The European Union

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Re: The European Union

Postby MayheM on Fri May 20, 2011 4:41 pm

OK my point of showing that was not to literally tie it to the biblical story but rather point out how similar they look.
Sporkeh, yes both are cylindrical. However notice that while the illustration of the tower of babel shows it as unfinished and the top of the EU building is designed in a way that looks similar to that of the unfinished tower in the illustration.

I am not trying to say this is a sign or an anything like that. Though I would not be surprised if the architect who designed this building did not take inspiration from this illustration. For no other reason then the fact that the idea behind the story of babel and the EU are similar. This idea being bringing many people together under one banner. I am also not saying the story is true, however it is a story that has been told and is relatively well known. One does not need to believe in God or the bible to have heard the story and even take ideas from it. But, I listened to a rabbi talk about it once. He described it as a symbolic story. To simplify it... the tower was to be built of brick. He went on to say that building something of brick rather than stone was the main point. He described individuals like stones, in that no two are the same. While bricks, bricks are all the same. The attempt was to make everyone the same. However we as humans are not all the same. Nor will be ever be. That is by design. Finally he referenced the part of the bible that states man was created in the image of God. He explained that by this it meant God is unique and we where created to be unique as well.

But this is not a religious discussion, I only brought up babel because of the parallels to the EU...

LordDz, considering there are so many who do not like it that seems to be unlikely. Also considering it has not really helped anything I do not see it as"working". Regardless of the existence of God, the EU and the idea behind it is a bad one. Making everyone the same is never good. It is impossible to make everyone happy and we all have so many different ideas. To try and put all those ideas together on a global scale would fail and is failing.

I obviously do not live in the EU, so I am speaking as an outsider. But I can see that even though my beliefs are not always in line with those on these forums when it comes to politics and religion I see eye to eye with many on this issue.
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Re: The European Union

Postby zombie@computer on Fri May 20, 2011 5:24 pm

Klifsnider wrote:
zombie@computer wrote:Your argumentation is rock solid, sir. I'll stop living cuz you are so much better than all of us :)

Edit: ah, you Belgian. Certainly the best people to know how to lead a country :smt044


Here's my problem with Nigel Farage: he uses almost exclusively 'ad hominem' arguments. In other words, personal attacks. He doesn't make the news very often here in Belgium, but I remember that he made the news when he did that personal attack on the President of the European Council, a Belgian, and a few weeks later called Belgium a "non-country".

Now, I was taught that Ad hominem-arguments are the lamest and stupidest arguments, we've all been doing it since we were children, calling eachother names, and it is in fact sort of childish, plus you don't have to be very clever do to it. This is why I consider him to be a relatively stupid person. If you look him up on wikipedia you can see that the list of scandals he caused is bigger than his biography. He is simply a person that likes to draw attention by making dumb and insultive statements.
Dont get me wrong, im in no way a Fan of Farage. But even the most stupid politician can make a point.

Klifsnider wrote:Now, moving on to you, I guess you can relate to him, as you immediately took the bait: you started mocking me and generalized all Belgians. You seem to be an easily influencable person with no critical outlook on the world or on any of the information that you process. Not to worry though, to be a successful doctor you just have to be good at memorizing your book. I doubt that you did any more research on the EU other than watching those youtube clips, your statement that there are no benefits from being in the EU clearly proves this and is very amusing.
hypocrisy, thy name is ...

Also, not sure if you know how to read, if you do, please reread the OP and try to understand what i wrote (concerning the underlined part in your quote). It's really not that difficult. If you think you fully understand, you can try giving arguments as to why it's a clearly wrong statement, since argumentations without arguments is like applepie without pie. Or apples.
As for the italic sentence, i agree fully (hehe, you thought you had me there :p ), thats (partly) why i'm doing a second study. Forgive me for not updating my forum profile.

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You too!
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Re: The European Union

Postby Sporkeh on Fri May 20, 2011 5:40 pm

MayheM wrote:OK my point of showing that was not to literally tie it to the biblical story but rather point out how similar they look.
Sporkeh, yes both are cylindrical. However notice that while the illustration of the tower of babel shows it as unfinished and the top of the EU building is designed in a way that looks similar to that of the unfinished tower in the illustration.

