i'm out of this thread to, g'night olls.

..like Caoimhe's family did then...?

dunno what she has to do with it. .

but I am half Irish as well as Polish      

anyway's  am offski

"Soldiers fought and died" card .Steve uses that as an emotional means to shut someone up.I am sick to back teeth of Steve,he is an ignorant man to think and say that only the English fought in WW2.If anyone needs to visit a library its Steve.

He's thick as pigshit!   He's a crap housemate, and I had high hopes that he would be a shining example, and an inspiration to the younger ones, but he isn't....he's a W@nker!

An interesting point.

Do I need to be shot to know it could kill or seriously injure me?

When in outer space, do I need to remove my space suit to understand that it will kill me?

Do I need to have unprotected sex and contract an STI to gain the experience of knowing I should use a condom?

You see where I am going with this..

claps too..  
 

Seriosuly tho you know what I meant .. of course books help but to learn fromt he experinece of others is the greatest tool of knowledge of all..

I may have worded it a tad wrong but the whole business got to me a lot and I found Bens attitude to WWII and looking after one's own first very hurtful to the memory of my father. .

for once I let my personal emotions get the better of me. .

wonder if the same thing happened to Steve when he responded the way he did too?    

Not excusing him at all.. but can kinda feel where he was coming from a bit

 mount, i like ben, but i sometimes wish he would think before he speaks. i int going to pretend to understand everything ben and steve said because i dont. but i do understand why it upset you.

I was boiling with Steve watching the highlights earlier on.

He talks and acts like a complete thug, they talked about going to Iraq etc to protect the people over there from crazy people. Steve knows what the risks were when joining the army, he knew there was a chance of injury or even death, he accepted these risks. While I admire him for how he has lived his life, I abhor the way he uses his condition to his advantage in arguments, just because the obstacle that Steve overcame is visible doesn't mean that the others in there haven't overcame massive hurdles to be where they are today. Corin suffered in incredible heartache with her husband, but she doesn't use that as a form of sympathy or a way to win arguments. Steve you fought for a British Army that too killed and injured innocent people- an action you yourself may have had one day carried out, 14 people in Derry in 1972, an action that your army carried out. Just because you were badly hurt in the troubles doesn't mean that other innocent people weren't either. The way Steve acts is that he who shouts loudest and most aggressively wins. Its time he himself wound his neck on a bit just because he served doesn't mean he knows more than Ben. In fact I though Ben spoke very well, and I found myself agreeing with a lot of what he said, I do believe the British Empire should take care of their own affairs first.

Sorry..rant over.

Simpliski. Caoimhe is from Dublin. I assume (although I stand to be corrected) her family are all from ROI.

Excuse my ignorance.. But what??

the objection i  had was not with steve's reaction to ben.

tis only bb after all.

what annoyed me was ben's  absolute  assurance  that when things cost money we shouldn't go spending it on trifles like  fighting  nazis and world domination.

we should 'look after our own' we should have found another way of  finding peace with the nazis, well we tried that, and they still marched into poland and slaughtered  millions.

so no joy there.

but hey ho.

My previous response to Jackson was not posted. Unsure if this was because it used the F word or because it contained derogatory remarks about Americans.  

Upshot was, Ben's a twonk and whilst I agree with his views on current policy (if we were still loaded then great but we're not yet we put out far more than our wealthier NATO/UN colleagues)  I don't necessarily agree with his view on 1930's policy (see where he's coming from tho') BUT Steve has no bloody right to call in the "Englishmen" (breathes deeply to avoid RANT about all the other Allied nationalities who died)  who died implying Ben's comment's were unmentionable. Sorry but too many people died to ensure Ben's comments WERE mentionable, including my great uncle but since he's Welsh I guess that does not count (cheap shot but it's late and I'm tired).

I have to live in a country with Nick Griffin. I find his views unspeakable yet I will defend his right to hold them.

Caraid I spent the best part of ten mins writing something out as well and it vanished, I thought I was going mad!

It's been posted that Ben's antecedents "hid" in Switzerland. No more so than Caoimhe's did in the Republic of Ireland (which was also neutral in WW2) and even less so than Mario's forebears who presumably were from Italy and hence under Mussolini.

