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The New Transparency of War and Lethality of Hatred
Hugh Pickens writes "Robert Wright says that if you had asked him a few days ago — before news broke that American soldiers had urinated on Taliban corpses — if such a thing were possible, he would have said 'probably.' After all if you send 'young people into combat, people whose job is to kill the enemy and who watch as their friends are killed and maimed by the enemy, ... the chances are that signs of disrespect for the enemy will surface — and that every once in a while those signs will assume grotesque form.' War, presumably, has always been like this, but something has changed that amounts to a powerful new argument against starting wars in the first place. First, there's the new transparency of war as battlefield details get recorded, and everyone has the tools to broadcast these details, so 'it's just a matter of time before some outrageous image goes viral — pictures from Abu Ghraib, video from Afghanistan,' that will make you and your soldiers more hated by the enemy than ever. The second big change is that hatred is now a more dangerous thing. 'New information technologies make it easier for people who share a hatred to organize around it,' writes Wright. 'And once hateful groups are organized, they stand a better chance than a few decades ago of getting their hands on massively lethal technologies.' It used to be that national security consisted of making sure all foreign governments either liked you or feared you; now it requires that as few people as possible hate you. 'I think we should reflect on that before we start another war.'"
No, the problem is our enemies do not fear us. We obsess and worry about whether our enemies like us. We allow our enemies to put propaganda in our legacy media. They don't.
If they truly feared us they wouldn't do the crap they do. Do ya think they would behead our people, desecrate their corpses, etc. if they feared us? Would they blow up a block of downtown NYC if they feared us? If they really though we would get seriously pissed off and go Add Coulter on their primitive asses and "Bomb their cities, kill their leaders and convert them to christianity." The answer is obvious.
Democrat delenda est
morality is evolution from barbarism.
if you profess and implement humanly genuene marolity than greed, wars will not be fought.
...when I was studying history in college, I read some WW2 memiors about the fighting on the island of Peleliu, and some parts very disturbing. The only difference between then and now is that then, they didn't film it and post it to YouTube.
'Humans who learn history learn that humans learn nothing from history'
There is no honor in being a mercenary for corporations and a corrupt government.
I fully believe if soldiers were fighting against a foreign invasion they would not have the same mindset as Xi/Blackwater.
US Marines routinely sent home Japanese skulls (they were photographed in LIFE). Someone sent Roosevelt a cigarette holder made from a Japanese femur. The Russians did crazy, unspeakable things to civilians on a large scale in Prussia and the Nazis were more than happy (desperate) to tell the world through even representatives of the Allied press.
And, oh yeah, the Nazis... no real need to go there.
And why stop with WWII? Vlad Dracul (yeah, that guy) made damn sure everyone knew why he was called "Vlad the Impaler" and he didn't even have a Facebook account.
So, in short, no, nothing new here.
I don't see a problem with it. Where was the outrage when they did far worse to our fallen troops?
---- Booth was a patriot ----
People today seem to think that this is something new. The only "new" in all of this is the instantaneous aspect of transmitting information. These types of acts have been perpetrated in other wars since man picked up his first sticks and stones. To be amazed that this actual happened is nothing more than the true disconnect that people; in general, have with reality as a whole.
I thought /. was about tech material!
So is the right of US to not only invade the country, put their own government, kill a lot of people, send their childrens to guantanamo, but also to shit over the dead bodies of the ones that tried to resist and even joke over it? Put it in the other direction, what if US get successfully invaded, the government replaced, the resistence obliterated, people sent to be tortured in concentration camps and the invaders shit over the corpse of your fathers/friends/whatever, would you be a little outraged? Would be their right to do so? At least the disclosing is not as bad as what was done in Irak.
How can you tell a kid it is ok to kill the guy pointing a gun at you. But you need to respect the body of the guy who wanted you dead? While it is disgusting, i find the killing far more disgusting then the pissing on the body.
We have always known of disrespect for the enemy; it is part and parcel of the mindset that allows most people to kill other people in the face of the knowledge that they are otherwise people just like them, with families, etc. History is rife with reports of disrespect on the battlefield. Spitting, pissing, dismemberment, burial of Muslims in pigskin, burial of Christians with no marker or no blessing, rape of surviving family members, etc., etc., etc.
The fact that these things happen with mind-numbing regularity has never served to prevent anyone from going to war. Religion is insufficient (and in fact serves quite commonly as cause.) Pacifism is plowed under in the face of those comfortable with violence.
What we can say is that the least likely occurrence of war has been when the parties (not) involved are strongly connected by trade, common language, and social patterns, and where the society at hand doesn't busy itself with creating, maintaining, or ignoring a growing underclass of people with less privilege, opportunity, and respect than others.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Why does war exist in the first place? No, it isn't because some are rich and some are poor. It isn't because American troops are in X country. It isn't because images of whoever, doing whatever, were broadcast wherever.
War exists because humans evolved to be herd animals with a strong need for hierarchy. At our most basic level humans desire to establish herds with an Alpha on top and an Omega at the bottom. This Facebook amplified, "I love you, you love me" mentality that presumes that we can all "just get along" goes against our very human nature.
Liking one another has nothing to do with hierarchy. There is no correlation between hierarchy and liking one another. Most leaders are respected first, and liked second -- if at all. Liking one another is a quality most appropriate for the followers -- and we all can't be followers.
If you want to end war you need to do one of two things 1) either destroy that which we as humans were evolved to do (perhaps via Terminator-like eradication of humans) or 2) create world-wide stable hierarchies that incorporate human nature.
In the Vietnam war our press corps actually showed the atrocities of war, including burned children, dying soldiers and the execution of civilians. The squeaky-clean "live from the White House" war coverage began to happen after that. If only our major news sources engaged in transparency these days - instead we either get social-oriented pro-government cheerleaders (e.g., MSNBC) or military-oriented pro-government cheerleaders (e.g., FOX), but really nothing that provides insight into the plight of folks outside the power structure.
there's the new transparency of war as battlefield details get recorded, and everyone has the tools to broadcast these details
That's why we should be like the Waffen SS or better yet, Rome. None of this pussy bullshit of not killing civilians and being civil. War is the most uncivil thing man does!
You want peace? Exterminate the enemy! Kill ever last man, woman, and child - then salt the fucking Earth!
What does the US do? They go in with their pink panties on and escort little old ladies with bombs.
Why don't they just give them Boy Scout uniforms and wooden guns and say, "Go to it, pussy! Bring peace to the Middle East! And make sure not to hurt anyone!"
Wars are dirty.
Given the reports of Christian fundamentalism in the American military I would have to wonder whether this was a religious motive behind the action by these marines.
> now it requires that as few people as possible hate you. 'I think we should reflect on that before we start another war.'
lots of luck with that, it seems now that we are "pulling out" of Iraq, we're looking to start another war with Iran (OK, so we've been "at war" with them since 1979) but it seems they're (high level govt officials and many Americans) itching for a shooting war with them.
mfwright@batnet.com
In WWII, we carpet bombed cities - entire cities and nations got to feel - first hand - how horrible war was. The result? The citizens would take life and politics seriously. You don't want to elect the wrong leader because YOU could be killed.
Now, war is antiseptic. We can target an insurgent with laser beam precision and take him out. All the other enemies are hiding in the nearby houses. If we leveled the entire neighborhood - men, women, children, babies, and all their pets... there will be no more desire to fight on their behalf, or the citizens would drive the insurgents out of their midst and not permit them to hide like the cowards they are.
