The EU awarded the Nobel peace prize

[gaggedLouise]

The EU winning the Nobel peace prize?? - wow, the Norwegian Nobel committe has really lost it! Or bought into somebody's bureaucrat festive rethoric, bought it hook, line and sinker. Give me a few instances where the European Union has been an active, vital force for peace or even assisting some conflict-ridden society in a powerful, honest way in the last twenty years, please...the time when it has actually been called a union.

Awarded now, it pretty much looks like a medal of honour to the European Central Bank and to some facets of the handling of the financial/banking/recession crisis. Okay, the committee head Thorbjörn Jagland stressed some other things (Croatia and Montenegro have been accepted for membership! Hooray! *puts ten champagne bottles in the ice bowler*) but mostly he was rehashing standard EU saviour rethoric (yeah, just hearing the grand old man of the Christian Democrat party here sayting "The EU has become the most powerful peace factor for current humanity (---) we as politicians are not doing enough to explain to people just how wondrous the EU is")

This is even worse than when they awarded Obama after less than one year in office. I'm a supporter of Obama and of some sides of the European community project - as an interstate thing, though not a federalist, supra-state ambition, a "United States of Europe" - but not a blindly uncritical supporter.

[Vekseid]

I thought Norway wasn't part of the EU?

Sort of smacks of internal Norwegian politics getting in the way.

[gaggedLouise]

I thought Norway wasn't part of the EU?

Sort of smacks of internal Norwegian politics getting in the way.

Tell me about it. ;) And I wonder what they're thinking in Greece and Spain - or in some countries of eastern Europe. Even around here and in Norway (next door, you know) there's going to be a flood of sarcastic comment about this on the lines of "Are you ***king kidding me?" or "Are they going to get the prize money in euros or in dollars? and who, personally, is going to pocket that dough?")

[Teo Torriatte]

Isn't the whole euro experiment, like... failing?!?...

[Stattick]

And I thought it was weird when they gave Obama the peace prize.

[Tamhansen]

No one is. As a political entity the EU cannot accept the money other than as part of their budget.

The Nobel committee might not always pick the best choice, but the choice has a proper foundation. In the last decade the European Union has tried, although not always successfully to promote the idea of peace. The EU has not only prevented war in it's own borders since it's inception at the treaty of Rome in 1957, albeit under a different name, which has made it the longest peaceful period in Western Europe since the Roman Empire, but it has also been instrumental in the due escalation of many conflicts around the world. Though they were not successful in every attempt.

Also the EU has been the biggest supporter of the world court, where countries can settle their disputes in a court of law instead of the field of battle. And it has been the most staunch supporter of the ICC which seeks to bring to justice to criminals of war.

Now, is the EU the perfect example of peace no. But as a separate entity it is doing its utter best. Unfortunately, the individual national governments are screwing things up.

[Hemingway]

I thought Norway wasn't part of the EU?

Sort of smacks of internal Norwegian politics getting in the way.

Norway is still part of the EEA, which essentially means Norway is part of the EU, is permitted to participate in the internal market of the EU and is obligated to adopt its legislation. What exactly Norway would stand to gain by awarding the peace prize to the EU is unclear to me.

To claim that this is totally unprecedented is ahistorical. The EU has, since it's very beginning, been a peace project. Europe, even today, is a volatile place. It was a volatile place at the breakup of the Soviet Union. I think the EU must get some credit for keeping Europe relatively peaceful for some 60 years, since the formation of the European Coal and Steel Community.

There may be better choices for the Peace Prize. I wouldn't really know. Is it better than when they gave it to Obama? There's absolutely no doubt about it. At that time, the Norwegian Nobel Committee was criticized for awarding the prize based on what was called an expanded definition of peace. This was also the case with the IPCC and Al Gore. I think these were seen as encouraging peace in a very vague sense. Now they've given it to an organization which has promoted peace in that very narrow sense of trying to prevent war, and they're being criticized for that as well.

I don't care very passionately about the Peace Prize, and I have no love for the EU, but I still think there's something to be said for this prize.

