--- Scribe1865@xxxxxxx wrote: > Omar writes: "The World War > II was started by the then relatively recent > nation-states of Germany, Italy, and Japan. These > days, both the Israelis and the Palestinians are > relatively new nations which by no means take their > group identities for granted. (The Israelis having > been scattered all over the world until recently, > and > the Palestinians currently being so.) This is very > simplistic but, I submit, > less so than the above." > > Omar's on to something here, despite his attempt to > be insulting. Who started > WW2 is beside the point. However, new cultures do > have more at stake in their > defense than settled ones. I wasn't really trying to be insulting on this occasion- maybe another time when I am more disposed. Here, I was just trying to cover my ass from criticisms for what is obviously a sweepingly simplistic account. Yes, newly formed communities do tend to have more at stake at self-defense. And families in tribal societies had significant functions of physical protection. O.K. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Photos: High-quality 4x6 digital prints for 25¢ http://photos.yahoo.com/ph/print_splash ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html