@TheChief he was arrested for that in the past, and he was already handcuffed, if those police weren't sadists that felt like breaking a man's back they would have secured him, but they didn't, the fact that you would defend such a brutal act of murder is disgusting.

Maybe if cops weren't murdering kids all the time people wouldn't run, but now you'll defend the murder of children too. Are you trying to be a scum bag, or does it come naturally?

"Officers are protecting us"

Yeah, right.

Oh my god, you're really defending a slave owning rapist. I know he claimed to be anti-slavery, he still owned hundereds of them and raped them oh his fucking of a human being who he owned as property and could have easily killed, or could have tortured, or whose children he could have killed, or sold, or tortured was consensual? Do you consider rape at gunpoint consensual too? Jesus fucking Christ, Sally Hemings tried to leave him in France where she could be free, the only reason she stayed was because he promised to free her children. She clearly wanted to be free and stop being his little rape toy.

Oh, I was unaware that the founding fathers set up conditions to prevent the heinous shit that happened in the gilded age. Oh wait, they didn't.
I also forgot the part where they made it illegal to rape and murder slaves, oh wait they didn't.
So much for protection.

Or that you ignoring the 14th amendment of a document you fucking worship when you think it's beneficial makes it obvious.

No, it's not. I also never said I hated the constitution, I have merely said its ineffectual. Keep up now.

Because as I stated I believe people are entitled to certain human rights and liberties. I guess arguing with a strawman is more convenient.

A straight line is a line that goes directly forward with no curves or bends in it. Pretty simple. A good government isn't insanely corrupt, doesn't commit war crimes, and so on. Pretty simple

@TheChief 1) yeah, sure. Just grow a pair and admit to being a bigot pls.
I'm interpreting it the way it's written, everyone is to be treated equally by the law. Pretty simple if you aren't blinded by a desire to oppress gays.

2) I've shown contempt for crooked, racist, sexist, elitist wannabe oligarchs. The constitution is just a piece of paper, and it's a living document so. I merely said it isn't perfect and fails to protect people's rights, so meh.

No, you did. You also compared a leader whose economic policies you disliked to a dictator who raped people with dogs

@Jacob Every minority in the world uses the bigot excuse when somebody disagrees with them. Mexicans do it with border control and Blacks do it with the police. The only difference is you may actually have a right to what you say you do.
"A desire to oppress gays". Is it really so alien to your diseased mind to think that someone may do something out of principle, and you do not personally fit in to why they're doing it?
What the fuck is wrong with you that the rape thing is what you linger on?
Show me the the sentence VERBATIM where I said "democracy is evil".
I didn't. I said giving people unlimited power, whoever those people are and whatever that power is, will end badly.

@TheChief yes, yes, show off more of your anger against minorties.
Except your principles are inconsistent, you're either an idiot or a bigot or both.

Because it was something the Pinochet regime did a lot, and you claimed both regimes were just as awful and tyrannical.

Show me where I said I said I hated the constitution rather than that it's just a piece of paper. You defended the hatred of democracy, clearly you think it's awful.
Which was irrelevant given we were talking about the poor, blacks, and women being denied voting rights.

@Jacob "Anger against minorities". What do you personally feel about the anti-police riots in Baltimore and in Ferguson?
How are they inconsistent? Because I interpret the Constitution differently than you do?

Any communist regime will inevitably end just as badly as any fascist regime does. Allende would either have gone mad or been put out of power like has happened in every Communist regime to date.

I defended DISTRUST of democracy, which is well-founded.
Denied the right to vote in a world where anywhere else they would have been denied membership in the human race.

@TheChief When cops kill innocent, unarmed people constantly people will get pissed off. Riots and violent backlash are a result of shitty conditions that should have been fixed long ago.

Because the 14th amendment is pretty clear and you're just ignoring it because you want states to keep people like me from having basic civil rights.

Well let's see, Allende allowed political dissent though out his time in office, shortly after Pinochet came to power he had a guy tortured and shot 40+ times for writing left wing songs. Lol, you're so full of shit it's almost cute.

You defended keeping the poor from having voting rights.
"I beat my wife, but not as hard as the neighbors beat their wives!"

@Jacob Then I don't understand why people got pissed off. Those killed in Ferguson and similar situations were by no stretch of the imagination innocent.

If you have so much faith in democracy why do you believe they'll deprive of what you consider to be your rights?

Victor Jara. I have a song by Christy Moore about him on CD. Didn't deny any of that. Didn't deny Pinochet was an awful sonofabitch. I merely said Allende's regime was doomed to fail as all such regimes are.

You call a line crooked without having ever seen a straight one.

@TheChief yes yes, stealing a bag of chips while black warrants death, I've heard this line before.

I believe every adult should have voting rights, I also believe there should be legal protections of people's basic liberties. I just don't think some crooked, privileged oligarchs and a paper they wrote should be worshiped. The alternative is to let a small handful of people, if not a single person, control the lives of others. What's funny is when I criticize suppression of poor people, blacks, and women, you just repeat "giving anyone absolute power ends badly" as if I were calling for anything other than a decentralization of power.

You said Allende would become just as tyrannical, when there's no evidence of such a thing occurring, and there is evidence of the opposite. Nice back peddling though.

A crooked line is still crooked no matter if all the other lines are crooked as well.

@Jacob No assaulting a clerk, charging an officer and trying to wrest his weapon away from him warrants it if you're stupid enough to try.

