Posted by pancho (64.168.25.158) on February 09, 2002 at 22:35:41:
In Reply to: Re: Like I Said... posted by Jeff on February 09, 2002 at 21:55:10:
Never mind that...where the hell you been? Is this any time to start dating...at your age fer chrissakes? Who is she and why...and what did you do and how and how often?
I don't think they banned Raman...that would be a little too much, even for them. I think Raman was really thoughtful and genuine in the discussions we had. I respected his resiliance and ability to come back again and again...and of course he made many excellent points.
I felt badly for him when his father died in that car accident. Even there we got to see what these Beastmasters are made of...when I saw the post Firas put up asking us all to "pray for his sole"...I just had to write and suggest the proper spelling...as well as express my sadness at his tragic loss. Firas changed the spelling, and deleted my post. When they decide you have to be "bad" they labor at it mightily and unfairly too....but guess who they slime the most.
I don't want to see people agree with me...I want people to be able to accept a challenge...I want to know that when the time comes and they are on their own somewhere in a jungle of Wit facing all sorts of perils, that they don't fold up and crumple.
Raman is a tough cookie, that's for sure. I think Andreas scared him a bit with the last hostile challenge he posed to his beliefs. Raman has seen what these guys can do...they fight dirty. He is married and has at least one young child. From my own experience I know our women are not too happy with the image of us as "warriors". It's one thing for Uncle Sam to call you in and tell you that miserable peasant in the hut that sits atop a manganese deposit is an enemy of yours that needs killing, as do his wife and children. That will make a hero of you and the wife and kids back home will cheer you.
But to elect yourself a soldier of sorts and begin this long weary campaign when no one asked you to and everyone and their brother is trying to get you to stop it...seem like willful self destructiveness or callow indifference to the pain and suffering these people will visit on your family and children.
For most people all it takes is for Fred Aprim to hint that if you don't stop challenging him and his make-believe "facts"...he will tell everyone the "truth" about how you treat your children...and they are gone...leaving "hero" and scholar Fred an open field. Calling our brave women who write "whores" and spreading innuendos about their chastity and so on, is another good tactic. These things have always worked in the past...as witness the Gassman. What a brave spectacle we make...running in fear of rumors and hints...may the day never come when an Assyrian has to do anything significant AS AN ASSYRIAN!
That's one reason I came on the way I did...flying fucks and all...to let these weasley bastards know that I was more than a match for them...could take whetver they said about me and my family...as any soldier risks making a widow and orphans out of his when he goes into battle against that poor peasant and murders him in cold blood for the Coca Cola Corporation or United Fruit or AT&T. If he can do his part...I can do mine. I will never be a hero to my family though...you can't expect that, because no one understands that Ashur's call is far more compelling than Uncle Sam's. To this Assyrian anyway.