"Missing" Leader pet peeves

[tatean]

Main Entry: ter·ror·ism
Pronunciation: 'ter-&r-"i-z&m
Function: noun
1 : the unlawful use or threat of violence esp. against the state or the public as a politically motivated means of attack or coercion

In that light, yes, the American Revolution was a terrorist action; terrorism is broader than the particular brand of fundamentalist terrorism of which the United States has been so acutely aware lately.

Please explain how history does not repeat itself.

Thank you for clarifying that for me. Long way between George Washington and Osama Bin Laden, though.

And yes, history repeats itself many times over. I think a dead Irish writer had an appropriate quote about this.

 

[NCC81701]

Is that dictionary published in mainland china perhaps?

I think Locke would disagree about violence used in the war for independence being "unlawful."

eta: I think it's disturbing that so many of you equate the founders of this country with modern terrorists. Thank you Michael Moore.

That definition came out of webster dictionary. Check it yourself.
http://www.webster.com/dictionary/terror
See definition #4

Our founders were terrorist, they commited criminal (indeed traitorious) acts against the state, destroyed property (boston Tea party), hijacked state property (where did you think Henry Knox got his cannons?), and attacked the soldiers and officers of the British Empire. All of these acts were committed for a political purpose, the independance from the British Empire (politically motivated) if that's not terrorism then i don't know what is because that is exactly what the insurgency in Iraq is doing to our marines.

There is one key difference between our founding fathers and Osama Bin Laden, our founding fathers were committing terrorist acts to build a brave new world; a world where the people would govern themselves, a world where people can speak up against their government without fear of reprisals, a world where people can believe in their choice of religion. All of these things we hold so dear today did not exist in their time. What our founding fathers (and mothers) were fighting for that makes all the difference between our founding fathers and religious fundementalist. And that is why our founding fathers are held in such a high place in history even among other nations.

Our founding fathers are not supermen, they were regular joes, some of them rich joes, but they were not perfect. How else can you explain how they were preaching freedom on one hand while at the same time own slaves? But that is what made our founding fathers so great, dispite their flaws, dispite their acts, they were able to make a great nation that holds true to its promise of life, liberty and happiness (even though it did take some time for everyone in the nation to reap those benefits).

Sorry for the rant, but i just hate how k-12 education in this country draws out our founding fathers as perfect people that can do no wrong; which in my opinion actually deminishes their greatness.

 

[Andicus]

That definition came out of webster dictionary. Check it yourself.
http://www.webster.com/dictionary/terrorism

Our founders were terrorist, they commited criminal (indeed traitorious) acts against the state, destroyed property (boston Tea party), hijacked state property (where did you think Henry Knox got his cannons?), and attacked the soldiers and officers of the British Empire. All of these acts were committed for a political purpose, the independance from the British Empire (politically motivated) if that's not terrorism then i don't know what is because that is exactly what the insurgency in Iraq is doing to our marines.

There is one key difference between our founding fathers and Osama Bin Laden, our founding fathers were committing terrorist acts to build a brave new world; a world where the people would govern themselves, a world where people can speak up against their government without fear of reprisals, a world where people and believe in their choice of religion. What our founding fathers (and mothers) were fighting for that makes all the difference between our founding fathers and religious fundementalist. And that is why our founding fathers are held in such a high place in history.

Our founding fathers are not supermen, they were regular joes, some of them rich joes, but they were not perfect. How else can you explain how they were preaching freedom on one hand while at the same time own slaves? But that is what made our founding fathers so great, dispite their flaws, dispite their acts, they were able to make a great nation that holds true to its promise of life, liberty and happiness (even though it did take some time for everyone in the nation to reap those benefits).

Sorry for the rant, but i just hate how k-12 education in this country draws out our founding fathers as perfect people and can do no wrong; which in my opinion actually deminishes their greatness.

I never said they were perfect. But they were NOT terrorists.