Would good and decent people get killed? Yup! Sure will! And it is the fault of the good and decent people that they are being killed. How? Well, if the good and decent people stood up for themselves, they could have put a stop to the bad people - but they don't. Why? Because "those who are cruel to the kind, will be kind to the cruel." If the good & decent spoke up, they would be targeted by the bad people and their lives would be in danger - so they say nothing, do nothing. Well, if the alternative were to have your city carpet bombed, then they would have every incentive to stand up and burn the evil out of their midst.
If you make war so costly to fight - the enemy will surrender. When they surrender, it is done on your terms. They violate the terms? They start losing everything again. If they want to pull their heads out of their collective asses and build up a good & decent society, we will help them. If they don't, we should kill them.
Make love, not war.
"What are you doing here, Elijah?"
this song by Rise Against actually says "they pissed in his hands". http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_DboMAghWcA
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You must be new here. At least once a day slashdot does a 'slashkos' politicized story. Always from an extreme progressive viewpoint. This is today's.
In a couple of months, as the US election cycle heats up it will get much worse. Especially since the progressive gameplan is basically going to be a scorched earth campaign since they have no positive case to make.
Democrat delenda est
I hope this is what they meant by Osama Bin Laden's "burial at sea" and that is why there are no pictures ;-)
That's so much worse than living in an area where explosive amputations aren't a strange occurrence, or where having the front of your head blown through the back of your head is a potential outcome of both supporting the local warlord and not supporting him.
Come the fuck on people. Its war. This is just like that Abu Ghraib bullshit. People die horribly all the time in these areas, and yet for some reason the thing that always outrages the moral cowards at home is when someone is humiliated. Its like the civilized mind cannot comprehend the atrocities of war, so they focus in on the level of wrong that they can identify with.
R Kelly never used a orphan as a human bomb, blew the legs off of another rapper, then had to watch him drag his intestines behind him while he bled out. But that fucker did pee on someone. Peeing on someone we can be outraged about. Peeing on someone we can understand.
You know what those guys who got peed on would really be upset about? Getting killed.
"After all if you send 'young people into combat, people whose job is to kill the enemy and who watch as their friends are killed and maimed by the enemy, ... the chances are that signs of disrespect for the enemy will surface — and that every once in a while those signs will assume grotesque form"
This disrespect for the enemy is embarrassing.
On a related note, is it illegal to spit on an image of Georg W Bush? He is after all no longer the president, but his character and tone lives on among some of the marines.
First we need to stop meddling in the rest of the worlds affairs. We need to worry about us (The USA) and our friends, whoever they may be.
We had a valid right of vengeance to go into Afghanistan since that is where Al Q was and they did attack us. Iraq was a joke. Libya was the right measure for the situation.
Defense needs to focus on defending our country. The reasoning behind the 5th fleet being in Bahrain is to be close in case something comes up. Why should the USA care if something comes up? That is an area that loves to kill to each other, has for centuries. It has only mattered in the last 50 years cause that is where most of the cheap oil comes from. Once that is over, no one is going to really care if they go back/continue to slaughter each other. We can sail a carrier group to anywhere in the world from our shores in few days, IIRC.
We knew where bin Laden was days after 9/11, some camp in Afghanistan. Imagine what the world would be like today if instead of marching in all loud and obvious (giving Al Q a chance to run), we sent half a dozen B2 bombers in and leveled the whole camp. I am talking about a complete annihilation of everything and everyone that was there. So that when someone came to visit the spot all they saw was charred dessert and nothing else. Then the President goes on TV and "can neither confirm nor deny that the USA had anything to do with it". That would have set a tone for the rest of the world to understand our position.
Being pissed on is something all you loserboy nerds have experienced at one time or another. This is a variation on the theme, with the difference that the guys being pissed on are not nerds and happen to be dead.
Geeks are so full of shit that "beating the crap out of them" takes a whole new meaning.
urinating on enemy soldiers / pow is unprofessional.
terrorism do not occur when all people are given a house, have food to eat, and free education to walk into their future. you need little repression on top of that to keep everything in line. thats why there was no terrorism in ussr. your future is guaranteed in every way - why bomb here and there ...
Read radical news here
Transparency can also lead to the good. The Arab Spring started because of the same transparency. Information technology helped overthrow tyrants. What you do with the information makes all the difference. If you are predisposed to hate, hate will be your response.
War... war never changes.
yes, 9/11 would never happened if u.s.w as not involved in middle east since mid 1930s, totally taking over the empire building policy of britain by nurturing and using radical islamist clans or organizations as a tool of power.
Read radical news here
It almost seems that these conversations seem to point out the errors of the "Good Guy's" ways more than the errors of the "Asshole's" ways.
I will be honest, I do not feel sorry if a bully is over punished for their transgressions. A person/nation/business/organization that is willing to allow wrong doing in their pursuits deserves every bit the shit kicking it gets when the tax collector comes to call.
This does not excuse anyone for horrific acts during war, but it should neither prevent a nation from visiting the necessary devastation in the defeat of their enemies. Raping and torture is never acceptable in any setting, but shooting first and asking questions later sometimes is!
what happened ? world war ii. you think the entire world will just stand by, watching you 'put bullets into everyone's brains' ?
fucktards are you the first people that need bullets into their brains. because people like you usher in world wars. since noone wants to go back to poking around with wooden spears again, i suggest you put a bullet into your head, and get it over with for yourself.
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The civilian population - which previously had been ready to sacrifice themselves when the Allies invaded were basically shocked into submission.
so it is not because by the end of the war, atrocities japanese had committed had become something common, and now very well known, but, because they were carped bombed into submission, they surrendered.
really. get a fucking clue. a world war ii downed FLYER says carpet bombing works, and you believe it. you could as well listen to marshall harris.
what did carpet bombing do in europe ? NOTHING. nothing. nothing other than razing entire cities and killing irrelevant civilians, whereas slave labor continued manufacturing tanks, warplanes in underground bunkers.
people who dont know enough about military history, should not talk about it.
Read radical news here
At its root, war is about an individual soldier surviving to return home to their family. If these soldiers are alive (and hopefully home), then this was part of their survival
strategy. How is their behaviour any different than defending themselves in combat? People who haven't been think combat begins when the shooting starts. Not so,
they are always under the stress of iminiate combat or danger. This BS of respect for a dead enemy's sensitivities is hollywood nonsense and inappropriate in a War setting.
How do we know the enemy hadn't just killed one of their friends? It is not a disgrace for a soldier to behave like a soldier; the only mistake I see is that the video
was posted because all of the virgins out there will cry foul!. The enemy was dead; it's not like they tortured them to death - that would be a problem.
Anything that get these guys home safely is fine; that's all I care about.
If pissing on the enemy allows then to focus on their next offensive, or survive the next attack, then so be it!
With the advance of the Internet it is impossible to hide the truth - existing human civilization is misguided. Near absolute power is given to the wrong people, and these wrong people are then getting absolutely corrupted by the power. Be it Government., be it Business, be it Religion - ANYWHERE where power is given to few "chosen" - it is abused.
Who would win? The FARE future or CORRUPT yesterday?
That is the issue of human race existence now-days.
Vassili Leonov
My grandfather fought in the Pacific theater in WWII. He had a kind of photo album full of pictures from the various islands where the battles were fought. This was a professionally printed and bound volume that I assumed was handed out to most of those who served in his division. It was filled with gruesome pictures of dead Japanese soldiers, many surrounded by posing American soldiers. This type of thing is just part of war. Soldiers have been posing with the dead enemy since the civil war and taking trophies long before that. Dehumanizing the enemy is just part of the psychological process of killing other people on a large scale.
