Ding dong the Witch is dead!

[TheGrandMom]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

Hmm? Has someone claimed otherwise?

I hope you aren't trying to justify violating human rights by saying others do it as well.

So that makes it ok for us to do it? It's difficult to condemn someone else's behavior if you're just as guilty, you know.

It's food for thought. Before people start pointing the fingers at one side, they should consider the other. Imagine being a soldier or civilian over there right now, living in fear, total fear, every single day. Can you? Of course you can't. We would have to experience it to be able to understand the psychological ramifications. We can imagine but it doesn't even come close. It's so easy to stand afar and point our fingers and judge but its another to actually be there, to experience it, and be changed by it......FOREVER.

[Murphie]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

That's a nice little speech, but the fact of the matter is, there are rules and laws that we have agreed to live by. It's a scary situation, and yeah, I'm glad that I'm not in it. But being scared doesn't justify treating other human beings, no matter how much we may dislike their own methods, and their own ideals in an inhuman fashion.

It's a bad situation all around. And I don't envy the soldiers there the position that they're in. It's a tough one. But that doesn't give them carte blanche to do as they please.

[Maju]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

While you guys might not like the occasional punch or kick to a prisoner, you have to realize, many of the people being held in Guantanamo Bay are highly trained, Taliban and Insurgent Agents.

And how do you know this? There is no proof of most of them having anything to do with terrorists or insurgents. They were simply captured by greedy bounty hunters and sold to the army because the army had promised to pay...was it $1000 for every captured enemy fighter?

The prisoners there are so desperate they're constantly trying to kill themselves, but they're not allowed to keep any potentially dangerous items and they're also being force fed so suicide is very difficult. Islam strictly forbids suicide and I'm sure you know how seriously Muslims take religion so they sure as hell don't have fun in there.

[Rodin]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

And how do you know this? There is no proof of most of them having anything to do with terrorists or insurgents. They were simply captured by greedy bounty hunters and sold to the army because the army had promised to pay...was it $1000 for every captured enemy fighter?

Well, there's as much of a chance that the people in Guantanamo are insurgents, as there are of people who were randomly captured by greedy bounty hunters. Also, it's not that hard to spot an insurgent or a member of the Taliban. Basically, any person who's caught firing at US troops, are insurgents, whether part of the taliban or not, and deserve to be in Guantanamo. Also, I'm sure that Americans have a system of checks and balances set up so they don't confuse people who were captured and sold.

There's absolutely no hard proof that these people are captured by bounty hunters. If there's some sort of reference that you could point me to, so I may read up on it, I would like that. But, as far as it goes, there's no proof that the people in Guantanamo are random people, being pretty much sold. I've had a buddy who was stationed in Guantanamo about 6 months ago, he said they ONLY put people who have intelligence that is valuable in Guantanamo. And, IMO, if they have information, they're being interrogated. But not as harshly as say....if we gave them over to...say....the Iranians. They'd use sodium pentethol on them, not to mention probably beat 1/2 of them to death.

[Virgil]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

I think the most important thing to remember is that when a political movement starts, it has a goal. I believe the original idea behind "Terrorism" was the liberation of Palestine from Israel.

The "first" terrorists fought for Palastine but groups like Al Qaeda hate the United States because of its presence near the Holy city of Mecca. To them it was a slap in the face.

As for the topic of war, Snake (I could be mistaken and it could have been Grey Fox or Liquid Snake. I haven't played the game in a while) said it best when he said, "As long as there are people, there will always be war."

[TheGrandMom]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

That's a nice little speech, but the fact of the matter is, there are rules and laws that we have agreed to live by. It's a scary situation, and yeah, I'm glad that I'm not in it. But being scared doesn't justify treating other human beings, no matter how much we may dislike their own methods, and their own ideals in an inhuman fashion.

It's a bad situation all around. And I don't envy the soldiers there the position that they're in. It's a tough one. But that doesn't give them carte blanche to do as they please.

They were told to torture prisoners by their superiors. In fact, some were threatened by their superiors for hesitating. My husband is a Marine. He served during the Vietnam era. Unless you've had experience with the military life, you have no idea about the conditioning these men and women are put through. An order is an order, regardless of your moral stance. Like I said before, unless you've walked a mile in their shoes, you have NO idea what it is like and have no right to condemn them without knowing ALL the facts. These men and women are pawns in a much bigger chess game....you should be looking at bishops.

