A "cycle of violence"--our tribe versus their tribe

[Terran]

One way to view the murder of Nick Berg, assuming it was perpetrated as revenge and is not some cynical ploy by a US faction, is to see it as a response to violence, which itself was a response to violence, which was in turn a response to violence.

Our tribe invaded their tribe's home unprovoked and killed a lot of innocent people, and humiliated a lot more, and denied even more their basic rights.

Their tribe killed four of our tribe in response and humiliated us by dragging our dead through the dust and displaying their bodies.

Our tribe marched into their city in response and killed hundreds of people, innocent or not, and destroyed their homes.

Their tribe (we think, maybe, it was them) grabbed an innocent member of our tribe and killed him in revenge in a way that they probably knew we would find extremely horrifying.

I received this poem today, by happenstance, and I thought it was highly relevant (and rather depressing). Maybe this belongs in the Lounge, I don't know. The author is one Thomas Lux.

The People of the Other Village

hate the people of this village
and would nail our hats
to our heads for refusing in their presence to remove them
or staple our hands to our foreheads
for refusing to salute them
if we did not hurt them first: mail them packages of rats,
mix their flour at night with broken glass.
We do this, they do that.
They peel the larynx from one of our brothers' throats.
We devein one of their sisters.
The quicksand pits they built were good.
Our amputation teams were better.
We trained some birds to steal their wheat.
They sent to us exploding ambassadors of peace.
They do this, we do that.
We canceled our sheep imports.
They no longer bought our blankets.
We mocked their greatest poet
and when that had no effect
we parodied the way they dance
which did cause pain, so they, in turn, said our God
was leprous, hairless.
We do this, they do that.
Ten thousand (10,000) years, ten thousand
(10,000) brutal, beautiful years.

[DieboldMustDie]

1. It's Nick Berg who was killed, not Michael.

[Terran]

2. Thanks, I fixed it.

Any response to the poem? I found it rather powerful, myself.

[Unperson 309]

3. EXCELLENT Poem!

Where did it come from? Did you write it? Very evocative imagery and just 'to one side of reason' enough to cause reflection and thought. We deveined one of their sisters"? Cool!

309

[Terran]

4. No, I didn't write it (I wish)

My partner emailed it to me because we'd been having this discussion over lunch about Nick Berg and the us-versus-them aspects of the situation. I don't know where he found it, but I'll find out.

Thanks, I'm glad somebody liked it.

Dirk