YOU'RE MISSING THE POINT. The Constitution is what laid the groundwork for all of the liberties enjoyed by modern people to be possible. I have showed you plenty of examples of our Founding Fathers speaking about how strongly they believed in the rights of man, yet you ignorantly cling on to the assinine belief that they were some manner of tyrants. You're wholly consumed by the idiotic. self-hating leftist stance that completely despises itself for being American and criminalizes one for feeling pride in their nation.
You're blatantly taking what I said out of context. The absolute power was your supporting the Supreme Court's ruling on gay marriage, which I interpret as overstepping it's Constitutional boundaries. And it's not decentralization of power if it's giving it all to the masses who have proven through the millennia easily swayed by whatever charismatic demagogue knowns how to use the right buzzwords.

Yes, but how do you know crooked from straight if you've never seen it? That is the idiocy of you view of Our Founding Fathers. Black doesn't exist if white doesn't.

@TheChief and that kid who was shot for having a BB gun? Or the 7 year old who was shot for answering the door with a Wii remote? Or that guy who got thrown into the back of a van after being handcuffed and somehow ended up getting his spine snapped in multiple spots? Or all the countless others who have been murdered or brutalized by cops for little to no reason?

Yeah, people like Thomas Jefferson loved Liberty so much that they held slaves and used brown women as sex toys. Or how they fear mongered specifically about poor people wising up and turning on they wealthy and powerful. The whining about not being able to idolize rapist oligarchs is cute tho.

Ideally the constitution would be worth something and actually protect liberties, but it doesn't. The government isn't going to bother protecting people's liberties if it doesn't have to or violating them is a net positive for them. Especially when you limit power to rich elites like those founding fathers you love so much did.

Yet you also said that every time I defending voting rights, also your interpretation is just a bull shit try at rationalizing denying people like me our basic rights.

No, it's taking power away from elites and spreading it out to every. Obviously it's not perfect, but it's preferable. Unless you want to deny that small cliches of elites when given control of the government haven't been shown to only look out for themselves.

No, the concept of a straight line is pretty simple.

@Jacob The guy thrown in the back of the van was at fault because if he hadn't been fighting the officers (who had every right to throw him in there, seeing as he was a violent drug dealer) they would have been able to secure him.
That kid ran from police and then waved something that to their sight was a gun. He is at fault, not the officers.
For one thing, it was a "17" year old, not a "7" year old. That chick was out of her mind to begin with, so she can't be held as a standard for police officers.
And you're ignoring the fact that officers are protecting us, not those thugs on the streets. Most people killed by police officers are killed because they're a threat to the officers or to the innocents.

Thomas Jefferson was OPPOSED to slavery as you would know if you'd done even the slightest bit of research. Most scholars hold his relationship with that woman was consensual.
If they feared, why did they specifically provide opportunities for the advancement of the poor and the weak in their society and the protections of them from the powerful.

The fact you honestly beleive that demonstrates you're primary source of information is some bullshit like Tumblr or Al Jazeera (aka Terrorist News Network)

Your ENTIRE concept of what basic rights are is WHOLLY derived from the Constitution you despise.

If you're so much in favor of popular power why do you rail against my suggestion of giving the choice of gay marriage to state legislatures, as opposed to investing that authority into the sinister cabal that is the federal government?

It's simple if you know what one looks like. Not quite so if you don't. You look at our government and call it evil, but you have no standard to judge what a good government would be.

@TheChief "Those killed in Ferguson and similar situations were by no stretch of the imagination innocent." So evidently your interpretation of the constitution allows for killing people without due process. They weren't "innocent"? So were they proven guilty in a court of law? Or are you talking out of your behind again?

@Dorkymike It allows for killing people in self-defense, as the Officer who killed Michael Brown did.

@TheChief You do not know that. Do you know why? Because it was a case of one persons word versus another. This is why you have trials. Do you know what a grand jury does? When you figure that out come back to me.

@Dorkymike We KNOW that Michael Brown robbed a convenience store and assaulted a clerk. We KNOW he assaulted an officer and attempted to wrest away the officer's gun. Now explain to me why the fuck we shouldn't believe the officer?

@TheChief Convenience store maybe. We certainly do not know about the gun. It is he said she said. We do know that robbing a convenience store usually does not carry the death penalty, especially if it is simply a case of shoplifting. But heres the thing you are missing. We don't know anything because there was no trial. Sometimes Grand Juries fail to indict because they believe there isn't a strong case for an indictment. In this case it was because the prosecutor DIDN'T DO HIS JOB. This is expected. The prosecutor works with the police to bring criminal cases to court. He has to have a working relationship with them. Understandable. However... This is exactly why the prosecutor is supposed to sit out in cases involving police misconduct and let a special prosecutor handle the job. What you are doing now is trying to prove a dead guy had it coming.

You can't do this for a few reasons.
1.) Lack of unbiased due process
2.) The other "crime" in question doesn't carry the death penalty.

Now why shouldn't we believe the officer? Because if the officer was being honest about the whole thing he wouldn't have needed the district attorney to try so hard to make sure the case never came to court. It's not rocket science.

'@TheChief'
"Denied the right to vote in a world where anywhere else they would have been denied membership in the human race."

Latin America had slaves too bub. And they were variously better or worse about it than the US (Brazil had slavery longer for instance). But yeah the racism was more or less the same, not horrifically worse.
As for women we got suffrage for them at a good time (beat the UK to it haha), but we were far from the first. So again, super mega wrong.

If I can be frank here... its a hallmark of being smart if you think of a concept like "US having women's votes when no one else did". And then go "Hmm, did we? Let me go see."
And its a hallmark of something else to just state it without doing any research, or even thinking about it.

