Welcome New Mudcatter Pol Pot !

Subject: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: GUEST,- "older and wiser"
Date: 14 Mar 01 - 06:17 PM

Please, everyone, join me in Welcoming Pol Pot, our newest member.

Every once in a while you need to confront something new and different to learn something new and different. Which brings me to the subject of this Cambodian dictator -

I don't believe he's alone in thinking the way he does; he verbalizes what a lot of people in Cambodian society think. I bear in mind that not everyone has studied up on the finer points of his style. Nor does everyone here appreciate the approach that has worked so well for him- mass genocide.

It can be an interesting experience talking to and listening to people who live in a completely different mindset from your own...and not judging them in the process. It's clear to me that like almost all other people he defends what he thinks is right, proper, fair, responsible, and just. That's what's so interesting about it.

Now, some people who decry Pol Pot's meanness can be pretty mean themselves. So...Let he among us who is without prejudice cast the first accusation. I'll say one thing for him. He's got fortitude. I'd have crawled away long ago if I was getting castigated by the international community the way he has been.

I have found that after a life of hating, detesting, and vilifying mass murderers, dictators, and despots I can now have friendships with them, play music with them, appreciate their strengths, and pardon their weaknesses...as I hope they would do with me. If not, I can live with it. What the hell. Politics ain't everything.

So, WELCOME POL POT! Lets hope we have some spirited debates.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: Pete M
Date: 14 Mar 01 - 06:39 PM

Hmmm,

I can't say I quite follow the point of this "older and wiser". I must admit to having been away from the 'Cat for about a year or so, and so have not caught up with all the new people, but from memory I don't think we as a community have ever advocated being non judgemental. The great strength, well one of them, of the 'Cat has always been our ability in 99.9% of cases to debate subjects with other members who hold opposing views without acrimony. Some of us have even changed our views as a result. Having said that, we all have our own carefully constructed prejudices and from my experience although the people most able to debate a topic are those capable of seeing the opposing point of view that doesn't mean they can't or won't condemn it. They generally don't advocate being non judgemental - usually quite the opposite.

Something I have said many times before and will repeat however, is that the one thing that most people hate is having it pointed out that their particular bete noir is not a 'monster', insane, depraved etc but 'just folks next door'. It seems to me that the only common factor in those more or less universally decried, is their absolute belief in themselves and the correctness of their point of view. A trait which is not limited to those who arrive in a position to apply their 'wisdom' to more than their immediate family.

Hope I haven't gone on about something that was meant to be a joke.

Pete M

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: catspaw49
Date: 14 Mar 01 - 06:58 PM

Welcome Pol Pot........As a representative of the Mudcat Hatemongers Club, an incredible group of cynics who dislike handling dirt without a shovel, we welcome you with open arms and newly acquired shovels. Though we too admit that all of us, no matter how hard we try, have some bigotry about us, some of us work on it instead of excusing it. We are now trying to change our ways and have gotten shovels. A Mudcatter pointed out to us that people are generally the same and we make too much of the differences, and those petty differences were what Hitler took advantage of.....though I doubt someone at Dachau would have considered the differences "petty."

So with a new light in our heart and shovels in our hands, we welcome you Pol Pot and I'm sure you feel that you have been misunderstood and the differences are simply petty.

Spaw (Irony well done, "Older & Wiser")

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: GUEST,Againanon
Date: 14 Mar 01 - 07:33 PM

Let's just toss this thread in the pot. It's starts in hell, and it's such a long climb out.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: menzze
Date: 14 Mar 01 - 07:59 PM

Can ya smoke pol pot???**BG** and in case of, how does taste?

menz-ze

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: flattop
Date: 14 Mar 01 - 08:17 PM

Since he's been dead a couple of years, he probably doesn't taste peachy.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: flattop
Date: 14 Mar 01 - 08:21 PM

Some interesting questions were raise (in 1997?) about Pol Pot on this site.

