NJS

O'Neill appeared before a parlimentary committee to defend spending 130m at Villa - most of his defence was it was "only" 70m net.

Christianity's contribution to Western Society morally is huge; one has to remember that when Christianity came along it initially won plaudits for it's sobriety, peacefulness, generosity, care for the poor and sick and above all it's central creed that it was a religious obiligation to act charitably towards others - something that disgusted the Emperor Julian who wrote that "it is a disgrace that these impious Galileans care not only for their own poor for ours as well" - but today would the extolling of such virtues fundamentally shock the leaders of our society? I don't think so. Whether these values are Christianities or not is a historical one, but it is clear that today we can see these virtues underlining our healthcare system for example... The influence of Christianity on the west is undeniable but also not exclusively beneficial. Every advance in human rights in the last 500 years has been opposed by religious authorities at some point - including the abolition of slavery. To suggest the idea of charity and especially medicine is exclusively Christian is also an insult to all of the Eastern philosophies - for example the service ethos of Buddhism pisses all over Christian charity from that pov. Someone mentioned geographical accident earlier which rings true in your case - if you'd been born in the Middle East you'd extoll the virtues of Islam as a cultural influence on humanity (with a degree of truth) or further east another influence - of course various perspectives all have some truth but that's my point - the underlying core values and ethics of all of them are broadly similar because they are all based on evolved human empathy - central to that is the lack of need for a particular tribal deity.

Part of that turning a blind eye to excess was and is backed by religion so to suggest that 20th century excesses were somehow a betrayal of better times is nonsense. Of course all civiliasations had brutal facets - I'm not saying humans are perfect but I don't get how you can say that in general the moral code isn't common. I can't think of any era where society wasn't underpinned by a broad notion of the common good - of course some failed to live up to that and got it wrong but even extremes like fascism and communism had a sense of "order" and desire to work at their core.Can you name a civilisation where murder and rape honestly weren't seen as geneally bad? On Hitler I have great "faith" that he could never have conquered the whole world in any meaningful way so the question is moot - there would always have been resistance. Even if they hadn't invaded Russia or had invented the A bomb they could never have conquered the Yanks militarily or China and India numerically. From a hypothetical pov I don't think in the 20th century onwards people would have accepted such a definition of the Jews - but funnily enough that very definition you mention was the official Catholic stance for centuries (minus the active extermination)

What do you think The church would have done in the middle ages with gas chambers or A bombs? The 20th century also saw massive advances against disease, hunger and poverty, of course they all still exist but to try and say it was dark age is ludicrous. Also note the widespread advance of human rights, and the increase of tolerance for homosexuality in a lot of the world as a huge step forward. Which God? As I alluded to there is a broad commonalitty of morality with all human communities. Of course there are aberattions but in general we do have an instinctive "feel" for right and wrong across a large span of ethics. Sociaties which never did know of an Abrahamic God all managed to come up with the same ideas - coincidence or evolved empathy based morality?

Humans are by nature a very social animal - to imply anything else is breathtaking ignorance. The western world has only reached this level of tolerance in the last 100 years - as religion's infuence wains - see the ongoing opposition to gay marriage as the perfect example of how wrong you are.

This would be the ten commandments that waste at least 3 talking about how to worship God, contain one that destroys the concept that the western world is based on (capitalism) and sees no need to proscribe rape, slavery or child abuse. Of course theft and murder were okay when Jehovah ordered it - how convenient.

Erm.... Murdered,raped,enslaved, exploited minorities etc etc Always find it interesting hove those who are "humanist" deride religion which was the very catalyst for said humanity. No - we formed communities - do you think some kind of switch was flicked by the Jews? Mankind would never have got anywahere near civilisation with empathatic morality. Yes a lot of these civilisations were religious but so what - what do you think came first. Also the Jews commited genocide in the name of their God, so again the idea morality was handed down to them is ridiculous. Many, many civilisations grew up in the last 5 thousand years or so - funnily enough all of them, no matter what belief system they follow have generally the same moral code - how does that work if it was exclusive to the Jews or Christians?

Just as stupid as the idea that Jehovah gave us morals. What did we do for the thousands of years before that?

It is perfectly acceptable to wish some well and genuinely hope they recover in the context of your own beliefs but I just think credit should go where it's due.