What I got from this was that when the government doesn't have the money to keep an adequate number of hospitals open in its own country for its own citizens while they spend money fighting someone else's war. Which I completely understand. As they say, sort out you own house before trying to sort out someone else's.

Also, aside the WW1 part which I admit I don't have much indepth knowledge of so I won't comment on his prosed pacifist approach. I think when Ben was referring to money he was talking about the war in Iraq.

But were Caoimhe's parent and family not originally from Dublin?

Yes... 

So how were they hiding a way in a country where they resided?!!

well wars have a habit of popping up at inconvenient times, they  take no account of  have you paid the gas bill yet and such.

ww2 was our war.

But it was never Britain's war? Why do Britain as Ben put it feel they need to be the policemen of the world?

Steve adds nothing to the house IMO, nothing against him personally, but we wouldn't miss him if he went would we?

ww2 was not our war?

i could be  pompous here and tell you to go to library, but i'm not  called ben, so i won't.

ww2 most certainly was our war.

No....... not one jot.

still not sure why that has anything to me getting hot headed about Ben comments and feeling hurt for my father and my Polish family... 

the other half of my family come from the ROI. . but that is not what I was angry about .. it was Ben saying we shouldn't have got involved when Hitler invaded Poland.. 

I got angry at Ben and what he said.. and it boiled over seeing it again tonight..  .

Steve went OTT, but am sure he also said all servicemen/women and civilians that died not just British personnel. .I may e wrong I was seething a bit  

my aunt was stuck in Warsaw after the war & would have been shot or taken away never to be seen again for voicing any opinion.. .she never had that luxury that Ben has.. .. ..  [that's thanks to the Americans given Poland to Russia tho..

anyway as Steve proved, twas an emotive subject and for Ben to be able to say  what he did is only because of all thsoe that did die or fought for the freedom of speech . . I just wish he'd wind his neck in sometimes ..

RiverRock - I SALUTE u on ur above posts - very VERY well put!!

I am not referring to WW2 I am referring to the current war.

we are arguing a non point then river.

my anger at ben was his  views on ww2.

I still stand by what I said. .tho I am not sure I said HID I said he has a Swiss passport and his family live there..

Oh bollocks J..... Yes they do pop up now and again but hardly unexpectedly. Did we NEED to fight the Falklands War? Did we NEED to get involved in Iraq first time around? Did we NEED to get involved in Afghanistan?  Did we NEED to get involved in Iraq? To all of the above - NO. The UK response was not NEEDS driven. 

And WW2 was not an English war. It affected everyone. I have never disputed the need when that need arose. But these days wars are fought for political ends and that sticks in my craw.

totally agree cariad.

seems i have not made myself clear in that  what made me angry was bens  attitude to  ww2.

which was our war and as you point out everyone's war.

ditto mine.. 

anyway am off again. .have fun guys  

Yes, but when Ben said the things that his own country's finances were not able to cope with a war I was sure he was talking about the current war.

Can anyone clarify which war he was talking about then??

WW2 and current ones as well ...

I intended it to refer to your comments that Ben's ancestors "hid" in Switzerland. That has no more bearing on Ben than arguing that Caoimhe's hid in the ROI or that Mario's fought for Mussolini in WW2 (if indeed they did, I dunno). We cannot slate our generation off based on what their grandparents great/grandparents did!!

please  god let's not into a debate  about where the 6th biggest economy in the world gets into a mess  by lashinb out millions  to the non deserving so  keeping the  wealthy, wealthy.

Well if it is current ones, I definitely agree that British troops have no call to be in Iraq and Afghanistan. Tax payers money being spent on someone else's war, while Civilians in the UK are dying because they haven't hospital access etc. What's the difference? One is where people are being killed by terrorists, the other they are basically being hung out to dry by their own state through not providing enough care.  The people suffering from British troops being in Iraq is the people of the UK. The troops are being killed, ordinary people are being denied adequate health care due to shortage of funds, and I am aware this is a bold statement but would 7/7 ever have happened if Britain hadn't gotten involved in the war in Iraq/Afghanistan?

I was lucky enough to have my nearest A&E 7 minutes away. Now my nearest A&E is almost 2 hours way due to hospital cuts. Thats why i think the money is better spend helping the people of this state before helping others.