The Politics of War Criminality

There are, however, large numbers of mass murderers floating around the world. How are the choices made on who will be pursued and who will be granted impunity? The answer can be found by following the lines of dominant interest and power and watching how the mainstream politicians, media, and intellectuals reflect these demands. Media attention and indignation "follows the flag," and the flag follows the money (i.e., the demands of the corporate community), with some eccentricity based on domestic political calculations. This sometimes yields droll twists and turns, as in the case of Saddam Hussein, consistently supported through the 1980s in his war with Iran and chemical warfare attacks on Iraqi Kurds, until his invasion of Kuwait in 1990, transformed him overnight into "another Hitler." Similarly, Pol Pot, "worse than Hitler" until his ouster by Vietnam in 1979, then quietly supported for over a decade by the United States and its western allies (along with China) as an aid in "bleeding Vietnam," but now no longer serviceable to western policy and once again a suitable target for a war crimes trial.

Another way of looking at our targeting of war criminals is by analogy to domestic policy choices on budget cuts and incarceration, where the pattern is to attack the relatively weak and ignore and protect those with political and economic muscle. Pol Pot is now isolated and politically expendable, so an obvious choice for villainization. By contrast, Indonesian leader Suharto, the butcher of perhaps a million people (mainly landless peasants) in 1965-66, and the invader, occupier, and mass murderer of East Timor from 1975 to today, is courted and protected by the Great Powers, and was referred to by an official of the Clinton administration in 1996 as "our kind of guy." Pinochet, the torturer and killer of many thousands, is treated kindly in the United States as the Godfather of the wonderful new neoliberal Chile. President Ford and Secretary of State Kissinger, who gave the go ahead to Suharto's invasion of East Timor and subsequent massive war crimes there, and the same Kissinger, who helped President Nixon engineer and then protect the Pinochet coup and regime of torture and murder and directed the first phase of the holocaust in Cambodia (1969-75), remain honored citizens. The media have never suggested that these men should be brought to trial in the interest of justice, law, and "civilization."

...

 

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: GUEST,"older amd wiser"
Date: 14 Mar 01 - 08:30 PM

I am sorry, Mr. Spaw, but I cannot in good conscience take credit for the irony above. The words are those of fellow 'Catters, shamelessly plagerized from the "Welcome...MAV thread, q.v.- with only a change of proper name.

There's nowt so queer as folk.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 14 Mar 01 - 09:04 PM

It looks to me like someone is pretty pissed off (angry) because there are some people in the Mudcat who hold opinions that are different than their own. I'm having a difficult time understanding in what way this attitude is different from the people they are complaining about.

As far as I know, only opinions have been exchanged in this forum. I'm not aware of any gunshots being exchanged. (Or any murders, or other atrocities.)

I've said this on another thread recently... "You become what you hate".

Some people here are beginning to look like petty despots themselves. And I hate so say it, but some of them are the ones who are supposedly on my side of the political spectrum.

Carol

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: Sorcha
Date: 14 Mar 01 - 09:13 PM

First response--I don't think so.
2nd response--it's a Troll.
3rd response--let it die.
Nuff said.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: katlaughing
Date: 14 Mar 01 - 11:40 PM

If we were haters and we become whatever it is we hate, then those on the far right who'd like to kill my gay brother, et alia, will become gay, we would end up wanting to kill them because after all we would have become that which we supposedly hate and, so, things will balance out, right, and no more "petty" differences!

Life is not all sweetness and light, people! It is healthy to air our differences and have conflicting notions of what is good for the world.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 12:00 AM

kat/katlaughing, since I'm the one who initially used the phrase that you referred to in your post, I guess I ought to address your comment.

First of all, I'm sorry your brother experiences hate from gay haters. Sometimes gay haters are just that because they are gay, and they are unable to face up to that fact. Certainly not in all cases, but it's not uncommon.

Second, I think you took what I said a little too literally. I didn't mean someone who hates would take on the exact attributes of the one he or she hates. My experience has been that if I hate someone for treating me badly, for instance, I may behave badly toward that person or even someone else as a way of dealing with my hatred.

