What we have accomplished in Iraq.

[catsittingstill]

Here's an example.  For those who don't have time to follow the link, it's an article about a 17 year old Iraqi girl, murdered by her father and her brothers for talking--talking-- to a man who wasn't a member of her family.  This is a common practice in Iraq now; it's called "honor killing."

I will just note that, however I might despise Saddam Hussein, while he ruled Iraq, honor killing was prosecuted as murder.  After the regime change we brought about, the police now congratulate these murderers.

Oh, well done!

Comments

[min0taur.livejournal.com]

"Honor killing" makes about as much sense as "holy war" -- and to the same (alleged) mentality. The so-called "war on terror" was/is mostly an excuse to impress the hometown jingoboys with how rich we are/were and how fearsome our fancy toys are, so they'll pony up for more and keep the punish-the-foreigner show going; none of it actually impresses the nutbags and the desperate or shellshocked-and-god-awed-full who follow them.

I think what this thing has always been is a problem in global mental disease. A mind virus that blinds the mind's eye, whether aggressive male or identifying-with-the-aggressor female, to the fact that there are two basic biological ways to be a human being and that both are fully human -- deserving of the dignity that one truly sentient being accords another.

[catsittingstill.livejournal.com]

I think it has to do partly with a human tendency to pigeonhole and label people. We are very good at picking out patterns (to the point where we will pick out patterns that aren't there, hence superstitions of all sorts), so we start to assume that everyone will fit those main patterns. So we say to ourselves men are strong, brave, agressive, proud; women are weak, gentle, timid, humble, and we separate ourselves into two groups, and punish those people who don't fit one group or another. Then something convinces us there must be a heirarchy between the groups, and when one group is agressive and the other isn't, the agressive group winds up oppressing the not-agressive group.

I think of civilization as the gradual realization that that oppression, and even grouping, is not right, and not necessary. I see it as partnering the growing distaste for violence that has been swelling in our worldview for the last 150 or 200 years or so. People who embrace change are more likely to have a lower tolerance for violence, and a stronger belief that oppression of anyone is wrong (probably because they don't tolerate the violence that is necessary to oppress people). That's my guess anyway.