Your post reinforces that you are indeed clueless. You dont care, as you are neither gay nor Jewish...and your ability for abstract thought is low. I grant you the new nickname of: Iron Brain (d=M/V)

Trying wearing a rainbow shirt or a kippah or both for a few hours, days, or weeks in your town/city and then get back to us on how long it is before you are insulted, harrassed, or intimidated. Or in an extreme case you may not live to tell us.

Once again I refer you to your wife. You could ask her some basic questions. Like about unwanted touching. Parking in unlit areas. Having her keys in hand walking to the car. Catcalls. Crowded public transit. Girls night at the bar. And a whole host of other related questions. You might learn something from her.

Yes I am using the right word. He exudes empathy in the video which is abundantly clear.

A rational mind without empathy is often called a psychopath.

If you don't see empathy in that video then you have a problem.

Nature vs nurture is a well known phrase with a well understood contextual meaning.

The rest of your post was irrelevant to my comment.

Haha, that's a genius idea. Would be hilaryous to see that.

In the case of Iran there is no easy solution. It is a theocratic state run by a religious nutjob. There is no such thing as common ground with a state that believes everything about the west is immoral and anti-thetical to their cult beliefs.

What we shouldn't have done was invade Iraq for no good reason just because US pride was hurt by 9/11. The biggest negative outcome was destabilizing Iraq which was the primary barrier/buffer of Iran. Most people don't even remember that 6 months before 9/11 Bush Jr. was looking to drop sanctions on Iraq and it was France and Russia that were resisting...and that was about oilfield contracts. Bush Sr. knew that destabilizing Iraq would create a power vacuum that Iran would fill which is why he did not pursue Iraqi forces all the way to Baghdad a decade earlier. Sadly his son was and is a moron.

In the case of Russia, you are correct in that we should have brought them along; however, you have the driver exactly backwards. The West treated the fall of the USSR as an economic free for all and completely fcuked up transition because of that. We did not sanction them. But we absolutely failed to help them create the govt and insitutional mechanisms to manage the economic transition. Instead we created crony capitalism, the wild west of economics, the massive consolidation of economic power in a few people, the continued disenfranchisement of the vast majority of people and the inevitable concentration of all power in what are effectively mafia bosses. All those oligarchs are people who just cheated the citizenry of all wealth by assuming control of the major Soviet industries...for free. Putin is just a natural outcome of these dynamics and if not him...then insert alternate name here.

In short, we are plagued at times with absolute shit leadership in international affairs.

Not sure why so many panties are in a knot.

Iran's response was weak and was for show and domestic consumption. Total failure of an attack, which was predictable and with hours of warning was destined to accomplish.... nothing...which it succeeded at. Ten seconds looking at a map explains why.

Israel doesn't have to do anything more right now and will likely just carry on with whatever they plan to do next in Gaza. The last thing Israel wants is to escalate further when their army is already tired from many months of conflict. They are going to look at this as a win in killing off senior Iranian scumbags for pretty much free.

What they should do next is figure out a way to extract their army from further direct engagement, make the Palestinians a UN refugee problem, and then start quietly assassinating Hezbollah leaders, whoever is left of Hamas leadership, and possibly Yemeni leaders all in a campaign to reduce Iran's proxies. The same way they assassinated Iran's top nuclear scientist a few years back with a remote controlled machinegun.

I guess this time they felt the target of opportunity was worth the risk, but that's not something you want to do so openly very often. Although, Trump got away with it as well...so there is that.

@sargentd: WTF dude? Are you clueless?

People calling something, anything, 'gay' are using the word 'gay' in a pejorative and derogatory manner....meaning being gay is derogatory. The fact that you and your clueless friends thought that was normal is simply indicative of your socialization.

Where I grew up in the 1960s/1970s we had similar tropes. For someone who was frugal, cheap, tight with their money, etc. it was 'you are such a jew'. Which is based upon a trope. Just like your decades later 'that's gay'.

The fact that in both cases it wasn't specifically addressing either an actual jewish person or an actual gay person is entirely missing the point. It is using an attribute like religion or sexual orientation in an entirely derogatory manner.

The fact that you can't or won't understand this is astonishing. Maybe talk to your wife about it, ffs.

I think I should start using SargentD every time I hear something stupid. Dumbest thing I've heard today - that's so SargentD. The guy that accidentally drowns himself and his wife by blindly following his GPS instructions and driving his car right off the road into a lake - oh man, that's so funny, so SargentD.

What I found interesting was the degree of empathy he has for these losers. Not what I would call the usual claptrap. Hence my comments on nurture vs nature.

Please discuss the actual video and what you think of it.

I think for the most part hate falls into the nurture category, as opposed to nature. You learn it. Arnold's viewpoint is that it can be unlearned and he seems passionate about helping people take the first steps instead of just righting them off as inherently evil.

This is a very individual centric viewpoint, which is his focus. But he does acknowledge the group dynamics aspect whether it be joining the Nazi party because it was the 'in thing' during the 1930s, or in the current era, the idea of buying into internet conspiracy nonsense that fosters hate. But he is mostly talking about a save them one at a time approach.

Personally, I think the group aspect is fundamental as hate correlates strongly with individuals struggling with self identity and fitting in with mainstream groups. So while I agree with everything Arnold says, I don't think you can move the needle on a society wide basis without tackling the core internet and social media issues.

I encourage you to watch this video. I believe he 100% nails it in terms of what hate is really about and the path to redemption. I particularly like his compassion for haters and his understanding of how and why people get to that point...and that it is never too late to change.

Apparently I hit a nerve.

And I know full well about what and why you were complaining. Trope (look it up). I can think of other examples as well, as my memory is excellent.

Reminds me of a female officer colleague of mine from 30 yrs ago who wanted to try out for JTF2 (look that up too) when it was first forming, but she was not allowed. Too bad, since she was spiderwoman and could best any man on the obstacle course, could free climb the most difficult mountain faces, and competed in ultramarathon (you shòuld look that up too, too). But hey, she did female push-ups, not male.