Finally, you said in your post that it's healthy for us to air our differences and have conflicting notions of what is good for the world. That is not what I see happening here. What's happening here looks to me like suppression of others' viewpoints.

Carol

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: katlaughing
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 12:11 AM

Thank you Carol, I was treating it with a bit of irony as I knew you didn't mean it literally and also because I was getting fed up with people posting it as literal in the other threads.

If you do a search on mav's name I think you will find that there has been no suppression of his views. I started the first Bushwhacked thread during the Shrub's first week in office, they went through at least 100 postings each up to what? Number 8 or 9, then the Encore and whatever the other one was. Nobody's postings were suppressed, repressed, or deleted, so I have to disagree with your observation, in act many Mudcatters, such as Skeptic went to great lengths to acknowledge his posting and debate ad infinitum with him.

I have noticed an interesting trend on the Mudcat. When those of us who are generally considered to be in good humour and welcoming speak out against someone we are accused of being full of hate and castigated for being bigots. Can't win for trying.

kat

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 12:23 AM

I have noticed an interesting trend on the Mudcat. When those of us who are generally considered to be in good humour and welcoming speak out against someone we are accused of being full of hate and castigated for being bigots. Can't win for trying.

--kat/katlaughing

I'm sorry you feel that way kat/katlaughing, but I can understand why you might feel the way you do.

I don't really have any interest in getting into the middle of anyone's political debate, discussion, or argument. I only got involved because of the level of vitriol I saw being exchanged by parties on both sides of the debate, and I was concerned about another flame war erupting. I still have that concern. I hope we can avoid that.

Best wishes,

Carol

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 12:25 AM

Sorry about the unclosed italics.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From:
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 12:31 AM

The family that lives behind me is Cambodian. I have never seen the woman smile and she is a beautiful woman in her 30s. I worked with many Cambodian children and teens. Their lives were indescribable. Pardon me for not joining in the merriment. mg

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: ddw
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 12:43 AM

My first reaction to this thread was that it was probably in pretty bad taste.

On reflection, however, GUEST older and wiser may have a point.

"The words are those of fellow 'Catters, shamelessly plagerized from the "Welcome...MAV thread, q.v.- with only a change of proper name."

I've sometimes thought we get a little too effusive in welcoming people into the M'cat Cafe when we don't know 'em from Adam's housecat.

Nothing against being friendly, mine you, but there are limits, eh?

david

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: katlaughing
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 12:50 AM

Thank you, Carol. I have the same concern, but I also get concerned when a Mudcatter may not say something for fear of being accused of being something they are not, in this case bigots. So, I guess, sometimes we just have to speak up, flame wars or not. Hopefully not. I do appreciate your concern.

Mary, I am sorry the thread title offends you; from what you've posted in the past, I can understand. I don't know who named it, but it was done with a very heavy bit of irony, so maybe that will lesson the sting a bit.

DW, egg-zactly! Someone comes into my house and repeatedly spews hateful rhetoric, I am sure not going to welcome them in to continue doing so.

kat

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 12:53 AM

On reflection, however, GUEST older and wiser may have a point.

"The words are those of fellow 'Catters, shamelessly plagerized from the "Welcome...MAV thread, q.v.- with only a change of proper name."

That's not entirely accurate. For instance this quote:

"I don't believe he's alone in thinking the way he does; he verbalizes what a lot of people in Cambodian society think. I bear in mind that not everyone has studied up on the finer points of his style. Nor does everyone here appreciate the approach that has worked so well for him- mass genocide."

I don't believe the words "mass genocide" were a part of the original post that this person was quoting from.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 01:02 AM

I'm messing up all over the place tonight. The first sentance in my last post is a quote from ddw's post.

kat/katlaughing, I've noticed that when the Mudcat is in the throes of a flame war, a lot of people stop reading and participating. So the message you want to get out may not be getting to people very effectively in such an environment. If we can find a way to convey our messages so that people don't stop participating, won't we be doing a better job of furthering our respective causes?

