If you could have killed someone....

Beevee • Dec 4, 2007 11:57 pm
.......and changed history as a result, who would it be?

For myself, if I had been Thomas Watson in the other room and accidentally done something that encouraged Alexander Graham Bell to invent the telephone, I would have committed suicide after having throttled him first.

I think the telephone is the most intrusive piece of apparatus ever invented. Why does everyone (well almost everyone) stop whatever they are doing to answer a phone? Why does the person making the call expect to get service ahead of the person who took the trouble to make a personal visit?

Why does the phone always ring when I am in the shower?

I hate it with a vengeance. I do have a mobile but it's only for emergency. The only time it rings is when my wife is on the other end and then I had better answer it - or else.

So - who would you have terminated - and why?
monster • Dec 5, 2007 12:09 am
I pretty much agree with you on telephones.

But to answer your question....

I think maybe we'd've been better off without Pol Pot. He really had no positive contribution.
classicman • Dec 5, 2007 12:21 am
Adam or Eve - take your pick.
LJ • Dec 5, 2007 1:08 am
emo phillips
lookout123 • Dec 5, 2007 1:53 am
gallagher. seriously quit smashing watermelons fucktard.
Hubris Boy • Dec 5, 2007 2:48 am
Henriette Presburg: mother of Karl Marx.

And then bury the corpse in a crossroads under a new moon with a stake through its heart.

'Cause ya can't be too careful.
Aliantha • Dec 5, 2007 4:53 am
George Bush
Sundae • Dec 5, 2007 6:53 am
A lady I worked with called Sandra M. If I wasn't afeared of the power of Google I would write her name in full.
No idea what effect it would have had on history, I just wanted to kill her.
Sun_Sparkz • Dec 5, 2007 6:58 am
I would have killed that guy who shot john lennon.

Apparently someone actually saved him from committing suicide a few years before he killed lennon? tard.


i dont like the notion of changing history too much. things happened for a reason.
Stress Puppy • Dec 5, 2007 9:18 am
To paraphrase Douglas Adams, if you try to go back into history to make changes, it won't work. Time and history fit together like a jigsaw puzzle.
Cloud • Dec 5, 2007 9:37 am
I don't think changing history is a good enough reason to kill someone. One thing that a lifetime of SF fandom has taught me--it never works out well! :)

Also, BeeVee, about the phone: Free yourself from phone slavery! You can do it! It's all in your head!

Just don't answer.
TheMercenary • Dec 5, 2007 9:39 am
Aliantha;413300 wrote:
George Bush

It was only a matter of time before someone would post him. You see if we were to say it we might get a visit from the Secret Service.
Beevee • Dec 5, 2007 10:00 am
TheMercenary;413325 wrote:
It was only a matter of time before someone would post him. You see if we were to say it we might get a visit from the Secret Service.



Noting where the post comes from beggars the question - does the Secret Service extend that far or would they attempt to use ASIS to silence the critic?
Beevee • Dec 5, 2007 10:08 am
Cloud;413323 wrote:
I don't think changing history is a good enough reason to kill someone. One thing that a lifetime of SF fandom has taught me--it never works out well! :)

Also, BeeVee, about the phone: Free yourself from phone slavery! You can do it! It's all in your head!

Just don't answer.


Are you telling me not to answer my wife?

Perhaps I should have married you instead? ;)
Shawnee123 • Dec 5, 2007 10:49 am
lookout123;413287 wrote:
gallagher. seriously quit smashing watermelons fucktard.


Amen!
HungLikeJesus • Dec 5, 2007 11:19 am
Aliantha;413300 wrote:
George Bush


The old one or the new one? I guess if the first was gone, that would take care of both of them.
lookout123 • Dec 5, 2007 11:25 am
noooo, because if you got the first one then we would all look at W in the same way that america viewed JFK, Jr. is that what you want?:headshake
HungLikeJesus • Dec 5, 2007 11:28 am
I guess I was thinking "Died at birth." I see your point.
lookout123 • Dec 5, 2007 11:30 am
butbutbut... you would "kill" a baby?

eh, maybe i just misinterpreted the thread. or maybe i'm just a smartass. take your pick.
Cicero • Dec 5, 2007 11:43 am
Did anyone see Chapelle's show "black gallagher"? Hilarious!!!


