Bill Cosby blasts the black community

[Gangrell]

Originally posted by The Hierophant: Man, sorry for the late reply, life has been hectic, and still is, so I'll just quickly state that by and large I agree with you to the extent that individuals make better discussion partners than ecstatic mobs But I also don't believe that universal truth exists and that attempting to 'convert' others to one's beliefs is a futile operation in that true communication (the total and utter sharing of memory, thought, emotion and experience: in essence, the total merging of minds) is impossible, thus, conversion (ie: attempting to implant your truths into someone elses mind, essentially 'cloning' your ideas) is also impossible. All that exists is your truth, by which you make sense of the world. In living in accordance to your truth, and your code, you can achieve fulfilment and satisfaction.

Hiero, sorry, but as I am so tired, isn't what you're saying contradicting everything you mentioned earlier in this thread?

Originally posted by The Hierophant: Discussion of ideas is a wonderful thing, but the agonistic competition involved in 'debate' is what often taints the exchange of thought. Discussion, rather than debate, that's what I like [img]smile.gif[/img] There are no winners or losers when it comes to defining personal truth.

Aye, too bad there's not more discussion here than flaming debates. But there are those people here that just says things intentionally to get under your skin, I won't say who, but you know who you people are [img]tongue.gif[/img]

Well, my bed calls for me, so I'm off to sleep. Night.

[img]graemlins/sleeping.gif[/img]

[Aerich]

Originally posted by MagiK: LOL Aerich..the only problem being is that some people don't distinguish the SOB's the same as others. However I do like your suggestion of battlefield.

Well, *obviously*, MagiK, we here get to pick the SOBs. Otherwise there's no point. And if *we* have any differences of opinion, it gets settled by food fight. [img]smile.gif[/img]

(Watch out for my cupcake mortars; they're lethal!!)

[ 07-06-2004, 03:20 AM: Message edited by: Aerich ]

[The Hierophant]

Originally posted by Gangrell: Hiero, sorry, but as I am so tired, isn't what you're saying contradicting everything you mentioned earlier in this thread?

No no [img]smile.gif[/img] Just because people can never fully communicate, does not mean that some people cannot successfully employ language to convince other people to follow their personal visions and ideas. The execution of such, I think, is essentially the essence of politics. But, I don't think that 'language' necessarily denotes 'communication'. Language is a device, a very human mind-control tool. But like most tools, its effectivness depends upon the skill of the person that wields it. Right? Some leaders are able to more readily harness the labour and goodwill of their servants than others?

Well, my bed calls for me, so I'm off to sleep. Night. [img]graemlins/sleeping.gif[/img]

Hey, wow, bed. Sleep! What a novel idea! You've convinced me to follow your ideas and actually get an early night tonight!

Man, i really want to continue this conversation. I like where it's going. But this isn't the thread to do it in, and since semantic philosophy isn't really a 'current event' we'll have to go to pm or make a new thread in a different forum to keep this discussion going... [img]smile.gif[/img]

[ 07-06-2004, 06:43 AM: Message edited by: The Hierophant ]

[Gangrell]

Originally posted by The Hierophant: Hey, wow, bed. Sleep! What a novel idea! You've convinced me to follow your ideas and actually get an early night tonight!

Oh ha ha [img]tongue.gif[/img]

Originally posted by the Hierophant: Man, i really want to continue this conversation. I like where it's going. But this isn't the thread to do it in, and since semantic philosophy isn't really a 'current event' we'll have to go to pm or make a new thread in a different forum to keep this discussion going... [img]smile.gif[/img]

My good Hiero, you have never heard of spam? It is a miraculous thing! Sure the moderators can shut this thread down if we do it too much, but we must march on, we cannot be opressed by them. Follow me

Yeah, it probably would be better to start a thread elsewhere, but anyway thanks for the discussion, later Hiero.

