Reply With QuoteGreat. Just what we need. More sloppy generalizations condemning entire cultures.Originally Posted by marxeil
http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/meast/...ain/index.html
Just saw it on the news. They blurred the bodies as they were pulled out from the cars, beaten, torched again, dragged through the street and hung.
These people are not people. As a punishment, the USA should reinstate Saddam.
Great. Just what we need. More sloppy generalizations condemning entire cultures.
Well, the footage showed hundreds of people participating, cheering and so on. I guess they just didn't show the thousands who tried to stop it.Great. Just what we need. More sloppy generalizations condemning entire cultures.
It's hard not to jump to generalizations when a group of people behaves in such a horrible manner. However, I try to remember that similar untrue generalizations have been made about all Americans, and it makes it easier to resist the urge to generalize.
You really have to wonder how interested we are in setting up a real democracy when significant factions of the populace are "voicing their feelings" in this kind of manner.The White House condemned the "horriffic attacks" by people "trying to prevent democracy from moving forward," spokesman Scott McClellan said.
I'm queasy about both sides. On the one hand, I agree, you're talking about a few hundred assholes in a country with thousands upon thousands of people. But, for the second time today, I'm reminded of my discussions with Tim about Palestinian terrorists. You have to wonder why, if those thousands and thousands of "ordinary Iraqis" are good people, they don't put a stop to this kind of barbarity. We have riots here in the states, but other people--usually police--work to stop them. If we had no police, I'd like to think that citizen groups would do the same thing. It really just seems like that sort of disgusting display can't take place unless the majority of the population is either supportive or at least apathetic; and even apathy is downright awful.Great. Just what we need. More sloppy generalizations condemning entire cultures.
Fear is a factor you're not considering, Ry. If I saw a mob of hundreds of very emotional and armed men (a large percentage of Iraqi men carry some pretty serious firepower most of the time), I'd hide or run, not stand up to them. That's a job for the police/national guard, not private citizens.
Gee, I wonder if those soldiers were looking for WMD?
The CNN article identified them as "civilians", but whatever.
I was referring to the five soldiers killed by the roadside bomb nearby. Should've been more clear.
that America, not even Anaxagoras' irredeemably thuggish South, doesn't have this sort of behavior. So it's not quite the same degree of fallacious generalization.
What the fuck is wrong with these people?
Hippies want me to fell bad about the Iraqi civilians we killed. We pretty clearly didn't kill enough, or at least not the right ones. These were innocent people.
Repeat after me: the Sunnis do not like us.
If I remember correctly (and maybe I'm mistaken) the Sunnis aren't the majority. They were the ruling minority (like in many arab countries). Where are the other factions? Clearly they prefer to also hate the USA. Maybe Saddam wasn't really all that bad. Or people's memory isn't really that great.
Three major factions:If I remember correctly (and maybe I'm mistaken) the Sunnis aren't the majority. They were the ruling minority (like in many arab countries). Where are the other factions? Clearly they prefer to also hate the USA. Maybe Saddam wasn't really all that bad. Or people's memory isn't really that great.
1) Kurds. Mostly like us, but they've been so fucked by the various powers in the region they're not going to put up with anything but their own quasi-state.
2) Shiite. Beat up quite a bit by Saddam & the Sunnis, so they mostly like us. Majority of the country, chiefly located outside the central Baghdad area. Don't know the rest of the details.
3) Sunnis. They may not have liked Saddam much, but they liked the Shiites even less. We've entirely fucked up the process of convincing them they have nothing to fear from losing power in the new Iraq; they're seriously worried about Shiite revenge.
Calling the entirely population of Iraq ungrateful assholes (also done in the Weekly Standard this week) - why won't those ingrates praise us for all we've done for them! - is a depressing example of an inability to actually put yourself in someone else's shoes. Instead everyone imagines what they personally would want if you moved to Iraq, completely failing to understand the goals and motiviations of the people involved.
LA riots of 1992; public lynchings throughout the 1960s and 1970s. Wouldn't be so sure.
It's just the level of fallacious generalization. Just as if someone would call Sweden a nation of queers and homos after seeing pictures from a Pride parade. I don't see anything wrong with being queer or a homo, but as generalizations go, it's just as bad, technically.
And on the other side, Joe Dipshit has set the bar for what constitutes fallacious generalization at groups of 3 people or less, and soon you won't even be able to say anything about an individual without saying "that particular day" immediately afterwards. Will appendages be responsible for the workings of the individual mind that controls them? Not for long!
STRAWMAN STRAWMAN STRAWMAN
I wouldn't mind if generalisations were kept to the scientific community, where they serve a purpose and people know how to use them.
By the way, I reread my post and wanted to make sure you knew I wasn't calling you Joe Dipshit, Anders. It was worded poorly.
http://news.search.yahoo.com/search/...&c=news_photos
We are so fucked.
Following up, I agree with this analysis:
http://www.tnr.com/blog/iraqd?pid=1518
Whatever the hell we think we're doing in the Sunni triangle, it sure isn't working.