Ummm...Please don't name current, living, high profile, political figures folks....You don't want any trouble because of a trifle statement on an internet message board do you? Call me paranoid...and I am...let's just be cautious in our approach here. Even if it is a hypothetical question!
:)



I can't think of anyone but an obvious Hitler right now...maybe I'll have a better answer later....

Great topic and nice to meet you!
:D


Oh and lets not forget how many things and lives telephones have saved? When I inevitably have a heart attack I'll want one.
ZenGum • Dec 5, 2007 12:01 pm
Thomas Midgley, Jr.

Who?

You know, they guy who developed both the tetra-ethyl lead (TEL) additive to gasoline and chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs)!

Yep, leaded petrol and CFCs, from one guy!

To be fair, if he hadn't come up with these, probably someone else would have. Although he fought strongly to deny the obvious harmful effects of lead.

He died in 1944, killed by one of his own inventions - strangled by the ropes of his "bed-assist device" which was meant to ease his sleep after he suffered polio.
Radar • Dec 5, 2007 12:28 pm
Aliantha;413300 wrote:
George Bush


I'm with you there, though I might get Colonel Edward Mandell House or Cecil Rhodes and this would have prevented the creation of the income tax and the federal reserve, public education, and would have prevented the creation of the CFR and the Trilateral commission.
icileparadise • Dec 5, 2007 1:28 pm
Lee Harvey Oswald. What would have happened? We can't change squat. Maybe JFK would have been great or had a Watergate. Cecil Rhodes was a man of his time he could not do any different. And Zengum, how do you know that stuff?
Shawnee123 • Dec 5, 2007 2:32 pm
Zen knows all. Zen sees all. Zen will make you rich. Find out how. Send $5 for postage and handling to

ZenGum
PO Box 7575757577557775
Hapan, Japan

I wouldn't kill anyone but I would like to have stifled a few. I guess anyone who felt it OK to slaughter Native Americans, and rape and pillage. I hate pillaging. It needs to be stopped.
BrianR • Dec 5, 2007 3:03 pm
Actually, I wouldn't eliminate anyone. There is no one that is 100% bad or 100% good.

No one likes Adolph Hitler (Shickelgruber) but even though he was history's biggest evildoer, not ALL of his reign was bad...

Under Hitler, the Autobahn was created, jet aircraft were mass produced for the first time, technology (albeit war tech) accelerated rapidly, the atom was split for the first time. These were good things. But also it cost the lives of some 11 million prisoners, including about six million Jews. Millions more died needlessly from the fighting.

The telephone was mentioned. Good or bad? Yes, it's annoying. But it has saved countless lives, brought people across the world closer together. Also interrupted untold dinners and showers and relaxing baths. But it is not ALL bad.

President Bush isn't all bad either. Perhaps not the best, but I think he's the right man in the right pace at the right time. President Gore wouldn't have done a damn thing but bluster the talk and we would be living with regular attacks now.

OK, Pol Pot hasn't made a positive contribution that I know of, but I don't know everything either.

The point is: no one in history (or now) is ALL bad and deserving of being erased from history.
binky • Dec 5, 2007 3:25 pm
My ex husband right after I got pregnant
Cloud • Dec 5, 2007 3:25 pm
can't interfere between a husband and wife, though!
binky • Dec 5, 2007 3:30 pm
you are assuming he did anything post imprenation to interfere with, other than punching me frequently
Aliantha • Dec 5, 2007 5:01 pm
Beevee;413330 wrote:
Noting where the post comes from beggars the question - does the Secret Service extend that far or would they attempt to use ASIS to silence the critic?


It's ASIO. Australian Secret Intelligence Organisation. And yes, their intelligence is very secret. So secret in fact that not even they know what it is.