[Tsikuro]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

1423 was also a very sad year.
People died.

[WishMaster3K]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

Why the BISHOPS, TGM >.> trying to imply something? I mean, we have Knights and Rooks, all of equal value, but of specific importance.

Anyway, I can't judge the military, because regardless of the convictions of the soldiers, they are merely following orders. Like we get ordered around at work, they're doing their jobs. And as such, you can't just "quit" the army. Blaming the soldiers is the wrong thing to do, but they work perfect as scapegoats for the safe politicians to hide behind.

Watching a movie like Jarhead, which highlighted not the effects battles had on the soldiers, but the psychological effects of being separated from their loved ones, having significant others openly cheat on them (one woman sent her husband a vid of her banging the neighbor), having girlfriends and wives send letters saying the relationship won't work anymore. . . Having families ostracise you. . . Blaming the soldiers for the torture is just a red "x" in my book.

That's why I'll just blame the politicians.

Edit: For the record, I am of the opinion that 1504 was a worse year, mainly because of the Bronze Bull fiasco in Spain. I stopped trying to get the stains out of my tights.

[Maju]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

Also, I'm sure that Americans have a system of checks and balances set up so they don't confuse people who were captured and sold.

Sadly, they don't if I recall correctly.

There's absolutely no hard proof that these people are captured by bounty hunters. If there's some sort of reference that you could point me to, so I may read up on it, I would like that. But, as far as it goes, there's no proof that the people in Guantanamo are random people, being pretty much sold. I've had a buddy who was stationed in Guantanamo about 6 months ago, he said they ONLY put people who have intelligence that is valuable in Guantanamo. And, IMO, if they have information, they're being interrogated. But not as harshly as say....if we gave them over to...say....the Iranians. They'd use sodium pentethol on them, not to mention probably beat 1/2 of them to death.

Unfortunately the only reference I have is a documentary I saw a few weeks ago and it was about this American lawer who's been representing a bunch of prisoners for free for years now. I wish I could remember more of what was said in it, but the prisoners in question were complete outsiders and had nothing to do with the war.

If you type in "guantanamo bay" in Google I'm sure you'll get many articles by Amnesty International and stuff that probably explain more.

edit: Ok I found this document on amnesty International's site. I'll put a couple quotes here.

There are believed to be nine men now determined no longer to be ‘enemy combatants’(17) who remain detained in Guantánamo despite a decision by US authorities at Guantánamo that they should be released and despite a District Court ruling in two of the cases that their continued detention at Guantánamo is unlawful. They are held in Camp Iguana, the facility at Guantánamo once used to hold juvenile detainees.(18)

Among the men are five ethnic Uighurs from China and another ethnic Uighur from Saudi Arabia. All six are believed to be at high risk of further human rights violations, including torture and possible execution, if returned to China. The other three men are believed to be from Uzbekistan or Russia, Algeria and Egypt. It is unclear whether the US authorities have also determined that these three men cannot be returned to their home countries because they risk further human rights violations. What is clear, however, is that they remain locked up in Guantánamo’s Camp Iguana despite no longer being considered ‘enemy combatants’.

Abu Bakker Qassim and Adel Abdul Hakim are Uighurs, natives of China’s north-western Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region. They were captured by Pakistani security forces in late 2001 or early 2002 and handed over to US custody in Afghanistan where they were held for approximately six months before being flown to Guantánamo as ‘enemy combatants’. In March 2005 a Combatant Status Review Tribunal (CSRT)(20) determined that they should no longer be classified as ‘enemy combatants’. The three other ethnic Uighurs from China who are no longer considered to be ‘enemy combatants’ are Ayob Haji Mamet, Ahmed Doe and Aktar Doe.

Link: http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGAMR510072006

[Murphie]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

They were told to torture prisoners by their superiors. In fact, some were threatened by their superiors for hesitating. My husband is a Marine. He served during the Vietnam era. Unless you've had experience with the military life, you have no idea about the conditioning these men and women are put through. An order is an order, regardless of your moral stance. Like I said before, unless you've walked a mile in their shoes, you have NO idea what it is like and have no right to condemn them without knowing ALL the facts. These men and women are pawns in a much bigger chess game....you should be looking at bishops.

At what point did I say that I was blaming the individual soldiers? I'm blaming the people that gave the order in the first place, TGM. I know that the soldiers are taking orders and don't have a lot of choice in the matter.