The reason our founding fathers are great is because they were the first (not counting the glorious rev) to say that if the government infringed on the natural rights of the people, the people had a right to overthrow that government.

What are the modern terrorists doing by contrast? They're blowing up their own people to "persuade" them not to vote. They're destroying infrastructure built for the benefit of their own people. They're trying to install theocratic dictators who would subject the whole population to the rule of Wahabist Islam.

Bear in mind as well, we aren't trying to annex Iraq or Afghanistan. We aren't laying any kind of claim to the region. Nor are we subjecting any kind of tax on those nation's people. In fact, we are spending BILLIONS to fight the terrorists in those countries.

The word "terrorist" as so many of you are so fond of using would include all the various european resistance movements of world war 2, the phillipine guerillas who fought the Japanse occupation of their home, and pretty much anyone else who dared to fight an unjust or oppressive government.

 

[Carver]

They don't, but the assumption seems to be that political correctness kept Hitler out; that should have kept Mao out as well.

That's a faulty assumption some here make. Mao and Stalin both left their countries greater than when they assumed office. Hitler ruined his country; on the greatness meter Hitler is not close to the other two.

 

[Andicus]

That's a faulty assumption some here make. Mao and Stalin both left their countries greater than when they assumed office. Hitler ruined his country; on the greatness meter Hitler is not close to the other two.

Yeah, leaving your country 50 million people lighter is great.

I'd like to know just how great Sid thinks Bismarck was considering he handed the chancellorship to Hitler...

 

[elderotter]

3).

2) Romans in general. Not only is Julius Caesar not the only interesting emperor.

Just a history buff here Augustus was first Emperor. Gaius Julius, Caesar was Dictator. His nephew Octavian was his heir, and became Augustus .

 

[NetMapel]

That's a faulty assumption some here make. Mao and Stalin both left their countries greater than when they assumed office. Hitler ruined his country; on the greatness meter Hitler is not close to the other two.

I don't know about Stalin myself, but I'm pretty sure Mao left China at a WORSE state than before. However, this subject is very very sketchy due to the time period it was in. You see, at the same time that communists were taking power over the nationalists in China, the Japanese were also invading China with their own version of holocaust. In the end though, I doubt the cultural revolution and the tiananmen square incident left China at a better state than what it could have been. Didn't some reports said that Mao brought China back 40 years both economically and technologically during his reign ?

As much as I do not like the hostile Qin Shih-Huang, he at least ACTUALLY improved China in many ways. He introduced standards in many areas and that helped speed up production process by a lot. He also built the Great Wall of China (although at a great cost) and fended off the northern barbarians.

 

[Reveilled]

Yeah, leaving your country 50 million people lighter is great.

I'd like to know just how great Sid thinks Bismarck was considering he handed the chancellorship to Hitler...

Eh? How did he do that? He died before Hitler was ten.

 

[Captain Murphy]

I've always wanted Gaius Marius to be available as a Roman leader...I realize he's obscure now, but it might get some people to learn a little more about history!

- Elected Consul 7 times
- Became known as the "Third Founder of Rome"
- Created the professional legion out of the largely unemployed lowest class - the "Head Count"
- Instituted tactical and equipment changes and greatly improved the Roman Legion

 

[Siggy19]

This whole 'terrorist' argument could rapidly degenerate, although I personally think that it is valid to have the debate. Please do not take offense at what I am about to say... I am merely trying to provide an alternative perspective.

My opinion is that FROM THE BRITISH perspective, the American Founding Father were a combination of Traitors and Terrorists. The dream of a land of liberty was probably not that different to a American fighting alongside Washington from the dream of eternal bliss with 70 virgins to Moslems fighting in Iraq currently.

Thus, most Iraqis probably support some degree of resistance to the Americans who invaded their country for (from their perspective) no reason. The only reason that remains remotely valid of the many given by the Bush administration was to 'liberate' the Iraqi people, but that is on a par with the Spanish invading America in 1775 to free them from the British and I suspect would have been equally unwelcome.

