September 07, 2004
They are lower than animals. They do not even deserve our scorn.
The Chechen terrorists who perpetrated the Beslan school massacre made a video tape of their siege. They seem to think that they will get the public to support their ongoing "efforts."
All we can do is pray they suffer far more than they made those children suffer.
On closer examination, portions of the video become even more disturbing.
...a shot where you hear a voice in the background. The voice is talking to someone on a cell-phone. He is not speaking Russian. He is either speaking Turkic or Arabic, but he distinctly can be heard speaking the Arabic phrase "Allahu-Akhbar". The next scene is disturbing if brief. The camera looks down at blood on the ground and pans past what look to be the legs and arms of dead children. You cannot see their full bodies, just a brief glimpse as the camera pans past to focus on the blood. Horrible.
Horrible description. I bet the guy who said it would really love an attribution seeing he's one of those academic types into citations and the like ;-)
Posted by: RS at September 7, 2004 09:17 PMI wish I had confidence in Putin to do deal with these threats in the right way, but I just don't think he's very trustworthy.
Posted by: Toby Petzold at September 8, 2004 02:17 AM"They are lower than animals."
This type of emotional statement once again sends the wrong message.
The people who committed the atrocities were human beings responsible for their action, and will have to answer to God on the Day of Judgement for what they have done.
To compare people to animals in such a manner is to give credence to the lie of the Theory of Evolution that man is just a higher form of animal and so is not really ethically and morally responsible for what he/she does.
Posted by: Miller at September 8, 2004 07:30 AMMiller,
That is nothing but moral equivalence BS.
Any type of being that would murder 300 kids IS an animal, and must be treated as such. Scratch that. Animals only kill for food, threats, and territory. So these beings are LOWER than animals.
Maybe your biblical view says otherwise, but I believe man IS a higher form. The whole "have dominion over animals" thing kind of explains it.
None of the above means that these butchers should not be held accountable. You failed to connect the ideas that since man is a higher form of animal, he is not really ethically or morally responsible for his actions. These are completely mutually exclusive ideas, and I challenge you to prove otherwise.
Emotion is one of the things that separates man from animals. We have emotion; animals do not. Therefore, to suggest that man somehow cap that emotion, is unrealistic.
We have every right to be emotional about Islamist thugs murdering 300 kids. You can wax elite all you want, but you can't deny human nature.
TV (Harry)
Posted by: Inspector Callahan at September 8, 2004 11:18 AMWhat I want to understand is how you people, especially the ones who like to call yourselves conservatives, rationalize placing premiums on children’s lives, over other children’s lives. Why can the people who committed these acts be seen as so vile and evil, while the thousands of Iraqi children killed from US aggression does not get the same vilification and demonizing?
Of course you will say that there is a moral difference, given that the US does not target the innocent. However, this is only a mental game that Americans play with themselves in order to appear morally superior and an agent of God, which blesses this nation with material wealth and thus must approve of our actions. The reality is that the US makes a conscious choice to kill innocent, as part of the imperfections that goes along with its goal to kill the guilty. In other words, this nation says it’s ok to kill the innocent, when you are aiming for the guilty. Kind of like the gang bangers who kill the little children playing in yards and parks, as they attempt to kill their rivals. Its “all good”, due to them not aiming at the children… right?
It funny how this nation always find a way to rationalize our killings as being morally different from other peoples and groups killings.
Ah, and Noah shows up and spouts more BS.
"thousands of Iraqi children killed from US aggression does not get the same vilification and demonizing"
Proof of these thousands of Iraqi children killed by the U.S., please? And sites like "antiwar.com" don't count.
"US makes a conscious choice to kill innocent, as part of the imperfections that goes along with its goal to kill the guilty"
This is a long-winded, more tin-foil hat centered version of what you alread said. Proof please? Cites? Links??
"funny how this nation always find a way to rationalize our killings as being morally different from other peoples and groups killings"
Funny how we haven't run planes into buildings killing innocents. Funny how we haven't taken over schools and killed 300 kids. Funny how we haven't blown up nightclubs with hundreds of Australian tourists. Funny how we haven't stepped onto buses with Old Jewish men and children and blew them (and ourselves) up.
Funny how the moral equivalence crowd can't see the obvious.
TV (Harry)
Posted by: Inspector Callahan at September 8, 2004 12:50 PMI love your writing style - are there any good IRC chat rooms or yahoo chats or aol web cam chats or something where I can chat with people like you and learn something in real time instead of bit by bit on a blog?
Posted by: chat with people at October 6, 2004 12:44 AM