OT: Genocide and Ethnic Cleansing and Death and Denial

[Guest guest]

Hey Melissa,

 

> > Some things I have been thinking about today. About the Denial Syndrome

> > and its effect on the lives of human beings. And about the loss of

> > objective reporting by the American media the last few years ..

> > especially since the Vietnam War. And about putting priorities in the

> > right place.

 

> Mornin Butch,

> I think herein lies much of the problems that ordinary people are faced with,

> we don't think, we react.

 

True it is for the average Joe & Jill .. and across the spectrum for the

above average Joe & Jill .. but in some cases that's not bad .. depends

on the training/experience they have. Sometimes training/experience and

confidence gives us the ability to react without thinking when immediate

action saves our butt. Pilots and parachutists and divers and mothers

of little ones come to mind immediately. ;-)

 

> Maybe we don't have the time or the desire or maybe the education, but we let

others,

> president, media etc. do it for us.

 

Its more desire or time than education .. methinks. I know many high

school graduates who keep abreast of current events and some professors

who are so involved in their own world that they fail to see outside it.

 

> I don't consider myself a liberal by any means but I love whales and other

> " critters " as much as the next person, and from experience I don't trust the

> media or the government, let me explain. My husband was in special forces

during

> Grenada and my father was in the Air force during Viet Nam. What they did and

what

> we were told, by the media and the government, were two very different things.

 

True it is .. I used to get newspaper clippings from home and I rarely

saw photos of the Medical Civic Action missions we participated in .. or

the sacks of captured VC rice we manhandled to take to the Vietnamese

orphanages, etc. But I have those photos .. and know for a fact that

the U.S. Army Public Information Officers were presenting them to the

media back then. But war with the Communists was not the only one we

were fighting .. there was also a war with the media.

 

As for the government NOT talking about special operations then and now,

and how combat aircraft were/are able to get from Point A to Point B

without being detected by this or that .. I'm in total agreement. And I

am in agreement with the government not telling the media too.

 

> Propoganda is alive and well in this government and is apparently necessary to

keep

> its agenda going.

 

Of course .. even when we write our thoughts its a form of propaganda ..

we just hope its not divisive and harmful to others.

 

> People like Moore will eventually bury themselves but hopefull in the meantime

they

> cause people to think, to feel, to get angry and to eventually DO SOMETHING!

 

I hope you are right. Moore is an extremist and an opportunist .. I am

a tad right of center on many issues but left on others .. eclectic I

reckon .. and I have a strong dislike for the actions of extremists to

the right or left.

 

> We are spoiled in this country to a large degree when it comes to solving our

own

> problems and assisting others around the globe.

 

True .. and that confidence or security we feel was won at a high price

over a few generations .. wasn't always like that. But I know for a

fact that America and the Western world has all but written off Africa.

I was an Area Specialist for Eastern Europe and the Mediterranean .. and

had to attend other Area Specialist refresher courses .. even in the

early 1980s the mentality of Africa being a basket case without hope for

change was prevalent. And its not based on political or racial grounds

but rather on a belief that one can't help governments that don't want

help .. or people who have adapted a lifestyle that can't be sustained

by their environment. Liberating a country in Africa .. a country that

doesn't have the means to support its population regardless of the form

of government .. means you take on the burden of feeding them forever.

 

Still .. we are wrong to turn our backs on them .. there must be some

human assistance provided even when their sorry leaders refuse to admit

to having problems they themselves created. Can we save them all? No!

But I think we can try to make their lives a bit better and hope that in

time conditions will improve somewhat and social evolution will take

root to some degree. If we write Africa off it will not be forgotten.

I've written before that our great or great great grand children might

have to deal with an organized Africa some day. All they need is a

great leader to bring them together .. and of course, that is not going

to happen with a ballot box. We can only hope any leader that might

emerge will be a benevolent one.

 

> We don't want to get our hands or our hearts dirty.

 

True it is .. much of it is because the little guys on the farm and in

the factories and such .. those that keep America humming .. rarely have

the time to do more than take care of their own. And as you said, we

depend on the government to establish priorities .. which puts Africa

somewhere on the bottom of the list. Nor do Black Americans associate

themselves much with Africans .. they aren't pushing for relief of those

folks just because they have a common heritage. But I don't blame them

either because they are also the guys on the farm and in the factories.

 

> While working on my masters degree we did a lot of research on Veterans of

Viet Nam

> and learned that in order for these men to venture out of their Leave it to

Beaver and

> Ozzie and Hariett world they had to be programmed into thinking they were

killing folks

> that were less than human, totally unlike " us " in any shape and fashion.

 

True this is .. from the first days of basic training troops are taught

to be a part of a lean, mean fighting machine. I learned long before

Glasnost that most Russians were civilized people .. met lots of Russian

officers in the diplomatic corps. One of them (now retired) was at the

wedding party Friday night .. we often joke about how we trained to put

each other under snakes.

 

> I guess nothing much has changed has it.

 

Elimination of the draft changed a lot of the attitudes of soldiers. I

was a volunteer but I spent tours in the 'Nam with draftees and I could

understand the lack of mental preparation of SOME of them. Jerked off

the street and told to be a soldier. But today's soldier has no room

for complaint because they know the score when they sign on.

 

Some other things have changed too methinks. We are not at war or at a

risk of war with what I would call " civilized " people today. Regardless

of Political Correctness .. it cannot be said that the mentality of the

Chinese Communist heirachy or Arabic Fanatic Leaders or the African War

Lords is civilized .. its just not the case! So progress is being made.

 

> If we don't have to look into the faces and the lives of these people it is

> easier to kill them and also easier to turn away and not help.

 

You are 100% right .. we can put the face of a cute baby seal on the

cover of a magazine and get folks aroused and angry at seal hunters.

But put the face of an emaciated, dirty child with flies blowing wounds

on their face on the cover and some will turn away from it and not pick

up the magazine again .. out of sight is out of mind.

 

> I don't have any solutions, unfortunately, only a deep sadness that history

> continues to repeat itself and we all become less humane.

 

I don't have a solution either .. and history does continue to repeat

itself .. but we are far forward from where we were centuries past ..

and even when I was a yonker. We are also far behind where we will be

in the future .. I hope. Isolation is proven to be ineffective as a

policy of international relations. And as the world's only Super Power

at this time .. America has picked up obligations and responsibilities

that we cannot shy away from. Ideally, we should be the Champion of the

down-trodden and a light of hope for the hopeless. We'll never achieve

perfection in this regard but that doesn't mean we can stop trying. And

Colin Powell is following this line of thinking by traveling to Sudan ..

regardless of which political administration he serves it is still the

correct thing for ANY American Secretary of State to do.

 

Man is a humane critter only when he is taught that being humane is a

better than being a barbarian. Fairness and honor and humane treatment

of others are not ideals we are born with .. they are learned behavior.

ALL Religious teachings assist in this learning process .. IF .. they

are not bastardized for political reasons or used as a tool to gain

power or riches .. as is the case with many of the Imams who practice

extreme Islam and the ultra right wing Christian dudes like Falwell and

his cohorts. Even the Irish find fault with America's policies and that

is really a case of denial of reality.

 

> Keep safe and keep smiling Butch,

> Melissa

 

Thankee ma'am .. and you and yours. :-) Butch