FM> I've never seen you support ANYTHING with a reasoned answer that
 FM> recognizes the right of anybody else to have an opposite view.
 AC> There's a reason I don't hold the "opposite view."
 AC> Still, I have a greater respect for the views of others than they have
 AC> for my views.  I don't engage in deliberate acts of ignorance and idiocy
 AC> to avoid intelligent and reasoned debate (my name calling is a response
 AC> to willful ignorance and idiocy).  Further, I don't want to force others
 AC> to live according to my views but they want to force me to live
 AC> according to theirs.
   First of all, that is the most willfully arrogant position a reasonable
human being could possibly take.  It automatically assumes a superiority over
others that most of us doubt seriously that you enjoy.  None of the regulars
here respond to you harshly until you have openly, unreasonably and
deliberately insulted them beyond any human tolerance.
   According to the civilized rules of orderly debate your own "white"
forefathers established for both parliaments and private arguments, it is
perfectly O.K. to call somebody's STATEMENTS, ARGUMENTS and UTTERANCES silly,
moronic, nazi, inane, or whatever invective suits you if that is truly the 
ay
you feel but it is NOT OK AT ALL to directly call the PERSON such names.  In
any assembly proceeding under Roberts Rules of Order, Newly Revised, you 
ould
be called down IMMEDIATELY by the Chair for calling people around you names
like that in speech or writing.  Tune in to the House or Senate on C-Span
sometimes and observe how the bitterest of enemies in those august bodies
refer to each other as "my esteemed colleague from Arkansas" or "my friend
from Wisconsin with whom I seriously disagree" etc.  No deliberative body in
the world could long engage in argument and debate using your tactics, Andrew
and you should know that.  Most people here that you attack (now I exclude
such newcommers as Frederic Rice, etc.) do NOT BEGIN by calling you names,
some of them defend themselves by responding to your ugliness.  I certainly
never gave you ANY reason to call ME (an American veteran) a NAZI and yet you
gleefully and persistently did so.  How do you EXPECT other people of good
will who only want to discuss philosophy to react to such ugliness.
   Moreover, the idea that anybody here could force you or anybody else to
change your lifestyle is ridiculous on the face of it.   Now if you're
referring to what might be done in a government of laws to accomplish that
then be advised that all of the citizens have a vote just as you do.  If you
wanted to argue vigorously against certain actions of governments, local,
State or Federal then the Politics echo is a good place to do that but if you
do it here you might even have MY support in SOME of it if you give others 
he
full right to express THEMSELVES but that is not your tone whatsoever.
Instead you sit in primary, gratuitious, unauthorized judgement of others as
pure evil while holding your own views as sacred.  That is NOT a 
hilosophical
approach.  If you think you have some CORNER on wisdom and knowledge you are
only deluding yourself.   Do you note that in all of this I have deliberately
avoided calling you any of the nasty names you call others and that some
others have therefore called YOU?
 FM> If you are of the "White" race (really a funny in itself because to me
 FM> "White" is albino) you have benefitted from "affirmative action" all of
 FM> your life.
 AC> How do you figure?
 AC> I figure: 1) What you say is not true. 2) I don't believe in giving
 AC> anyone preferential treatment based on race. 3) Two wrongs don't make a
 AC> right.
   Saying that you believe that what I say is not true doesn't offend me one
bit because in saying that you are not attacking me personally.  My answer to
you is this:
   I thought the equation of "white" and "albino" to be pretty obvious.
Except for albinos, we are ALL some color besides "white" or "black" or 
red."
I personally am not particularly happy that the people of African descent
chose to refer to themselves as "Black" but I can't really change that, can 

   As to the preferential treatment according to race, I agree with you and
our forefathers should NOT have extended such preferential treatment to
themselves (some Blacks even held slaves) and long after slavery was over
according to Federal law my ancestors continued to practice it and Plessy vs.
Ferguson (a Supreme Court decision relating to a case in my own area)
permitted that.  Just suppose that because of the color of YOUR skin you had
been forced to take the back seat in a train or bus.  How do you think YOU
would feel?  Through centuries and decades your "white people" extended to
themselves ALL of the preferential treatment anybody could imagine. 
   Your argument that "two wrongs don't make a right" is the hallowed 
rgument
of the White Citizens Councils and the followers of David Duke in response in
MY State to the legislation FORCING equal civil rights for ALL citizens.  It
caused some highly interesting things to happen regarding my own "white" life
that I could relate to you but will refrain.  Historians, as a matter of 
act,
were generally agreed during the forties and fifties that but for the
DELIBERATE forcing of second class citizenship to "Blacks" on public
transportation the whole civil rights movement might YET still be something 
n
the future.  The argument that "two wrongs don't make a right" is a very
convenient one for the group that profitted for centuries from affirmative
actions extended toward themselves.
   You are entitled to disagree and to express that disagreement.  You are
NOT entitled to call other people names for disagreeing with YOU.
Sincerely, 
                                     Frank
                                                                              
                                                       
--- PPoint 2.05
---------------