[John D Harris]

Originally posted by The Hierophant: Man, sorry for the late reply, life has been hectic, and still is, so I'll just quickly state that by and large I agree with you to the extent that individuals make better discussion partners than ecstatic mobs But I also don't believe that universal truth exists and that attempting to 'convert' others to one's beliefs is a futile operation in that true communication (the total and utter sharing of memory, thought, emotion and experience: in essence, the total merging of minds) is impossible, thus, conversion (ie: attempting to implant your truths into someone elses mind, essentially 'cloning' your ideas) is also impossible. All that exists is your truth, by which you make sense of the world. In living in accordance to your truth, and your code, you can achieve fulfilment and satisfaction. Discussion of ideas is a wonderful thing, but the agonistic competition involved in 'debate' is what often taints the exchange of thought. Discussion, rather than debate, that's what I like [img]smile.gif[/img] There are no winners or losers when it comes to defining personal truth.

If no universal truth exsists how can one be for or against anything? If we are all equal and we each have our own truth how can anybody ever disagree with the actions/thoughts of anyone else? By what authority does a person have to say that the action of another are wrong/ close minded/ antagonistic/ agruementative/ incert negative term of choice here? If living in accordance to one's truth/code is the standard that is to be applied. Then if one's truth/code was that they have the right to steal/ rape/ murder/ incert negitve activity here, then there can be no one to say their actions are wrong. ie: death pentalty, War in Iraq, terrorism, crime, No one can disagree with another taking those courses of actions. After all it is the person's version ofyour truth and your code that must be applied to their actions. It MUST be the standard in which their actions are viewed, not the viewers version of your truth and yourcode.

I would submit the following alterative: There is your truth, my truth and THE truth. THE truth does not require the acceptance, acknowledgement, or the agreement of either your truth or my truth to exsist. The real question is does your truth, my truth seek to become one with THE truth. In my life I've discovered there are some very simple ways to find if a person seeks to know THE truth.
1) Do they acknowledge THE truth exsists? (This is the foundation, for without this foundation then there is NO such thing as wrong. If there is no wrong, then there is no reason anybody can give to disagree with anything, genocide/torture/murder/rape/stealing/lying/incert what ever you disagree with here. If no THE truth exsists one cannot complain about how another argues their version of your truth and your code without being hyocritical and violating one's own version of your truth and your code.)
2) Do they back up their truth with logical reasons, and try to explain their logic or do they just throw their truth out without any supporting reason/logic and expect others to accept it as if it was a pronouncement from on High?
3) Do they apply the same standards to their truth as to another truth? Questions to ask to find out if they apply the same standards. When presented with another truth do they dismiss it out of hand, yet complain when another dismisses their truth? Are they willing to entertain their truth being questioned, or when their truth is questioned do they seek to dismiss the question as Irrelavant/ changing the subject/ scoring points/ incert term of choice here? When asked questions do they answer the question as asked, or do they give an answer to a question that wasn't asked? If anybody's truth can not standup to some questioning how much of THE truth exsists within their version? If a person will not answer questions possed to them about their version of the truth, how can they even think of NOT accepting another's truth out of hand/ whole heartiedly?

[The Hierophant]

Originally posted by John D Harris: If no universal truth exsists how can one be for or against anything? If we are all equal and we each have our own truth how can anybody ever disagree with the actions/thoughts of anyone else? By what authority does a person have to say that the action of another are wrong/ close minded/ antagonistic/ agruementative/ incert negative term of choice here? If living in accordance to one's truth/code is the standard that is to be applied. Then if one's truth/code was that they have the right to steal/ rape/ murder/ incert negitve activity here, then there can be no one to say their actions are wrong. ie: death pentalty, War in Iraq, terrorism, crime, No one can disagree with another taking those courses of actions. After all it is the person's version ofyour truth and your code that must be applied to their actions. It MUST be the standard in which their actions are viewed, not the viewers version of your truth and yourcode.

Oh yes, you're getting quite close to my truth there [img]tongue.gif[/img] Which is, that there is no right or wrong, save what you decide to be right or wrong. Reason for disagreement arises from the actions of others not conforming to your belief of how people should behave. Just because no one can ever be 'universally' right does not mean that they cannot or will not try to impose their desires upon other people. There is nothing inherantly, universally 'wrong' with killing another member of your species (I've heard you advocate such actions time and time again JDH [img]smile.gif[/img] ) or with forcing sexual procreation; such actions only become 'murder' and 'rape' when an individual judgment call is made in accordance with one's own belief structure, and within the belief structures of others within your social group. Which is absolutely fine, there's nothing good or bad about that in my mind, it seems to work, by and large.

