Citizen Linus

Citizen Linus

Posted Sep 14, 2010 17:36 UTC (Tue) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630)
In reply to: Citizen Linus by Doogie
Parent article: Citizen Linus

How exactly do you know this?

Because I read and keep myself informed and don't block outside information for ideological reasons. Let's take Saudi Arabia, for instance. There is nothing like the abuses recorded at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_saudi_arabia in the United States. (I'll go out on a limb here and guess that you're a man, because any woman would know for sure that Saudi Arabia is one of the worst places in the world.)

Now look at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights_in_north_korea. Do you claim that "Torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, public executions, extra judicial and arbitrary detention, the absence of due process and the rule of law, imposition of the death penalty for political reasons, the existence of a large number of prison camps and the extensive use of forced labour" are problems in the United States?

This is not to say that those are great places to live, but the people who do live there are not inherently evil

I never said the people were inherently evil. But an Islamic theocracy as in Saudi Arabia is inherently evil. And totalitarian communism as in North Korea is inherently evil. On the other hand, the principles of freedom and democracy upon which the United States was founded are inherently good even if you think the US government has not done a good job living up to those principles.

To put it another way: Saudi Arabia and North Korea have inherently evil systems of government that cannot be made good unless the systems are completely overhauled. The United States has an inherently good system of government that can (alas) be corrupted by bad people.

There's no question that the United States is a far better place to live than most other countries on Earth. The US ranks decently on the press freedom index (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Press_Freedom_Index) and the freedom house list (http://www.freedomhouse.org/uploads/fiw08launch/FIW08Tables.pdf)

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