I am not trying to say this is a sign or an anything like that. Though I would not be surprised if the architect who designed this building did not take inspiration from this illustration. For no other reason then the fact that the idea behind the story of babel and the EU are similar. This idea being bringing many people together under one banner. I am also not saying the story is true, however it is a story that has been told and is relatively well known. One does not need to believe in God or the bible to have heard the story and even take ideas from it. But, I listened to a rabbi talk about it once. He described it as a symbolic story. To simplify it... the tower was to be built of brick. He went on to say that building something of brick rather than stone was the main point. He described individuals like stones, in that no two are the same. While bricks, bricks are all the same. The attempt was to make everyone the same. However we as humans are not all the same. Nor will be ever be. That is by design. Finally he referenced the part of the bible that states man was created in the image of God. He explained that by this it meant God is unique and we where created to be unique as well.


The "tower of Babel" image is an artist interpretation though so I'm not sure what your point is.
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Re: The European Union

Postby MayheM on Fri May 20, 2011 5:57 pm

Yes it is an artist interpretation of it... I know. Which is why it can not be said that the EU building is based on the real tower. Which is why I was not saying it was. I was pointing out that the EU building and that artists interpretation are similar. Being that the story of Babel and the Idea behind the EU are similar in their core concept I feel it is interesting that seemingly the architect who designed the EU building too some inspiration from that specific artist interpretation of what the tower looked like.

My point of bringing up the Rabbi is that I believe that was are all meant to be individuals and to bring everyone together under one banner is a bad idea. The comparison he made about the stone and brick rings true to me. Yes we should all work together to make things as good as they can be in this world but having a central government to overlook the world is a bad idea. I would not want some guy in a different hemisphere telling me what I can and can not do. I think that is a pretty reasonable response...

You do seem to be missing my point and thinking I am trying to make some religious correlation between the tower and the EU. That is not the case. I am only pointing out the obvious similarities between the two.
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Re: The European Union

Postby Sporkeh on Fri May 20, 2011 6:18 pm

Illuminati did it.
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Re: The European Union

Postby MayheM on Fri May 20, 2011 6:53 pm

Just did some looking around and that illustration happened to be by a Dutch Artist in the 1600's... and the EU building happens to be in... That's right Strasbourg. Again, not saying it is a sign, only that the inspiration for the building is from that illustration of the tower.



Again I am not posting this for the religious reasons though I do find some of the "supposed" symbolism in the poster interesting. (mainly the block head reference) Because it is in keeping with what the Rabbi I spoke of said. But it shows from an early point the EU building was based upon the tower and the idea of EU was based upon the idea behind story of said tower. Whether it is the slap in the face to Christians the narrator is depicting, I don't know about that... But it is interesting none the less. Honestly, it does beg the question, why base the design building on the depiction of a building that was destroyed in a story?
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Re: The European Union

Postby Klifsnider on Fri May 20, 2011 10:45 pm

As long as you realize Nigel Farage is an idiot.

I didn't mean to offend you, also I never said I was clever so I am allowed to do personal attacks on people :D I've made worse 4 am posts, trust me. Trek het u niet aan.

Also, there will be a European patent soon (hopefully). There are a handful of countries that are making a big deal out of what languages the patents should be translated in, but this should be resolved soon. Basically what this means is that instead of having to request a patent on something in all member states seperately (keep in mind that patents can cost thousands of euros), they can just get a European patent, valid in all member states, and be done with it. This obviously reduces the cost a lot, they hope this will encourage innovation and R&D. How's that for an advantage br0? That's just one relatively small project that we can thank the EU for.
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Re: The European Union

Postby Dionysos on Fri May 20, 2011 11:23 pm

So the shape of a headquarters has any actual meaning in the real world? Sorry, it might be a funny similarity, but that's as far as I would take it.

The EU is bad in that it perpetuates and further imposes an undemocratic system of governance and an inviable economic system. People have to follow laws that have been decided by people they haven't even voted for indirectly, often with little or no chance of stopping a crazy law. Personal liberty is eroded.

The EU is good in a couple of areas like standardizing things like accepting education, free movement across borders etc.
The Venus Project wrote:The most valuable, untapped resource today is human ingenuity.
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Re: The European Union

Postby Sathor on Sat May 21, 2011 1:47 pm

We should also not forget the European high courts have decided some pretty important things about individual rights! While some EU laws might inflict personal rights, the European courts have done the opposite thing, often strengthening our rights against the laws of our countries when the national courts failed.

For example, you can look here:

http://www.actup.org/forum/content/euro ... ases-1990/

This is especially about homosexual discrimination. Take this case for example:


Salgueiro da Silva Mouta v. Portugal (no. 33290/96)
21.12.1999

Joint custody withdrawn from a father on account of his homosexuality.

