This war is really getting to me

[EricaLubarsky]

I was thinking that this thread should be in the politics thread, and people will probably still think it deserves to be there, but I hope we can preserve this thread as an apolitical thread about the emotional cost of war.

400 US troops have been killed since the official end of the war and each one of those people had families. Tillman's death just drove it home even more to me that many families are deeply affected by the ongoing hosilities in Afganistan and Iraq. Whether the war was correct or not, these people were human beings with families that have been killed. My heart goes out to all the families of those killed and I can't help but feel a little sad myself knowing that there are a lot of families missing members right now.

[sturm und drang]

Doesn't it boggle your mind that we haven't yet figured out a better way to handle disputes?

Amazing.

[Max Power]

Wouldn't it be great if war just got erased as a concept. Think of all the productivity that is lost every year throughout the world - just to invent new and more efficient ways to kill our neighbors.

[Chiwas]

[madape]

When you guys come down off of your pot buzz and decide to look at the world the way it really exists, maybe you would come to the conclusion that your fucking rights as a freedom loving Americans are threatened by a cabal of wacked-out fundamentalist muslims who would love nothing better than to splatter your daughter's brains all over the walls of your church. If you don't think this shit is worth fighting for, then you are all so hopelessly removed from reality that you just might deserve the fate these assholes desire you to have.

Heroes like Pat Tillman are the only reason that you are able to tuck your kids in at night, all safe and snug. Don't belittle his death by diminishing his cause. He gave his life so you and your childrens' throats won't someday be slit by the islamic scimtar. The fallen soldiers don't want your pity. They deserve your respect.

Show some fucking respect.

[EricaLubarsky]

Originally posted by: madape
When you guys come down off of your pot buzz and decide to look at the world the way it really exists, maybe you would come to the conclusion that your fucking rights as a freedom loving Americans are threatened by a cabal of wacked-out fundamentalist muslims who would love nothing better than to splatter your daughter's brains all over the walls of your church. If you don't think this shit is worth fighting for, then you are all so hopelessly removed from reality that you just might deserve the fate these assholes desire you to have.

Heroes like Pat Tillman are the only reason that you are able to tuck your kids in at night, all safe and snug. Don't belittle his death by diminishing his cause. He gave his life so you and your childrens' throats won't someday be slit by the islamic scimtar. The fallen soldiers don't want your pity. They deserve your respect.

Show some fucking respect.

I find that grossly innapropriate. This is not a political thread and no one disrespected Tillman or any other serviceperson. This thread was about giving them thought.

[sturm und drang]

Ape,

I was a history major. I adore history, especially martial history. I am constantly mystified by the fact that it is the year 2004. We have put a man on the moon and in orbit. We have cured thousands of diseases. Technology has evolved at an incredible rate.

And yet... we still handle disputes the same way the Mongol hordes did, the same way the Vikings, Angles, Romans, Gauls and Visigoths did. Despite our myriad advances across myriad fields, we still simply kill one another to settle disputes.

I have no idea where you got your idea that I was impugning this war effort or our soldiers - that's another discussion entirely. The fact that we - and by this I mean an all-encompassing "we humans" - are still fighting wars today to solve our problems is just incredible to me.

Read "Blood Rites" by Barbara Ehrenreich for more...

[Max Power]

Originally posted by: EricaLubarsky

I find that grossly innapropriate. This is not a political thread and no one disrespected Tillman or any other serviceperson. This thread was about giving them thought.

Chiwas DID make it political with his "addition" to the thread. We were talking war as a concept and Chiwas misunderstood.

Ape - I am as deeply conservative as ANYONE on this forum. NOBODY repects the military more and I understand and acknowledge the concept that war is necessary to maintain our freedom. However, it would be nice if our species evolved to the point where war is unnecessary.

[chumdawg]

Originally posted by: sturm und drang
Ape,

I was a history major. I adore history, especially martial history. I am constantly mystified by the fact that it is the year 2004. We have put a man on the moon and in orbit. We have cured thousands of diseases. Technology has evolved at an incredible rate.

And yet... we still handle disputes the same way the Mongol hordes did, the same way the Vikings, Angles, Romans, Gauls and Visigoths did. Despite our myriad advances across myriad fields, we still simply kill one another to settle disputes.

The argument would go like this: some people just need to be killed, quite frankly, for the good of society. There is no way to settle a dispute with these people, so your only choice is to either eliminate them or live with their evil. As long as these people continue to exist, the choice will always be the same.

[Usually Lurkin]

Originally posted by: sturm und drang
Despite our myriad advances across myriad fields, we still simply kill one another to settle disputes.

This is simply not true. A lot of "we"s vote to settle disputes. Sure, some of the "we"s would rather rape and torture and cut and kill. That's why war is necessary. But it's not the answer to "disputes" in general.

And don't pretend war hasn't changed over the last couple thousand years, or that those making war don't have the choice of how the war is conducted. There's a huge difference between indiscriminately killing and torturing and raping and pillaging an enemy's general population, and doing everything remotely possible to kill or capture only those who are trying to rape and torture and cut and kill. These are significant advances in what is the most gruesome and horrible, yet necessary way in which we must settle the worst of disputes.

[sturm und drang]

Sorry, UL, but I respectfully disagree. Yes,"we" vote to settle disputes. Yes, smaller arguments are handled and solved in ways other in warfare - something, by the way, that has occurred for millenia. Yes, evil people exist and act in worse ways than "we" do. Obviously. However, the fact that humanity has not yet figured out a better way to settle the biggest, most egregious international disputes is... incredible.

The accoutrements may have changed. The look and feel may have changed. For the most part, warfare is now a more surgical, long-distance affair than it once was.

The fact of the matter, however, remains. War is still, underneath it all, quite simple. It is about killing.

Regardless of my opinion of this war we're involved with, Pat Tillman's death just reinforced the idiocy of the whole thing. Doesn't it make you question why we humans haven't figured it out yet? We are an intelligent, adaptive species. Why can't we evolve past warfare? There has to be a better way.

The futility of it all is heart-breaking to me.

[FishForLunch]

Make love not war.
No war just peace.
Why cant everyone just get along.
Islam is a religion of peace.


Barf......

[Usually Lurkin]

Originally posted by: sturm und drang
Obviously. However, the fact that humanity has not yet figured out a better way to settle the biggest, most egregious international disputes is... incredible.
. . .
We are an intelligent, adaptive species. Why can't we evolve past warfare? There has to be a better way.

Thank you for qualifying which disputes we are "still" settling by use of warfare. For our way of life, at least, this is not a first choice approach to societal disputes. It is also beyond question to say that there is warfare, and there is barbaric warfare. As much as you want to link together all killing, you just can't. Killing someone that tries to kill you is inherentlty less bad than raping and killing someone's family, and their friends, and their friends families because you want to.

You also seem to be enamored with this grand "we" thing. Adopt that if you like, it's useful for some things. But tell me - in the sense of the grand "we", what basic problem have we solved? Poverty? Hunger? Sickness? Death? Hatred? Injustice? No. No. No. No. No. and No. It all exists somewhere. How do these problems get solved? Only by way of the smaller "we"s, and then for only as long as people are willing to put forth the effort to make sure they stay solved.

To claim that the grand "we" are that intelligent, that adaptive is a fantasy.

[Chiwas]

We are an intelligent, adaptive species. Why can't we evolve past warfare?

The very answer is here, in the evolution theory. Warfare is needed to eliminate other races of the same species. Doing that, eliminating inferior races, allows to have room, time and resources to evolve for more adaptation, while protecting the own DNA. Using this theory, we and they are fighting to eliminate the other.

That would mean that we still are led by our instinct.

[Usually Lurkin]

Originally posted by: Chiwas

Warfare is needed to eliminate other races of the same species. Doing that, eliminating inferior races, allows to have room, time and resources to evolve for more adaptation, while protecting the own DNA.

wow. Hitler? Hitler, is that you? Did you move to mexico? Are you using Elvis' brain to clone a true King?

[Chiwas]

No, no, no. I would be very old.

I was just saying that using evolution as platform for analizing why we still have to fight, that might mean that we are still guided for some kind of animal instinct.

I don't like wars but I understand that that has been common in human history and that probably they never will end.

There are multiple reasons to not kill other people, but always we will find others to kill them, using whatever platform, doctrine, or excuse, even religion.

[Rhylan]

As long as there are people who think that they can get to Heaven/wherever-good by killing people or themselves, then "we" are royally screwed.

[EricaLubarsky]

that took only a handful of posts to go political.

[Epitome22]

It's tough to talk about something like war and separate politics from it.

[MavKikiNYC]

Originally posted by: Epitome22
It's tough to talk about something like war and separate politics from it.

Exactly. Especially in the context in which we're living, it's hard to think of a comment about war, pro- or anti-, that isn't at least implicitly politically-tinged.

[Drbio]

STOP THE PRESS!!!!!!!!


I agreed with epitome. [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]

[Evilmav2]

Yeah, I bet we'd all be better off if the United States would just give peace a chance, and make a humane and enlightened effort to find non-violent means of effecting conflict-resolution with it's avowed enemies...

[Usually Lurkin]

Originally posted by: EricaLubarsky
that took only a handful of posts to go political.

It can be expected that part of the discussion of the emotional cost of war is a discussion of the relative cost of not having war.
Yes. Freedom and safety cost an awful lot. Without war, we may well give up an extraordinary number of lives as well as our freedoms and way of life.

[Usually Lurkin]

Originally posted by: Chiwas
I was just saying that using evolution as platform for analizing why we still have to fight, that might mean that we are still guided for some kind of animal instinct.

oh. I get it. (I think) And I agree. If evolution has anything to do with the existence of warfare, you could argue that evolution promotes warfare - get rid of inefficient genetic influence (or social influence, if you want to extend the evolutionary model) before it has a chance to reproduce.

[jacktruth]

I find it sickening that our presense in Iraq is used as an example of why war is so bad. We announced what we were going to do, why we were going to do it, and gave a pretty good indication when we were going to do it. We've done everything we could to protect the innocent.

I think there are much better examples of the horrors that humans are capable of.

Let me think, how about a terrorist group out of the blue flies 2 commercial jets (nearly 3) into buildings full of innocent civilians.

[MavKikiNYC]

Alternatives to "this war".


Militants in Europe Openly Call for Jihad and the Rule of Islam
By PATRICK E. TYLER
and DON VAN NATTA Jr.

Published: April 26, 2004

Jonathan Player for The New York Times

LUTON, England, April 24 — The call to jihad is rising in the streets of Europe, and is being answered, counterterrorism officials say. In this former industrial town north of London, a small group of young Britons whose parents emigrated from Pakistan after World War II have turned against their families' new home. They say they would like to see Prime Minister Tony Blair dead or deposed and an Islamic flag hanging outside No. 10 Downing Street.

They swear allegiance to Osama bin Laden and his goal of toppling Western democracies to establish an Islamic superstate under Shariah law, like Afghanistan under the Taliban. They call the Sept. 11 hijackers the "Magnificent 19" and regard the Madrid train bombings as a clever way to drive a wedge into Europe.

On Thursday evening, at a tennis center community hall in Slough, west of London, their leader, Sheik Omar Bakri Mohammad, spoke of his adherence to Osama bin Laden. If Europe fails to heed Mr. bin Laden's offer of a truce — provided that all foreign troops are withdrawn from Iraq in three months — Muslims will no longer be restrained from attacking the Western countries that play host to them, the sheik said.

