156 MILLION DEAD CANT BE ALL THAT WRONG!

[Edric O]

Poland was never part of the Soviet Union either. And I think we've already settled the fact that the Stalinists who ruled the Soviet Union, China, Poland, Yugoslavia and the like were most certainly NOT communist.

If you're willing to believe that anyone who called himself a communist was really a communist, then you should also believe that the People's Democratic Republic of Korea is democratic... ::)

See the previous page of this topic, and the zillion other topics where I explained this matter in detail.

See also this article. It explains how those kinds of statistics are far from accurate, because we simply don't know how many people really died, and how many of those deaths can be reasonably linked to the government. Is is the government's fault when millions of people die in an accident (like, say, a severe drought which causes a famine), or during wartime?

The 20th century was one big bloodbath, and it's hard to figure out who killed who, and for what reasons.

Finally, regarding Wolfwiz's point about the liberation of France: It is perfectly true that the Americans and the Brits liberated the French, but it is equally true that the meaning of the word "liberation" implies being free of constraint. If you expect the liberated country to behave according to your wishes, then it wasn't liberation, it was conquest.

As Winston Churchill said when he lost the elections in 1945:

"It is their right to kick me out. That's what we've been fighting for."

Edit: Fixed the link to the "bloodiest tyrant of the 20th century" article. (here's that link again)

[Wolf]

Edric, I thought you would look to make remarks about my entire post, not just about a single example that I used. First, you would be right about your statement, if it were true.

There are multiple instances in history in which France has not obeyed America's whims, in fact, the instances in which France did what America asked it to do, it did because it coincided with French interests. To me, it appears the French are free. They have the freedom to make their own laws, to follow their own way in the world, and as much as America proclaims and complains otherwise, that is the way it is. France is a free France, to say that "political pressure" makes it act in accordance with others' whims is to place an argument on my example which can be attributed to any country. Name a nation that has acted fully without regard to political pressure from any other nation on Earth, or acted in response to other nations' actions. I do not think you will find many. Are all these nations' conquered by the nations to which they act in accordance with political pressure? No, I do not think so. I think you know the term of "conquest" I was speaking of -- strict military and direct political conquest, not a roundabout form of political coercement. Maybe you construe that as conquest, and maybe it is a better definition, but it was not the definition I was referring to, okay?

On that tack, my argument was to get other Americans, British, and Canadians here to perhaps feel somewhat connected to France's modern day actions. Perhaps I am wrong, but I think that what France does is relevant to the nations that fought a war under the auspices of liberating France. (Whether or not it was actually liberated.) Americans, British, and Canadians, to this day, are more or less under the impression that our actions were done with the goal of making France free. (Whether or not it was truly freed does not really matter -- it is the attitudes of our history that matter.) To say that we do not care what France does with itself, then, is in a way, to degrade the sacrifice our ancestors made in order to allow France the ability to make its own laws. That does not mean, however, that we seek to change France's laws, not at all. It does mean, though, that we should be pretty pissed off.

[Edric O]

I'm sorry I didn't reply to the rest of your points, but since I do not actually know what this new French law stipulates, I can't comment on it... and in any case, it's a law about schools, not about graveyards or WW2 monuments.

France is a secular republic, which means that the French government may not favour one religion over another, and it may NOT persecute any religion, either.

Here are the websites of the French Parliament:

National Assembly

Senate

The really funny thing is that France is currently ruled by a right-wing conservative government, and it has a right-wing president.

Now, about your most recent post, I think you misunderstood me. I was talking about the hypothetical situation in which you would expect a "liberated" country to behave according to your wishes. In that case it would be a conquest, not a liberation.

I'm not saying that this is actually the case. It's quite obvious that France is a free country acting according to its own wishes. France WAS truly liberated. It IS free.

(although there are some people who wish it were otherwise...)

[Nyarlathotep]

To simply put it, freedom of religion should be allowed. I do not see the point of  making it phrohibited by law that people can't express themselfs according to their religion.. I mean, it's crazy to say it's forbidden to wear something that expresses your religion. I could agree with the law if it would prevent people from discriminating others, but I doubt that that's the meaning behind the law.

If the above is what Emp meant, then I agree. Although I do not find the link posted of any relevence for the above opinion.

[Dude_Doc]

Some Christians are extremists, so they believe that Jesus and Co were all "Western Christendom". This means that the Jews were not religious, but a race, just like Arabs, Germans, Brittish and so on. Then Judas betrayed Jesus, and that's where the whole thing comes in, according to the Nazis.

So, they believe that Jesus was Christian, but was betrayed by the Jews, which adds up to their propaganda during that time.

Ask me, I think Hitler wasn't Christian at all. It was only a religion he allowed to be in the Third Reich.