The Portuguese courts’ decision had been largely based on the fact that the applicant was a homosexual and that “the child should live in a traditional Portuguese family”. The Court held that that distinction, based on considerations relating to sexual orientation, was not acceptable under the Convention. Violation of Article 14 (prohibition of discrimination) taken in conjunction with Article 8 (right to respect for private and family life).

I bet the man is very happy to have the European Union.
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Re: The European Union

Postby MayheM on Mon Jun 20, 2011 10:43 pm

Dionysos, Let me clarify once again. The shape of the building WAS based on the illustration of the tower of babel done by a Dutch artist. The EU is based upon the idea of bringing all European nations together under one banner. This too resembles the idea of the tower of babel. According to the story in the bible the tower was destroyed by God because those who built it defied the wishes of God. Regardless of the authenticity of the story, the fact that they based the building on the design of the tower as depicted by the Dutch artist, does leave one to wonder why they chose that design. The only way I can see it as it was done intentionally and was done as a spit in the face to those who believe in God. I just asked the guy I work with who is an atheist what he thought, and he agreed with me. He felt it was a poor choice for design.

One could look at that two ways Sather. While I am all for human rights and everyone being treated fairly, I do not believe it is right for a group of people to supersede the laws established by a country. While the example above is an example of how that can be a good thing, that also sets precedence and opens the doors for things that would not necessarily be viewed as positive. But i also believe that people are born with rights and they can not be given by any government. For those who give, can also take away. It was one of the principals America was founded upon, sadly one that has been overlooked over the years.

Anyway to what I was actually coming here to post... I just read about the second bailout of Greece. Seems pretty bad when entire countries are getting bailed out because they can not take care of themselves. Even worse that it happened twice. It may seem heartless, but how will they ever learn to take care of themselves? Eventually the EU will have to say no. Then what will Greece do? It seems to me like the governments of the world need to seriously learn how to stop spending so much damn money.
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Re: The European Union

Postby Sorrow on Tue Jun 21, 2011 8:14 pm

If you leave Greece out to dry we all suffer for it, once again it's the average citizen that has to pay for it. our government is in the middle of huge budget cuts of 30 M for the next few years but all of a sudden we should donate 10 M+ to Greece? Where does this money come from?. It's not only Greece that's to blame. Blame France & Germany and the banks for lending Greece money and making loads of profit on the interests. The whole system's corrupt.

Dunno what to do about it though, it's all politics and sneaky bs that's in some realm played out next to our own.
EU's not all bad though. Can't think of a very compelling reason but apparently the Euro saved the NL from taking a heavy hit during the crisis. And who knows with countries like China / India growing immensely over the coming years that we might need to band together as EU nation states to survive the flashflood of cheap 'everything' coming to our markets.

I remain sceptical though, I find that we're ill-informed on the crisis, all the media does is try to instigate the populace with 'clever' wordings like "people in Greece are lazy" etc. and the politicians always decide the total opposite to what the public wants. (ya okay in some ways that's a very good thing with the growing idiocracy over here.)
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Re: The European Union

Postby MayheM on Tue Jun 21, 2011 8:50 pm

Your first sentence is the very root of what is wrong with the EU in my opinion. It sucks to have everyone tied together so that is one goes down the rest suffer. It seems like a great idea when everything is going great since if one country does well, everyone does well. The idea is not fully thought out because when things are good people do not look at the downside. Then the financial meltdown happens and the problems snowball from country to country because everyone bails out Greece, then they have to bail out the next country and the next, eventually even the strongest of the nations in the EU are hit because they have had to put money into countries whose leaders have done a shit job. The problem with Greece is that the government made promises they could not keep. The people are calling them on it, and the government is defaulting.

It is this very reason why I am all about limited government. My well being should not rely on the government. I am 100% debt free in my personal life, yet my government owes 14 trillion and counting. I took control of my own spending to eliminate debt, while my government continues to spend money like a crackhead. In fact the only difference between the way my government spends money and the way a crackhead spends money is the crackhead at least spends their own money.

Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The larger government gets and the more we rely on them the more they can and will take for its people. Thomas Jefferson said “A government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take away everything you have.” I happen to agree with that idea. The thought of having a government which rules over so many scares the shit out of me. But again, I am seeing this as an outsider. Though it does seem that several of you are not so keen on the idea of the EU...
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