@TheChief "Every minority in the world uses the bigot excuse when somebody disagrees with them. " This is literally the dumbest thing I've ever read. The only people who go around crying "bigot" from disagreement are strawman characters created by people like you. The rest of the world uses it when somebody displays that they are a bigot. Don't like being called a bigot? Don't be one. Simple. It isn't your "principles" that make you a bigot, it's blind hatred. "Principles" in this case are just a post hoc rationalization of something you can't justify.

@Dorkymike Only in strawman characters? You must not have been paying attention after those hoodlums got shot in Ferguson and Baltimore.
Why is it so alien to your thinking that maybe you don't figure into it personally? My beliefs are my beliefs, and for all your bitching about equality you show mine no more respect than you find me to show yours.

@TheChief See, you are actually being a bigot. What went on in Ferguson wasn't even LEGAL. If you knew anything about that case you'd know that having the DA prosecuting police officers was actually a violation of Missouri law. And "Hoodlums" LOLOL. Protesters become hoodlums because what? Were you paying any attention? Do you remember that when the local police chief was replaced by somebody from the FBI the violence at the protests died down? Do you know why that was?

I don't show your beliefs respect because they are not respectable beliefs. The problem with bigots is they always believe their beliefs are reasonable. If you told me you don't like Metallica, or the Beatles or some band that is a reasonable belief. If you told me you don't like eating a lot of sugar because you think it is unhealthy that is a reasonable belief. Blanket labeling of African Americans who are angry about something as "Hoodlums" is not a reasonable belief. It simply shows you are a bigot.

@Dorkymike The individual shot in Ferguson was a criminal. He robbed a convenience store and assaulted a clerk. Later, he assaulted an officer and tried to wrest the man's gun way from him. He was shot. He died. He brought it upon himself.

I don't label them hoodlums because they were angry. Lots of Black people have been angry about a lot of things, and many of them have been reasonable. But burning down your own town because some thug got shot while attacking a policeman is not reasonable. If anything, it just reinforces the stereotypes that have polarized racial relations for decades.

@TheChief You don't have any actual facts in this case. You do know that right? What you believe depends on whose testimony you take. You are a bigot if you automatically assume the police were right, especially given the number of inconsistencies in the way the matter was handled.

@Dorkymike Why am I a bigot to take a police officer's word when dealing with a criminal?
ALL the evidence points towards the shooting being self-defense. Half the prosecution's witnesses didn't even see it happen. All those who supported what the officer said were credible and what they said in no way conflicted the officer's testimony.
If anything you're the bigot for assuming that police officers exists solely to harass minorities.

'@TheChief'
Are you Irish in heritage? Because I think I now recall you saying you were from Massachusetts. And it complies with the Catholic thing which you apparently are. So odds are really good.
And I really hope so.

@sagas Yes I'm Irish.

'@TheChief'
ahahaha blammo
Keep swinging that fist at the criminal urban slum dwelling louts my man.
Also very funny if you are currently turning your nose up at refugees of any sort.

@sagas How is that in any way related to my contempt for criminals?
I'm not turning my nose at refugees. I'm saying when refugees are coming from countries lousy with violent militants we need to be careful.

'@TheChief'
And what does "be careful" entail.

@sagas Not let everyone who comes to us with an open hand into the country.

'@TheChief'
The cool thing about immigration is its actually a process involving a tremendous amount of paperwork, background checks, interviews, and conditions to be met for the immigrant.
Almost like its point is to apply scrutiny to the immigrant.

@sagas Which is why legal immigration isn't quite so common.

'@TheChief'
No that's because average people on their own literally cannot immigrate.
You have to either:
-Be a refugee
-Be some sort of super person like a noted scholar or artist or something like that
-Have an employer ready to sponsor you
-Be related to an American citizen
-Marry a US citizen.
-Win a literal lottery lol

No random person can just go "I'd like to apply to be an American."

@sagas And that is flawed and another unfortunate feature of our modern America. Don't get me wrong, I'm far from being a xenophobic Trump supporter. But more bad than good will come from letting immigrants flood into this country without any idea who they are and what issues they bring with them are.

'@TheChief'
You're avoiding my questions and points.
The very process of immigration establishes who a person is and what issues they bring with them.
Even for refugees.

@sagas And yet the issues-racial violence, sympathy for radical group in their native countries, the drug trade-all remain and grow as major issues in all the countries which have a major population of immigrants. The U.S., the U.K., France and a myriad of similar countries all are pushed to the brink by the problems these refugees bring on top of the existing ones.

'@TheChief'
Immigrants tend to come from crappy or at least crappier countries....
...why do you think they immigrate.
Like is it some major puzzle to you why the US is no longer swamped by Irish immigrants? Well its because Ireland politically stabilized and became a first world country. Rather than the famine scarred poverty filled craphole wracked by political violence it used to be about a century ago.
So you seem to be thinking you're making a point here? Pointing out something notable?
When actually no you're really not at all. You're doing the equivalent of pointing out that rain is wet, and acting like this is alarming late breaking news.

"The U.S., the U.K., France and a myriad of similar countries all are pushed to the brink by the problems these refugees bring on top of the existing ones."

The UK and France may think they are, but really they're fine. The US is completely fine and KNOWS it because the US has been doing this literal identical song and dance for over 150 years a million times over with countless different peoples and places of origin.
Your very own Irish ass would not be here if this was not the case. In fact if I recall right and you're in Massachussetts, try throwing a rock and see if you don't hit someone for which this would also be true.
Or did you imagine Ireland in the 1800's was a land of stately manors, jolly well fed well landed farmers, and cheery economic and political conditions.

