I remember sitting in a bar in downtown Seattle on the eve of the American invasion of Iraq when a young couple sitting beside me interrupted my conversation with my friends. They objected to my objection to the coming war. I asked them if they knew the difference between Sunni and Shiite Muslims. Of course, they didn't to which I added, "You will know the difference soon enough." It's so utterly ironic that we Americans are shielded from the true horrors of war by our censorship yet grotesque violence permeates our films and TV shows. I heard so many "warnings" about this documentary, about how "disturbing" the violence it depicts and I wonder what people thought war was at its core. War is about destroying people, literally destroying human beings en masse. The people murdered don't get up after it's all over and go on to do something else, like the extras in an Arnold Schwarzenegger film. Real violence isn't fun or cool like it's made out to be by Quentin Tarantino. War is about destroying lives and those lives destroyed go on to haunt the lives of those left living.
War destroys the ability of people to go on living, as we are seeing now in Syria which is a direct result of the Iraq War. These cities in Syria can't be rebuilt nor can much of those in Iraq that were bombed almost to extinction. Of course, all of this is pretty remote for Americans living on the other side of the world.
Another thing never considered is that for Muslim men violence can serve as a substitute for sex. I saw this in Lebanon in the 1980s. If women and alcohol are proscribed in your culture what outlet do young men have? Now all young men take this route but it is usually the fail-safe path of losers Muslims like we are seeing in Belgium and France. Losers who can't meet women or too cowardly to admit they are homosexual are turning to suicide bombings as a form of redemption.
War destroys the ability of people to go on living, as we are seeing now in Syria which is a direct result of the Iraq War. These cities in Syria can't be rebuilt nor can much of those in Iraq that were bombed almost to extinction. Of course, all of this is pretty remote for Americans living on the other side of the world.
Another thing never considered is that for Muslim men violence can serve as a substitute for sex. I saw this in Lebanon in the 1980s. If women and alcohol are proscribed in your culture what outlet do young men have? Now all young men take this route but it is usually the fail-safe path of losers Muslims like we are seeing in Belgium and France. Losers who can't meet women or too cowardly to admit they are homosexual are turning to suicide bombings as a form of redemption.