No major embarrassments (at least any more so than being too chicken to fight in person), and no complaints from your civilian population about too many casualties, I think those poorly dubbed aliens may have been on to something.
You might want to look at how long those countries lasted (specifically, compared to countries that did NOT follow that "logic").
No. The "little tyrants" are VERY specific in their killings. One informer dies and other people are reluctant to become informers.
I don't think you understand the word "genocide".
Well at least you got that part right. If we could capture the correct people and take them out of the general population then we'd have less of a problem. That would be the WORST thing that could happen to those people.
But we don't. We capture INNOCENT people along with the them and that just spreads the hate.
And that is IF we bother to capture them as opposed to blowing up the building where they live (and killing other people who live in that building as well). Which, again, just spreads the hate.
Think about how YOU would react if the foreign invaders killed your brother and his family (who you KNOW was innocent) just because they happened to live in a building where someone fighting the invaders lived.
Look up the word "Quisling".
The entire world DID stand by. Hitler invaded Czechoslovakia and the whole world stood by doing nothing. Hitler purged the Brown Shirts and the whole world stood by doing nothing. Hitler evicted and forced the Jews into ghettos/internment camps and the whole world stood by doing nothing.
People like you are exactly why genocide continues to be perpetuated around the world to this very day.
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/US_ThirdWorld/dictators.html
.... sorry, sopa to fix that problem. not that things like fox news channels et al were not around to allow people to stupefy themselves into the mindset of 50 years ago either ...... but they will fix everything - dont worry. they even fixed habeas corpus recently !!!
do NOT support atrocity-committing dictators into power in other countries for the sake of a few corporations' self-interests, dont get hated. simple. VERY simple.
it only becomes complex when you are allowed yourself to be brainwashed by the propaganda arms of those corporations (Called media). and america has been doing it for around a century, only to be disrupted by the thing we call internet, which allows real information to be accessible.
but hey - they are fixing that too ! they are giving you soap
Read radical news here
like 'if pissing on enemy will allow them to go on next offensive so be it' or, 'carpet bombing worked' .......
im wondering, how many of these idiots, have actually done real military service ? do they think they know shit about war, military, and how it unfolds ?
no.
people who are comfortable behind armchairs, doing nothing but blabber.
i'd advise you to take at least one tour of duty to support a war that is started to further corporate interests, and lose an arm or a leg, and THEN talk.
what ?!?! you dont want to do that ?!! but why !?!
Read radical news here
I was not a fan of Cowen's arguments in two episodes of Econtalk, but there was a lot about his TED talk Be suspicious of stories that I really liked.
The first was that overuse of the good vs evil story mode lowers your IQ by ten points.
The second was that over-reliance on the story "we need to get tough with ..." is nearly as bad.
Here's Cowen being an idiot:
Cowen on the Great Stagnation
And here's the rebuttal, fresh off the press:
Ion Proton sequencer decodes DNA fast and on the cheap
The space program is big and impressive and you can pick up chicks by sneaking them into the JPL and letting them steer the Mars rovers. However, the entirety of the space program, IMHO, is bupkis in significance compared with sequencing the human genome and the era of proteomics now unfolding. Stagnation my ass.
In a terrorist society, only psychopaths commit crimes, of which there are plenty, as the society conspires to drive them to it.
What drives me nuts about this story is the tacit concession to escalationism. If you shoot at someone and later they stumble over your corpse, you can't say you didn't have it coming.
Urination = Disrespect
Bullets = Terminal Contempt
The urine perps should be disciplined, no question, but it's hardly legitimate fodder to order another cargo ship of Chinese machetes.
The problem is that we have enemies.
London and the Soviet Union fought against foreign invaders (the Germans). Even in the countries that Germany conquered, there were active resistance groups. Even in Germany there were people who helped save/hide Jews.
Not to mention a few attempts by the German military to assassinate Hitler on their own so they could end the war.
Finally, during the ground invasion of Germany, Hitler killed himself and the German people surrendered to the Allies. And there was not any active anti-Allied resistance movement. They'd fight against their own government when it was run by Hitler, but they accepted the Allied control while it lasted.
entire world stood by UNTIL some point.
all the rationalizations and justifications for the invasions of germany were based on pre- ww1 and ww1 griveances. politically, it was hard to counter.
even while invading poland, germany was using the german minority in danzig area (gdansk) as an excuse. (not too much a minority actually, 200k or so people).
and, leave aside the international community, germans even didnt know what was being done to jews in internment camps. actually, germans even didnt know what was being done to GERMANS, despite nazi govt. have been rounding up and killing disabled, 'undesired', mentally ill etc in rural 'hospitals' since mid 1930s already.
noone stood by. world war ii started. and more than 45 million people died, most of which is unaccounted for.
however, putting a bullet to his brain would fix problems for both the grandparent poster, and the world. if all such people put bullets to their brains, we wouldnt have neither terrorism, nor war, nor corporate greed - none of the problems on this planet in the first place, with a little exaggeration.
Read radical news here
So if an American soldier does something bad, gets recorded, the thing goes viral and cause an outrage it's transparency's fault for "sharing hatred" ? Holding soldiers to a standard is a bad thing?
You might want to read these things called "newspapers".
"They" already KNOW that attacking us will result in their deaths. That is why they wear suicide vests.
They WANT us to attack them to justify their extremist views (similar to yours).
That doesn't make any sense.
You admit that their people are dying in the current situation.
Yet you had previously claimed that if we killed their people then they wouldn't attack any more.
So killing their people when they attack us results in them not attacking us any more (except when they continue to attack us).
Of course. Because you are an extremist who cannot see how the "logic" of his position is invalidated by his own claims.
How would YOU react if foreign invaders killed your brother and his innocent family just because they lived in the same apartment building as someone fighting against those foreign invaders?
"It used to be that national security consisted of making sure all foreign governments either liked you or feared you; now it requires that as few people as possible hate you."
A lot of people, like presumable the non-sarcastic GP, don't get that.
I write about this in my essay here:
http://www.pdfernhout.net/recognizing-irony-is-a-key-to-transcending-militarism.html
"There is a fundamental mismatch between 21st century reality and 20th century security thinking. Those "security" agencies are using those tools of abundance, cooperation, and sharing mainly from a mindset of scarcity, competition, and secrecy. Given the power of 21st century technology as an amplifier (including as weapons of mass destruction), a scarcity-based approach to using such technology ultimately is just making us all insecure. Such powerful technologies of abundance, designed, organized, and used from a mindset of scarcity could well ironically doom us all whether through military robots, nukes, plagues, propaganda, or whatever else... Or alternatively, as Bucky Fuller and others have suggested, we could use such technologies to build a world that is abundant and secure for all."
Within twenty years (if not sooner), I'd expect any disgruntled alienated teenager will be able to download plagues off the internet, tinker with them, and produce them at home. We need to build a society that works a lot better for everyone before then. One only needs to think about teens making computer viruses (which have had real costs to so many people) over the last twenty years and imagine the same happening in the biological realm. Why should it not?
Consider this slashdot article from earlier today as just one example of dropping biotech costs:
http://science.slashdot.org/story/12/01/13/2353220/a-dna-sequencer-cheap-enough-for-some-doctors-offices
Nanotech, robotics, computer software, and other advanced technologies pose similar problems in their own way.
A "basic income" (Social Security and Medicare for all from birth) is part of building a world of advanced technology more likely to flourish in the 21st century, as would be improving the gift economy, as is better planning, and making improved subsistence technologies widely accessible (a double-edged sword, true).