@sagas Thing about the Irish is, when we came, we didn't unwittingly bring along with us any extremists determined to destroy the country we were coming to.
What's more, back in the day there was more than enough work to go around, as opposed to now that the native population is facing the real possibility of being rendered obsolete by advancing technology.
Franc and Britain are fine? Have you read anything about the racial tensions there? The riots? The strife between immigrant populations and police forces? Immigration is a whole damn lot of why about half the British population wants to get the Hell out of the EU.

'@TheChief'
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fenian_raids
And then later plenty of IRA funding came from Irish-Americans.
That and all the widespread gang activity and general urban crime, and corrupt city politics systems that the Irish were utilized through like Tammany Hall.

"What's more, back in the day there was more than enough work to go around"

Yeah-huh.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9c/US_Unemployment_1890-2009.gif

"Franc and Britain are fine? Have you read anything about the racial tensions there?"

The existence of racial tension is not the sign of a national apocalypse anywhere. As for the UK, are we talking the ethnic tension against recent immigrants? Or the ethnic tensions between the Irish and Unionists in Northern Ireland?

"The riots? "
If you heard about riots in France recently, they were labor riots. Strike related things lol.

"Immigration is a whole damn lot of why about half the British population wants to get the Hell out of the EU. "

The Brexit is a really dumb idea being propped up on flimsy ground and sold to idiots on paranoia.

@sagas There's a difference between fighting foreign dominion of your nation and butchering everybody who disagrees with you.
The racism against the Irish was the reason we had to resort to crime. I'm not saying that doesn't have a hand in what's happened to the Mexicans and such, but the fact is that generation of immigrants coming to this country didn't do so with the intention of helping a national crime syndicate.

Point is our economy can't support as many mouths as we got let alone those coming here.

Recent immigrants.
That wasn't racial tension. That was a fight to unify the nation and free it from British authorities and their Unionist sympathizers.

The way I hear it is that the Bobbies have for the first time had to start using guns due to the crime caused by unregulated immigration.
And in France need I point out the recent attack by ISIS militants?

The EU has passed unfair laws without any consideration to those not in the leadership and forced Britain to accept immigrants they aren't ready for and can't take care of.
Idiots who make up-according to the most recent pole I read-48% of the British population.

'@TheChief'
"There's a difference between fighting foreign dominion of your nation and butchering everybody who disagrees with you."

You don't know what's going on in Syria right now do you. ISIS is only one faction among many, constrained to specific geographic areas, belonging specifically to Sunni Islam, and didn't really exist in the country as we know them until 2013. Add on top of that the fact that ISIS in large part is an organization made up foreign recruits, not so much the locals in places they conquer. ISIS broadcasts its extremism to attract crazies from around the whole world, who frankly actually come to resemble foreign dominators to the local villagers and what not. To say nothing about locals who aren't Sunni Muslims, because while I'm sure you're familiar with ISIS mistreatment and killings of Christians, they do the same for non-Sunni muslims like Alawites, Ismaelis, and vanilla Shia.
Surely someone Irish can appreciate the importance of sect in religion?

Coming back to Ireland, what is Ireland's history? Especially Northern Ireland? Its of the English/British crown trying to colonize the place and control it better. Which meant eventually encouraging trustworthy and tough Protestant settlers (mostly from Scotland) to go over and "tame" the land. That's where all the Northern Irish Protestants, who make up the Unionists, came from.
In Irish history they (and the English nobles who took land in Ireland) were minorities ruling over a majority. A situation very much akin to apartheid in South Africa, up to and including the native Irish being excluded from major rights deep into the 19th century.

This talk you're making of the Irish struggle, well lets look at the Syrian Civil War.
Syria was (in part still is) a country run by a dictatorship belonging to a minority group. This group is called the Alawites, who are a very strange offshoot of Shia Islam (I guess you could compare them to Mormons in terms of really out there Christian sects). Alawites are essentially Arab as well.
The majority population is Arab too, but Sunni Muslim.
So for years since 1970, there has been a dictatorial regime run by members of the Alawite people. And with that has come dominance by the Alawites in all social spheres, and discrimination and marginalization toward the Sunni Arabs. And even worse discrimination against Sunni Kurds.

The war began with basic rallies and protests against a dictator, like the other Arab countries in 2011 (Egypt, Tunisia, Yemen, Libya etc.). The Syrian government brutally attacked such protests, with full on military and lethal response accompanied by secret police terror. This backfired because the severity was so great that it lead to protestors arming themselves and fighting back rather than just limping home and staying quiet. Imagine Tiananmen Square if Stalin had been in charge or something. This just kept escalating and eventually produced a war between rebels and government.

ORIGINALLY this was not sectarian, meaning it wasn't so much about X Group vs Y Group. But that tension between a ruling minority vs a underclass majority was an undeniable elephant in the room. And the dictator eventually (with evil intelligence) started playing to hatreds to divide his population, and make sure a significant portion decided to stay loyal (so Alawites and other minority groups sans the Kurds).
By 2016 where we are its become super sectarian, and tons of ethnic cleansing and borderline genocidal actions have taken place. Because essentially a majority was being controlled by a minority.
Which is the Irish experience with English/Scottish Protestant settlers and colonizers.
In the SYRIAN Civil War, those same minorities became spooked both by propaganda and some actual genuine concerns and turned against the anti-government rebellion and stayed loyal to the Assad regime. Alawite Muslims, Ismaeli Muslims, many Christians, and sort of the Druz.
In the IRISH drive for independence, the minority Protestant population became spooked by propaganda and some genuine concerns and turned against the Irish drive for independence and stayed loyal to the British crown. Demanding the parts of the island where they lived in large amounts stay in the UK.