The fact that many innocent Iraqi civilians have been killed by car and suicide bombs is swamped in the mind of the Iraqis by the fact that more have died as a result of 'collateral damage' caused by the American military.

We define the Iraqi 'insurgents' as terrorists but do not use the same term for our own actions despite the fact that they are more deadly. It is reasonable to argue that this is because the deaths caused by us were accidental, while the insurgents did it deliberately. However, to most Iraqis the Americans should not be there in the first place and are responsible for inspiring the insurgency.

In practice, most great leaders have been responsible for many deaths, especially since warfare has tended to elevate leaders into the 'great' category.

Mao and Stalin were actually pretty non-expansionist... they generally tried to build buffer zones of client states, but rarely expanded beyond that. Hitler would have been a totally valid leader in the game... but I suspect that the designers chickened out.

Other leaders that should have been included are William the Conqueror of England, Solomon and Benjamin Disraeli of the Jews, Simon Bolivar and Fidel Castro of Latin America, Leif Erikson of the Vikings, Nelson Mandela of South Africa, St Paul and Martin Luther of the Christians... some of these could have been real fun !

 

[Gumugum]

Mao? I guess... Really he was a worse tyrant than Hitler

Puting stalin would have been as bad as putting hitler.

Fact: Stalin and Mao both appeared in Civ games.

Conclusion: Hitler should have been in the game.

 

[belamorte]

Tell the Native American that the "founders" were not terrorists. Vaccinating the "white" people from small pox and not the natives then giving the natives blankets containing the small pox sounds quite "terrorist" to me. Not to mention the near genocide of the native people in the process through other means. Sounds alot like what Hitler tried to do with the Jewish people - the difference is that the American/British won/conquered the natives but the Germans lost WW2.

/disclaimer, this was a different time yet by todays standards the "founders" of America, as well as Canada were not the great people that many make them out to be.

 

[Distraction]

This whole 'terrorist' argument could rapidly degenerate, although I personally think that it is valid to have the debate. Please do not take offense at what I am about to say... I am merely trying to provide an alternative perspective.

My opinion is that FROM THE BRITISH perspective, the American Founding Father were a combination of Traitors and Terrorists. The dream of a land of liberty was probably not that different to a American fighting alongside Washington from the dream of eternal bliss with 70 virgins to Moslems fighting in Iraq currently.

Thus, most Iraqis probably support some degree of resistance to the Americans who invaded their country for (from their perspective) no reason. The only reason that remains remotely valid of the many given by the Bush administration was to 'liberate' the Iraqi people, but that is on a par with the Spanish invading America in 1775 to free them from the British and I suspect would have been equally unwelcome.

The fact that many innocent Iraqi civilians have been killed by car and suicide bombs is swamped in the mind of the Iraqis by the fact that more have died as a result of 'collateral damage' caused by the American military.

We define the Iraqi 'insurgents' as terrorists but do not use the same term for our own actions despite the fact that they are more deadly. It is reasonable to argue that this is because the deaths caused by us were accidental, while the insurgents did it deliberately. However, to most Iraqis the Americans should not be there in the first place and are responsible for inspiring the insurgency.

In practice, most great leaders have been responsible for many deaths, especially since warfare has tended to elevate leaders into the 'great' category.

Mao and Stalin were actually pretty non-expansionist... they generally tried to build buffer zones of client states, but rarely expanded beyond that. Hitler would have been a totally valid leader in the game... but I suspect that the designers chickened out.

Other leaders that should have been included are William the Conqueror of England, Solomon and Benjamin Disraeli of the Jews, Simon Bolivar and Fidel Castro of Latin America, Leif Erikson of the Vikings, Nelson Mandela of South Africa, St Paul and Martin Luther of the Christians... some of these could have been real fun !