I was saying that as human beings, and as a society we can't look down on other cultures for the way that they treat people if we're perfectly willing to do the same, even if it's only a means to an end. It makes us the figurative pot calling the kettle black as it were.

[TheGrandMom]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

Watching a movie like Jarhead, which highlighted not the effects battles had on the soldiers, but the psychological effects of being separated from their loved ones, having significant others openly cheat on them (one woman sent her husband a vid of her banging the neighbor), having girlfriends and wives send letters saying the relationship won't work anymore. . . Having families ostracise you. . . Blaming the soldiers for the torture is just a red "x" in my book.

My husband and I watched that movie Jarhead. While we know it isn't possible, we had hoped it would delve a bit deeper into the psychological effects. You know when you marry someone you expect them to change throughout the years you are together. So the person you marry now will be slightly different 20 years from now. We all evolve and change as we experience life. But when you send a loved one into a war zone and within a year or so they come back and are so damaged and changed by what they have seen and what they have done, its a blow so deep and hard that your love and committment to that person must have a very strong bond.

Some of the things I went through with my husband were addiction issues, night terrors, obsessive complusive behavior, post traumatic stress, and various other things. That meant that my husband was a alcoholic because there isn't much to do while you are in the service besides your duty and drink. Along with the drinking came abusive behavior both physically and mentally. Night terrors are a real treat. Did you ever wake up to having the person you love most in the world with his hands around your throat squeezing the life out of you? His obsessive compulsive behavior came in the form of guns. He needed to have one near. They were practically in every room of the house and we had young children at the time. Post traumatic stress manifests itself in many different ways and varies from person to person. He could not talk about things and the only emotion he could express was anger. If he was hanging a picture and hit his finger with the hammer while putting the nail in then that was a cause to burst into a fit of swearing, yelling, and putting his fist through the wall. Spilling a glass of water got the same yelling and swearing and then throwing the glass across the room and smashing it. And these things were only the tip of a very large iceberg.

As you can imagine, this was NOT the man I married. But this is the man that came home to me and that I had to live with for the rest of my life. To say that war changes a man isn't correct. War changes EVERYTHING it touches, even the families of those that serve.

At what point did I say that I was blaming the individual soldiers? I'm blaming the people that gave the order in the first place, TGM. I know that the soldiers are taking orders and don't have a lot of choice in the matter.

I was saying that as human beings, and as a society we can't look down on other cultures for the way that they treat people if we're perfectly willing to do the same, even if it's only a means to an end. It makes us the figurative pot calling the kettle black as it were.

You know its funny, people are always saying "end the war/win the war" but when they see what it sometimes takes to accomplish this task then they get judgemental. So lets say you have 5 prisoners and one of those 5 knows where the terrorists are going to attack next in another country. Another car bomb in another busy residential area killing hundreds of innocent people in the near future, thats all you know but one of these guys knows when and where. What are you going to do to find out? First you psychologically torture them while depriving them of rest, food, and water. Ok 2 of them break and you find out they are not the guy you need. So now you are down to 3 prisioners and one of them is your guy but you've taken the torture as far as you can. You know you have very little time to find out the information you need. You have other avenues open and searching and you hope they will come up with some more information but its not for certain. What is for certain is the guy that knows all the details is right in front of you and all you have to do is get that information out of him or hundreds of people are going to die. Inncocent women, children, men going about their daily lives are going to be blown to bits not to mention the psychological damage that will be done to the survivors and citizens of that country. What do you do? WHAT DO YOU DO?? You do whatever is necessary. Simple as that.

But no one wants to look at that side of it. No one wants to hear about it. If they do their dirty little work behind closed doors and no one finds out, then we all sit in our quiet warm homes safe from all the horror that is out there. Unaware, blithely going about our daily routine.

Does this justify treating every prisoner we get with physical torture and psychological abuse? No, it doesn't. Is it sometimes necessary to do to some individuals? Yes, it is. Get used to it, its a god damn war.

[DakAttack]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!



What?

[Rodin]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

Does this justify treating every prisoner we get with physical torture and psychological abuse? No, it doesn't. Is it sometimes necessary to do to some individuals? Yes, it is. Get used to it, its a god damn war.

QFT...