I don't think anyone's going to come knocking on my door anyway. I'm pretty sure they'd read this thread, then read the rest of my posts and realize I'm just some dopey liberal looney from the land of idiots and realize the only person I'm a threat to is myself. ;)

Senior or Junior. I don't mind which btw.
Stormieweather • Dec 5, 2007 8:13 pm
binky;413437 wrote:
My ex husband right after I got pregnant


Funny, I was thinking exactly the same thing. Only MY ex husband, not yours :greenface .
Urbane Guerrilla • Dec 5, 2007 9:45 pm
For God's sake, don't tempt me!
sikcboy • Dec 7, 2007 6:19 pm
GHANDI
hippys who needs em!



joking aside tho
whos heard the theory there is a hitler and ghandi in all of us potentially?
Beevee • Dec 7, 2007 9:46 pm
sikcboy;414319 wrote:
GHANDI
hippys who needs em!



joking aside tho
whos heard the theory there is a hitler and ghandi in all of us potentially?


Ghandi?

You're a bit late. Someone got there before you.

So, that's the who. But why?
Ibby • Dec 7, 2007 10:21 pm
I think I'd try nipping that Nirvana thing right in the bud. Take out Cobain, early early early 1980s. Not AFTER he started nirvana cause that would change nothing, he'd still be a martyr.
binky • Dec 7, 2007 10:27 pm
Stormieweather;413580 wrote:
Funny, I was thinking exactly the same thing. Only MY ex husband, not yours :greenface .


I'd go in halvsies with you for both of them:cool:
Yznhymr • Dec 14, 2007 3:09 pm
Without a doubt, it would be Abd Allah ibn 'Abd al-Muttalib. That way 911 would only be listed as an emergency telephone number on Wiki.
Mockingbird • Dec 14, 2007 3:15 pm
Ibram;414393 wrote:
I think I'd try nipping that Nirvana thing right in the bud. Take out Cobain, early early early 1980s. Not AFTER he started nirvana cause that would change nothing, he'd still be a martyr.


Man, I don't even know where to begin with you on this one.
Cicero • Dec 14, 2007 3:22 pm
wtf is wrong with Cobain? He didn't make himself a martyr, and it wasn't him who asked people to do so. Unlike other, real, martyrs he didn't claim to be a god or a saint or anything but fucked up....It's not his fault he became people's idols!!

That guy used to live under bridges and tried to survive on his own talent.That's until his illness completely took over and died. His story wasn't a glorious martyr story by any means...It all is a crying shame. Bottom line: Someone's son is missing their dad.

So maybe you don't like his music...why would you want him killed?
lookout123 • Dec 14, 2007 3:33 pm
because ibram is young enough that he never actually experienced what nirvana/cobain brought to the music world. he has only experienced the post-nirvana world where we have kids who weren't even born yet walking around wearing nirvana shirts and pretending they have a clue about what cobain was trying to say.

honestly i hated the whole grunge thing - but i saw nirvana in a lttle bitty club playing to a couple dozen of us while promoting their cheapo album Bleach. they were absolutely different than anything else being done at the time. I loved them right up until i saw a cheerleader at my school wearing a "smells like teen spirit" t shirt. i knew then it was over.
while i'm not a huge nirvana fan i don't think you can blame all the idiots on cobain.

one of my employees a few years back went to school with him (verifiable) and said he was a really nice, shy kid.
Mockingbird • Dec 14, 2007 5:57 pm
Is it the cool thing to bash Cobain lately? I've seen much more of this in the last two years than I saw even while Cobain was alive. The guy made a good contribution. Whatever everyone one else did with it afterwards good or bad isn't really his fault.
Cicero • Dec 14, 2007 6:07 pm
Maybe to have a "Ramones" moment, you have to bash "Cobain".

lol!!!

I don't know....I'm not as cool as most folks.
ViennaWaits • Dec 14, 2007 11:56 pm
Tim and Eric.

It is NOT an awesome show.
It is NOT a great job.

:reaper: