Fuck the Middle East.

Religion is not any kind of issue in this territorial enmity.

OP has never heard of WWI or WWII or the Korean War or any other conflicts.

Op bery intellrigent

Yes OP. We would we way better without algebra, clocks, airplanes, surgeries, coffee or soap.

Israel has a lot of hot as fuck, openly gay men...

And where in the heck would we get our precious oil? Cheap transportation runs the American economy. And it's Hebrews v Arabs and Persians, it ain't stopping anytime soon. But just you wait until Israel blows up that mosque atop the Dome of the Rock, Cersei Lannister style.

[quote]Yes OP. We would we way better without algebra, clocks, airplanes, surgeries, coffee or soap.

Oh please. Nothing, but nothing, of worth has come out of Islamic countries for the last thousand years or so.

[quote]Israel has a lot of hot as fuck, openly gay men...

Link please.

R8

R6, we get most of our oil from Canada.

My brother is living in Amman, Jordan, for work and loves it. Says it’s cheap and safe and the people are very nice.

I’m too much of a nervous Nellie to visit there but he raves about it. They go hiking and the food is great and the landscape looks like Arizona and Utah, etc.

👏👏👏👏 Agreed I'm sorry lte to understanding this but are Muslims worshipping a meteor too? Please educate me.

The cat litter box of the world!

(hit send too soon!^^)

Dry, ugly, stinky, and filled with shit.

Strike the middle east from the world and half of our problems are eliminated.

They have been fighting in that part of the world for over 2,000 years. It's a cluster fuck. Been hearing about since I was a teen and now decades later I am an elder gay, nothing ever seems to change. Except better weapons and drones.

Americans need to decolonise themselves back to wherever the fuck they came from.

Let the middle east figure out the middle east. Not our problem. Do they worry about us?

We have enough problems on our Americas continent(s).

Well I am about 30% Native American R16, so I am not going anywhere.

Muslims were invading and colonizing long before Americans, or the English, or even the Spanish.

^^^Muslims are the Europeans' problem. Let them fight and figure it out.

Americans can sit this one out.

If oil had not been discovered in the Middle East, world governments would not give a rat's ass what the region is fighting over.

Solution: stop buying gasoline as much as you can and strongly consider going electric for your transportation needs going forward.

R21, if only we had alternative sources of energy besides oil!

This entire region monopolizes the world's attention.

Can they STFU for a few months?

[quote] My brother is living in Amman, Jordan, for work and loves it. Says it’s cheap and safe and the people are very nice.

Jordan is different than other Muslim countries in the middle east because of it's relationship with the U.S. And by relationship, I mean the money they get from the U.S., to stay in line.

Blast the entire Arabian peninsula from the globe, and overnight the world becomes 90% more palatable.

[quote]Muslims are the Europeans' problem. Let them fight and figure it out.

American Muslims have become much more emboldened. When Muslims were 1.1% of the European population they were invisible.

R26, fuck them. They can have fun freezing in Dearborn. They're statistically nothing.

R27 Actually, they are statistically bigger group than gay people.

R28, I very much doubt that.

R29 You doubt numbers? You aren't making any sense

R30, it has always been difficult to ascertain the actual numbers of gay people.

Not so much with Muslims or these other idiotic religions!

What R31 said. There are no closeted Middle Eastern people.

Fact: Sharia law would not prevail anywhere had the United States and its oilmen supported Saudi Arabia since 1933.

It will never end.

R31 Okay thrn, gays make 0.5% more of the USA than Muslims. Huge numbers

R32 What the hell are you talking about? We are discussing Muslims, not Middle Eastern people. Most Muslims in USA aren't from the Middle East

R35, yes, cunt. You type Reddit.

R37 Yes, retard. You type someone who spends all day on Reddit and knows awfully a lot about it, just to shit on it afterwards.

Had they NOJT supported Saudi Arabia.

Because Saudi Arabia is Wahhabism, fundamentalist. It prevailed nowhere else at that time. It only prevails today because they support it. And because Iranians adopted it because of the corruption visited on Iran by the west

R38, what the fuck are you talking about, you stupid bitch?

