If we can justify the slaughter of 100,000 innocents, what have we become?

[mopaul]

those people in iraq didn't attack us. so why have we killed so many of them? our tax dollars, killed those mothers with babes in arms, old men and women, fathers and sons, our men, shooting their men down like dogs, without purpose or reason.

what the fuck have we become?

[blogbear]

1. As far as I'm concerned..monsters..

[barbaraann]

2. Well, if you look at the history of the US,

we've slaughtered a lot of innocents.

I think we need more ceremonies like this one:

http://www.nps.gov/fova/archive/nezperce.htm

[mopaul]

8. millions

can't deny it

[Thoth]

3. The new Nazis - in total denial of our destructive actions n/t

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

5. Jumping the gun?

Invoking Godwin's Law on this thread...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_law

:)

[Thoth]

15. I can see the point of Godwin's law...

but if America really does become fascist (in a generic, though not specifically German sense) according to the 14 points put forward by Lawrence Britt and others, then the Nazi analogy becomes appropriate. There may come a time when Godwin's law no longer applies. I am certainly aware that we're not about to walk down the same exact path as Germany did in the 1930s and 40's. My post was emotional and more to the point of our country's (a majority of the voting population anyhow) tendency to see its actions as always just and to glorify military action. Most of our country is ignorant of our war crimes committed in Iraq that we at DU are all too aware of. These charactericstics are shared with Nazi germany, as well as other fascist regimes throughout history.

[leveymg]

4. I'm ashamed to say it. n/t

[Vinca]

6. Don't lump us into one big pile of war criminals.

Half of "we" wanted no part of it, but without the votes we are powerless.

[oblivious]

7. When I put that to one of my now ex-friends, he replied:

"Who's to say Saddam wouldn't have killed even more if the US hadn't invaded."

As if the purpose of the invasion was to prevent genocide or something.

Thick. Evil. Hopeless.

[KlatooBNikto]

9. When it is Arabs,Iranians, Vietnamese, Laotians, Cambodians

Nicaraguans we don't keep count because killing one or hundred thousand feels the same because they are the Untermenschen.

As Robert Oppenheimer said after creating the A-Bomb,"We have become death, destroyer of the worlds".

[DoYouEverWonder]

11. I love when they call themselves

the culture of life. It's so transparent because we all know that whatever they say it really means the opposite.

[Taxloss]

10. self-delete

self-delete

[htuttle]

12. So if someone blows up a shopping mall...

...and manages to kill a rapist or two who was shopping there that day in addition to all the innocents, then what? What are you saying?

That's the most ridiculous thing I've read all morning...

[Taxloss]

14. self-delete

self-delete

[htuttle]

16. Anywhere you go and kill hundreds of thousands of people

...You are bound to kill a few who 'deserved it' in the process. Hell, I bet when bombs go off in Israeli pizza parlors, now and then they manage to kill a few criminals in the process. You think there weren't a few dozen white collar criminals, and probably a mobster or two, who were hanging out in the vicinity of the WTC the morning of Sept 11th?

So what IS your point?

Who's 'mourning for Uday' around here? Where are you getting this from?

[Taxloss]

21. self-delete

self-delete

[htuttle]

33. What difference does it make, qualitatively or quantitatively,

...to say that 99,900 innocents were killed, but 100 of them deserved it?

Or that 100,100 were killed, 100 of which 'deserved it'?

And deserved 'what' according to 'whom'? Which court or process decided that some in Iraq deserved to die? Who delivered a death sentence, and under what authority other than the rule that might makes right?

You say you aren't justifying the deaths of innocents, but the given the wanton destruction, attempting to state ANY mitigating 'facts' is a justification. Dropping a bomb on an apartment building to get one of it's tenants, and killing scores of the rest of them in the process, simply cannot and should not be mitigated or justified in any way. Doesn't matter if the guy was Jeffery Dahmer and Osama bin Laden rolled together. The 'evilness' of the target is simply irrelevant.

There is no way to mitigate the conscious killing of innocent people, no matter what the reasons are. Isn't that what we are supposed to think about terrorist acts against ourselves? Isn't that the same argument that Ward Churchill got in trouble for making?

[Name removed]

40. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[KlatooBNikto]

18. Sometime ago during the Tsunami disaster in Asia, I had posted

about two of my med school trained daughters had left to work with those victims and a poster had the same kind of response.He/She said that we should not feel sorry for all the victims because some of them might have made fodder for Bin Laden.

That is the same pattern of thought I see here.It was despicable then.It is despicable now.

[Taxloss]

22. self-delete

self-delete

[KlatooBNikto]

27. I can tell you why I consider them the same train of thought. When it

is the Arabs or Asians that are dead,we do not consider them to be worthy of our attention.After we have reached that conclusion, we manufacture a justification like what if Uday or Qusay were part of the dead, it will all make our own evil deeds less repugnant in our own minds.