"All Muslims of the West will be obliged," he said, to "become his sword" in a new battle. Europeans take heed, he added, saying, "It is foolish to fight people who want death — that is what they are looking for." [Observation: Fight them? I say oblige them all the way to hell. ]

On working-class streets of old industrial towns like Crawley, Luton, Birmingham and Manchester, and in the Arab enclaves of Germany, France, Switzerland and other parts of Europe, intelligence officials say a fervor for militancy is intensifying and becoming more open.

In Hamburg, Dr. Mustafa Yoldas, the director of the Council of Islamic Communities, saw a correlation to the discord in Iraq. "This is a very dangerous situation at the moment," Dr. Yoldas said. "My impression is that Muslims have become more and more angry against the United States."

Hundreds of young Muslim men are answering the call of militant groups affiliated or aligned with Al Qaeda, intelligence and counterterrorism officials in the region say.

Even more worrying, said a senior counterterrorism official, is that the level of "chatter" — communications among people suspected of terrorism and their supporters — has markedly increased since Mr. bin Laden's warning to Europe this month. The spike in chatter has given rise to acute worries that planning for another strike in Europe is advanced.

"Iraq dramatically strengthened their recruitment efforts," one counterterrorism official said. He added that some mosques now display photos of American soldiers fighting in Iraq alongside bloody scenes of bombed out Iraqi neighborhoods. Detecting actual recruitments is almost impossible, he said, because it is typically done face to face.

And recruitment is paired with a compelling new strategy to bring the fight to Europe.

Members of Al Qaeda have "proven themselves to be extremely opportunistic, and they have decided to try to split the Western alliance," the official continued. "They are focusing their energies on attacking the big countries" — the United States, Britain and Spain — so as to "scare" the smaller states.

Some Muslim recruits are going to Iraq, counterterrorism officials in Europe say, but more are remaining home, possibly joining cells that could help with terror logistics or begin operations like the one that came to notice when the British police seized 1,200 pounds of ammonium nitrate, a key bomb ingredient, in late March, and arrested nine Pakistani-Britons, five of whom have been charged with trying to build a terrorist bomb.

Stoking that anger are some of the same fiery Islamic clerics who preached violence and martyrdom before the Sept. 11 attacks.

On Friday, Abu Hamza, the cleric accused of tutoring Richard Reid before he tried to blow up a Paris-to-Miami jetliner with explosives hidden in his shoe, urged a crowd of 200 outside his former Finsbury Park mosque to embrace death and the "culture of martyrdom."

Though the British home secretary, David Blunkett, has sought to strip Abu Hamza of his British citizenship and deport him, the legal battle has dragged on for years while Abu Hamza keeps calling down the wrath of God.

Also this week, over Mr. Blunkett's vigorous objection, a 35-year-old Algerian held under emergency laws passed after Sept. 11 was released from Belmarsh Prison. The man, identified only as "G," suffered from severe mental illness, his lawyers told a special immigration appeals panel, which let him out of prison and put him under house arrest.

Mr. Blunkett insisted that that should not be the final judgment on a man already found by one court "to be a threat to life and liberty." In an interview on the BBC over the weekend, Mr. Blunkett advocated a stronger deportation policy, initially focused on 12 foreign terror suspects held without charge since the Sept. 11 attacks.

Despite tougher antiterrorism laws, the police, prosecutors and intelligence chiefs across Europe say they are struggling to contain the openly seditious speech of Islamic extremists, some of whom, they say, have been inciting young men to suicidal violence since the 1990's. One chapter in Sheik Omar's lectures these days is "The Psyche of Muslims for Suicide Bombing."

The authorities say that laws to protect religious expression and civil liberties have the result of limiting what they can do to stop hateful speech. In the case of foreigners, they say they are often left to seek deportation, a lengthy and uncertain process subject to legal appeals, when the suspect can keep inciting attacks. That leaves the authorities to resort to less effective means, such as mouse-trapping Islamic radicals with immigration violations in hopes of making a deportation case stick. "In many countries, the laws are liberal and it's not easy," an official said.

At a mosque in Geneva, an imam recently exhorted his followers to "impose the will of Islam on the godless society of the West." "It was quite virulent," said a senior official with knowledge of the sermon. "The imam was encouraging his followers to take over the godless society."