Our technologies have become too powerful to allow a global society to have so much inequality, suffering, disease, poverty, ignorance, hatred, and cruelty. We need to move to a new socioeconomic paradigm ASAP. We will still have problems, but they will be more manageable.
There is a lot more on my website about this.
It is ridiculous, for example, to worry about Iran developing a nuclear bomb when they could easily develop plagues. The USA was very lucky that blowback from invading Iraq did not include tens of millions of US Americans dying from ethnically-targeted plagues (whatever the costs to the country being invaded). The USA may not be so lucky next time. And the same goes for attacking smaller and smaller organizations as time goes by. We need to completely rethink our security posture to emphasize intrinsic security and mutual security.
The Foresight Institute also has some good thinking on this in the past, in terms of empowering everyone to deal with emerging threats. It's like the playing fields has totally changed, but the USA still is still preparing to win at Major League baseball when everyone else is now playing pickup games of soccer everywhere.
A big problem is that the USA has so much military equipment (especially nukes and probably other stuff), that if it falls apart politically and economically (which is how it has been heading), it may well take the rest of the world with it. And it is completely ironic, because so much of our energy goes into competition and guarding, that we could
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
The subject in self-reply says it all.
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Who is this imbecile and why should anyone care? There are several articles linked, which is pertinent if any?
i dont think i am part of this 'we' you are talking about. the only terrorist bombing ive ever seen was done by a buzz-cut army vet with blond hair and blue eyes.
Well, what we have here is a troll by the editors. Obviously, the end-result is preordained. USA=bad. Can there be any other acceptable outcome? Can you imagine, for example, a Slashdot story that ends with "USA soldiers good, enemy bad"? Of course not, it doesn't fit "the narrative". Moreover, such a story would help "all the wrong people".
Ohmygod, the people who were trying to kill our soldiers, got killed themselves, in poetic justice. And, most damning of all, USA soldiers were revealed as people who take pleasure in defeating the enemy. We MUST MUST MUST invalidate this, in any way possible. USA soldiers are bloodthirsty thugs of a fascist regime - pretty much the same as depicted in Soviet propaganda circa 1962.
Interesting that Abu Ghraib was mentioned. It's an atrocity, to be sure. Men were made to wear panties on their heads. Just a point of curiosity and intellectual honesty here: can any of you name an atrocity committed by the enemy? Serious question. (1) I bet you can't. (2) If you worked for the New York Times, would your editor allow you to publish the facts of such atrocities? (3) What would be her justification for suppressing such news? (4) Why would you agree with her justification? (5) You disagree with the entire concept of 'enemy', unless it's defined as a fellow American.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
if you havent been shot at by the taliban than your opinion is moot. war is fucked up fucked up things happen.
You may actually be the dumbest person I've ever seen post here. Please take you fanatic, jingoistic hatred for any political stance that you disagree with and post it to Fox News. They welcome loud mouth bigots with open arms...you may even get you own talk show out of it!
"Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right" - Salvor Hardin
Yeah, so it was like that long ago. It's really sad to see that your highly professional elite soldiers are no better than soldiers were in the first half of the last century.
The family of my best friend as a teenager came from Germany in the immediate post-war years. I remember one time, quite out of the blue, his grandfather (who had been a young man during the war) came up to and told us "If you ever hear a German tell you that we did not know what the Nazis were doing, he is lying." (these were his exact words). He went on to tell us how families would disappear, many Jewish but also others as well, and that while no one could be quite sure where they were taken, everyone knew that it was to their dooms.
It still stands as one of the most profoundly disturbing experiences of my life, to have this old man so brutally and honestly reveal a truth to me in such a fashion, to brush away all the standard excuses that German's of the wartime generation invoked to get out of any sense of responsibility for what had happened. To this day I actually have no idea why the old man came up to my friend and I, but he permanently altered my view of humanity, and how easy it is to rationalize any action, and even in many cases inaction. Europeans from Paris to Danzig stood by and let their countrymen be marched off to their deaths, and while there were heroes here and there (just as there were collaborators), all in all they just stood there.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
is exactly wrong. precisely 180 degrees from reality. terrorism is the weapon of the weak, who believe they have no other means to fight.
In the first century BC, Mithradates and his allies killed every single Roman citizen in Anatolia within a month's time. Historical estimates offer that somewhere between 80,000 and 150,000 Romans were killed across the Aegaen islands and Anatolia. This happened in a world without the Internet, without mass media, without high tech weapons, without gunpowder.
Mithradates and his lieutenants were able to spread hatred of Rome entirely through word of mouth. They were able to coordinate their slaughter without the Internet. They were able to kills tens, if not hundreds of thousands, in practically the blink of an eye.
It doesn't seem to me that much has changed with regards human capacity to spread hatred.
So you are saying that if a foreign force invaded your home, all that it would take to make you less likely to fight back would be to tell you that your DEAD body will be dragged around?
I am not capable of understanding that "logic".
Meanwhile, the "bad guys" strap on suicide vests and blow their own bodies all over the landscape. As long as they can take down one American.
Except that the only reason that people in Al Qaeda were not considered overly dangerous nutcases and turned in by their neighbors (or otherwise were pressed to reform by their wives and cousins etc.) is that there is a lot of anti-Western sympathy based on the USA having supporting various oppressors in the region.
You don't get a storm without the heat dynamics behind it... Seeds of evil may exist in the hearts of all people, along with good (see Thich Nhat Hahn's writings), but what emerges has a lot to do with circumstances (as well as culture and individual upbringing). That is part of what is meant by winning "hearts and minds" overseas, a battle the USA has been losing (to the extent it is even trying).
The USA also has had a lot of anti-whatever hate groups, as has Europe. The difference is that those societies in the past have generally been functional enough in various ways that people don't let them grow that much, and also in decades in the past it was a lot harder to project power internationally (like with the KKK). But sometimes the social forces have been there to let hate groups rise (like the Nazis). It is better to prevent fires than to have to fight them. And when you do fight fire, it is generally best to fight it with water (not more fire).
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
The ultimate in political correctness. I say piss on 'em.
you're right, global conspiracy among all germans alive in the 1930s-1940s to pretend they didn't know what was really going on. A grand and perfect conspiracy only spoiled by your one friend. Yup. That seems likely.
'I think we should reflect on that before we start another war.'" We? Really? We flew our own planes into the World Trade Center? We attacked the Cole? We shot our own Blackhawks down in Somalia? Get a friggin' grip. We didn't start this war, we're just finishing it.
I think it is more for specific values of "know". Hang on for a moment.
It certainly wasn't because Hitler wanted them to have an all expense paid vacation in New York City.
And that's where the "know" comes in.
Were they being taken to prison?
Were they being taken to an internment camp?
Were they being taken to a work camp?
Were they being taken to prison/work camp to face execution?
Were they being taken to a concentration camp?
Without that certainty, lots of "patriotic" (my country, right or wrong!!!) Germans could "believe" that they were just going to prison or an internment camp (like we did with our Japanese citizens).
Look at the reactions to our own Guantanamo Bay detention camp from our own people. And look at their justifications for it.
People are people. They're just born under different political / religious systems. But their reactions and biases are usually the same.
Because we won WWII, we write the history. We frame the discussions.
If Germany had won, there would be a different dialog.
As it is today. As it will be tomorrow.
Again, as long as there can be some question about what, specifically, is happening to the prisoners ... most people will try to believe whatever is easiest for them to live with.
So that they can live their lives the same way they lived them yesterday. And the day before. And how they want to live them tomorrow.
We have it easy, here in the USofA. Yet we still have only a small fraction of our population turning out to vote.
Pot, meet kettle.
