The Frogs

[Cyrus]

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I really don't know much about Le Pen.

[/ QUOTE ] Which is why I am bringing a few facts about the man to your attention. Your admiration for Taki should be tempered.

Le Pen quote, August 31st 1996 : ""Yes, I do believe in the inequality of races! Olympic games show clearly inequalities between the back and white races concerning, for example, athletes, and runners in particular. It’s a fact. [...] I’m stating what I see. [...] Egalitarianism is simply absurd." Et moi je dis, vas the faire enculer, pièce d' emmerdeur.

Fools such as li'l zipo here (who tries hard to be irrelevant again) will ignore to their detriment the significance of European neo-facists such as Le Pen and his numerous followers in France, people who attack Muslims one night - and paint swastikas in Jewish cemeteries the next.


But perhaps some of the folks here will probably find a lot of common ground with Taki (or Le Pen) in their attitudes towards "towel heads" and "camel jockeys"...


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Those who would squelch free speech and debate (as Le Pen was effectively squelched in France) seem to me at least as guilty of such things [as fascism].

[/ QUOTE ] This is correct, despite being a gross exaggeration. (Fascism is alotgether a very different thing. I cringe whenever Bush is accused of being a fascist.) For what it's worth, I believe that freedom of speech is essential in a democracy, whether it's the speech (expression and dissemination of ideas) of neo-fascists like Le Pen, Holocaust deniers like Faurisson, German neo-Nazis, etc etc. Europe is lagging way behind the United States in this respect.

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Is it possible that Le Pen might actually have a point, and that the cumulative effect of years of unbridled immigration of poor unskilled North Africans and Algerians is actually harming the country?

[/ QUOTE ] Yes, in my opinion Le Pen is correct in that aspect -- but there are many other politicians, who happen to be more mainstream than that neo-fascist, who are arguing against totally free immigration and are making their case with more intelligence, less inflaming rhetoric, none of the supremacist ideology and more constructive proposals. Le Pen has effectively sabotaged the public dialogue necessary for France to find a way ahead on the issue of immigration.

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Besides, Taki sure knows how to write a column.

[/ QUOTE ] I already told you : Taki's writing is his saving grace. He is a true son of a bitch otherwise.


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P.S. to Zeno. Sorry if this has diverged from the light intent of the thread.

[/ QUOTE ] You could atone by providing a joke that's better than the Zeno ear-clapper. [img]/images/graemlins/cool.gif[/img]

[vulturesrow]

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I already told you : Taki's writing is his saving grace. He is a true son of a bitch otherwise.

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Well said. The man can turn a phrase but some of the things I have read by him are downright nauseating.

[MMMMMM]

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I really don't know much about Le Pen.

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Which is why I am bringing a few facts about the man to your attention. Your admiration for Taki should be tempered.

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What makes you think my appreciation of his columns is an untempered admiration of every thing he writes, or everything about him or who he likes? Didn't I make it clear from a previous thread that there are things one may agree or disagree with in Taki's columns? Is a standard for writers that we now must agree with ALL of their views, and admire ALL whom they admire--or if not, shun them entirely?

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Le Pen quote, August 31st 1996 : ""Yes, I do believe in the inequality of races! Olympic games show clearly inequalities between the back and white races concerning, for example, athletes, and runners in particular.

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Cyrus are you claiming that whites are the athletic equivalent of blacks, on average? Got anything to back up that assertion? Ever look up top running records in recent years? Blacks dominate the highest levels of the sport of running even more so than they dominate the sport of basketball.

Obviously there are actual physical differences between the races. However, equality of rights should be the most important guiding principle. Equality of rights however does not imply, nor does it even have anything to do with, matters of actual physical qualities.

Now, IF Le Pen further asserts that blacks are inherently mentally inferior (does he actually claim that? I don't know if he does or not), I'd say that is a baseless and troublesome statement. However, that has no bearing on whether Taki writes a good column or makes some good points of his own. And I don't have to like every person a columnist likes, in order to appreciate their columns. Nor should you.

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You could atone by providing a joke that's better than the Zeno ear-clapper.

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Well it's an old one by now, well-known to grizzled veterans of this forum, but for everyone else, check out this link:

French Military Workout

[Cyrus]

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It's an old one by now, well-known to grizzled veterans of this forum, but for everyone else, check out this link:

French Military Workout

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I'm a grizzled veteran of Monty Python's Flying Circus and I think this clip is taken from one of their skits. It's not originally an anti-French joke. Some web guy probably posted it up as such.