ISIS? ISIS isn't even from Syria. They formed from an assemblage of war tourist jihadis and disgruntled Sunnis and former Saddam people during the Iraq War, as a little group called "Al Qaeda in Iraq". Remember all those horrific beheading of hostage videos during the war? That was them. We were able to flatten them pretty well in 2006 (I think), and they sort of went quiet.
Then guess what! The country next door collapsed to anarchy and horrific chaotic bloodshed! So along with other Al-Qaeda loyalists they moved over and started operating within Syria. Eventually they got tired of Al-Qaeda and had big disagreements and turned on them, and broke off as their own group. Christening themselves (among other names) the "Islamic State of Iraq and Syria". They started a sophisticated propaganda campaign online and advertised like crazy, and tons stupid and/or crazy people flocked to join them from around the world. They gobbled up and killed lots of Syrian rebel groups in the countries east, and also attacked and took territory from weak far flung Syrian government areas. This also meant they controlled the border with Iraq, so they took a gamble and started crossing it and trying to take territory.
The Iraq military was a miserable weak corrupt entity and collapsed way more easily then anyone expected and ISIS as able to capture a ton of territory in Iraq really quickly including Mosul.

They are a transnational group that while they've claimed to have founded a country and do control territory, are still basically similar to Al-Qaeda in that they're not really tethered geographically to a people, or area. They are not a native outgrowth of Syria, as I said their rule in Syria and Iraq tends to resemble that exact foreign domination you mention.

Expecting Syrian refugees to have sympathies to ISIS is ignorant and uninformed for a variety of reasons. Namely that local Syrians who do support the group would not be fleeing Syria and deciding to try and live in the west, they would be fleeing to ISIS controlled cities and territories.
And if they belong to any group that isn't Sunni the suspicion is extra ignorant. It would be like thinking a Protestant from Northern Ireland might secretly be an IRA member.

And the IRA (and Unionist terrorist groups) did plenty of killing that wasn't strictly on the basis of soldiers and officials or any of that. Killings were also made purely on sectarian basis. And certainly the hate came down to that sort of non-political distinction. I have stories of plenty of older locals of Irish ancestry who can remember their parents refusing to let their kids marry anyone of English blood in the US!

"The racism against the Irish was the reason we had to resort to crime. I'm not saying that doesn't have a hand in what's happened to the Mexicans and such, but the fact is that generation of immigrants coming to this country didn't do so with the intention of helping a national crime syndicate."

No generation of immigrants has any such intentions.

"Point is our economy can't support as many mouths as we got let alone those coming here."

The largest generation of Americans alive is entering retirement age and then subsequently the sweet embrace of death. The Baby Boomers. The subsequent generations are smaller, a population shrink would normally be occuring, especially with low brith and even marriage rates of Millennials thus far. But this won't be an issue because of our well controlled and steady rate of immigration. Even including illegals, who by the way have significantly slowed down on the whole.

"That wasn't racial tension. That was a fight to unify the nation and free it from British authorities and their Unionist sympathizers."

It's not racial yes, but its ethnic tension. You clearly don't know who the Unionists are. They're the descendents of Protestant settlers from (mostly) Scotland. So the Troubles are colored by hate between Irish Catholics and Scots-Irish Protestants. You've surely heard that term right? Scots-Irish? Scotch-Irish? Ulster-Scots? Those are the Protestants of Northern Ireland. They are not indigenous Irish Catholics who just so happened to be loyal to London. Their reason of being Unionists and loyalists, is because they feared living in a new independent Ireland dominated not by London but by Dublin. By the Catholic majority. Both for losing their privileges, and fearing backlash.
And lacing all that is the inevitable hatred and bigoted feelings that have grown between the two groups over history as well as the recent 20th century as Northern Ireland.
Some Unionists will abuse symbols of Catholicism, use phrases like "Fenian" or "Paddy" that are straight up ethnic slurs, and gloat about bloody conflicts they won in history. Similar comes from the Republicans (the Irish natives).
This is much better and calmer nowadays, but even so that change is fairly recent.
Give some watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4RZ73gNom8
And of course this infamously disgusting recentish event: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Cross_dispute

Functionally speaking hatred between groups largely defined by a religious divide is basically racism for all intents and purposes. Being Irish-American you should be supremely familiar with the fact that Catholicism is tied to the identity and the culture and the family. Not just some random theological choice. It's near inseparable as part of Irish ethnic identity, as it is for Italian, Latino, Polish and so on.
You're not some Evangelical Protestant who thinks of religion strictly in terms of missionary activity, born again context, and rootlessness. You should know this.

"The way I hear it is that the Bobbies have for the first time had to start using guns due to the crime caused by unregulated immigration. "

In what way is immigration to Britain unregulated.

"And in France need I point out the recent attack by ISIS militants?"

None of whom were Syrian refugees or even from France.

"The EU has passed unfair laws without any consideration to those not in the leadership and forced Britain to accept immigrants they aren't ready for and can't take care of. "

Movement of EU citizens within the EU is very loose yes, but that requires the individual moving to be an EU citizen. This doesn't cover refugees or immigrants from outside the EU. Moreover the UK is not part of the Schengen Area, they chose to be excluded, which means the lack of border controls between EU countries doesn't apply to the UK to begin with.
The UK hasn't been forced to accept Syrian refugees and as always they are able to basically pick and choose pretty freely what they participate in unlike many of the weaker poorer EU countries like Greece. So zero refugees have been forced on the UK by the EU. They have decided to accept some of their own volition though, which is y'know, control of their own immigration if I've heard of such.
If anything the immigrants in question that Brits are less able to deny because of EU law... are from poorer EU countries. A large part of British anti-immigration sentiment isn't just against Muslims and Hindus, but against Poles, Romanians and Bulgarians.