I agree with the AC GGP.
NON-geek Linux user since 1998
It doesn't take a conspiracy to try to convince yourself that nothing's wrong. All it takes is an uncomfortable fact that you don't want to acknowledge, and that's enough for most people to try to pretend it's not true.
Hatred goes both ways. A culture where rape victims are routinely jailed or stoned to death is utterly abhorred in most western civilizations. And that's just ONE example where soldiers fighting in Afghanistan can clearly see where "we" have completely different set of moral standards as "they" do. Peeing on a corpse is disrespectful, but on the good-bad scale the mistreatment, abuse, disfigurement, and murder of young Afghani women is a million times worse.
But the media downplays western reaction to these daily atrocities, while playing up how justified "they" are in getting so bent out of shape by a few jerks peeing on dead people. I guess it's ok to be a rapist and murderer "over there" but don't dare be disrespectful to those same rapists. Hey rapist sympathizers - get bent. Better yet, come over here so I can piss on you and show the proper amount of disrespect towards a culture of hatred and violence that deserves little respect.
Good thing we've restrained our soldiers from acting according to how they REALLY feel. It's strange how the guys with the really big guns aren't allowed to be disgusted by truly disgusting behavior. That's something new in history, the guys with the guns exercising restraint. But don't dare show any respect to the soldiers who haven't gone beserk and killed everyone in the entire country, even though their enemy has the stated desire of commiting mass murder and genocide, and has also acted to further that goal. Nope, we're insisting on respect and restraint against an enemy that shows neither trait in return. Weird. Are we just all retarded that we think this is normal?
Why the fuck would they fear you?
Deleted
Read the fine summary.
New information technologies make it easier for people who share a hatred to organize around it...
The impact of technology on society is just as newsworthy here as the next incremental improvement in graphics engines.
There are two kinds of people: 1) those that need closure
A list of people whose grave I'm going to piss on one day. I started making this list many many years ago, probably after I first heard the phrase "I'M GONNA PISS ON YOUR GRAVE" in some action movie. Just because Jack Nicholson said "I'M GONNA PISS IN YOUR SKULL" once in a movie probably just added to my resolve.
This bothers you? The fact that bad things happen every day bothers you? You should talk to your therapist about this, not us. What happened to "News For Nerds, Stuff That Matters"?
Now if this is just some rant based on your own particular slant of politics that's another matter. Why inject something as ugly and divisive as politics here. Here where, Me Myself and I, come to escape from those sort of discussions.
Dude, most of your readers are just laughing at you.
The first thing most people have to do to cope with killing as a matter of business, even for a just cause is to stop thinking of the enemy as people. War is just that its business. We are not talking about defending some property, yourself, or someone you have a personal attachment to; its killing in support of some abstract set of principles and because someone from the government told you to it.
That is simply not the sort of motivation most decent people need to take a life. I do think war is often necessary and all of us back at home need to keep in mind what the military is really for and that is to kill people and break things.
Its no surprise to me so many of our boys and girls are coming home with major damage to their mental state. We keep telling them to think of the people shooting at them as well 'people', who probably are in many ways like them with families back home, hobbies, hopes and dreams. We think we are being humane doing that but what we are doing is fatal to the humanity of our own troops. You can't kill 'people' like you and feel okay about it at the end of the day. Well I don't know personally but I don't think I could. What I think I could do is kill 'they enemy'.
I think I could do that in a dispassionate professional way and not feel like I had to get revenge. I could view them like a dangerous animal or a hazardous machine to work around and just get the job done. Once the threat was removed I could be okay with it. Now if you make them 'people', and tell me I am there trying to help them, I expect I'd find it really allot harder not to take their shooting at me personally.
Really we need to recognize that nation building does not work. We can't just go into a place with a completely different culture and liberate them. We need to choose our missions better. 'Take out Saddam and his government who we think are building weapons of mass destruction that could be used against us or our allies' is (if supported by real evidence) an example of a legitmate mission for America's army. 'Turn IRAQ and Afghanistan into democratic republics' is not.
Repeal the 17th Amendment TODAY! Also Please Read http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Great. Someone has a different view than yours so they're "spinning" it.
I can tell that this is going to be a GREAT conversation.
I said "end the war".
I did NOT say "surrender".
Hitler's own people were trying to kill him so they could end the war.
Actually, it does.
Again, Hitler's own military people were trying to kill him.
Once Germany surrendered, there wasn't an active anti-Allied resistance in Germany.
Prior to that, there WERE Germans who protected Jews in NAZI Germany. Because being the AGGRESSOR is different. Nazi Germany was the aggressor. The German people knew that.
Nice use of Wikipedia.
The problem is that nothing you just copied invalidates my statement that Hitler killed himself and Germany surrendered to the Allies.
No. It was "non-existent".
Your Bruchsal example happened PRIOR to the war being over (on 1 March 1945). The Allies took it on 2 Apr 1945. Which, as you were so hot to point out, is PRIOR to Berlin's surrender on 2 May 1945.
So it is kind of difficult to have anti-Allied resistance PRIOR to the Allies taking control of the town.
Well, you're just sitting on your ass bitching about SOPA and PIPA while the Congress is passing the infinite detention bill. But it's OK because it doesn't concern US citizens, only foreigners. After all,every single right is a privilege granted through citizenship.
learn history first. of course there occurs dissent when you have famine, war, shit. what you call 'stalin' is a period in between the late stages of the revolution chaos and late stages of world war ii. THE most horrible period that ussr has had passed through.
stalin died before 1950. where was dissent in 1960 ? where was dissent in 1970 ?
let me tell you where it was - because there were now apartments, food, education, universities, the dissent had stopped.
not to mention most of the dissent was pertaining to ethnicity - in world war ii, they relaxed nationalism, and allowed nationalism to have some space, and all those dissenters united against the common enemy - nazis. and chechen ? are you aware that its another ETHNIC problem ? where are the russian terrorists ? where are ukrainian terrorists ? hell, where are sibir terrorists or ancestral finnish terrorists ?
very wise of you - and short sighted - you know about gulag, you know about GERMAN speaking population in byelorussia, but your mind did not wander from there, asking 'why', and how. it just stopped there. basically, you know bits about history, but not enough to create a continuing timeline in your head and see what happened at what point, why, and led to what point.
Read radical news here
Criminals always plead ignorance. From the joint in their pocket to mass grave nearby: they don't know how it got there!
US national debt is over 100% of GDP. It's banana republic time from this point on. Well into PIIGS territory.
Deleted
what you are speaking of, is different - you are saying that people in occupied countries stood by. the grandparent was saying that the world stands by.
whereas, there was a world war going on, because world did not stand by continued invasions.
Read radical news here
The outrage seems to be about them getting pissed on, not about them being killed. Not that they deserve that outrage either. They belong to an organization that beheads people, and films it for propaganda. Where was your outrage then?
This is a war, and if you didn't know what it did to people, then it's on you to educate yourselves.
I never quite understood why it is so abhorrent (by comparison) to do things to dead bodies (which cannot feel or be affected by such acts) while the actual act of killing those people (which obviously affects those people quite a bit...) doesn't get much mention. We don't care that these men were killed, we care that they were peed on afterward. Why the differing standards?
There is a reason why USA and others have held a policy of home ownership over the last century or so. The more a person has to loose, the less he or she wants to rock the boat. And then there is the issue that your not sure if you have supporters. It is damned hard to face down a group on your own. A death wish and no material or social ties likely helps a lot.
comment first, facts later. http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm
Germany has to SURRENDER before there can be anti-Allied RESISTANCE.
