Iraqi War Casualties

Here is an email I received in response to one of my essays.

Iraqi War Casualties : Person Person : person.person32@yahoo.com : 2009-12-10

People don’t usually get up the energy to write unless they are angry. What you see posted is a pretty random sample. I don’t post the most obscene emails because Google would reclassify my site which would stop people from finding information in the non-war-related parts of the website.

I am not a martyr. I suffer much less by opposing the war than if I simply wrung my hands in despair. Nobody has beaten me up. The martyrs are the Iraqis and Afghans who literally gave their lives to stop the Americans from killing their children. I made no sacrifice even remotely that large. Americans often threaten me with violence or death, but so far none have actually done any physical harm. I was active in gay lib in the early 70s when I would typically receive three death threats and 300 abusive calls a day. What I put up with now is minuscule.

Your blog in general is violent — yet you speak against the violence of war. Interesting irony.

The first human who hurled an insult instead of a stone was the founder of civilization.
~ Sigmund Freud (1856-05-06 1939-09-23 age:83)

You use the words violence and martyr in a broad way. I have not harmed any soldier. Neither have I advocated violence against them, other than following through on the prosecuting them for war crimes fully in accord with law. I have condemned their actions. If doing that is hate, then you must also condemn Jesus for his violence against the money changers. I did not even overturn any of the soldiers’ furniture. Granted, I advocate shunning solidiers socially, just as I advocate staying away from any serial killers. But you are correct. I do hate these bastards for what they have done. You seem blythely unaware that what they have done makes most civilian serial killers look like Ryan Seacrest. You have some psychological mechanism either for not seeing it or for excusing it. I can’t imagine you talking the same way about young man who raped and murdered the family next door. Is it racism or patriotic blindness that makes you excuse these same crimes when the victims are Muslim and the perpetrators American soldiers?

I found it quite a tribute to freedom of speech and agree that war is an atrocity.

I do find it amazing that in #4 of your need to give reasons why more Americans are not pictured you say this:

“I don’t really give a fig personally about US soldiers who die. Those US soldiers voluntarily chose the profession of hired killers. They kill for thrills and money, not because they are defending their country. I care about civilians, especially children, of any nationality or religion. I realise, however, that most Americans are infected with racism and nationalism and care only about American deaths and then only white ones, so I will gladly post any photos you can find of US casualties to pound home the cost of this war in suffering to Americans too.”

A very generalized and hateful statement, though you do not advocate love to all mankind in any way therefore not out of keeping with your blog.

Truly shocking.

Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat and swallow a camel.
~ Matthew 24:23

You are odd duck to consider vigourously condemning killers as more shocking than killing itself. I think you need to sort out your priorities. Your patriotism has addled you. What you are effectively doing is analogous to getting more upset with people who loudly and angrily demand better law enforcement than you are with home invaders. You don’t seem to get it that what the American soldiers are doing is illegal. It as a capital crime. I have every right to angrily demand such criminals be stopped. Not even Hilter routinely tortured his P.O.W.s. Not even Hitler used banned chemical weapons. If this is not a situation for which anger is appropriate, I don’t know what anger should be reserved for.

Have you ever seen the video tape of the mothers of Jeffrey Dahmer’s victims screaming at him at the end of his trial for murdering their sons. The crimes of the US soldiers are tens of thousands of time greater. Some screaming is completely appropriate.

Best of luck to you.

I find your argument amusing, basically that because I am allegedly so violent, I have no right to condemn the violence of American soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq. Usually, soldiers write me and say that because I have no combat experience and have not killed any children, I have no right to judge them. Catch 22!

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