While such a sermon may be incitement, recruitment takes a more shadowy course, and is hard to detect, a senior antiterrorism official said. "Believers are appealed to in the mosques, but the real conversations take place in restaurants or cafes or private apartments," the official said.

While some clerics, like Abu Qatada — said to be the spiritual counselor of Mohamed Atta, who led the Sept. 11 hijacking team — remain in prison in Britain without charge, others like Sheik Omar, leader of a movement called Al Muhajiroun, carry on a robust ideological campaign.

"There is no case against me," Sheik Omar said in an interview. Referring to calls by members of Parliament that he be deported, he added, "but they are Jewish" and "they have been calling for that for years." Among his ardent followers is Ishtiaq Alamgir, 24, who heads Al Muhajiroun in Luton and calls himself Sayful Islam, the sword of Islam. He says there are about 50 members here but exact numbers are secret.

Most days, he and a handful of his followers run a recruitment stand on Dunstable Road much to the chagrin of the Muslim elders of Luton. Mainstream Muslims are outraged by the situation, saying the actions of a few are causing their communities to be singled out for surveillance and making the larger population distrustful of them.

Muhammad Sulaiman, a stalwart of the mainstream Central Mosque here, was penniless when he arrived from the Kashmiri frontier of Pakistan in 1956. He raised money to build the Central Mosque here and now leads a campaign to ban Al Muhajiroun radicals from the city's 10 mosques. "This is show-off business," he says in accented English. "I don't want these kids in my mosque."

Other community leaders look to the government to do something, if only to help prevent the demonization of British Muslims, or "Islamophobia," as some here call it. "I think these kids are being brainwashed by a few radical clerics," said Akhbar Dad Khan, another elder of the Central Mosque. He wants them prosecuted or deported. "We should be able to control this negativity," he said. In Slough, Sheik Omar spent much of his time Thursday night regaling his young followers with the erotic delights of paradise — sweet kisses and the pleasures of bathing with scores of women — while he also preached the virtues of death in Islamic struggle as a ticket to paradise. He spoke of terrorism as the new norm of cultural conflict, "the fashion of the 21st century," practiced as much by Tony Blair as by Al Qaeda.

"We may be caught up in the target as the people of Manhattan were," he told them. And he warned Western leaders, "You may kill bin Laden, but the phenomenon, you cannot kill it — you cannot destroy it. Our Muslim brothers from abroad will come one day and conquer here and then we will live under Islam in dignity," he said.


Patrick E. Tyler reported from Luton, Slough and London and Don Van Natta Jr. from London. Souad Mekhennet contributed reporting from Germany.

[Psychedelic Fuzz]

The human is an enigmatic creature isn't it?

A being with two hands, two eyes, and two legs, just like yours and mine painted the Mona Lisa, one designed the pyramids, one wrote beautifully profound music without even being able to hear it, one designed the contraption I'm using to type this...and yet one ordered the deaths of 6 million people on the basis of religion, and one hatched a plot to knock buildings down and kill people simply because of the country they are from.

It's sad that humans haven't gotten past the need to assert dominance and settle disputes through violence, but that's the way it is.

War isn't a "good" thing by any means, and we owe it to ourselves to try and change the socio-economic factors that made certain enclaves of the islamic world such a breeding ground for hate. We also owe it to ourselves to push back when we have to.

What I really grapple with is why we seem to put more value on the life of an American than, say, a Kurd gassed by Sadam or a widow starving in Afghanistan because the religious authorities wouldn't let her work. It may seem callous to say this, but since we are not being subjected to a draft, everyone who is fighting knew what the deal was when they signed on. That said, I have nothing but undying respect for the people in the military. In fact I have several family members in the service. They volunteer to go out into life threatening situations in order to protect us.