You think there are more Muslim people in the US than gay people?

R40 Is too stupid to be insulted

Hello?

[quote] Because Saudi Arabia is Wahhabism, fundamentalist. It prevailed nowhere else at that time. It only prevails today because they support it. And because Iranians adopted it because of the corruption visited on Iran by the west

You think the Shia Ayatollahs in Iran have adopted Sunni Wahhabism and that the west made them do it.

Cogent thinking

Israel:

Even their far right leader supports the gays...

And yes, I know that he's a typical political animal who does political bullshit things. Point is, Israel is different from the rest. And yet there are fools here who want it destroyed.

Miss Lindz wants war!

Bitch is ALWAYS slobbering for some huge, nasty, vicious, stupid, endless, go-nowhere war in the Middle East r47. Constantly. It is such a fucking sickness with that cunt.

A close relative of mine lived in Qatar for work for several years. He's very liberal but his answer is level the whole area. He said the people are awful, cruel and have no regard for the life of anyone not in their tribe.

[quote] He's very liberal but his answer is level the whole area.

these two thoughts do not align.

[quote]It will never end.

The strife will likely not end anytime soon, but US involvement and interest would greatly diminish with adoption of non-fossil fuel vehicles and transportation. Even lower dependence on foreign oil (we are much less dependent than we used to be) will only be a good thing.

We will always be supportive of Israel to a certain extent. But can be less so with less dependence on products from the Middle East.

R50 liberal doesn't mean woke and far left kumbaya.

But “liberal” does mean respecting human rights.

but it does imply, don't kill millions of people for the fuck of it r52

[quote] And because Iranians adopted it [Sunni Wahhabism] because of the corruption visited on Iran by the west

Perfect illustration of muddled progressive thinking. First, be completely ignorant of what you are talking about. Then blame western colonialism for all ills.

The Iranian clerics have no agency. They are a product of western influence. There would be no corruption in Iran if not for the west.

Khoemini lived for decades in Paris, R55. If he was not western influenced, it would be surprising.

The religious Islamist nutcases were going to take over Iran no matter what.

Here's a thought, we don't support Saudi Arabia AND Israel. We get out of there completely. No money to either of them. No weapons. Zip, Zero, Nada, stop buying the oil. Let the best man win, law of the jungle.

Oh but we must support Israel for Democracy! No, No, we do not. What has it gotten us except into more wars and a drain on American economy? If one TINY democratic country falls, the world is not going to collapse. It happens all the time. No, we don't need their "intelligence in the region", If we are out of there, it really does not matter what they do to each other does it? We have technology for that. If they can't stand on their own, how long must we prop them up? It's been decades! It's an artificial reality to think that we should do this forever.

Petroleum is not just for gasoline.

[quote]yet there are fools here who want it destroyed.

I just want them all to stop killing each other.

Yes it’s exhausting but the reality of middle eastern oil and ancient religious culture clash has made it all a lynch pin in world politics. A smaller example has been Northern Ireland and the Protestants and Catholics. I used to say- knock yourselves out- enjoy killing and maim your neighbors over “religion”, idiots. But contain it to your own neighborhoods and homes.

But reality is reality. The sad part in the Middle East is that the people are really not at each others throats- but their leaders including virulent theocrats are!

Judaism is not in conflict with other religions Islam is.

R58 If that would happen, Israel would cease to exist in less than 24 hours.

^dream on

R64 Huh?

Arab/Muslim guys are HoT 🥵

I’ve never had sex with an Arab guy but still- hot , hot , hot.

As long as they don't have "issues", R66. I have been with Muslim men. I've also had more than one totally freak on me either after or sometimes even before due to their culture's extreme homophobia. Threats and crazy shit about Allah and all that shit for NO reason except that a switch inside them flipped. They also tend to be aggressive on Grindr with little respect for boundaries. If I were a bottom, I might appreciate that more tbh, but it just comes off as needy and makes me think of the women that get groped in the middle east for simply existing.