Carol

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 01:11 AM

This is the original post, by WYSIWYG:

MAV, welcome to the Mudcat. Now, bear in mind please, that not everyone has studied up on the finer points of your style. Nor does everyone here appreciate the approach that has worked so well for you in the whacked threads. I welcome you, and I hope you aren't a one-trick pony.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: katlaughing
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 02:10 AM

Carol, I think enough people continue to read that the points will be made; they just choose not to post.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: wdyat12
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 02:23 AM

Welcome to Mudcat Pol Pot!

I think I already did this.

wdyat12

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 02:26 AM

Some of the ones I most care about have said they stop reading.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: wdyat12
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 02:37 AM

Carol, I know how you feel about MAV, but Mudcat turned me around. Maybe we should ask all new members to read and consider the FAQ and Welcome to New Members permathread before we castrate them.

wdyat12

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 02:51 AM

wdyat12, I'm not sure I understand what you're saying. I welcomed MAV on the original welcome thread, and I have not participated in bashing (or castrating) anyone. Maybe you need to have another look at the MAV welcome thread.

Carol

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: wdyat12
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:08 AM

Sorry Carol,

I'm so confused reading between the lines on this Welcome to Pol Pot thread. I was under the impression that MAV was now posting as Pol Pot. Please help me out here. It's 3:12 AM here and I should be asleep, but I can't rest until I find out the truth.

wdyat12

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:19 AM

Hi wdyat12.

Ok, I'll try. The person who posted this thread (welcome Pol Pot) is upset that some Mudcatters have welcomed MAV. S/he also appears to be upset with the reasons that these Mudcatters are giving for welcoming MAV.

The person who started this thread is telling us that we can't welcome MAV if we want to.

I know it's confusing. I'm having a hard time understanding it myself.

Carol

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: wdyat12
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:44 AM

Thank you Carol,

My apologies to you and Pol Pot for my obvious misunderstanding of what is going on here. Carol, you were rather considerate of MAV in your posts. I will rest easier knowing that you folks have this situation under control? Pol Pot, I look forward to talking with you when I get this all sorted out. Carol, thanks again for responding so soon. I am off to my blankie now. I will see how things fair on this thread later today.

Nighty Night, wdyat12

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 04:02 AM

Good night, wdyat12.

Just one more thing, though. The Pol Pot who posted to the MAV welcome thread is a Mudcat identity that was created specifically for that thread. Someone was using that name to try to make a point.

If you click on the name Pol Pot in that post (the blue letters), you will find that the first (and probably only) post for this identity was that one.

Carol

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: Pol Pot
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 09:47 AM

Sexual deviates must be purged from society along with Communists non believers liberals abortionists free thinkers and other enemies of the state. Only so can we build the glorius future.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From:
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 11:11 AM

this is sick and exceeds human decency. If there are rules here about people posting under names equivalent to Adolph Hitler, I ask that they be enforced. mg

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: LR Mole
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 11:36 AM

You know, though...better that we know this stuff is there, I think, and treat it with civility. In the face of madness, quiet (and music) is preferable to more noise.--LR Mole, from the dark.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: hesperis
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 12:50 PM

For an intelligent analysis of Pol Pot, just read flattop's posting in the early part of this thread...entitled: The Politics of War Criminality. That pretty well says it all.

Now I think I'll (*yawn*) go back to tuning my guitar.

- LH

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: GUEST,The Yank
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 12:56 PM

I don't know, Mary, Pol hasn't said anything that MAV didn't- in fact Pol has been considerably more restrained and polite. I don't recall anyone saying MAV was "sick"- or calling for rules to be enforced. Surely what's allowed for one should be allowed for the other? In the spirit of tolerance and being non-judgemental?