That is the train of thought that fits nicely with the sentiment that we need not shed any tears for the Tsunami victims.

[lectrobyte]

25. Dude, that's a pretty nice hole you've got started, why don't you

keep digging and see if you can hit Australia or China or someplace when you break on through. I'd have a lot less problem with your attitude if Saddam and company were not in power because of U.S. intervention and support. There's a nice photo of Rumster shaking hands with Saddam.

[KlatooBNikto]

13. This is a very despicable thing you have posted.Please retract

that post.

[Taxloss]

17. self-delete

self-delete

[mopaul]

19. the dead aren't saints, they are people just like you, but they're dead

you know what i meant, but i understand that there are some people who like to have the last word.

[KlatooBNikto]

20. Remember that we are the ones invading a country that posed no threat to

us.If we are the world's policemen, let us go and correct the crimes of our "allies" Musharraf, Saud, Al Sabahs,the Emirs and others who are on our payroll first. Uday and Qusay may have committed atrocious crimes but the crimes of these big time monsters need to have a higher priority on our moral outrages.

[Taxloss]

24. I agree completely.

[Mandate My Ass]

26. Disgusting

:thumbsdown:

[KlatooBNikto]

30. Tax Loss, thank you for your gracious gesture.My esteem for you

has increased several fold.

[Taxloss]

34. Thank you.

I can only apologise, absolutely and thoroughly. This thread was plainly no place for moral relativism.

[Taxloss]

29. Well, I've deleted everything myself and

have asked the admins to remove this regrettable episode entirely. I didn't mean to start a flamewar and apologise unreservedly if I caused offense.

[mopaul]

32. i got your point taxloss

you are entitled to your opinion. it's hard to put this shit into words, and sometimes it gets sidetracked. happens to me all the time.

[Taxloss]

36. Thanks. Sorry for fouling your thread.

My face is pretty red right now.

:blush:

[KlatooBNikto]

35. Once again thank you.You are a person of great integrity.

[Taxloss]

38. You're welcome. Sorry again.

I hate flamewars. So unproductive.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

23. "Good" Germans. Amerika uber alles.

Just wave the flag, reduce the the people we're killing to "enemies", shout "Support Our Troops", silence the opposition, and get back to the Bread and Circuses (Big Macs and NASCAR), and make killing respectable.

[Cooley Hurd]

28. The Power of Pride...

Every time I see one of these stickers, I'm just so perplexed. What are we supposed to feel proud about?:shrug::mad:

[lectrobyte]

39. Yes, Lowe's (home improvement) store starting giving those out

during the big wave of nationalism after 9/11/2001. I wondered what we were supposed to be proud of. Certainly not our airport security. Or our ability to track down Osama. Or our diligence to reports that have titles like "Bin Laden determined to attack in US".

[AG78]

31. Human beings

A few bad apples always ruin it for the rest of us. Those apples are the ones that acquire political power, then use the power of the state to slaughter people thousands of miles away(or sometimes next door). It's happened before, and it'll happen again. The Bush administration is not the first, and they won't be the last.

It's what expanding centers of power do. America is no different.

If humanity has proven anything, it's that we're a complete freak show. Be you Christian, Muslim, white, brown, whatever.

And there is a purpose. There are reasons. We're an empire, and that's what empire's do. We do it because we have to. If we didn't, America would die. We must continue to expand, and expanding means getting rid of anything in your way. That's what large centers of power have always done.

We haven't become anything. This is what we've always been. We don't go to war for other people. We go to war for our, or the elite, interests. That's opening up markets with a gun. That means using war to build bases in important places for some future conflict with another large center of power.

Just so happens that the people currently in power are a little more overt about the whole thing.

I have no faith in humanity left. It's the same crap all the time. The political sphere is just a cycle. For a while it's a little more progressive. Then it swings back to a more fundamentalist time. Then it'll go back to something more liberal. Then something along more authoritarian lines. Then it just keeps going back and forth from there. Same fights come along, over and over again. War, no war. Taxes, no taxes. Right, left. Save the environment, we need an economy. More religion, less religion.

[mopaul]

37. sort of like hell

same old story, and it's happened thousands of times throughout history. the mayans, the romans, the egyptians, all fell to dust.

[izzie]

41. Well all I can say is it not our fault.

After all why did they get in the way? The US govt. does no wrong.

[KlatooBNikto]

42. This reminds me of what Nixon said during the Watergate years.

Just because the President does it, it means it is not illegal. Your statement reflects the basic premise of our Press that our Presidents and their advisers are virtuous men who are incapable of committing crimes and even if some of the things they do don't meausre up, they meant well.That is what counts, except if you are the victim.

[miss_kitty]

43. "If we can justify the slaughter of 100,000...what have we become?"

Something awful.