[OldSchoolGamer]

They should have given it to the brave 14 year old girl who stood up to the Muslims in Pakistan and demanded girls have the right to get an education.

http://news.yahoo.com/conversations-malala-yousafzai-girl-stood-taliban-133500248.html

[ShadowFox89]

They should have given it to the brave 14 year old girl who stood up to the Muslims in Pakistan and demanded girls have the right to get an education.

http://news.yahoo.com/conversations-malala-yousafzai-girl-stood-taliban-133500248.html

But she's Islamic! And Muslims are the new Communists!

Yeah, they should have, but politics sucks like that.

[Vekseid]

They award can't be made to the deceased.

[Tamhansen]

But she's Islamic! And Muslims are the new Communists!

Yeah, they should have, but politics sucks like that.

I don't get that point really. About communism. Remember, even Stalin was nominated for the award on two seperate occassions.

And Vekseid is also correct. Since 1976 the prize can no longer be awarded to the deceased, unless of course they die after the decission has been made public

[ShadowFox89]

 But.. she's still alive... barely, but still. Unless I missed some news in the past few hours...

[gaggedLouise]

They award can't be made to the deceased.

The prize for literature has been given to a recently dead writer once or twice, but that was long, long ago.

[Sabre]

They should have given it to the brave 14 year old girl who stood up to the Muslims in Pakistan and demanded girls have the right to get an education.

http://news.yahoo.com/conversations-malala-yousafzai-girl-stood-taliban-133500248.html

Don't you mean stood up to the Taliban?

[Oniya]

But.. she's still alive... barely, but still. Unless I missed some news in the past few hours...

Last I heard, she was in critical condition, but the doctors have removed the bullets from her head.  I may be wrong, but I think there's a nomination deadline for each year's Nobel Prize - if so, she might have missed qualifying, just due to the recency of the event.

[Callie Del Noire]

Last I heard, she was in critical condition, but the doctors have removed the bullets from her head.  I may be wrong, but I think there's a nomination deadline for each year's Nobel Prize - if so, she might have missed qualifying, just due to the recency of the event.

F-ing cowards with guns. Shooting a 13 year old for having a spine.

[yobo]

I have to admit I didn't see this one coming, and I'm still not sure that it was a good decision to give to the EU, especially the timing with the crisis makes it appear a tad political. I haven't gotten around to read the speech or anything else to see how they argued for EU winning the prize, just that they had been working towards a peaceful Europe for the last six decades on the radio.

That being said, one of the reasons the forerunner for the EU of today was founded was to make a new big war in Europe as unlikely as possible. And if we look at the six decades before its foundation, compared to the six after, Europe has been a lot more peaceful (if this is EU's credit or not is another discussion). And as Hemingway points out, EU has been a peace project since the beginning.

[OldSchoolGamer]

Don't you mean stood up to the Taliban?

"No true Muslim..."

[OldSchoolGamer]

Maybe the Pakistani girl didn't get in under the wire, but I'd still like to see the prize go to something other than a big, bloated bureaucracy.  Governments are doing something between "little" and "diddly-squat" to solve the world's problems these days.

[Callie Del Noire]

"No true Muslim..."

What? Are you infering that a girl who clearly understood the principals of behind the Pillars of Faith wasn't a true and faithful follower of Islam? Just because she didn't take the outlooks that some thugs with guns ascribed to elements that were added after the Koran was already established?

Or were you being snarky to the Taliban's claim to being 'true men of faith'? (I notice few of the fanatics with guns actually BUILD anything after they win.. they like to shoot folks too much)

[Vekseid]

"No true Muslim..."

Our entire problem with extremists is no one stands up to them. One girl does, gets shot for her efforts, and you mock her sacrifice with crap like this.

It isn't appreciated.

[OldSchoolGamer]

Our entire problem with extremists is no one stands up to them. One girl does, gets shot for her efforts, and you mock her sacrifice with crap like this.

It isn't appreciated.

Oh, I wasn't mocking the girl.  I wouldn't have lamented her not getting a Nobel Prize if that had been my intention.  She deserved the Nobel Peace Prize and a dozen other awards too.

