Monday, April 05, 2004

The killing goes on

It is so difficult to talk about this without seeming like one is unfeeling and unhorrified by brutality.

The killing and mutilation and four Americans in Falujjah was brutal, horrible and seems calculated to enrage the sensibilities of any decent human being.

It was so horrible, that, almost overnight, it has become common to hear Americans talk about destroying the place in retaliation.

Such a reaction is very human. It’s what makes us what we are. It’s what made us survive as a species.

But what is America becoming?

Yes, we should be shocked and horrified at the death of those four people.

But we should also be shocked and horrified that so many Americans want to kill a city of 250,000 people because of the death of those four people.

The unpleasant fact is that the people in Falujjah reacted like every single invaded people in the entire history of the world. They reacted the way we would react if we were invaded.

What they did is unthinkable. But if we were invaded, WE would do the unthinkable. Heck, we are contemplating the unthinkable NOW, and we’re the invaders, not the invaded.

But too many Americans now seem to think that we have some right to Iraq, and are insulted that people whose country we have taken over with bombs and guns aren’t properly grateful to us for the favor.

When the hell will we grow up?

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