinians support these attacks because they exist under Israeli occupation, I find it fascinating that you do not look into the sheer conditions that Israel imposes on the Palestinian people which to me explain their armed resistance, from the separation wall, to check points, to arbitrary incursions, to open air prison, to blockades, to home bulldozing, to large scale bombings and destruction that we have witness over the last few weeks.

As I said again terrorist action is a symptom not a disease in Palestine, the Israelis gave no other option to many Palestinians who resist the occupational actions. To us this may seem like lunacy but then again we haven't lived most our lives under occupation.

I don't condone alot of their actions, I believe alot of it is counter productive, but am not living in those conditions and I cannot simply brush aside these attacks and claim that they are simply being stubborn, that they are all extremist or all are seeking martyrdom. Because we have seen such sacrifices and terrorist actions in previous conflicts.

^xxovercastxx
I'd have to pretty much agree with everything you're saying. There's no right on either side, there's no entitlement as such, and perhaps it is only through complete conquest and domination of either side that the fighting will stop.
Somehow, though I doubt it.
Although maybe the Northern Ireland situation could be a reasonable model for peace.
I'm not religious myself, but it seems that they mostly resolved their differences through talking about what shared beliefs they do have in common.
I'm not saying that situation has completely healed, but with comparative economic prosperity and sharing of power and shared beliefs a lot of the wounds have healed.
Maybe some day in the distant future talks between leaders of two Abrahamic religions talking about what they do have in common could bring more peace to the area.
So sad that these groups of people kill each other because of some beliefs about the greater good.

Ah yes the time of the year when we can stroll into shops and buy explosives to celebrate the apprehension of a failed terrorist. There will be the usual stories of kids losing eyes or the odd hand.

Fawkes' gang tried to kill James I for the Catholic cause. I might be wrong but I don't get the impression of Protestant/Catholic friction these days unless you wander into Northern Ireland or Scotland.

I have in previous years gone to a firework display but I feel I'm not the only one whose enthusiasm is waning. Normally you hear fireworks being launched from around October but it's been quieter this year. Near my office the only fireworks being left off are celebrating Divali. And in years past you would see children shouting "penny for the guy" - http://www.icons.org.uk/theicons/collection/bonfire-night/features/a-penny-for-the-guy-in-progress.

No more. Halloween has definitely edged out Bonfire night. Bloody yanks, would you adam and eve it.

To buttress my point, here's a list of holy wars divided between monotheists and non-monotheists.


Caused by monotheists:

• Crusades in the Holy Land.



• Crusades in France (aka Albigensian Crusades)



• Northern Crusades against Baltic pagans.
  
  
• 16th century French Wars of Religion.



• Taiping Rebellion.



• 2nd Century battles for the Holy Land.



• Muslim Conquests of Arabia.



• Muslim Conquests of Asia Minor



• Muslim Conquests of Northern Africa.



• Muslim Conquest of Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal)



• The Reconquista of the Iberian Peninsula.



• The 30 Years War.



• Saxon Wars of the 9th century.



• Conflicts of Bosnia and Kosovo. (The media didn't really report it, but the wars were as much about Christianity versus Islam as anything else.)



• Protestant-Catholic conflict in Northern Ireland

Caused by non-monotheists:

• The Second Sino-Japanese War.
  

The video mentions the Kalinga War started by Ashoka, ruler of the Mauryan empire, as a war caused by religion, but there's absolutely no evidence that this is the case. Everything points to it having been instigated purely for the sake of imperial expansion.

In fact, Ashoka suffered crushing guilt when he saw the horrors his war had brought about. He then converted to Buddhism and renounced war, committing himself to the promulgation of Buddhism and the prosperity and well-being of his people.


So, I've got a list of 14 wars waged in the name of monotheistic religions, and just one war waged in the name of a non-monotheistic religion. (And if you look at the history, it was only labeled a religious war well after it had begun to curry popular support; it wasn't started religion, though it probably would have ended sooner without it.)

Consider that for most of the world's history, most people weren't monotheists. Monotheism didn't really grab a significant chunk of the world's population until the 8th century or so. Even today, almost half of the world's population believes either in no God or in more than one god. Were non-monotheistic religions, to generalize, disposed to holy wars and religious conflicts, the numbers would bear that out. But they don't.

Heck, let's look at religious conflicts going on right now. There are 24 listed conflicts, and only 2 of them were instigated by non-monotheists.

The facts are pretty clear. Non-monotheistic religions, on the whole, don't really cause holy wars. Almost every monotheistic religion, on the other hand, does cause holy wars. The only exception that comes to mind is Mormonism, which hasn't had a chance yet.

Atheists, please restrict your ire appropriately.