No, I'm mocking those who always pull a "no true Scotsman" whenever one of Islam's many many antisocial and misogynistic acts are pointed out.  The Muslims who shoot a young girl in the face aren't real Muslims.  The Muslim who crash airplanes into buildings aren't "real" Muslims.  The Muslims who gang-rape African women in southern Sudan and break their legs while mocking them for having no God aren't "true" Muslims.  The alphabet soup of terrorist groups the world over aren't "true" Muslims.  The Muslims killing people and blowing things up in (fill in the blank with any one of dozens of countries on three continents) aren't "true" Muslims.  Etc., etc., etc.

[Stattick]

Oh, I wasn't mocking the girl.  I wouldn't have lamented her not getting a Nobel Prize if that had been my intention.  She deserved the Nobel Peace Prize and a dozen other awards too.

No, I'm mocking those who always pull a "no true Scotsman" whenever one of Islam's many many antisocial and misogynistic acts are pointed out.  The Muslims who shoot a young girl in the face aren't real Muslims.  The Muslim who crash airplanes into buildings aren't "real" Muslims.  The Muslims who gang-rape African women in southern Sudan and break their legs while mocking them for having no God aren't "true" Muslims.  The alphabet soup of terrorist groups the world over aren't "true" Muslims.  The Muslims killing people and blowing things up in (fill in the blank with any one of dozens of countries on three continents) aren't "true" Muslims.  Etc., etc., etc.

What about Christians? What about the Christian Identity sects that lynch people of color, and burn black churches? Are you saying that all Christians everywhere are responsible for the actions of a few crazies?

[Sabre]

No one has pulled a 'No true Scotsman' here.  If there is an example here, it's as follows:

A: She stood up to the Muslims in Pakistan.
B: Most people including the girl in Pakistan are Muslim, who have widely denounced the act.
C: She stood up to the true Muslims in Pakistan.

Calling the Taliban the Taliban is not a fallacy.  This is what they are.  This is what they call themselves, Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan.

Oh, I wasn't mocking the girl.
...
No, I'm mocking those who always pull a "no true Scotsman" whenever one of Islam's many many antisocial and misogynistic acts are pointed out.

Yet sadly you did as Malala was in fact one of these people who don't accept what the Taliban did as Islam.

[OldSchoolGamer]

What about Christians? What about the Christian Identity sects that lynch people of color, and burn black churches? Are you saying that all Christians everywhere are responsible for the actions of a few crazies?

I'm saying when the "crazies" get widespread enough to kill people around the world, on an ongoing basis, you've got to wonder what kind of religion produced them.  Any sample of humanity will have deviants and psychopaths, but with Islam it's off the friggin' chart.

[Stattick]

I'm saying when the "crazies" get widespread enough to kill people around the world, on an ongoing basis, you've got to wonder what kind of religion produced them.  Any sample of humanity will have deviants and psychopaths, but with Islam it's off the friggin' chart.

I think a lot of it has to do with the crushing poverty that much of the Muslim world is facing, and the really fucked up politics that are left over from European and American colonialism. It wasn't until after WWII was over that most of the Middle East gained independence from colonial powers, and when we drew the current map of the Middle East, we went out of our way to draw the map in such a way as to leave countries in internal turmoil and external problems, to keep the Muslim world divided against itself. So, most of the Middle East has been under its own rule for less than a century, while all the world powers use the Middle East as a chessboard for proxy wars and to get rich.  In those conditions, it should be no surprise that they have a major problem with the world powers, and there is no shortage of young men with no money, future, or hope that can be turned into jihadis. The problems in the Middle East and with Islam are mostly problems that we created.

[OldSchoolGamer]

I think a lot of it has to do with the crushing poverty that much of the Muslim world is facing, and the really fucked up politics that are left over from European and American colonialism. It wasn't until after WWII was over that most of the Middle East gained independence from colonial powers, and when we drew the current map of the Middle East, we went out of our way to draw the map in such a way as to leave countries in internal turmoil and external problems, to keep the Muslim world divided against itself. So, most of the Middle East has been under its own rule for less than a century, while all the world powers use the Middle East as a chessboard for proxy wars and to get rich.  In those conditions, it should be no surprise that they have a major problem with the world powers, and there is no shortage of young men with no money, future, or hope that can be turned into jihadis. The problems in the Middle East and with Islam are mostly problems that we created.

