Words fail me.

[kangeiko]

Twin bombings kill 64 in Baghdad

This is one of the most despicable acts I've yet to encounter in this whole sorry mess. Not only were the bombs detonated in a marketplace - a marketplace, for crying out loud, where parents take their children and buy food for the week - but the bombs were strapped to two mentally disabled women and detonated remotely.

That's right. A bunch of armed men got together and decided that the way forward would be booby-trap the mentally disabled. What next? Grenades in nurseries?

I have a lot of time for people who want to argue that the Allied presence in Iraq is doing more harm than good. I have a lot of time for people who want to argue that suicide bombers are born of desperation, and we should do something about the growing levels of desperation around the world. I have a lot of time for people who argue that the politics of Iraq and its slow disintegration can't be explained away with 'heroes' and 'bad guys'.

I have no time whatsoever for people who strap bombs to the mentally disabled. That's not a suicide bomb. That's another victim.

Any legitimate grievances these bombers may have had are now so completely irrelevant in my head. I don't care. OK? I know I should, I know that the best way to settle conflicts is to stop assigning blame, but in this instance I don't care.

Comments

[monanotlisa.livejournal.com]

That's right. A bunch of armed men got together and decided that the way forward would be booby-trap the mentally disabled. What next? Grenades in nurseries?

We've had that, haven't we? Apart from the whole "terrorists hiding in hospital basements" allegation, which I cannot confirm after a quick googling, there have been bombs in Red Cross/Crescent ambulance cars, strapped under sick children. Not to mention kids with bomb belts; whether they themselves detonate them, or whether they are remotely triggered: always mass murder on part of the instigators.

This is despicable, I'm with you. But new? Only by degrees.

[kangeiko]

there have been bombs in Red Cross/Crescent ambulance cars, strapped under sick children. Not to mention kids with bomb belts; whether they themselves detonate them, or whether they are remotely triggered: always mass murder on part of the instigators.

I... did not know that.

Goddamnit. Nothing - and I mean nothing - I have studied or read on the politics or the psychology of this and other conflicts has brought me even close to understanding the rationale behind acts like these. And I am trying to, I really am. It just makes me sick to my teeth.

[monanotlisa.livejournal.com]

I... did not know that.

Well, the ambulance explosives and bomb-belt kids weren't in Iraq, but obviously, the mindset's not any different, whether we look at Israel or Afghanistan or Pakistan. I'd look for more in-depth info, and I think it important to look at who the source is and stands for, but frankly, it's all too depressing right now.

And there is no true understanding if you are a sane person--there is only the fact of seething, irrational hatred and the will to destroy no matter what the cost, and not just their own humanity but the lives of other human beings.

[kangeiko]

it's all too depressing right now.

I had to give up looking this stuff up after finishing my degree. Day in day out with the horror - week 1: genocide, week 2: famine, week 3: rape in wartime... it just went on and on. Astonishing that I got out of it with only a minor case of depression.

there is only the fact of seething, irrational hatred and the will to destroy no matter what the cost, and not just their own humanity but the lives of other human beings.

Week 4: understanding the psychology of atrocities. There is logic there, and method to the madness, it's just... deply unpleasant. Deeply, deeply unpleasant.

It sounds really cowardly, but I'd rather not have to think about it unless absolutely necessary. Trying to wrap my brain around what would make someone do something like that... *shakes head*

[eldritchhobbit.livejournal.com]

I have no words. *stunned and horrified and sickened*

[kangeiko]

I know. I just... I know.