Whether the country realizes this or not, this is a war. We have to do certain things to find out what we want to make more people safe. This isn't extreme physical torture. We're not sticking bamboo shoots under their fingernails, we're not burning them, we might hit them, smack them, but that's all I've heard. You don't think the UN has people present in Guantanamo Bay? The UN has inspectors there to make sure the prisoners are being treated justly. And honestly, look at it like this:

You're in a police interrogation room. A kidnapper and murderer is being interrogated to find missing, and possibly murdered children. One of the interrogaters ends up getting frustrated and slaps the guy. Is it against his human rights? Probably. Would you care at all? Probably not. You'd probably be thinking, "That guy deserves more than a slap!"

Now, you have known members of the Taliban, and Al Quaeda in Guantanamo Bay. Then there's the five or so that aren't affiliated with them. To be quite honest, and this is the TRUTH, not a matter of opinion. ANYONE, and EVERYONE affiliated with the Taliban is a murderer. Yes, it's true. If they supported the Taliban during Septermber 11th, they are involved in the murders of thousands of American citizens. I decide not to have ANY sympathy for them what-so-ever. Do I know anyone who died in September 11th? No. But still, these people are good-for-nothing murderers. The 5 who are in Guantanamo Bay, that aren't enemy fighters, I agree, should be released. But for the rest of them, it's a Jihad they want, they'll get a war. But they'll be sorry they ever fucked with U.S. To be completely honest, we did nothing wrong. This isn't about us being "infidels". This is because we helped Afghanistan defeat Russia, but we didn't help the Mouja-hadin set up a government. There's nothing holy about this war. The Taliban is just trying to justify revenge by calling it the "Slaughter of Infidels". Every member of the Taliban deserves to die, because they're murderers, and nothing more.

[Murphie]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

You know its funny, people are always saying "end the war/win the war" but when they see what it sometimes takes to accomplish this task then they get judgemental. So lets say you have 5 prisoners and one of those 5 knows where the terrorists are going to attack next in another country. Another car bomb in another busy residential area killing hundreds of innocent people in the near future, thats all you know but one of these guys knows when and where. What are you going to do to find out? First you psychologically torture them while depriving them of rest, food, and water. Ok 2 of them break and you find out they are not the guy you need. So now you are down to 3 prisioners and one of them is your guy but you've taken the torture as far as you can. You know you have very little time to find out the information you need. You have other avenues open and searching and you hope they will come up with some more information but its not for certain. What is for certain is the guy that knows all the details is right in front of you and all you have to do is get that information out of him or hundreds of people are going to die. Inncocent women, children, men going about their daily lives are going to be blown to bits not to mention the psychological damage that will be done to the survivors and citizens of that country. What do you do? WHAT DO YOU DO?? You do whatever is necessary. Simple as that.

So, let's say you've taken five prisoners, and you think that one of them knows where the next strike is going to be. You ask and you ask, and you deprive them of food and water and you smack them around and humiliate them and eventually they give you an answer because they just want the torment to stop. What about then? You're not omnicient. You can't KNOW these things and then torture them until they tell you what you want to hear. That's inhuman.

But no one wants to look at that side of it. No one wants to hear about it. If they do their dirty little work behind closed doors and no one finds out, then we all sit in our quiet warm homes safe from all the horror that is out there. Unaware, blithely going about our daily routine.

Nice speech, once again. It sounds like a campaign ad, or one of Jack Nicholson's speeches from A Few Good Men.

Does this justify treating every prisoner we get with physical torture and psychological abuse? No, it doesn't. Is it sometimes necessary to do to some individuals? Yes, it is. Get used to it, its a god damn war.

Nice rationale. The fact remains that is illegal to treat prisoners of war in this manner. If you want to do it, great. But don't be surprised when people don't pat you on the back for it.

EDIT:

Rodin - I (and many others) get that this is a War. We just disagree as to what actions are necessary to achieve our goals.

[Omni]

Re: Ding dong the Witch is dead!

I (and many others) get that this is a War. We just disagree as to what actions are necessary to achieve our goals.

This is a joke and a contradiction.

I really dont think you get that it is a war. In war, bad things happen. People die, people get hurt, people suffer. In the end, more times than not, things are better. That's all we can hope for.

You expect to fight a war with pretty happy ideas and nice words? While the enemy is doing things to our prisoners 100 fold worse than anything we've done and you come down on the US? Absolutely laughable.