Otherwise it would be known as "war".
Because, otherwise, it would be "war" and "resistance".
Again, it was non-existent. Your Bruschal example has been shown to be incorrect.
Now all you are doing it trying to confuse post-surrender RESISTANCE movements with war-time operations.
Nor did I ever say they were.
Which means that you have resorted to a "straw man" argument based off of your extreme claims.
Members of Hitler's military command DID attempt to assassinate him (multiple times) WITHOUT " the *entirety* of the German population" being against Hitler.
Again with the extremes.
Why?
I have stated (and demonstrated) that your position on THIS issue is incorrect and now you resort to attempting to re-phrase my position in extreme terms that I have not used.
Is it just so you can beat a "straw man"?
If preventing war is impossible, and it is inevitable that "hate" grops will gain acccess to WMD, the only logical conslusion is to eradicate our enimies.
Terrorism was made for TV/media 40 years ago. A PR war. Backing off because of fear of bad PR concedes this fight to those who want to look bad. It is how they intimidate others, enforce their will. More media/more attention already has enabled more bad actors, so common now as to be unremarkable. Beheading? Acid bath? Nothing new, never mind. Piss story is man bites dog, plays to western insecurities and fear. Pure fear underlies this entire piece. What will the neighbors say?
And now they will be IMMORTALIZED in history.
And when our military leaves Afghanistan (and it will) they will be remembered by the new Taliban-based government (and probably taught in schools).
"Terrorism" is a tactic.
The problem we have (and I believe that you implied such) is that we keep grouping people into the "terrorist" category based their CHOICE to CHOOSE "terrorism" as a tactic.
And then we try to find the commonality of that GROUP that "made" them CHOOSE the tactic of "terrorism".
The only commonality is that THEIR PERCEPTION of the situation was such that "terrorism" appeared to them to be their best option to attempt to achieve their goal(s).
It's not about the goal. The goals vary.
It's not about the emotion. The emotions vary.
It's not about the background. The backgrounds vary.
Everything varies EXCEPT that they chose "terrorism" as their tactic.
We were Al Qaeda...terrorizing our enemies...until the 90s when they started to turn against us. Who do you think trained them and armed them? How do you think that Bin Laden's family is buddy buddy with the US government?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Cyclone
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
It's war. We tell our soldiers they are fighting for the survival of our country, or way of life. Go put a bullet through your enemies, head, the stomach, their back. Empty your clip. If they engage at close range, put a knife through their eye. Disembowel them. Waterboard the if you need information. Throw a grenade between them and blow them to bits. Push their bodies into a ravine so they won't be see along the trail. Piss on them, wait, no, definitely don't do that. This is morally wrong!! Once you kill them, leave them there to rot. This is the right thing to do.
BULLSHIT.
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
Correcting your false statements is "pedantic"?
The GOVERNMENT needs to surrender.
Otherwise it is Germans fighting against the Allies, in a German city, in Germany, while the German government of Germany is at war with the Allies.
Otherwise known as "war".
By your "logic", the entire war was "resistance". Just by different peoples in different locations at different times.
No. I stated how you were wrong. And I've just re-stated it here.
Feel free to beat those straw men, though.
The bombing of Bruchsal was a POSSIBLE Allied retaliation for the killing of a downed pilot PRIOR to Bruchsal falling to the Allies.
Here, I'll time-line it for you:
War with Germany.
Allies invade Germany.
Downed pilot killed by people of Bruchsal.
Allied bombing of Bruchsal.
Allies take Bruchsal.
No Allied casualties in Bruchsal from war operations or resistance forces.
Hitler kills himself.
Berlin falls.
Germany surrenders.
Feel free to argue with the facts. :D
The "transparency of War" is BS. The Taliban, the Iranians, the various Jihadis, AQ, and so on do all sorts of things on video (like sawing off Daniel Pearl's head while he was alive, or other captives) and there is no "hatred." Just admiration and sadly, desire.
Everyone knows of the male double standard -- Madonna and Whore. But only those willing to see know of the female double standard: Alpha and Beta male.
As long as a man or group of men are perceived as Alpha males (dominating, powerful, sexy) anything and everything they do is considered OK. No matter what. That's why guys like Scott Peterson even in jail get thousands of love letters. Meanwhile as long as a man or group of men is perceived as a "Beta Male" that is ordinary, average, cooperative, unsexy, boring, etc. they must be PERFECT AT ALL TIMES.
WHERE is the outrage over 9/11? Why is "Incredibly Loud and Extremely Close" all about some emo-kid crying and not the revenge of a son over a father's murder? Why? Because Muslim jihadis are "Alpha" to women and the feminized culture of today. If Muslims had done this in 1935, knocking down the Empire State Building, or killing thousands, there would not have been a Muslim left alive in America by six weeks time. And every Mosque would have been razed to the ground. Today there is a Victory Mosque going up near the former Twin Towers. Why?
Because women and thus society treat Alpha and Beta Males differently. The Taliban throw acid on women's faces for learning to read, and behead schoolgirls, but no one cares. There is no outrage, and no "Hatred." Because, hey Alpha Male.
Beyond the feminized West which craves violent domination and brutality, people fear and respect strength, and despise weakness. Killing the enemy and desecrating their bodies worked VERY well in the Philippines, where Muslim Moro Guerillas were buried with pigfat in the early 1900's. Or scalps were taken (by both sides, extensively) in the Indian Wars. Brutality and domination work.
Every boy in High School knows this -- Football players are not picked on, the small and weak are. Women tend to desire domination and submission, which works out OK for them in the short run (as anyone witnessing this female craving for abusive strength can see). For men it is disaster, hence the split in the West. If you are guy, mostly you don't care about pissing on dead Taliban. Why would you? That just shows you're strong and they are weak. A woman or feminized/gay man? Well you want to submit to the powerful so they'll like you and dominate you but not kill you or damage you.
This is what people dont get when I tell them that even when the US govt does this (it will begin here within the next few years thanks to the NDAA) that people will not rebel. They will stand there and shit themselves and reassure themselves that "At least it isnt me" even though they know it could be them next. They stand there because if they cry out, they will get taken too, and so will everyone who cries out.
Yeah you can be a hero, until you realize you are going against a system bigger than you and has all the guns and you have none.
Just how before guns, you would be going against a system with all the swords. except now, it's more than just guns, it's bombs, and you can even be legally assassinated.
America's going to get a wake up call here pretty quick, except america is not going to wake up.
I wouldnt put the blame on the german civillians, by the time they realized they had elected a corrupt government in, it was already too late.
After all, Hitler was a strong, trustworthy fellow who was going to bring glory to germany at any cost, and actually did for the first few years of his rule. At least that was the perception the average german citizen had. Then suddenly people start disappearing and secret police groups started terrorizing the minority groups no one would dare to defend unless they wanted to suffer the same fate.
It's the same reason they will create laws that go after some unattractive group, such as pedophiles or copyright infringers, and have jack shit to do with those groups. It's hard to look like a reasonable or sane person when you argue for pedophile rights, you just lumped in with them and you get ignored, or in the case of Nazi Germany, get executed.
Whoever's president next term will remind us who now holds the keys of power here, wont matter which poltical ideology they subscribe to, they will tighten the noose around our throats just like the nazi party did to german citizens, and anyone who isn't "patriotic" will disappear just like people in germany did, and no one will be able to defend them as they will be "enemy combatants". just how the jews, gypsies, mentally ill and challenged, union leaders, and political opponents were the "diseases of the german state" It's real easy to make someone unfavorable, just slap a negative label, say that they're it and process them accordingly, and make sure people know that these people no longer are considered human. It's a good shot across the bow of a populace to keep them in line. The US has done this to our enemies to shake them up, and they will happily apply it to the rest of us.