And the limp-wrist "joke" is a little tired.

[InchoateHand]

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Obviously there are actual physical differences between the races.

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Care to back that up? Please give me a biological definition of "race" to begin with. Good luck finding one.

[MMMMMM]

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Obviously there are actual physical differences between the races.

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Care to back that up?

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Uh, let's see... blacks have darker skin, whites have lighter skin, Asians have yellower skin; blacks have curlier hair, and are more prone to high blood pressure...OBVIOUSLY, these are physical differences.

[Cyrus]

This is my first and last warning in this thread : You are now in the processs of digging yourself in a hole. (Apologies to red-tush Zipo for borrowing his English!)

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Asians have yellower skin.

[/ QUOTE ] I haven't heard or read about Yeller Asians for a long time. Thanks for the memories.





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Blacks ... are more prone to high blood pressure.

[/ QUOTE ] Would this be mostly about blacks in the United States? Or everywhere in the world? [img]/images/graemlins/smirk.gif[/img]

A small hint to help you with what you're talking about : You have a very small idea of what you're talking about.

"...contrary to popular belief, blacks were not more likely to experience complications associated with heart disease and high blood pressure"


"...food habits account for high cholesterol which causes high blood pressure"

"...depression in African-American Men May Be Barrier to High Blood Pressure Control"

[MMMMMM]

Cyrus, I'm not a doctor and could be wrong about high-blood pressure--but I'm NOT WRONG about sickle-cell anemia:

"sickle cell anemia...

...hereditary disease that destroys red blood cells by causing them to take on a rigid “sickle” shape....Sickle cell anemia occurs mainly in persons of African descent. The disease also occurs in persons of the Middle East, the Mediterranean, and India...

...An estimated 1 in 12 blacks worldwide carries the sickle cell trait, while about 1 in 400 has sickle cell anemia."

http://www.britannica.com/Blackhisto...KeyValue=67625

Moreover, despite your denial, Asians DO tend to have yellower skin than others--and blacks tend to have browner skin than others, as well as kinkier hair. This is NOT controversial (except maybe to people so steeped in political correctness that they deny plain facts which make them uncomfortable).

If you want to claim that "race" doesn't exist, well technically that may be the case, but you cannot deny that the groups at least casually referred to as "race" DO have some special physical characteristics on average that set them apart. Moreover, those characteristics tend to be passed on genetically; moreover, not all such physical characteristics are equal.

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Obviously there are actual physical differences between the races.



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Nothing about race is obvious or universally accepted. From the Columbia Encyclopedia:

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Many physical anthropologists believe that, because there is as much genetic variation among the members of any given race as there is between different racial groups, the concept of race is ultimately unscientific and racial categories are arbitrary designations. The term race is inappropriate when applied to national, religious, geographic, linguistic, or ethnic groups, nor can the biological criteria of race be equated with mental characteristics, such as intelligence, personality, or character.

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[MMMMMM]

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Obviously there are actual physical differences between the races.

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Nothing about race is obvious or universally accepted. From the Columbia Encyclopedia: ...


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I think it may be that the definition of "race" is giving the trouble here. Maybe "race" is not the best term for certain obvious group characteristics or differences (what would a better term than "race"? I don't know). However, whatever term is used, there are certain obvious differences such as skin pigmentations, greater susceptibility to certain diseases such as sickle-cell anemia and high blood pressure, etc. It is A FACT that those characteristics are not randomly distributed. So if you don't want to call it "race", what then would you call it?

Since there are some clear physical differences, it is not wrong to suppose that there may be other physical differences as well--one of which is borne out by the example of tremendous black dominance in the sport of running. By the way, I recall reading, many years ago, that blacks on average have a higher proportion of fast-twitch leg muscle, compared to whites who have a relatively higher proportion of slow-twitch leg muscle, which helps account for the fact that blacks are even more dominant in sprinting, whereas whites tend to be more distance runners.

Even if there is argument about the word "race", it cannot be denied that there is medical evidence which shows that "African-Americans" are more susceptible to, which diseases? Sickle-cell anemia and high blood pressure? And that is the main point, in my opinion--that the "groups" (since the word "race" seems so controversial) have definite tendencies toward certain physical characteristics which are not in all respects equal. That some such characteristics and differences clearly exist is what I meant by "obvious."