I thought we wre heading away from all this rubbish - albeit as much down to apathy as much as any kind of "enlightenment" but still. If prayer is so great would they have been brave enough to leave him lying where he fell and form a circle around him to pray? If he does recover you know it will be called a "miracle" when the only miracle on show is human intelligence and empathy backed by years of training from all concerned. In fact if I worked so hard on pushing the boundaries of life and then people effectively said "well fair enough but it was really God that saved him" I'd be pissed off. Theres also the question they won't answer - if he had (or indeed does) died would they have "blamed" the same God they want to thank? Will they explain to the family of the bloke in the next bed who did die that their prayers weren't good enough or God didn't think he was worth a saving nudge? I understand that it's all a hangover and its very human to think in these terms when faced with tragedies but thousands if not millions die every day - I just wish we could accept this, no matter how sad it is on an individual basis, and leave this legacy of our species childhood behind.

Just noticed Kilmarnock beat Celtic in the League cup final - a lad I work with was going up for this so he'll be fucking ecstatic (and I doubt he'll deal with any of my helpdesk requests tomorrow).

Bit of a struggle but the result is so important - also we should have had 3 really. I think we really need to freshen up the creativity in the summer.

The correct "who are you referring to" dig is Rotherham - they were the first. I also think "manure", "chelski" and "citeh" are far bigger crimes than the OP - sky era shite of the worst kind.

Yep in one thread - another Ashley is a twat leviathan - I remember Renton accusing him of having a sex wee when West Brom equalisied which is when he (Renton) stopped even trying to talk to him.

I hate it when it's used when we're playing them, It's okay when Mancs or Scouse Cunts use it. It's fucking abysmal when you hear people in London use it - I know all the jokes about them being a London club but just fuck off.

I've had many arguments with many people both on the internet and in "real" life where no matter how passionate they became, I always felt I could shake the hand of the other person and buy them a pint. I always used to think exactly that of LM but over recent months I think his level of personal nastiness to people has gone way beyond what I think is okay. I don't want to play the amateur psychologist but I think the few good signs happening around the club (which I'm as cynical as anyone else about) are getting to him as being "right" has become far too important to him and anything that threatens that brings out the worst. Sadly I've got to the point where I honestly can't see him enjoying watching the team anymore which he denies. I think if the mods had said to him "Look mate you're dragging the board down, take a break" it would have been good to see him say "you're right" but to be greeted with a response which at best is an infantile "but I'm right" and at worst a shit lot of abuse is not on. I've said before I don't agree with permanenet bans and I do hope he comes back - unfortunately I can't see him changing the record if he does. Again sadly I can only imagine him returning if the season does peter out a bit and don't want to see any more smilies if we lose a couple of places on the last day like last year.

Corporate HR bullshit. Wasted most of today completing my "annual objectives" - HR doublespeak to give the cunts a supposed purpose in life - you're fooling no fucker whatsoever.

What gets me is the thick Fast Show fucking fans of theirs actually thought what Krul was doing was THAT bad - fucking Sky era fucking pricks - everthing that's wrong with football is summed up by their fucking ignorance. Cunts.

Another played added to the list I would love to see crippled for life.

It used to be 4 hours but they changed it to 24 a few months ago - absolutely shit.

Tranmere: One kid just in front of me shouted Toon Army just after the start of the silence -he was told to shut up be everybody and their fans responded to either the first interruption or the "shushes" - at the end of the minute someone chinned him. Since then the Mackems have interrupted about 3 silences that I know of - I sometimes think that their desprate underlying need to try and be better than us leads them to mirror the bad as well as the good.

I think we'd have a few (maybe 7 or 8) more points if Taylor hadn't been fucked. I haven't gone overboard on this season's performances as I still think we need more creativity (maybe by fitting in Be Arfa) but my gut feeling is we're a better side overall. There have been aberrations but I think we've competed against the better teams a lot better than last year. (Of course being so badly affected by Taylor's injury is a sign of squad weakness)

I think poor seasons by Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool so far have made it look like we are up there which is why I mentioned luck/management as a factor. One thing LM does get right is that it needs to be year on year.

I'm happy to try Spurs approach but see 5 teams whose revenues/profits/cash are very hard to match. That's why imo challenging around 5th/6th/7th is about "right" sadly. Beyond that its about management/luck. Yeah, I think that should be the expectation, with anything higher something worth celebrating. Having the 3rd biggest stadium has less impact than it used to. Having the 6th biggest revenues and the 7th wealthiest owner should give us a good headstart though. Having the 20th net spend going hand in hand with an as yet unknown profit (before the hefty profit on player trading is accounted for) doesn't suggest we're doing what it takes to maximise those things we have in our favour though. I agree with that last bit and that's why I still don't "support" him. I've said before I don't understand what he really wants to get out of it - if it is "enjoyment" then he could certainly do more.

I'm happy to try Spurs approach but see 5 teams whose revenues/profits/cash are very hard to match. That's why imo challenging around 5th/6th/7th is about "right" sadly. Beyond that its about management/luck.