"Idiots who make up-according to the most recent pole I read-48% of the British population."

Surely someone of Irish extract can find little to argue here.

@TheChief Wow... Just wow... Where did the "God loves everyone" thing go?

@Barracuda Hindsight 20/20.

@Barracuda Exactly where and when did I refute God's enduring providence for anyone?

You shouldn't say 0.0% as you really can't have accuracy greater than ~1% with sample size of just 102 people.

@siprus I would also say the age range is clearly not 0-25 years. I seriously doubt that the youngest person they surveyed was 0 years old. Or if he was, I doubt he answered anything that could realistically be interpreted as Yes or No.

@Tjalve
Agreed. I think it'd be more reasonable to start the survey at age 5,where one can form even the simplest of opinions, and perhaps have a larger population surveyed.

@TheChief 1) "your kind"? glad you're at least being blunt about your disgust by those different from you.
Except we aren't changing the constitution, the 14th amendment has been a thing for a while
They can support what they want, they can't force religious laws on people.

2) I've shown nothing but ambivalence toward it because it's just a piece of paper that fails to do what it is meant to. You're ignoring the 14th amendment, which I bring up not because I'm gonna pretend to care about the constitution, but because you're being a hypocrite.

What ever happened to that "democracy is evil" song and dance? I guess when it comes to oppressing groups you dislike you're all for it.

@Jacob 1) I am not one of you, therefore you and those associate with you are "your kind", not "my kind" or "our kind". Simply a matter of grammar.
You are interpreting it in one way. Certainly not what it's drafters intended, but a legitimate interpretation. Other would argue it, and in many situations their interpretations would be equally legitimate.

2) You've shown utter disgust and contempt for it. That view subscribe to one interpretation of the Constitution. I find it too broadly encompassing for safety's sake. I stand by my statement it's a matter best left to state legislative bodies.

Never said democracy is evil. I said it is flawed and unrestricted it is a doomed endeavor.
The Constitution doesn't mention the redefinition of social institutions as one of the powers allotted the federal government and therefore is within the authority of the state governments.

'@TheChief'
"2) You've shown utter disgust and contempt for it. That view subscribe to one interpretation of the Constitution. I find it too broadly encompassing for safety's sake. I stand by my statement it's a matter best left to state legislative bodies."

Congratulations on being hypocrite of the year! You lambasted Jacob earlier on picking and choosing, and here we see that actually that is you!
Because you are very literally choosing to not regard the 14th Amendment because apparently its..."too broadly encompassing for safety's sake". Whatever the heck that means. The 14th Amendment is clear as day. No state can deny equal treatment under the law to its citizens.
Read it yourself.

"No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

Marriage is a legal status we as citizens of the US can gain through the government, a privilege that allows for certain benefits and useful applications under it. It doesn't even have to involve religion at all whatsoever, you can get legally married through paperwork and a state representative (justice of the peace). It doesn't mention gays? Well the funny thing is it doesn't mention anyone more specific than "persons born or naturalized in the United States". No mention of race, religion, sexuality, ethnicity or even gender.
If you find that super broad? Good. Obviously in certain circumstances and cases other laws come into effect and would bar dangerous people some of those rights, rights they lost under the law for crimes they will have been legally guilty of. Or for instance if that freedom in question is a violation of someone else's rights. Like say a pedophile and a child.
It is impossible to find an argument that excludes LGB people from that equation that isn't based in a strictly religious argument.

@TheChief 1) Yes you are, no one who actually treats gays like people supports them not having equal rights, just be open about being a bigot, it's less pathetic. I'm not defining their lives, they just want to limit my freedom to do something that doesn't impact them in any way. They can cling to their religious institutions, but their fairy tales don't get to dictate legal institutions that everyone else deals with, or let's them lord over people.
2) it's a piece of paper that can't even do the only noble thing it sets out to do, and I'm not even ignoring it, you are.

@Jacob 1) The fact that your kind can change the Constitution because it's "the right thing to do" means that anyone can do the same with that argument.
You get to freely choose what you support and why. That is your right. Anyone else can do the same, that is their right. If you oppose that, you're a hypocrite.
2) How am I ignoring it? You have shown nothing but contempt for it, except for when it seems to support your own political ends.

I am personally ambivalent as to whether or not your kind can marry, but I think it ought to be left up to the state legislatures.

'@TheChief'
Nothing was changed in the constitution. The constitution does not mention marriage at all. So I'd love to hear you explain how gay marriages being also recognized as legal marriages the same way as straight ones changes or violates anything at all in the constitution.
Equal rights however is mentioned in the 14th Amendment.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_Protection_Clause
This came up because of unequal treatment between blacks and whites during Reconstruction. The idea is pretty clearly that the law must apply equally regardless of demographic.

"All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

Denying access to a state service on a reasonless basis is very clearly in violation of this. And oh yes it most certainly singles out states, not the federal government alone.
Now if you'd like to dig up an amendment or passage in the constitution that defines the gender or sex or whatever of the couple getting married, I'm all ears.

@TheChief 1).Stop being opposed to people having equal rights and maybe they'll be more respectful towards your imaginary friends
2). Exactly, no one should be able to force their religion's laws into actual laws.

