I am genuinely asking you to provide the source of the information you on which you rely to quote Evin prison as a place where Iranian women’s human rights are violated.

If you haven’t got a reliable source, then I imagine you’ll attempt to fob me off with a glib retort.

It’s over to you

If you haven’t got a reliable source, then I imagine you’ll attempt to fob me off with a glib retort.

It’s over to you….

As for terrorism - the cycle of violence, chicken and egg? Brendan Nelson here admitted expressly it was a war for oil.

Having said that I watched a DVD called Fires of Kuwait recently courtesy of ex human being Saddam: 700 of them taking 9 months to extinguish, initial predictions were 5 to 10 years. The fires turned day to night and were surrounded by unexploded ordinance with some 40 countries involved in the joint project, with 10,000 staff.

As one said, the best and worst of humanity on display in the same location.

hrello I am Sukio Sumura is pleased to mreet you we j apanses no do butif it
said theydoit when ans some man rike Hitchen fifht coloumn no good then they m ay as well or they out a
anatawa ima yoshinde hamora hamasaka i think is too

I lrike poltics in aussie but very similar in J apan am from osaka and 23 years old
working in Q eensland for tourist company and i rike aussie Guy

mY father he work for toyota 50 years he start at age 5 but he not satify w ith
his work effet and lose many sleep

bY from Sukio Sumura

“Or tell a young Iranian that she’s doing her sisters a disservice by not openly telling the truth about what is happening to non-conformist women in that country”.

What is the ‘truth’ in Iran?

Hey you all its been great reading your minds after watching that Q & A.
And Guy that fabulous Life of Brian defined the true individual when … as the huge crowd that filled the valley came to bay assertively “we are individuals !! …. we are individuals !! … we are individuals !! …. we are individuals !! … yes all those all beautiful perfect orgasmically scrumptious thousands of young human yummies …. then the camera panned to the cretinous ancient little long bearded underdressed bent bloke supporting himself with a twisted bent stick up on a ledge on the side of the hill away from the yummies when he said “I’m not!”

And yes Elizabeth Bay is better.

There’s always been the talkers and the doers. Humans have littered history with blood and other in converting great thinking into real action. There’s always something missing in the conversion.

But apart from that whopping inconsistency, Hitchens batted every question with moral conviction and clarity, which is a lot more than one could say for the bloviating drivel from some. Waleed Ali, mostly in agreement with Hitchens, was also pretty impressive too, but nothing makes my flesh creep more than glib Jesuits passing off some legalistic sophistry about ‘gay marriage’ when his tribe have been sending po-fters to hell for centuries (while harbouring pedophiles of the cloth, let’s add).

For my money Hitchens was the clearest and most cogent speaker on that show. How he tolerated the vacuous claptrap from one panelist…well, it was almost saintly. Instead of hiding behind a pile of dogma and moral hypocrisy, Hitchens has the guts to stand there ‘with his dong hanging out’ and tell people what ‘he’ believes is right, not parse bits of testaments. Or tell a young Iranian that she’s doing her sisters a disservice by not openly telling the truth about what is happening to non-conformist women in that country.

Courage.

I’d call that a very dangerous idea.

The reality for many of us who enjoy a soy coffee while perspiring over pictures of Julia Gillard is that militant Islam doesn’t want to go to the dance with us and we can’t understand why. Hitchins, even when he is wrong, at least makes us think.

i guess i was referring to the fact that you define the Darlinghurst secular-humanists as a loose group with broadly similar views / values, then lampoon them for the ‘asymmetry’ of the broad variety of those views… and then have a go (maybe attack wasn’t the right word) at Hitchens in straying from those views (rather than the views themselves..either way)

my point was - as clearly and bluntly as i can muster - there is no f**ing belief system
you made it up! i doubt all those who attended were from darlinghurst or some such
as i doubt that all those who try to separate their spiritual beliefs from their ethics (secular humanists) are part of the “latte-sipping, condom wearing set” (thanks john james…for nothing)

all those individuals thinking for themselves, with their own individual belief systems (known only to themselves) may appear to be believing in nothing…tangible - written down at least…..and as a group they certainly seem to be believing in any which thing!
the very mistake both chesterton and yourself, it seems, make
believing in nothing is not the same as not believing in something

you didn’t attack the ideas, you just played the man

myself, i am a non-practicing brunchermentalist
though i like the cakes, i just don’t have the time..

Yase.

Holy fucking shit. That is hilarious. Now I’m off to enjoy not having AIDS.

Chesterton’s idea of ‘believing in nothing’ would probably have covered anyone who didn’t at least adhere to some form of monotheism, so all you nihilists, agnostics, secular humanists and atheists out there, look out! You’re all just a couple of drinks away from fascism or worse!

What a load of cobblers GK, (and GR!).

Rubbish Hitchens for Iraq, (god knows I did, to anyone within earshot!), but please, let’s not drag out befuddled old Poms who wanted to lie on their death beds listening to Latin sacraments as even vaguely relevant.

Purleeeeeese!

Hitchens, of course, is a profound embarrassment to Left-liberals because he realises that militant Islam must be confronted. Rundle and the guys think its all the fault of the Americans.
I remember being on campus when the Khymer Rouge swept towards control of Cambodia and hearing the Left praising their ” glorious revolutionary brothers”. Pilger, of course, continues the theme. Its all the Americans fault
Pol Pot learned his Marxism at the feet of Paris based intellectuals.
The liberal Left are guiding US foreign policy and its is salutory watching the confusion and weakness amongst Obama’s administarion as the Taliban and Islam show their contempt for the latte-sipping and condom-wearing set.
Darlinghurst is full of them.
A culture that believes in nothing cannot find within the strength to resist oppression.

I’ve read his book a while ago, and must say I was more impressed with Richard Dawkins take on atheism, which I found more measured and more intellectual. But Hitchens has a place, people need to be taken down aggressively at times to make a point.

His views on the Iraq war aren’t particularly relevant to a talk titled “Religion poisons everything”.

I must admit I live in a suburb that is right next to Darlinghurst.