Sorry, you can peddle that if you want, but I'm not buying.  I don't know why so many people are just itching to exonerate Islam no matter what it does.  You don't hear people excusing the Holocaust because economic conditions in the Weimar Republic were harsh, or the Inquisition because, well, "people just didn't know any better."  Muslim imams could start the day by dropping a hundred Christian and Jewish babies onto spikes, and liberals would still make excuses for them. 

And while you're at it, please tell me what these people did to deserve Islam's wrath...what happened to them really isn't that terribly far from the babies-on-spikes scenario I described.
http://www.villagevoice.com/2001-02-06/news/gang-rape-in-sudan/

And for the record, I still would have liked to see the Pakistani girl get the Nobel.  Might encourage that part of the world to grow the fuck up, stop making excuses, and enter at least the 20th century.

[Callie Del Noire]

Sorry, you can peddle that if you want, but I'm not buying.  I don't know why so many people are just itching to exonerate Islam no matter what it does.  You don't hear people excusing the Holocaust because economic conditions in the Weimar Republic were harsh, or the Inquisition because, well, "people just didn't know any better."  Muslim imams could start the day by dropping a hundred Christian and Jewish babies onto spikes, and liberals would still make excuses for them. 

And while you're at it, please tell me what these people did to deserve Islam's wrath...what happened to them really isn't that terribly far from the babies-on-spikes scenario I described.
http://www.villagevoice.com/2001-02-06/news/gang-rape-in-sudan/

And for the record, I still would have liked to see the Pakistani girl get the Nobel.  Might encourage that part of the world to grow the fuck up, stop making excuses, and enter at least the 20th century.

So do I condemn the Roman Catholic church for the Provosional IRA (and more radical Irish groups) bombing Protestant schools, and/or killing mixed religion couples. Or the massive amounts of fraud and molestation a bunch of priests in the faith conducted.

The conduct of a faith isn't in the measure of the most radical segment that gets the media attention. It is folks like the bus driver I did 2 shore patrol rotations with on my last cruise, or the tour guides in Dubai, Bahrain, and Thailand took me around to see stuff. Or the cab driver in Dubai who didn't charge me for a five block trip to collect a friend. Or the three Muslims I served with in A-school. Or the two guys and their families I know back home in the Carolinas or the woman who is raising her kid her in the US I know in my class.

You talk a lot about the media blitzes but you are perfectly wiling to buy into the image they are selling. I've known Muslims from Spain to Malaysia, Australia and here in the US. There are very few that dress like Bin Laden did in his ads and everyone that I've been around and talked to carries the shame of that man and his ilk on his or her shoulders. It's about as fucking fair as branding every German and Austrian with the specter of Adolf Hitler.

And how do you define the atrocities of men like Stalin..who quietly did at LEAST as much as Hitler did when it came to kililng anyone who crossed him.

Or if you want to throw out 3rd world atrocities.. which religous group do you blame for the .. FIFTY years of atrocies that have been going on in Burmha/Myamar?

[Sabre]

Sorry, you can peddle that if you want, but I'm not buying.

The question then is why.  Is there some fault with the logic presented?  A gap in the theory that isn't explained?  Or is it simply answering a question you didn't want to answer.

I don't know why so many people are just itching to exonerate Islam no matter what it does.  You don't hear people excusing the Holocaust because economic conditions in the Weimar Republic were harsh, or the Inquisition because, well, "people just didn't know any better."  Muslim imams could start the day by dropping a hundred Christian and Jewish babies onto spikes, and liberals would still make excuses for them. 

Maybe because the ire in this question is built on a pile of premises: that it was Islam, its tenants, its laws, and its supposed uniqueness, that did these crimes and not the people holding the gun - that the person who shot Malala in the head had no moral agency of his own, and that behind his mask there isn't a human face but a Quran.  This is the exact same sort of asinine and shallow reasoning that your so-called liberal counterparts are using if they place blame on the consequences of white imperialism.  Only instead we're now placing blame on the consequences of Islamic fanaticism or fundamentalism.