However, agreement between individuals does not constitute universal truth. If you and I were to witness a man being killed by another man, we could both agree that the action was murder, however, this doesn't mean that the action universally was murder. Another witness, operating under a different belief system and personal truth could just as easily see the 'murder' as an 'execution', and their conclusion would be just as valid as ours. And who cares? Their disagreement doesn't have to be perceived as a threat to our judgement. We know we are right in accordance to our truth, they are more than welcome to be right in accordance to theirs. If we decide to escalate our differences to the level of physical conflict, then so be it, but none of us involved in such contest would ever be universally right to do so, we'd simply be excercising the dominance of our personal belief systems through violent subjugation of others. Which again, is only good or bad if you choose to think it is.

I would submit the following alterative: There is your truth, my truth and THE truth. THE truth does not require the acceptance, acknowledgement, or the agreement of either your truth or my truth to exsist. The real question is does your truth, my truth seek to become one with THE truth. In my life I've discovered there are some very simple ways to find if a person seeks to know THE truth.

You raise some really interesting points here and I really want to talk about them, but I have to get to a meeting. It is my personal belief that being punctual for meeting the head of the university classics department is a wise move [img]smile.gif[/img] So, after that's done, we can keep this going.

[ 07-06-2004, 05:23 PM: Message edited by: The Hierophant ]

[John D Harris]

The Hiero,
I see where you are coming from and understand the logic used. I have some major problems with it though.
1)If there is no ultimate truth then "might does indeed make right". Because it is the domination of one's ideas/actions/thoughts over another, and therefor would be OK. If "No ultimate truth" exsists.
2)If there is No ultimate/absolute/total truth. Then that statement testifies against itself. "No ultimate truth" is an ultimate truth regarding the exsistance of ultimate truth, but since there is "No ultimate truth" then the statment there is "No Ultimate truth" is false by it's own standards. That would make it an oxymoron and not a paradox.
3)Since there is "No Ultimate truth" I never advocated killing of any one, you just interpted it that way. If there is "No Umltimate truth" then any links to any of my posts on this board supporting the statement advocating killing, do not exsist. You just believe they do.

I believe there is a confusion of perspective and truth, the two are not the same. That then begs the question, does one realieze(sp?) there is a differance between their perspective and THE truth, and do they seek to overcome their perspective in favor of THE truth?

[Timber Loftis]

NY TIMES
GUEST COLUMNIST
The New Cosby Kids
By BARBARA EHRENREICH
Published: July 8, 2004

It was such a dog-bites-man story that I almost skipped right by: Billionaire Bashes Poor Blacks. The only thing that gave this particular story a little piquancy is that the billionaire doing the bashing is black himself. Bill Cosby has been attacking the poor of his race, and especially the youthful poor, for a range of sins, including using bad words, "stealing poundcake," "giggling" and failing to give their children normal names like "Bill." "The lower-economic people," Cosby announced, "are not holding up their end in this deal."

They let me down, too, sometimes — like that girl at Wendy's who gave me sweet iced tea when I had clearly specified unsweetened. She looked a little tired, but, as Cos might point out: How hard can it be to hold a job, go to high school and care for younger siblings in all your spare moments while your parents are at work?

But it's just so 1985 to beat up on the black poor. During the buildup to welfare "reform" in 1996, the comfortable denizens of think spas like the Heritage Foundation routinely excoriated poor black women for being lazy, promiscuous, government-dependent baby machines, not to mention overweight (that poundcake again). As for poor black youth, they were targeted in the 90's as a generation of "superpredators," gang-bangers and thugs.

It's time to start picking on a more up-to-date pariah group for the 21st century, and I'd like to nominate the elderly whites. Filial restraint has so far kept the would-be Social Security privatizers on the right from going after them, but the grounds for doing so are clear. For one thing, there's a startling new wave of "grandpa bandits" terrorizing rural banks. And occasionally some old duffer works himself into a frenzy listening to Cole Porter tunes and drives straight into a crowd of younger folks.

