Gulor Gularin

Even your so called radical changes due to war can take generations. The decline of the Indian culture in the US took several hundred years. The spread of latin throughout the Roman's conquests did not happen overnight either. War is no faster in social change than nonviolent processes, except in those situations where the loser is wiped out. It just seems like a short time because you can point to a particular change and say "look, that is because of the war". It is less nebulous than the constant changes we undergo simply as a result of being exposed to other ideas.

For example, the change in Germany from a nazi dictatorship to its current state did not happen in a year. It took many years to effect and is still ongoing in some ways, driven by ideas that are not forced upon them from outside. Japan also took years to develop into what we recognize as modern Japan after the war.

Gulor Gularin

I just thought of another example....take the advances in medicine. One year polio is a tangible fear in the population of the US, the next year *poof*, it has been defeated.

Look at the attitudes towards smoking. In my lifetime I have seen it move from being the norm, even glorified to a situation where smokers are practically 2nd class citizens. No force caused that shift in outlook.

AIDS is another example. One year people are happily humping everything that comes their way without a care in the world, a couple years later AIDS is discovered and the whole scene changes.

I would consider all of these drastic changes, at least on the scale of what you claim war driven changes to be.

Esbat

Several hundreds of years? Possibly from colonization, but it took a generation once "manifest destiny" was invoked to wipe out a good portion of the remaining influence. Look at it this way" within one or two generations, the power structure and culture of the Western US changed.

No... but the change from Nazi Dictatorship to "so sorry, we won't do that again" would not have happened without the war. Also, the change INTO a Nazi Dictatorship *may* not have happened without the first world war. Chicken, egg.

Japan, which had for hundreds of years rolled ahead, preserving its culture, suddenly had a change of heart about some very basic things when they lost World War Two.

I think the Japanese got a very strong dose of Western culture and Christianity force fed on them after WWII... Quite a shift from where they were before the war. While it might take years and years for those ideas to fully take fruit, the fact of the matter is without some very strong intervention, the ideas never would have *begun* to shift in the first place.

I'm not saying that non-violent means are inferior, nor am I saying that non-violent means can not change things almost overnight (especially in the case of technology, though a LOT of technology has its root in military applications

Gulor Gularin

Then you are arguing my point

IMO we overlook a lot of what changes happen from mundane causes because, well, they are not that interesting. Wars are more interesting, or at least more dramatic so we tend to pay more attention to them.

The whole thing that started our discussion was a statement that most drastic social change comes from the use of force. I don't think we can accurately quantify just how much drastic change has happened and then assign a force or non force cause to it to really decide what "most" is.I suspect we will have to agree to disagree.

In the original topic, ELF is claiming that force is the best way to change society into what they want. I simply am throwing the bullshit flag on that notion. I don't believe they really give a rat's ass about what they are claiming is their motivation.

Esbat

No, I agreed with a lot of your points before I made my first post. I just like to argue (in the true sense of the word). I find a good argument will often increase my understanding of a subject, ESPECIALLY if I take the side against what I am trying to learn more about.

The main caveat to that method is having someone with a good grasp of the subject to argue with.

edit: fixed dumb spelling error.

Gulor Gularin

Hope I filled the bill. Have a great Labor Day weekend folks.