An explosion rocked downtown Bozeman yesterday, killing one woman, creating a nightmare scene on Main Street. People are in shock.
I can’t help but be reminded that my country routinely drops bombs of much larger magnitude on cities in other countries. Most people here are impressed when we do that. The Pentagon even allows us to watch films of bombs blasting – from a distance, and dehumanized. Our bombs make a big, titillating boom.
This is what it’s like on the other end.
Gaza After Israel Attacked
The “H.I. Bunker Buster” (Humanely Intended) – a U.S. Bomb Dropped on Iraq (military target, of course).
Piece of Mindful 
Little Eichmanns!
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We target the enemys’ military.
Bombing civilian targets increases moral on the enemy’s side.
Now you know.
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1) We target civilians.
2) Careless disregard is no different than deliberate targeting anyway, under the Geneva Conventions.
Now you know.
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I thought we only targetted wedding parties. Our bombs seem drawn to those like tornados to trailer parks.
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Metaphor is a casualty of mass electronic media, especially I.T., because action repeats with no consequence, no lesson, no cause and effect. It just repeats – action over and over again, allowing the brain to sidestep the part where we are part of something real happening. Like sleepwalkers, we don’t remember anything the next time it happens, so we surely can’t rely on abstract representation to generate post-modern empathy.
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We target civilians.
You like to think so. The body count says otherwise.
Careless disregard is no different than deliberate targeting anyway
Who packs the most “careless disregard”? I think Stalin’s motto needs updating: “Hold your friends close, hold your enemies closer, and hold civilians closest of all so you get the benefit of world press attention.”
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The body count says otherwise.
Depends on who does the counting. When we do, there are very few, and they are all bad guys. When others count, you automatically say it’s flawed, and propaganda.
The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them. George Orwell
The confusion between judgement of fact and judgement of value occurs at the level of these qualifications of fact and interpretation. For example: All bombings by the enemy are acts of savagery aimed only at civilian objectives, whereas all bombings by one’s own planes are proof of one’s superiority, and they never destroy anything but military objectives. Similarly, when another government shows good will, it is a sign of weakness; when it shows authority, it wants war or dictatorship. Ellul, Propaganda
Careless disregard is killing twenty civilians to get one “terrorist” – like Israel just did. Direct targeting is hitting a busy marketplace, using white phosphorus, like Israel just did.
Direct targeting is leveling Hanoi and Haiphong and Falluja, like the US did.
You on Mars or something?
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So that’s an admission that we carry reckless disregard for civilian casualties, just not as much as others and that somehow makes our actions okay? Why yes. Yes it is that very admission.
And to think, it’s the right that accuses the left of moral equivalence …
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The bell curve has a tail, Wolf.
The confusion between judgement of fact and judgement of value…
Maybe it would be useful to chart civilian casualties vs the destructive capability of a society. The Palestinians have the capability to kill 100 Israelis a year, and they kill…what? 50? The Israelis have the capability to kill millions of Palestinians and they kill…what? 50?
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Good grief – again, what planet? The Israelis killed 1400 – last month!
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You have to pace it out over several years. But whatever the numbers, this ratio is heavily in favor of the Israelis. I think it is worth some attention, since you are so interested in body counts.
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You have to count Lebanon too, by the way. Add another 20000 or so. The body count there is quite impressive. I don’t know the psychological exercise you’re doing here – I tend to oversimplify people’s complex motives, but it sure sounds like you’re doing some serious rationalizing.
Odd that the side that piles up the body thinks body counts are unimportant. No – not odd at all. Also odd that you seem indifferent to the crimes committed by the Israeli – violation of security council resolutions, violation of World Court decisions, rejection of UN resolutions, theft of arable land and water … a macabre need for war to continue expansion … agents provocateurs … odd you think all of this is OK.
It’s very simple, I suppose though – Palestinians are demons, walking devils. You hate them.
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you seem indifferent to the crimes
Who is carrying the bigger blind spot here? The Palestinians have embraced the widespread and indiscriminate use of terrorism and it elicits not one peep from you.
I never said Israel was a saint. You use inflated casualty counts, but that is your schtick, so carry on. But if the situations were reversed with regard to military power, the body count would be much higher in the other direction.
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Ah, taking refuge in the non-disprovable hypothesis. I accept your concession. And I inflated nothing – I merely deliver unto thee the dark “secrets” – secret only in the sense that you don’t know about them even as the rest of the world does.
I’ve explained my position thoroughly – the behavior of certain Palestinians is atypical, and self-destructive, as it unleashes and even justifies the terrorism of the Israelis. I’ve even speculated that the isolated incidents of terrorism, which you claim typify an entire population, might be the result of agents provocateurs, as the territorial aspirations of the Israelis so dominate their thinking as to make the Palestinians incidental and temporary roadblocks.
First you give a dog a bad name, then you can beat him.
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