Iraq may become another Vietnam...but lets weigh that against the benefits of possibly having a strong, functioning democracy amid the middle east's oil despots...and whether we support or comdemn the war, we shouldn't ever waver in our support of the young Americans who volunteered to go into a hostile place in the hope that people half a world away will see the prosperity and freedom that we do...and that our children will directly reap the benefits of that.

[Chiwas]

"Love does not unite us, fight does."

- Jorge Luis Borges.

[madape]

While it's clear that some of you may be are rejecting the nature of your species, you can still take comfort in the fact that the social security administration has projected violence related deaths to plummet from 112.3 per 100,000 citizens in 1979 to 33.6 deaths per 100,000 in 2100.

Here's the Link!

Currently, we die at a rate of approx 80 per 100,000. I wonder what that number would look like in say... Saudi Arabia. I bet it's more than ten times that amount. In my opinion, the Western world, lead by America, is making great strides against violence related deaths. It's the Jihadists from the Middle East who's culture perpetrates murder and war. Would there be less war if there were less fundamentalist muslims? I think the answer is clear. The Cold War likely saved millions from the Communist gas chambers. How many lives will the war on terror save? Only Osama Bin Laden knows the answer.

[EricaLubarsky]

this thread has been made political. Shame on you all.

please move this to the polics thread or delete it, mods.

[madape]

Do it now mods, or else Erica Lubarsky will weep for your midguided judgment!

You better do it quickly, or she just might pray for your sins!

[madape]

On a personal note, I'd like to apoligize for not being able to dismiss the reality of the world I live in. I'm sorry for not being willing to join in the circle jerk of hippies and potheads on this thread who infer that our fight against terrorism is some kind black mark on humanity. I'm sorry I don't condemn this war on moral grounds, becuase "War is bad.....mmmmkay". Shame on me for making this thread politial.

[sturm und drang]

Yeah, Ape, you're right. How incredibly stupid of some of us to lament the fact that humans haven't moved beyond killing as the means to solve disputes. Why would we even think such a thing? Killing is definitely the most logical and sophisticated way to address differences.

Time for me to get back to my bong now. While I'm at it, I'm going to go eat a Tofu burger, forsake all hygiene, crochet a shawl, put on my Birkenstocks, let all bodily hair grow unabated and flap freely in the wind and pray - oh please Earth Goddess, oh please make it so - for a Peter, Paul and Mary reunion.

[Chiwas]

Edit: It's not only Israel-Palestine. It's Human Nature.

[Fidel]

Time for me to get back to my bong now. While I'm at it, I'm going to go eat a Tofu burger, forsake all hygiene, crochet a shawl, put on my Birkenstocks, let all bodily hair grow unabated and flap freely in the wind and pray - oh please Earth Goddess, oh please make it so - for a Peter, Paul and Mary reunion.

That made me laugh Sturm.

Your daily routine eh? [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]

[Rhylan]

All it takes is a trip down to your local Wal-Mart to understand the stupidity inherent in the vast majority of human beings. Most people in America, with all our relative prosperity, can't even get their shit straight.

We're sure not gonna wake up in 50, 500, 5000 years, and look around to see everyone being nice and peaceful with each other. Human nature's a mutha.

[Psychedelic Fuzz]

Human nature's a mutha.

couldn't sum it up any better than that.

oh well, back to my incense and Ravi Shankar records.

[u2sarajevo]

Thanks to sturm and PFuzz there is some high humor in this thread.

I wish I was liberal so I could make a reference like...

I am going to go rub my stone under my arms and scour my beard for crumbs, I got a date tonight!!!

edit: not to imply that all liberals are granola.

[Psychedelic Fuzz]

high humor

[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]

now if everyone would hold hands and join me in singing "Where have all the Flowers Gone?"

[Smiles]

Originally posted by: Psychedelic Fuzz

[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]

now if everyone would hold hands and join me in singing "Where have all the Flowers Gone?"

hey, don't joke about that! [img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-blush.gif[/img]

[img]i/expressions/face-icon-small-wink.gif[/img]

We can fully grasp the horror of war - even as we recognize that it's sometimes necessary in this day and age.