But yes, some of them are really hot physically.

Well, we've known THAT since at least Rudolph Valentino!

I mean his movie role as "The Shiek," not his own ethnicity!

Op stand down.

Do Muslim men have good anal hygiene standards? Seeing as they're not allowed to wipe properly.

R71 They receive a 4 out of 5 on the Anal Hygiene Scale, which means well above average to very good.

All savages

R73 is in denial. He lusts after Arab/Muslim guys, but hasn't been able to land a hot one yet. Hence the angry 'All Savages' post.

Just keep hope alive and that incredible savage cock could be yours some day.

Fuck you too! You whore!

Pussyface!

Fuck you!

[quote]A close relative of mine lived in Qatar for work for several years. He's very liberal but his answer is level the whole area. He said the people are awful, cruel and have no regard for the life of anyone not in their tribe.

My uncle has the same opinion. He traveled to the Middle East many times in his career and basically called the region barbaric. He said it should all be bombed into glass.

I feel bad for the animals there. The birds must be terrified.

As long as Petroleum is still the #1 Source of fuel for energy, we (U.S.) are NEVER leaving the Middle East.

(Ever hear about a War in a little place called, "Iraq"?)

I hesitate to jump into such an... in-ter-es-ting thread, but since I taught middle eastern history for a decade I think I have something legitimate to add. Yes, there has been a huge amount of fighting and warfare in the middle east over the last two thousand years. But if we're honest, the last two thousand years have been pretty bloody just about everywhere on earth. So far, our biggest, deadliest wars (the Crusades, Hundred Years War, WWI, WWII, etc.) have been started by European Christians. During the Dark Ages in Europe, the middle east and Arabian culture were a beacon of light and hope, where the arts, literature, science, and philosophy flourished - it was the cultural heir to Greco-Roman civilization. Unfortunately, Islam was founded on the idea of expansion through conquest. Things were relatively stable as long as there were no lands to dominate and new people to convert. But once it became a true empire lust for power and riches overcame religious zeal and Islam had its great schism, similar to the protestant breakaway in Christianity. The Sunni-Shiite infighting was suppressed for a long time by European colonialism, but the minute the colonizers left the religious splits became political as well.

In modern times the formation of Israel has been blamed for most of the problem, but it really just became the Official Excuse. No one in the middle east likes the Palestinians or truly gives a rat's ass about their welfare. They never have, and they probably never will. But they became a great unifying cause to rile up the people, and we know how unifying a Great Enemy can be in the hands of despotic leaders.

So, the history of the region isn't really any more bloody than anywhere else, but the people there have hung onto a lot of medieval ideals and ideas. In countries like Jordan, where the people are better educated, things aren't so crazy. We won't even talk about Iran and the Persian Empire -this post is already too long... I'll just finish by saying if we're not very, very careful we could end up like the middle east in the very near future. Christian Nationalism is a major threat to our world -not just our country.

Thanks for reading this far. I promise not to do it again. At least not without posting photos of hot, nude men.

R80 I learned something new thank you. I appreciate our DL scholars. I'd like you to post more about the region in terms of theories of how you see the next 5-10 years playing out in the Middle East.

Agree with r81. More please. We need some insight here.

[quote] All savages

Albert Einstein

Sigmund Freud

Jesus of Nazereth

Bob Dylan

Jonas Salk

J.D. Salinger

Stephen Sondheim

Karl Marx

Steven Spielberg

Franz Kafka

Robert Oppenheimer

Marc Chagall

Philip Glass

Etc.

And George Glass.

I like Israelis

[quote]We would all be better off if the Middle East never existed.

if it were only so simple, dearie

"if wishes were horses then beggars would ride. . . "

[quote]I'll just finish by saying if we're not very, very careful we could end up like the middle east in the very near future. Christian Nationalism is a major threat to our world -not just our country.

No, it's not a major threat to our world.

Do you know nothing of history, R87? If Christian Nationalists take over the US, they will begin holy crusades to "save" other countries -and, of course, free the Holy Land from Muslim control. They did it before and they'll do it again.