The politicians are not listening because they no longer have to, they have tested us and found that we will stand by idly now.
With that, I do not give the German people flack for their choices, they were deceived, and in the end, powerless. They couldnt defend themselves or attack people who had some of the most advanced military equipment of the time, and neither can we.
With that sobering thought, have a great weekend.
A suggestion. Learn a bit more about the Second World War, before you post again.
'We had no Nazis here in our village.
They all came from outside.
Perhaps there were some Nazis in the next village, I don't know."
-- Translation, from an interview during the American occupation of Germany
"Europeans from Paris to Danzig stood by and let their countrymen be marched off to their deaths, and while there were heroes here and there (just as there were collaborators), all in all they just stood there."
A lot of them helped. After all, murdering Communists is rational, and there was enough anti-Jewish and anti-Gypsy irrational prejudice that most of them weren't missed.
Look up the Waffen SS divisions from the occupied countries. Some of them fought superbly.
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
are you aware that, that massacre occurred right at a time when norway was opposing israel in various important international political issues, and also spearheading pushes about the palestinian problem ?
that is not some natural occurrence. that kind of thing regularly happens when a nation's interests go against israel - especially its neighbors. so far the only immune nation is ireland. when ireland and israel get into some sort of conflict, israel suffers.
Read radical news here
The number of people here trying to justify the actions regarding the Taliban corpses is truly disgusting, there's a difference between collateral damage and wilful contempt and this act goes against the values of Honour that is so often espoused.
> to brush away all the standard excuses that German's of the wartime generation invoked to get out of any sense of responsibility
"If you ever meet an American who says he did not know what Bush was doing, he is lying".
"If you ever meet an American who says he did not know what the CIA was doing, he is lying".
"If you ever meet an American who says he did not know what Nixon was doing, he is lying".
"If you ever meet an American who says he did not know what Hoover was doing, he is lying".
"If you ever meet an American who says he did not know what Harding was doing, he is lying".
"If you ever meet an American who says he did not know that WMD was an excuse, he is lying".
I could target other countries just as easily. Now that we've determined that all Germans tried to hide their Nazi past, what's America's excuse? You want me to add waterboarding and Guantanamo to the list too?
AC
PS Fuck you!
We can exclude editors - can we please get an option to exclude regularly accepted submitters?
Fighting evil is a noble cause and must be done.
that was how good people were persuaded into wars for profit for the last 2 centuries ... oh - and in roman republic too - every war roman republic has waged, was based on various justifications, and most of the justifications were manufactured through setting up events in volatile zones through the government's own means. just like how u.s. has been pumping up radical islamists for 20 years, and when it was needed, they suddenly appeared as the enemy.
Read radical news here
Genocides have happened every few years since WWII, and no one did anything to stop them. Yes, the entire world will stand by wand watch.
http://www.good.is/post/urination-at-war-don-t-be-mad-at-the-peeing-be-mad-at-the-killing/
This article has the stance that war needs to end first. Something that probably has a lot of truth to it.
However, being from Germany, I have a somewhat different perspective on the issue. When I was younger there was still a draft which meant that not only a certain subset of the population would serve in the military but a sample that represents the citizenry more accurately. This in itself helps but the draft also helps with avoiding stupid wars. If it is your son or daughter that has to go to war you feel differently. It reduces how removed the military is and how removed the issue of war and peace from the average citizen is.
Another thing is the concept of the 'Citizen in Uniform'. It says that soldiers do have rights in their life inside the military and that they have almost the same rights outside the military as a regular citizen. It is part of the concept of 'Innere Führung'. If anyone is interested in what this entails, read the excerpt on Google Books that I linked to.
http://books.google.de/books?id=4mSeiOoMpvsC&pg=PA169&lpg=PA169&dq=staatsb%C3%BCrger+in+uniform+english&source=bl&ots=AFdnB4pm2f&sig=th75ntix6iYVqtRQ9LS0v2Nkc_w&hl=en&sa=X&ei=Hl0ST_iSM83HsgbsickN&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=staatsb%C3%BCrger%20in%20uniform%20english&f=false
Sometimes, I have that thought but about Guantanamo. We are just living our life while people are held in an illegal prison where, literally, torture was/is practiced. We know it and we just stand there.
I don't have an account but I had to reply.
A bit of proof for what you write was done by a Dutch columnist who as a pure racists wrote that HE did note hate the Muslim cashier serving him and therefor there was no need for fear or war... HER opinion was never mentioned as it does not matter to the likes of him. Muslims are not human beings capable of having their own desires and motivations but simple pets to be pitied and coddled unable to be held accountable for their actions any more then a retarded child.
It takes two to tango, it only takes one to start a war. Love is a two way street, hate isn't.
By stating only HIS own lack of hate for that girl he states that what SHE is thinking of him is of no account, the powerfull westerner vs the immigrant (and of course, he simply assumes that a girl with a headscarf is a Muslim (head scarfs are often worn by western women to keep their hair under control, see series like Last of the Summers Wine) and indeed an immigrant).
Their exist pictures on the net in which you see white people partying while two black people are hanging after lynching as some kind of macarbe party decoration. Did those two men hate white people? Those white people in particular? How are the hate lines drawn?
The conflict between Islam and Islam and Islam and the West are extremely complex. It is not just Islam vs the West, in Afghanistan there used to be Buddhist statues of great age until they were destroyed despite the fact that Japan was a great donor of aid to Afghanistan long before the current conflict. For centuries those statues stood, why did they have to be destroyed?
Conflict is a difficult thing and understanding it is not helped by 12 year old boys who want to see the world burn joining the discussion. There is not a single case of a Muslim force treathing western prisoners respectfully. Not one. Yet that is not part of the discussion for most. Why?
To many who protest about some western soldiers loosing it, the Muslim is not a full human being, they don't consider them on an equal level so when countless western prisoners are abused and degraded, they don't see it on the same level. Double standards.
True equality is holding everyone to the same standards. If you think a barely passing school grade is a sign of mediocrity in a white person it is then wrong to celebrate it if a small percentage of immigrants manage it. It re-enforces the idea that "they" are below "us".
See the ancient disuccions about Dresden and the use of nukes on Japan. The protesters never hold the german and japanse people accountable for the countless atrocities committed with their full support (did the mothers who died at Dresden refuse to talk to their SS sons? Did the japanese sisters refuse to acknowledge their child raping brothers?) and thereby make it the norm for Germans and Japanese to be inhuman monsters and only the Allies are held to have any morals to be held to accountable to.
It is dangerous to base your own morals on those of others (if they do it, we can do it) but it is equally dangerous to just accept low moral standards as normal in "them" even if you think that doing so makes you a great humanitarian. One of the most racist thing to say about another groups action that goes against your own morals is to say "oh well, it is cultural".
It was once German culture gas people. it was the american south culture to enslave people. Did we let them do it just because it was their local system? No? then why don't we hold Muslims to the same morals and judge their mistreatment of prisoners and minorities as we would judge ourselves?
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
The sight of soldiers urinating on dead enemy is a propaganda blow. If we are pinning our hopes on propaganda to "win" Afghanistan for us, we've already lost.
I know that Afghanistan was the staging area for the 9/11 hijackers. I don't want the Taliban to come back. We don't want it to become a failed state, a playground for terrorists. But are we expected to go into every failed state out there and create a functioning state? That policy is doomed to failure. If that's the policy, we need a new one. One that doesn't bleed us of blood and treasure (we don't have), and has a very very low probability of success.