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: GUEST,Melani
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 01:47 PM

I suppose we should welcome any new member, but membership implies a certain behavior standard. With any luck, MAV has interests other than being obnoxious. I must confess that since I currently have limited computer time, I did not even open any of the "Bushwhacked" threads, since they were so long and I had a pretty good idea what they were going to say. When I opened the "Welcome MAV" thread and saw some of the remarks, I went back and checked his/her posts and found them to be pretty nasty. I suppose some people use the anonymity of Mudcat to take out their aggressions. I find this annoying and don't really want to bother with it. I quite enjoyed older and wiser's irony, but then I have a perverted sense of humor. Now, does anyone want to discuss music?

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: Matt_R
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 02:45 PM

All through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall, always.

--Mohandas Gandhi

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: mousethief
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 02:46 PM

How reassuring -- if your entire family is wiped out by the tyrant, I'm sure Ghandi's words will soothe all your ruffled feathers.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:02 PM

Ok, the question I have is this. Are we going to damage the Mudcat just so we can be right? That reminds me of the attitude the U.S. had in Vietnam where we did our best to destroy the counry in the name of saving it.

How much damage is enough damage? Are we willing to hurt innocent bystanders in the name of our cause? Does any one of us have the right to use the Mudcat to grind our particular axe, if we do it at the expense of the Mudcat, and at the expense of members who are not involved in our particular battles? If we do that, how is that any different than any of the regimes that sacrifice humanity in the name of the "cause"?

Having a hard time understanding this double standard. Damage is damage. Hate is hate. Flaming is flaming, whether you do it, or MAV does it, or Mother Theresa does it. It's destructive no matter who does it, and it's hypocrysy to point fingers at people for doing something we do ourselves.

Carol

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: mousethief
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:08 PM

Responding to fire with fire.

Responding to fire with self-righteousness.

Not responding to fire.

Pick one.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:10 PM

mousethief, what I am asking people to do is not respond to fire. What are you advocating?

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: mousethief
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:14 PM

Am I advocating anything? How about.... hmm.... Compassion for people who have been pushed too far? There's something to advocate. Also free speech. MAV has the right to spew his bile here, I guess, and thus we have the right to react as we see fit. And you have the right to say YOUR piece about the whole thing.

Seems to me the system is working just as designed.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:22 PM

mousethief, the people who engaged in political discussions with MAV have done so out of choice. If these people didn't like MAV's tone or what he had to say, they had the option of not participating in the discussion.

However, when the Mudcat is damaged by flame wars, and damage does occur in the Mudcat during flame wars, innocent bystanders are hurt.

There's the difference.

Carol

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: mousethief
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:26 PM

And the way to make it stop is to nag people like a schoolmarm? No offense.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:28 PM

Have you got any solutions, mousethief?

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: mousethief
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:31 PM

Let it run its course. People will get tired of it and it'll drop like a stone through a wet paper bag.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: Matt_R
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:32 PM

Flame wars! You 2 haven't been around long enough to see what a REAL downhome flame war is like, when ever single thread is a flamewar, and there is no escape. Threads are hijacked for flaming, new flaming threads aimed at certain people are launched, flaming PMs and emails are launched, even the Mudcat auction taken over by the insanity. This is nothing, just a minor skirmish. I haven't read any GWB threads, and therefor am not offended. If you IGNORE the flamers, they will go away. I have, and I am content.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: CarolC
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:40 PM

mousethief, that hasn't been my experience. My experience has been that flame wars, left to do their thing, tend to escalate to the level that Matt has described. Maybe there is a reason that the flame wars haven't escalated to that level in a while. Maybe it's because of the efforts of the many people currently in the Mudcat who are willing to put the welfare of this site above their own personal agendas.

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: mousethief
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:41 PM

So THAT's the secret to contentment? Sheesh, here the whole world has been searching for thousands of years, and Matt goes and figures it out in an afternoon.

Who'd'a thunk?

Subject: RE: WELCOME NEW MUDCATTER POL POT !
From: mousethief
Date: 15 Mar 01 - 03:45 PM

Carol, seems to me the MAV threads are 3/4 of the way down the page, and slipping rapidly. This so-called flame war seems to have run its course.

But what do I know?