@Jacob 1) Stop trampling on the Constitution and Bill of Rights for your own convenience.
2) To do that you would first have to limit one's freedoms to a further degree than most religious laws would.

@TheChief 1) I'm not, the 14th amendment is supposed to grant everyone equal rights. Meanwhile it's not supposed to let religious fanatics trample on the rights of others. You right wing constitution worshippers are never even consistent.

2). Lots of religious laws call for stoning people to death for trivial shit, while I'm just saying don't force your religion's laws on everyone else. The difference is pretty obvious.

@Jacob
1) From your point of view, I suppose. From the point of view of others, equal rights does not enter the ken of redefining a religious institution.

2) SOME religious laws do. Many have nothing to do with capital punishment.

@TheChief 1) except marriage isn't just a religious institution. Christian/Muslim/Jewish/whateverism marriages are religious institutions. Marriage under the law isn't, it's a legal institution and all that was changed was the national legal definition of marriage. You can still cling to your retarded, homophobic little bull shit if you want to, I just don't have to suffer for it.

2) many still are repressive either way, and the ones that call for murder are reason enough for us not to let fanatics turn the U.S. into a theocracy.

@Jacob
1) I'm not clinging to it you ignorant little fuck I'm saying others do and you've no more right to define their lives than they do yours.

2) And in order to protect the United States you're willing to wholly ignore the very soul of it.

@TheChief Kid, you don't understand the constitution. Period. You understand your own prejudices and try to rationalize them as being in the constitution. The constitution does not work the way you think it does, nor has it ever. And no, I don't have to respect your opinions. You are entitled to your own opinions, but not your own facts. In your case you can't tell the difference. That's on you, not me, not Jacob or anyone else.

@Dorkymike So disagreeing with you about what the separation of power is, makes me a bigot?

@TheChief You are a bigot because you automatically took the police side in Ferguson without asking any questions about the police story OR the way the case was prosecuted. You are a bigot because you call black protesters hoodlums without realizing that much of the violence was police incited. You are a bigot because you make claims that "bigot" is just a card minorities play. There are no cards except the card card.

@Dorkymike I side with the officer because he was not proven guilty. There is no evidence to prove he was and there is plenty supporting his innocence. The very fact that he is a police officer should count for something and the fact that the man he killed was a criminal should serve even more.
The violence WASN'T police incited. It was caused by Black people paranoid about a white conspiracy against them, so deep-seated that they'll ignore any evidence of wrongdoing among their own ranks in favor of blaming the police.
I didn't claim it was "just" a card. I said libtards like you use it to force their opponents on the defense about open and shut cases like some gang-banger getting shot for assaulting an officer

@TheChief
" I side with the officer because he was not proven guilty. " He never went to trial. Why? Because the "prosecutor" aka the DA had his back.

"The very fact that he is a police officer should count for something and the fact that the man he killed was a criminal should serve even more."
No. This is not, nor was it ever how evidence works.

"The violence WASN'T police incited." I'll take the testimony of those who were there over your attempts at psychoanalysis any day. Sorry.

"libtards" You're done. Go back to kindergarten kid. It seems your education up to now has been useless.

'@Dorkymike'
This dude got angry when I mentioned the existence of the Preamble and Articles, and didn't seem to understand that they mattered in interpreting the Bill of Rights lol. Or he didn't know they existed. Its hilarious pretty much no matter what.

@sagas Right Wing bingo pretty much.

'@TheChief'
Name one way that non-gay peoples lives are defined or redefined or whatever by gay marriage being legalized.
In fact its the other way around, and its not only the other way around, its a total violation of religious freedom to deny gays legal marriage rights. There are religions, even sects of Christianity that before it was legalized were supportive of gay marriage. And any gay person who was in their own part religious and desired a wedding as recognized by the law like any other, was not allowed by law to be married under their own religious beliefs.
Lacking any actual argument of harm caused by relationships between two consenting adults, there is absolutely nothing to be said against it.
The only violation of liberty, religious or otherwise? Is the violation of defining a universal institution by the beliefs of specific religions and religious people, and not allowing equal treatment under the law of those same people even in cases of secular marriages through justices of the peace...or Vegas chapels.

You started out right in saying that its not against any rules to be influenced by a religion in pushing for things in US government. But of course as I said, you really are for going beyond that and defining law by certain religions. And the state can not recognize laws respecting a religious establishment. No one or even many religions may define the law of the land. Which is exactly what you are calling for and complaining about.

'@TheChief'
Marriage does not belong to any culture or religion. It is a ridiculously widespread practice that has popped up out of the human aether in countless societies. Acting like its the trademarked property of Christianity, let alone in your modern understanding of what it even is, is hilariously clueless.
It has already been redefined even in the Christian context, recently at that. Marriage was a method of economic and property negotiation, very much a business venture even as pertains to starting families. With the women being moved very much like property.
The modern idea of marriage as love between two adults calling their own shots and starting a family around that? A redefinition.

@TheChief opinions are one thing, forcing your fairy tale books laws into law merely because your book says so is another

@Jacob 1) Fuck you.
2) You can't limit one person's right to choose something without limiting everyone else's.

TheChief: *fangirls over the constitution*
TheChief: *defends letting religious people base policy off what a holy text says*

Uhhhhhh

@Jacob Go fuck yourself.
There is nothing in the Constitution which determines what people can and can't believe and why. The idea that it would is anathema to the very spirit of the Constitution.

@TheChief It's called the Virginia Statutes for religious freedom https://cas.umw.edu/clpr/files/2011/09/Jefferson-Statute-2-versions.pdf

@Irish Not even remotely related.