[quote] If Christian Nationalists take over the US....

And if pigs could fly there'd be pig shit all over the place.

I really hope it doesn't happen.

Christianity in the US has been on a steady decline since the 70's. Taking over the US is not going to happen any time soon. Be honest, how many people do you know PERSONALLY who even attend church every Sunday? I know most of my relatives who are devout Catholics have become complacent with that. Most of the marriages I have been to with straight young couples no longer take place in church. People for the most part are just not that religious in the US anymore except for a few pockets in more rural parts of America.

You can thank the good ole US of A for a big chunk of the middle east being oppressively religious.

In the 1960s and 70s large swaths of the Middle East reflected Western "sensibilities" with clothing, culture, and freedoms.

But the USA deemed it better to back religious fanatics with oppressive views -- So that's what we "installed" and those Middle East countries shot back to the stone age in their culture.

You've got your head in the sand and you are completely out of touch R90. I'm very surprised by your post actually.

There are at least 100 million Evangelical christians (up to 37% of the population) in the US and they are hardcore and HATE the gays. That number doesn't include conservative catholics and other conservative christians which number in the millions too.

Have you not heard of Project 25 and their plans?

[quote]But the USA deemed it better to back religious fanatics with oppressive views -- So that's what we "installed" and those Middle East countries shot back to the stone age in their culture.

It was a lot more complicated than that.

[quote]Blast the entire Arabian peninsula from the globe, and overnight the world becomes 90% more palatable.

Ah, the "just blow up 1/4 of the planet's surface and kill off 2 billion people and all our problems are solved!" solution.

Pure fucking genius in its simplicity.

Enjoy your bright future in Fallout Bunker #353.

R94 Isn't that what China tried to do to us by releasing Covid into the world? If you think that there aren't people on this planet who have no qualms about killing millions and millions of innocent people, you are completely out of touch. Take a look at what is happening around the world. It's not pretty. And it's not going to get better.

[quote]Isn't that what China tried to do to us by releasing Covid into the world?

Braindead fucking idiot QAnon cult loon.

Thread is about the Middle East, not COVID and how much China sucks. Don't take the bait.

[quote]There are at least 100 million Evangelical christians (up to 37% of the population) i

It used to be 75%, stop being a drama queen. Religion in the US is on decline.

Yes, overall religion is on the decline but the political influence of whack job evangelicals is too high.

[quote]I'll just finish by saying if we're not very, very careful we could end up like the middle east in the very near future. Christian Nationalism is a major threat to our world -not just our country.

The FBI and Homeland Security watch these things very closely and I don't fear it taking over, and I don't see how it would ever take over in Europe. Radical Islam is more of a threat to the world, IMO, and I hope the United States maintains a seriousness about it and uses common sense in our immigration practices so that radical Islam can never take hold here.

Meant "take over and become a serious threat"...

They’re uneducated animals still living with a 14th century mentality.

Which is why I am happy to have 90 military bases aiming bombs at all corners of that shithole.

R91, It is true that we overthrew the democratically-elected Mossadegh of Iran and "installed" the Pahlavis, who also wanted to modernize Iran but corruptly. The Iranian Revolution was an unintended consequence; the US didn't "install" Khomeini.

In 1958 Eisenhower intervened in Lebanon to support its PRO-WESTERN government against Communism (yes, the common post-WWII enemy).

We supported the Mujahideen in Afghanistan against their Soviet invaders. That backfired into the Taliban, but neither "installed" nor welcomed.

Iraq has been part of an empire, a separate kingdom, and an authoritarian regime. It never had a "religious fanatic" "installed" as its leader, by the US or the British.

So I'm asking what countries do you have in mind?

OP, What is "godawful real estate" to you is untold wealth to others.

You're very naive. "We" overthrew Mossadegh with never more than 12 people in the country, while Britain, with hundreds of intelligence agents there, had nothing to do with it? No the Brits did it and allowed a sociopath braggart Roosevelt from the US to claim credit.