This is all seriously off topic but in lieu of this conversation moving to a different thread I'll say this much.  An explanation is not an exoneration.  Nor an excuse.  Nor a justification.  We do explain how Hitler came to power, and how antisemitism in Germany was prevalent because of the conditions in the Weimar Republic.  We also explain the Inquisition and the societal and church reforms that created it.  These aren't excuses.  These are explanations meant to humanize and understand why a person can do the things someone else who did not grow up or experience the same hardships could.  But the crime remains criminal.  The difference, however, between this and that, is that no one but anti-nationalists or anti-Catholics decide to put blame on the concept and theory of German Nationalism or Roman Catholicism.  If a German girl in 1938 is shot in the head by fanatical Nazi party members for speaking out against the party, no one expects someone saying 'that girl stood up to the Germans' to make sense, nor find it hard to swallow that someone correcting them by saying 'don't you mean stood up to the Nazis?' is then a No true Scotsman attempt to exonerate Germans or German nationalism.  The problem is Muslim imams aren't dropping Christian and Jewish babies on spikes every morning, but people are still making excuses on why 'they're not really Muslim' based on anecdotes from a smaller percentage of Muslims in the world.

And while you're at it, please tell me what these people did to deserve Islam's wrath...what happened to them really isn't that terribly far from the babies-on-spikes scenario I described.
http://www.villagevoice.com/2001-02-06/news/gang-rape-in-sudan/

Why don't you start by telling us why we should accept the premise that these people are experiencing 'Islam's wrath' versus the more sane observation that Northern Sudanese Arabs are ethnically cleansing, raping, enslaving, and executing non-Arab blacks?  Because the North Sudanese government is a military junta that posits itself as an Islamic government?  I suppose that makes sense, and also why this same government did the same exact thing to the west Sudanese people in Darfur - killing, raping, enslaving and executing non-Arab blacks - not five years ago.

Except the Darfur region, including the people being gang raped and enslaved in the exact same fashion with the same exact perpetrators involved using the same tactics, is predominantly Muslim.

'Islam's wrath' indeed.

And for the record, I still would have liked to see the Pakistani girl get the Nobel.  Might encourage that part of the world to grow the fuck up, stop making excuses, and enter at least the 20th century.

Funny, since Pakistan already awarded her their National Youth Peace Prize last year, and renamed it in her honor after her shooting.  But I guess that's also just 'making excuses.'

[Tamhansen]

I don't know why so many people are just itching to exonerate Islam no matter what it does.  You don't hear people excusing the Holocaust because economic conditions in the Weimar Republic were harsh, or the Inquisition because, well, "people just didn't know any better."  Muslim imams could start the day by dropping a hundred Christian and Jewish babies onto spikes, and liberals would still make excuses for them. 

And while you're at it, please tell me what these people did to deserve Islam's wrath...what happened to them really isn't that terribly far from the babies-on-spikes scenario I described.
http://www.villagevoice.com/2001-02-06/news/gang-rape-in-sudan/

Actually I hear both of those a lot, but that's beside the point. I mean how many times do we really condemn what the British and french did when they colonised the area, or how the Israeli government is turning the Gaza strip into a virtual prison camp?  Basically there are monsters in any denomination. Both Hitler and Mussolini were Christians. devout Catholics even. Does that mean the holocaust was Christianity's wrath? Stalin was raised orthodox, were the Gulags also Christianity's doing? Pol Pot  was a buddhist, Mao zedong confusianist.

The main problem is people like you calling this "Islamic' it's not. Islam, although having rather violent tennets would not accept any of this. These are people that have no morals and are not following their faith. But by calling it 'islamic' you are alienating the proper Allah fearing muslims who will get a damned if we do, damned if we don't attitude.

You wanna raise your voice against these atrocities? Then thank you, I love yyou for it. But call a spade a spade and out these people for what they are. Soulless monsters, goading on thousands of conformistic peasants

And for the record, I still would have liked to see the Pakistani girl get the Nobel.  Might encourage that part of the world to grow the fuck up, stop making excuses, and enter at least the 20th century.

you do know that the twentieth century is still more than 400 years off on the Arabic calendar? :P 
Sewriously, no it wouldn't. Giving her the peace prize would solve nothing. helping and encouraging others to stand u as well. Being constructive in your critisism, respecting the fact these are people with feelings, and not just bash them with your completely unwarranted moral high ground that will help.

Until we as Americans stop our own soldiers from degrading prisoners, sexually assaulting women and girls, urinating on holy texts and using 14 year olds as target practice, we cannot take moral high ground with any one.