Yeah, wish it was that way in the US of A... I don't have anything against religious people, but I'm getting tired of explaining to people that "The Bible says..." isn't a fucking justification for lawmaking when the first rule on the primary law document of the countries specifies quite clearly that the government is not allowed to give a shit what the Bible or any other holy text says.

@star3catcher It certainly is a justification. No one can tell anyone else what determines their views.

'@TheChief'
Are you even Catholic lol.
lol at what is probably an Evangelical Christian using a pope avatar.
Maybe you're as clueless about religion as you are about the constitution.

@sagas Yes I'm Catholic.
How does that in ANY way indicate I'm not Catholic?
Fuck you. I know plenty about both.

'@TheChief'
Rare to see US Catholics talk like you do. Almost makes me question that you are one haha.
Like Catholics, even conservative ones (much like Mormons) are not the kind that is all comfortable with talking like "Yeah sure, pave over the country with our thing". Because there's a history there of being the attacked minority.
Naw, you sound like someone from one of those Protestant groups who super dominates some part of the US and doesn't ever stop to wonder why Church was kept separate from State. Because gosh everyone in my county worships just like me!

@sagas Talk like what? Tell me exactly what it is I do that is contradictory to my faith.
I don't believe I ever advocated abridging anyone's freedom of worship. If I'm wrong, please correct and cite as to where I said it.
I believe in separation of Church and State: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof". That is exactly and what Separation of Church and State means. It doesn't mean people can't advocate politics based on religious beliefs.
Everyone thinks their view is best, and my beliefs aren't going to affect that fact, so why should I let their beliefs affect mine?

'@TheChief'
Not so much the faith, as the demographic. Catholicism really comes down from the family, like most religions its really culturally rooted. Most Protestant and Sunni sects are significantly less like this, especially the younger and more recruiting obsessed forms.
So yeah, there's certain things outside even of the religion that sound "Catholic" or not to me.

"It doesn't mean people can't advocate politics based on religious beliefs. "

I'm not talking about your comments here, but comments you've made elsewhere on the site.

"It doesn't mean people can't advocate politics based on religious beliefs. "

Also this isn't quite right. Religion can be your inspiration, but when it comes down to things like government court cases and things like that? Your arguments can't come down to religious beleif as the justification against something, unless its defense of your own habits (and even that is quite conditional).
One of the reasons the people arguing against gay marriage in federal courts were doomed was because they had to dance around religious justifications against gay marriage and try to make an actual argument without it. This proved quite hard.

@sagas Which ones? My opposition to illegal immigration is more a matter of looking out for my own country than any religious thing.

There is no "can" or "can't" in matters of belief. People will believe what they believe regardless of what anyone else thinks, as is their right. What I think you mean is they can't make a decent argument based solely on religious principals, which is true.

'@TheChief'
You've said statements fast and loose on separating church and state before. For instance something along the lines of America becoming a theocracy being fine if "the people wanted it".

@sagas I didn't say it would be "fine". I stated that if the people want something, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are quickly forgotten. A theocracy was just a potential example of that.

102 isn't that much, compared to other poll's, but anyways. still funny, watching america's reaction! XD

@a_norwegian_guy

I was going to say, that's a very small survey group, and not likely a diverse one; for example, 102 students all from one college campus surveyed in one afternoon?

This comment section is pretty heated, and i think that everyone should read the Virginia Statutes for Religious Freedom https://cas.umw.edu/clpr/files/2011/09/Jefferson-Statute-2-versions.pdf

@Irish 1) Nobody is advocating for the establishment of a national religion, which is the only thing that those statutes are related to.
2) Those aren't even in the Constitution, so they have no bearing on Americans, let alone the whole rest of the fucking world.

And yet a large proportion of Icelanders believe in Elves.
Which proves G.K. Chesterton's observation that when you don't believe in God, you don't believe in nothing, -- you believe in anything.

@Danelaw
I hope you'll appreciate that all the people I know that believe in elves are between 45 and 80 and are also Christian or pagan. The belief in elves seems to connect with these two religions for some reason.

@TheChief where did I say that

@Jacob That was the obvious implication of criticizing my rightful reverence towards the Constitution and my defense of religious folks' right to their opinions.

'@TheChief'
You don't understand how the constitution works though. As I recall you seemed to only think it was a list of amendments lol.

How many youngsters are there in Iceland? If the whole population is a little over 300'000, then 102 youngsters is actually quite a big part of all young icelanders.

Indeed it is... that's why 102 is enough (and anyway, no baby will say they believe ANYTHING about the world. They can't even talk yet). I rather doubt a toddler would understand what "believe" means and is too busy trying to learn what the world is and how it works by experimenting to wonder about origins as is...

@Suominoita Actually the population size doesn't matter for sample size. Generally, 42 is the absolute rock-bottom bare minimum which requires special techniques to deal with. 100 isn't that much either.

@Monty688 Of course the population size matters. Survey people who belong to group X, you may only take 10 if only 10 people belong to said group in the first place. It's 100% coverage.

Taking 1000 of 6 000 000 or 100 of 600 000 has the same ratio. Also, that was all that were answered of that age-group. It's likely that they did send more requests (say 1000), but only those 102 answered.

religion is for weenies

'@Willowthecollie' What a compelling argument.

@palestine_yazan
hey, thanks man

'@TheChief' hi , are you associated with the kennedy family in any way , shape , or form ?

@Raimondas No and (though I know I probably won't like the answer I must ask) why?

'@TheChief' you are very paranoid it seem , maybe you are related to nixon in actuality ?

@Raimondas Hah hah. Why do you ask?