Plucky

Fair? Yes, I'm afraid I think so. I grew up in South Africa and moved to the UK 6 years ago, and two differences have been apparent to me since; There's always a pub nearby ... or three, and drinking usually seems to be a rush to get your evening's worth before the closing time (although this doesn't apply everywhere anymore I believe). - Citizen of the World -

I personally care for two reasons: 1 - A lot of 'God-botherers' (as my Grandmother used to call over-enthusiastic christians) feel it's their duty to save\convert\enlighten the rest of us. This interrupts my life. If it didn't, I wouldn't care. 2 - Many people are dying every day (Palestine is the first example that comes to mind) which might not be as bad if people hadn't based so much of their lives on their Religion (both sides, in this example). This makes me feel sad, angry, helpless, frustrated. Feelings I wish I didn't feel as much whenever I read the news. Therefore I care what some people believe, because it sometimes affects me, and many others negatively.

Yours is still relevant - two generations back. I'm guessing you probably have memories of hearing first-hand stories of Sweden, from before your recent ancestors moved to the US. Traditions that started with the immigrants, as in your case, is fine, but claiming some heritage all of a sudden after a few hundred years .. and sticking an 'African' sticker on the American celebrators .. I'm sticking with silly. Africa is a very big place .. with very many countries, all with diffierent cultures and traditions. These foreigners saying they're a part of the continent, generally, is true, we all are. Not just those with darker complexions. They're simply not African, or we all are. - Citizen of the World -

I'm with you there. How many years or generations back can you go to claim some sort of heritage? I was born in Africa from European immigrants (3 generations back) - does that make me a 'European African', and should I celebrate that if I had never set foot in Europe? I'm white, but I'm much more of an African than any black American who's never set foot in Africa. I've lived it, and am familiar with it's ways. Kwanzaa, as something associated with 'being' African in some way, for born Americans is just silly. If you go back far enough, we're all Africans anyway. Where's the line? 200 years? 400? Let's see, in the last 200 years, my ancestors came from Norway, Netherlands and England (mostly) .. I'm going to start wearing a viking hat, clogs and a cravat at christmas from now on. - Citizen of the World -

I agree, as that person had chosen that country above another to live in, so I don't know what you're referring to? - Citizen of the World -

In another thread, it was mentioned that any discrimination against someone because of something they did not choose, is wrong. For example race, gender, appearance, physical ability, country of birth ... this makes sense. It was also said that based on the same principle, we have no right to be proud of anything ourselves, where we had no choice in the matter. The same list above applies here too, race, gender, country of birth, etc. ... this also makes sense. You did nothing to make yourself that way, so cannot rightly be proud of it. So what's with all the patriotism? What is it about the current political borders we happened to be born within, that we feel have the right to be personally proud of? What makes our fellow citizens more important to protect or be proud of than people who were born in countries other than ours? I mean, patriotism is blatantly exploited In all countries, yours is not exempt. It forms the backbone of propaganda. Again, your country, wherever you are, is not exempt from this. Patriotic propaganda plays a big part in winning support for wars and other decisions that affect others adversely. Would our world be more peaceful, tolerant and less xenophobic if we were all simply less patriotic? After all, our country of birth isn't anything we chose, and unless we've lived amongst the locals of every other (200+) country how dare we say ours is 'better' in any way? - Citizen of the World -

Was anyone else's first thought "Hear no evil, see no evil" with Richard Pryor and Gene Wilder? - Citizen of the World -

Ok, I'll concede that I'm naive on this matter, so please tell me the whole story? My naive opinion is that people who were living in what is now Israel's borders, were forced out of their homes and hometowns by Israel. I.e. an invasion, who then effectively enforced a form of apartheid. Is this wrong? Or are you simply saying that the locals felt that they were forced into terrorist actions .. killing people .. simply because they didn't get on with their new neighbours? I mean, surely there's more to this than "Israel existed and they didn't like it" - Citizen of the World -

Ok, so then what were the reasons for the 'cross-border terrorism'? And has anything been done to help solve their issues since? - Citizen of the World -

How about "If Lebanon wasn't invaded and occupied for decades by Israel, Hezbollah probably wouldn't even exist"? You can't simply sum up the situation from only the most recent actions, or only the actions reported by pro-Israeli sources. It goes much further back than either of our statements above. - Citizen of the World -

I'm with you (for a change today ) - it's fine to do things just for ourselves. As long as we're not doing something that will probably harm others, or take something away from them, for our benefit. - Citizen of the World -

Not always, I always imagined I'd be a dad, and looked forward to it, I love my nephew and my two other godchildren to bits. I decided though, that if I were honest about what good it would do to a small group of people emotionally (my family), compared with how much global bad it could add to, affecting many, many people ... it wasn't a hard decision to make. Depends on your idea of 'right' and 'wrong'. To me, it's wrong to add another person (and all their offspring) to this resource-stretched world, especially in the western world, where each person's environmental 'footprint' is huge. How? My interpretation would be 'productive addition to my country's economy' ? How long will that last when humanity have sucked this world dry? Yes, more people = more brains = bigger corporations = faster developing technology = potential to fix our mistakes in time, but I'm not losing anything by playing it 'safe'. - Citizen of the World -

I don't think you'll find any of my posts (even the bits I edited out) were slamming US gun laws or culture. My original post was about a person resident in a non-UK country, commenting on how UK residents feel about their safety. Careful what you imply, please. - Citizen of the World -

True enough. Funny though, that if one is adding to the global destruction of our world, and ultimately the human race by adding to the over-balanced human population, isn't one also being selfish for having kids? Seriously, other than satisfying one's natural maternal\paternal instincts, what good are we doing for anyone else by reproducing? - Citizen of the World -

Oh, I see, so this is a revenge thread? "Someone posted something I didn't like about my country, so I'll post something bad about theirs" Got it. - Citizen of the World -