The law-abiding old whites are no prize either. Overwhelmingly, they choose indolence over employment — lounging on park benches, playing canasta — when we all know there are plenty of people-greeter jobs out there. Since it's government money that allows them to live in this degenerate state, we can expect the Heritage Foundation to reveal any day now that some seniors are cashing in their Social Security checks for vodka and Viagra. Just as welfare was said to "cause poverty," the experts may soon announce that Medicare causes baldness and that Social Security is a risk factor for osteoporosis: the correlations are undeniable.

And the menace posed by the elderly can only get worse, as ever more of them sink into debt. What's eating up their nest eggs? In many cases, drugs. How long before the streets are ruled by geezer gangs mugging us to support their insulin and beta-blocker habits?

All right, before the AARP issues a fatwa against me, could we please acknowledge that the demonization of welfare recipients wasn't based on reality either? Contrary to the stereotype, welfare moms in 1996 averaged two children per family, not six, and in surveys always expressed a desire to work, should child care become available. Incidentally, only a minority of them were African-American.

As for the black youth who so exercise Cosby, their pregnancy rates aren't "soaring," as he reportedly claimed; in fact, they're lower than they've been in decades. Ditto with crime rates. And if Cosby's worried about poor grammar and so forth, why isn't he ranting about the Bush 2005 budget, which would end a slew of programs for dropout prevention, recreation and school counseling?

Or, if he's looking for tantrum fodder, what about the fact that a black baby has a 40 percent chance of being born into poverty? You can blame adults for their poverty — if you're mean-spirited enough — but you cannot blame babies, and that's, in effect, what we're talking about here.

As the sociologist Michael Males, who monitors youth-bashing outbreaks, told me: "Younger black America today is struggling admirably against massive disinvestments in schools, terrible unemployment, harsh policing and degrading prejudices, and they're succeeding amazingly well. They deserve respect, not grown-up tantrums."

But it must be fun to beat up on people too young and too poor to fight back, or the elderly rich wouldn't do it. Cranky old rich people: now there's a demographic group that qualifies as a genuine Menace 2 Society.

Thomas L. Friedman is on leave until October, writing a book.

[Morgeruat]

Heh, you know, I could ALMOST be persuaded by that article (It did scare me about the dangers of geezer gangs I shudder to think about the crowd of Hell's Angels my poor old grandma is running with [img]tongue.gif[/img] ) if it weren't for the fact that Jesse Jackson (A man who I have little respect for, but that's another matter) hadn't been behind Cosby 100%.

I have enormous respect for Bill Cosby, he's one of the few comedians who is funny without being dirty, or vulgar, and is a huge promoter of family values.

[John D Harris]

Good to see you back TL! Are you trying to make ammends by going after the Right wing Cobal(sp?), the vast conspriacy? Best be careful, I can hear the secret board meetings now and they are going to plan to crash the stock market, polute the world and kick old ladies out of their houses to get back at you.

BH's article/editorial has got to be prehaps the most ignorant, as in unlearned, mass of words I thunk I've ever read. I want to see if I got this right Mr. Cosby can't say anything because he's rich, yet BH doesn't even bother to explain how Mr. Cosby became rich. Did He just happen upon his fortune while stumbling around sipping on a bottle of Mad Dog 20/20? Or prehaps he inherited it? Maybe his wealth comes from threatening to boycot companies and orginizations if they don't donate to his cause? I know he married into money right? I'd bet BH has no problems with being rich by those methods, It just seems BH has a problem with becoming rich by working for it. I wonder would BH turn down a raise when time comes for her new contract? You know a raise that would make her CLOSER to being rich. BH would surely turn any raise down in fact I bet BH has already gone to her employer and demanded that she is paid less so she can be poor. Yeah right! Mr. Cosby is qualified to make each and everyone of his statements, he's paid his dues, he left his acting career to go back and teach. A career that he was at near the top of at the time he left. He came from a poor background and make it good. No BH's problem with Mr. Cosby is not he's rich, but rather he isn't picking their cotton, working their fields, their plantation. He's made something of himself and is telling others how to do it also, how to get off the Gov't and victim teat. That makes Mr. Cosby very dangerous.