It's like saying, "Mosquitos cause malaria. So we're going to have to drain every swamp in the world, so we can stop the threat of malaria." Here's a crazy thought: how about we stay out of the swamps, unless they're actually IN the US.
When did we do that?
I thought the Islamic, afraid of women and afraid of the modern world, terrorist asshats most recently did that.
about the inconsequential things compared to media blackout on Al-Qeada London Bomb civilian victims of Al-Qeada Madrid civilian victims of Al-Qeada http://scrapetv.com/News/News%20Pages/Business/images-2/afghanistan-war-civilians.jpg ">Afghan civilian victims of Al-Qeada also include women and children http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/11/06/article-0-071BAEFB000005DC-851_964x544.jpg
It's interesting to think about people starting to caring about their country's online reputation. The article is right as well that the internet has created classes of online vigilantes.
I don't think it's going to change policy at all. America has the most defense of any country and doesn't worry about vigilantes. Also America has a sense of self rightness as well. Americans believe that the wars are God's work so practical considerations come second.
All the fresh young things who imagined that the net would become an instrument of freedom got it wrong. The net is and will be a weapon of oppression and control.
'Take out Saddam and his government who we think are building weapons of mass destruction that could be used against us or our allies' is (if supported by real evidence) an example of a legitmate mission for America's army.
I hope I'm not a lone voice. Your justification for pre-emptive war against a sovereign power only requires evidence that they are manufacturing WMDs. That's all. The rest is a 'could' and you can justify anything with a 'could'. Iran are making WMDs (probably true) that 'could' be used against the US and it's Allies? Well of course they 'could'. They could be used, legitimately, in response to a pre-emptive strike from the US or it's Allies! Israel 'could' use it's WMDs against the US or it's Allies too. Not enough reason to invade them though (IMHO). I don't think evidence of manufacture alone is enough to justify attacking another nation. If they threatened to use use them against the US or it's Allies then maybe. Maybe. And that's only if you can make a strong argument that pre-emptive war is justified either at all or in these specific circumstances. But just because they have WMDs? No.
Simpering fagboy drivel. Plagues come and go; bribes exist, but no gifts. The parasite American sub-classes ... both wealthy and poor ... can be de-empowered, sterilized, driven to the fringe leaving a productive republican core. Next.
"Everyone" may have the tools to broadcast details, but if the mainstream media do not bring it to attention of the masses and takedown notices can keep it out of the online limelight, then only the "fringe" will every hear about it - and so no meaningful political consequences. This latest news about urinating on dead Taliban smells like textbook spin to hide even worse news in its shadow. Control of the news re: war is exactly why the government and pro-goverment media is coming down so hard on the foremost US political prisoner of conscience, Bradley Manning and the rouge publishing site Wikileaks. They are successfully influencing the majority public opinion against the first bit of real solid news to escape the lockdown control of public debate since the Vietnam war. Note: Leaking of sensitive information is obviously NOT why he is being persecuted - more sensitive leaks go without investigation all the time. There is some hope however, with some new professional investigative news channels springing up funded by viewer donations... just need to build their audience - if possible.
So urinating is "Disgusting and immoral" but putting a bullet in their heads, bombing the shit out of them, occupying their homeland, forcing democracy down their throats...that's all fine and dandy? I just don't get it.
Iran has tentacles into South America, and those forces can freely flow right up into the States through the nonexistant southern border we are so afraid to police.
WOW. 'tentacles'. iran. south america.
hahaha ahahahahah ahahahaa ha ahaa haahahahahahaah
that is the problem with american right. they dont know shit, and therefore scared of everything. let me tell you as a person neighboring iran - iran cant even 'tentacle' its neighbors, leave aside fucking south america.
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he is within the 99% within his country. the pyramid does not change shape in wealthy countries. just, it moves up a bit.
so if an african is in the 99%, the american who is in the 1% compared to the african is in 99% compared to its own 1%.
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a lot of exemplified and referenced propositions, yet it is not modded higher than 2.
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being an uncontested royal douchebag of the lowest order is better than being an ignorant moron of the first order :
Turkey, 1915-20: 1,200,000
this probably pertains to the 'armenian massacre' that happened in world war 1. first, it is not something in between 1915 and fucking 1920, but happened in winter of 1915-1916.
second, entire armenian population of the entire ottoman empire was not more than 1.2 million people, leave aside armenians dead on the winter march in eastern anatolia being 1.2 million
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottoman_Armenian_population
eastern anatolia is not a place that could keep 1.2 million total population in itself, leave aside armenians.
all these ignoring the fact that no armenian anywhere else in the empire was harmed in 1915, and the armenian artisans, bureaucrats, shopkeepers and business owners in istanbul or elsewhere kept about their business as always.
finally, what happened was a forced migration/march in the winter, so that the armenian population would not support russian supplied armenian revolter gangs. purported to be freedom fighters, they were killing anyone who did not supply them with supplies, even if armenians - just like the other 'national' gangs that dotted the anatolian landscape then. 200 to 300,000 people died, because of the winter conditions on the road.
while it is something utterly stupid and brutal to force people to march in winter, one would be hard pressed to call it a genocide considering the fact that in the SAME year, an 30,000 strong ottoman army that comprised of turks, kurds, arabs, armenians, greeks, and a zillion other ethnicities have died out of cold because they were not supplied with winter equipment due to poverty of the empire, in the SAME area.
by the way israel still forces migrations even this day.
so, wherever you got your figures is unreliable.
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What kind of kindergarten view of the world is this?
Wars start for political reasons, usually competition for territory, dominance or resources.
Let's let the adults back in the room now.
Futurist Traditionalism
Why did the author (Robert Wright?) assume that the US has control over whether there will be a war or not? Is he alleging that the Taliban are not or our enemy? Or that the war against Iraq was discretionary?
What happened in this case is nothing new in many ways, except for one ---> They forgot that stupidity has no boundary.
I mean, you can kill those talibans and piss on them but taking video of it and then put it online?
Stupidity to the grandest degree !!
If you remember your Homer, Achilles (effectively one army's commander) kills Hector (basically, an enemy commander). Hector's dying words are that he just wants an honorable burial. Instead, Achilles promises to deface his corpse in any way he can. Achilles abuses and desecrates and drags his corpse around as a nasty insult to the Trojans, as the Trojan leadership begs for days and offers to pay lots of money just to have the corpse back.
And Achilles was a "hero."
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Europeans from Paris to Danzig stood by and let their countrymen be marched off to their deaths, and while there were heroes here and there (just as there were collaborators), all in all they just stood there.
Instead of doing what? Germans already had beaten their armies and took away their arms. If some of us are going to be killed, most or all of us should die too? That'll show those pesky Germans!
In words of a movie bully : "What are you looking at? You want some?!"
It is so easy to ride tall horse on a separate continent.
This is BS. There is plenty of coverage of US military actions. There is no likewise coverage of the conduct of US enemies on the battlefield. That is because one side believes in a free press and the other doesn't.
This was no different in Vietnam. The communists killed plenty of civilians, many on purpose and for effect, but these atrocities were hardly reported by the Western press because they didn't have access to NVA/Vietcong areas.
How many reader on *THIS* board have been downrange? Sorry, sipping a latte' at Starbucks just doesn't count, so don't presume to hold a moral high ground over people who've been there and done that. After 3 tours downrange, no, I don't see a problem with it; it's a pile of spoiled meat made up of dead shitheads who were trying to kill them a few minutes earlier; it's counting coup and as old as man has been walking upright.