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kanadahockey

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  1. How on earth can "paying taxes" be the moral justification for whether or not we defend human and civil rights? There are an awful lot of Canadians who pay no tax. And when you use "we have no obligation" - why do I have to be part of your "we"? Why does someone in the middle of nowhere rural Canada have to be part of my "we" that I have to subsidize? edit: I would add, to address the point above, that I don't believe in a mandatory draft. I believe in maintaining a professional army. People who have a job description and are paid to undertake that job description.
  2. My real point is, why should a Canadian be within my fence - and, for example, someone from Rwanda be outside my fence? I don't get where there is any moral obligation to protect a Canadian - when it is improper to protect someone from Rwanda. If your argument, which it appears to be, is that it is wrong to involve oneself in any foreign militaristic intervention other than pure and immediate self-defence then yes, I believe it is equally wrong to use the law to involve oneself domestically to stop you from buying (or even stealing) my property. If I can personally stop you, bully on me. Just like if the Rwandan civilian could have stopped the organized genocide, bully on them. If I can't, tough luck. If there are human and civil rights, they are inherent to every person and deserving of protection. If someone's human and civil rights are not deserving of protection, then I want the right not to have to pay taxes to protect other people within Canada if I so choose. If you get to choose people outside of Canada you don't want to protect, I want the right to choose people in Canada I don't want to protect. Now, I actually am not a libertarian - I don't believe in this. And therefore I believe in the possibility of interventionist humanitarian action. I believe we should have acted to stop the Rwandan genocide and I believe we should act in the future to stop genocide. Now, the devil is in the details as to when it is appropriate to act - but public policy decisions are difficult. Saying "all war is bad" is simplistic and dangerous. And leads to the death of 1,000,000 black people in Africa. Question war. Just like we have to question every police shooting and every interventionist action by the state taken internally within Canada. But sometimes police have to shoot someone to protect hostages - and sometimes it might be necessary to bomb somebody to protect inherent human rights. Hopefully someday neither the Army nor the Police will be needed.
  3. Let me ask you a question - why should I care anything about you, or someone else in Canada - and not care about someone else in the world - simply because of a difference in nationality? Why is it fair for me to have to pay taxes to support the RCMP in rural BC or rural anywhere in Canada? Why shouldn't that be at my discretion? I will only pay for those services that directly go to my living area and it is not fair for me to be asked to contribute towards parts of this country that I have nothing to do with. Its not fair to ask a RCMP officer to go somewhere in Canada for a risky job when they have nothing to do with that area of Canada. Look, I hate the glorification of war and I think many, many wars could have been avoided if both politicians and the general populace were a little bit less stupid. But under your doctrine, there is no such thing as human rights or civil rights that are deserving of state protection. If we as a society believe that within Canada, there are those individual, human rights, worth using the power of the state to combat through the use of violence (i.e. the Criminal Code and the Police) then in theory that should apply globally. Whether a specific incident warrants the use of interventionist force would be a separate argument. Economic sanctions are considered acts of war. How many people believe that sanctions against the apartheid regime in South Africa were wrong? If individual people or companies wanted to refuse to trade with South Africa they could do so "at their own discretion". However, it is not fair for the Canadian government to use the power of the law to force that.
  4. Although I understand why In Flanders Field is the poem we associate with Remembrance Day, I'm not sure it is the best poem for a day that is supposed to be not only about honouring those individuals who gave their lives, their health or prime years of their lives to fight for this country - but also remembering, as civilians, what war is about, and what we ask of those individuals who serve - and why more needs to be done to avoid war. Individuals who died, served or serve today should be honoured. Although not all war can be avoided, war should not be glorified or honoured. For people who have never served, which includes myself, here is a short reason why, in my opinion, we honour those who have - and why we should always do our best to avoid having to ask people to serve: The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner by Randall Jarrell From my mother's sleep I fell into the State, And I hunched in its belly till my wet fur froze. Six miles from earth, loosed from the dream of life, I woke to black flak and the nightmare fighters. When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose.
  5. Your reply in that thread to me was sheer brilliant comedy....cheers.

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