I really think you're using broken logic here. I mean, I don't agree with the Iraq war, but its still the insurgents that are killing the civillians. THe Americans in the Revolutionary war weren't out to slaughter civilians to instill fear in the British, they wanted to separate themselves from Great Britan. And yes, several leaders on both sides were overzealous and did kill Loyalist/Patriot citizens, but most did not.

As for the Hitler thing, Hitler is the person most often connected to the word 'evil'. Every leader in the Civilization series had at least some good side (Khan's tolerance of religion to towns that surrenderd to him, for example). Now, come up with one good thing Hitler did (besides proving facism is bad). I doubt you could produce one.

 

[bky1701]

Puting stalin would have been as bad as putting hitler. I hate it when people have no ideas what kind of atrocities he commited (caused more deaths than hitler too).

You need to understand one thing…

BEING NICE IS NOT A REQUIREMENT TO BEING INFLUENTIAL

The only requirements to being a civ leader is being influential and a head of state (and that is not even required all the time). You may not like it, but it’s a fact that “bad people” do, in fact, change the world, even if you don't like the fact they do.

But anyway.... Lenin is better for Civ, I think. He did much more.

 

[Distraction]

Tell the Native American that the "founders" were not terrorists. Vaccinating the "white" people from small pox and not the natives then giving the natives blankets containing the small pox sounds quite "terrorist" to me. Not to mention the near genocide of the native people in the process through other means. Sounds alot like what Hitler tried to do with the Jewish people - the difference is that the American/British won/conquered the natives but the Germans lost WW2.

/disclaimer, this was a different time yet by todays standards the "founders" of America, as well as Canada were not the great people that many make them out to be.

And the Brits weren't much better.

 

[LAnkou]

well, i will add my two cents

the main differencies that separate the founding fathers (and resistance, french revolutionnarists) from present terrorism is that present terrorism are blind attack, whereas the others target specifics people...

so, attack against americans and iraki government can be "parralleled" with great cautious (and with great cautious again, i really mean it, it's too soon to have a real fair judgement, don't mix present and history) with fouding fathers and others revolutionnary movemement. Blind attacks on market and only civil people is totally different.

one is for political purpose only, the other to put some terror (where the name comes from)

always be cautious with this notion, it's too soon to have faire judgement

and about hitler, as i'm french (that may matters), hitler would have bother me, even if it was AI lock. how could you imagine to play as or be friend with Hitler.

About Stalin, well, i prefer Lenin
About Mao, doesn't really know much about him but since he is not a shame for China present government, i'm ok

that is the great difference: German people are generally ashamed of Hitler, that is not so sure about Russian and Chinese (i'm not saying a holy truth just that i presume it)

 

[belamorte]

And the Brits weren't much better.

Your dead right the Brits as well as the French were not much better.

 

[Hugbear]

Depending on your perspective, you can argue many ways. Maybe the Americans and British were expansionistic imperialists, and the Native Americans were terrorists.

Mao should be in the game because he is still considered by many Chinese to be a national hero, despite his paranoia and ineptitude as leader. Mao fought against foreign domination and was a symbol of Chinese nationalism in the 40s. Would Germans or Russians say the same about Hitler or Stalin?

History forgives all in due time, and predecessors are rewritten so that contemporaries can understand them. For now, I think the leader choices are ok.

 

[SmartMuffin]

You all seem to be forgetting the precedent here.

Mao is in the game, and Stalin was in Civ1. There is precedent for both of those individuals being in the game, and as far as I can recall, nobody has been offended by it.

If you believe they could put Hitler in the game and nobody offended, you're just wrong. The fact that they're "just as bad" because of statistics is irrelevent. They aren't as bad, because one is much more offensive to the average person than the other. That's what matters.

 

[William Wilson]

They aren't as bad, because one is much more offensive to the average person than the other. That's what matters.
It is sad when the average person dictates complicated matters.