Nice sentiment, but you're arguing from a complete absence of logic, as usual. You make a statement proclaiming that This Is Not The Way Things Really Are, yet offer absolutely nothing to back up your argument. It's a simple fact that our front pages are filled on a daily basis with news of atrocities in the Middle East, stories about Islamist terror, and so forth. In the past 24 hours alone, we've had this sickening attack, arrests of Islamist terrorists in London along with the seizure of explosives, and arrests of suspected Islamist terrorists in Ottawa. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I see a pattern.
It's pretty idiotic to say that all Arabs are violent lunatics because of incidents like this, but I think it's equally stupid to pretend that there isn't something going on here. That there isn't something at work in the Arab/Muslim world that causes or assists in these violent clashes with the West.
Also, from the news reports it seems like the entire town pretty much rose up after these people had been killed and had a grand old time ripping apart the bodies. That, to me, is the scary part. I can understand a mob mentality taking hold of a minority of citizens, but this is well beyond that. And such a level of barbarity separates this event from such things as the LA riots in 1992 and what happened in the South during the civil rights movement, as crimes then didn't feature entire communities pouring onto the streets to revel in the carnage.
Yeah. Reginald Denny got his head caved in in LA in 1992, but four Crips did the dirty work, and hundreds of people didn't descend while he was unconscious and tear him to pieces. On the contrary, four people in the area chased off the attackers and got Denny the medical help that saved his life. I doubt that there were even four residents in Fallujah who refused to play kick the corpse yesterday.
You obviously have no idea how many people live in Fallujah, or how many people were part of the mob. That's as bad as thinking the entire population of Baghdad was involved in pulling down the statue of Hussein last year.[/list]I doubt that there were even four residents in Fallujah who refused to play kick the corpse yesterday.
I don't think we're necessarily there yet, but this is where our lack of an endgame is really going to hurt us deeply. As the article you linked to in your next post correctly asserted, the US doesn't have a good plan to bring the Shiites and Sunnis together, and as long as that's the case, it's going to be ugly there.
This is what makes the forced pullout from Iraq even worse. Now I never supported the war in Iraq the way we went about it, but since we went in, we have to do right by these people. If we leave with this hanging in the breeze, then we've done a terrible disservice to what might already be a terrible disservice.
Furthermore, what are contractors doing out there anyway? It feels like there is barely a military presence there which has no control over the situation. That area isn't secured yet, we shouldn't be rushing contractors in there.
edit: Check out this link
How exactly are we going to punish people? Pick them out of the video tape and go to town on them? I doubt we have video footage of who actually killed these people. Sounds like we may enter a tit for tat situation... then they get pissed and retaliate, and we get pissed and retaliate. Sounds like another middle eastern flashpoint.
I wonder if the average American even knows that Bush had to be briefed on Iraq's ethnic diversity just prior to the invasion. When the coach isn't even aware of the basic ethnic make-up of a country, let alone the history of political and religious animosity between these groups, the administration's leadership might not have a good clue on how to get their buy-ins on a new form of government that's being forcibly imposed on them by a foreign power and that's not exactly indigenous to their culture.
http://billmon.org/archives/001318.html
Billmon finds some stuff talking like the killings were maybe in reaction to a 10 day marine offensive in the area.....
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4645401/
Bit of stuff I didn't know:
I wonder why they're using special forces troops for food delivery.....The company declined to comment beyond a statement that acknowledged it was a government subcontractor providing security for the delivery of food in the Fallujah area.
Firm provides range of paramilitary services
Privately owned Blackwater USA’s range of paramilitary services, include providing firearms and small-groups training facilities for Navy SEALs, police department SWAT teams and former special operations personnel.
“We’re very proud of the work that we do. We feel that we support a just cause,” assistant training director Chris Epperson said during a visit earlier this year.
The company’s security consulting business connects former special forces troops with jobs that may involve protecting people or places, or training foreign militaries. Epperson said the company’s contractors also provide protection to L. Paul Bremer, the U.S. administrator in Iraq.
A job description posted on Blackwater Security Consulting’s Web site last year described positions for independent contractors needed to provide executive protection.
Because it's a risky job and someone might beat them, kill them and hang them?
Would you have said as of last week that we needed ex-special forces people normally used for bodyguard work to escort food into Fallujah? I wouldn't.
Why did they have these superman assigned to something so pedestrian? Were they doing something other than food deliveries, additionally? How does this tie into the supposed 10-day marine assault on the area?
Not that I have any idea, but the story as written so far sounds strange.
From a billmon comments thread:
http://billmon.org/archives/001318.html
http://ancapistan.typepad.com/unfair...on_iraqis.html
Not sure how reliable that is, but.....
Looks like the marines have been clamping down and we got some return fire."You can't escape and you can't hide ... the coalition will find you and bring you to justice."
This is a leaflet that the Marines have scattered all over Fallujah, according to Iraqis.
Hooray for Jason remembering that there's 3 main factions over there. It's always nice to talk with someone who's informed.
Apparently the Marine offensive is about to start, as they are taking over the area from the Army, who was in charge previously.
Strategy-wise, it's important to the perpitrators to either cause a huge response, to generate sympathy, or no response, to "pull a mogadishu". I just hope the marine response is decently quick and decently effective. Bremer's response seems to indicate that this is what will happen. Of course, marines are not known for subtlety.
The hardest part about making sure that Iraq actually improves will be in convincing the sunnis that their best chance of survival/growth is to work within the system. It will involve a lot of carrots and sticks.
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