Cheering At The Screen.

[themidnightgirl]

I don't have a source for this, I got it off a Bruce Cockburn Mailing list I'm on. I'll attribute as soon as I know where to.



Lately I've been paying more attention to an interesting phenomenon.
I think of it as "cheering at the screen," so that I don't have to think
of it as what it really is, "bloodlust," or "loss of humanity."

I've noticed it for a while, but it really struck home yesterday, when
news articles started appearing about US soldiers killing Saddam
Hussein's two sons. Shortly after reading it, I walked over to check
out the results of the fire at the Eiffel Tower and then went for a drink.
In the bar was a rather loud American offering to buy drinks for
everyone to celebrate their deaths.

Then this morning on the AOL main screen there was a poll to see
whether their deaths had "improved morale" and whether members
thought Saddam would be next. Given the sensibilities of AOL-Time
Warner, I'm surprised they didn't make it a contest. "Win a free year
of AOL...predict the date and time of Saddam's death!"

Yeah, yeah...they were Bad Guys. But it disturbs me when human
beings are so out of touch with the reality of both life and death that
they can celebrate the death of another human being. And I'm fairly
convinced that one of the main reasons that they *are* out of touch
is the constant bombardment of make-believe violence and death they
see on TV and in movies. They know it's not real. It's a fictional shoot-
out between the Good Guys and the Bad Guys. So when one of
the Bad Guys takes a slug in the belly from the Good Guy's 44
magnum, "the most powerful handgun known to man," they cheer.
Right has prevailed. Evil has been vanquished. It's a simple world,
for simple minds.

But it makes me remember a day a few years ago. I had flown into
La Guardia to attend a seminar and was driving back to the airport.
But I was 'way early, too early to think about going straight to the
terminal. So, when I passed a multiplex movie theater in the Bronx,
I said to myself, "Self, why not take in a movie?" So I stopped, and
bought a ticket for the only film that was starting at that time.

It was a film called "Colors," starring Robert Duvall and Emilio Esteves,
and was about gangs in L.A. I was a little early so I walked in and sat
down in one of the front rows and munched my popcorn and waited
for the film to start. But before it did, about 40 guys and gals came
in. They, too, liked the front, so they filled in all the seats around me.
And it didn't take a real genius to figure out that the reason they'd
picked this particular film to see on a Monday afternoon was that
they were all members of a local gang.

So the movie started. And the guys and gals around me really got
into it. They were remarkably friendly to me, offering to share popcorn,
cokes, joints...whatever they were passing around. But I noticed that
it made for a different type of movie-going experience than usual. On
screen, when one of the gang members got killed, the gang in the
theater booed. When one of the cops got killed, they cheered.

Mainstream Americans and the media seem to make a big thing out
of it when crowds of Iraqis, seeing a convoy of the troops who invaded
their homeland hit by an RPG, and American soldiers lying bleeding
in the road, cheer. Yet they think nothing of buying a round for the
bar and cheering themselves when *their* Bad Guys get killed.

It isn't about Bad Guys or Good Guys. It's about death. It's about
someone being knocked across a room by the force of a metal slug
propelled by enough powder to blow up a tree stump. It's about a
human being blown into little pieces by an explosion. It's about some-
one's family's life being shattered, and women and children in tears.
It's about death.

And those who laugh and cheer about it are, in my opinion, not only
in danger of losing the last handhold they had on their own humanity,
they're creating some really interesting karma for the circumstances
of their own deaths. Cheer not for whom the Evening News gloats;
it gloats for thee.

Comments

[crocodilewings.livejournal.com]

Pins it down pretty well. I've been building up an unhealthy cynicism and distaste for the attitudes of the world at large for the past year or so now, and I was astonished at the entire reaction.

Did anyone else see that footage of the sky over Baghdad? Several dozen kilos of ammunitions blasted into Iraqi airspace seemed to be a perfectly acceptable method of celebrating the death of Hussein's sons, the names of which most people probably didn't even know this time last week. Just imagine what was happening on the ground.

[raggedyman.livejournal.com]

Several dozen kilos of ammunitions blasted into Iraqi airspace seemed to be a perfectly acceptable method of celebrating the death of Hussein's sons, the names of which most people probably didn't even know this time last week.

Harsh. Those were Iraqi's firing in the air, overjoyed at the deaths of two extremely vile and evil people who had directly caused death and pain upon thousands of thier fellow countrymen. The Iraquis sure as hell all knew the names those two, and had lived under fear of those names for years.

I'm not arguing for or against the acceptability of their actions, just pointing out where those actions came from.

[crocodilewings.livejournal.com]

Fair point.

Some intereting thoughts to dwell on:

- Why was there no footage of all the celebrating Iraqi people?
- Why has there been no mention of coalition forces putting a stompy halt to large quantities of Iraqi people brandishing heavy firepower in the streets of the capital, especially in the wake of recent attacks on coalition soldiers?
- Why do so many Iraqis have automatic weaponry, and possibly more importantly, where do they get the tracer rounds to load them with, so they look pleasantly cool against the night sky for the cameras?
- Why has there been absolutely no mention of civil incidents of any kind in and around Baghdad, with the exception of the whole burning-sky ordeal?

[blue-cat.livejournal.com]

While they were undoubtably unplesant people from popular opinion they were probably loved by someone.

And while their deaths were probably appropriate, and probably necessary, and somehting of a relief, the ghoulish glee with which it was greeted is -

don't know.

Makes me feel hollow.

I understand, and propound pet theories about the tribalism of modern humanity and so on and so forth - the delight in 'boxing' people into 'good', 'bad', not from round here, different, same, appoved of, disapproved of.....

creeping inhumanity - how far from cheering the death of an enemy to stating that he wasn't human.

or like the photo of a korean? general shooting someone in the street - it was famous, but for the wrong reason. We look and see an authority figure as judge, jury, executioner to a bound prisoner. But the prisoner was a murderer, and the general was an x-cop who was fed up with killers getting away with it.

[crocodilewings.livejournal.com]

While they were undoubtably unplesant people from popular opinion they were probably loved by someone.

I don't believe we've ever seen Saddam Hussein cry on the news.

I don't think anyone would be interested.

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Sorry Robert, I'm going to disagree with you on this one. If half the stories about them were true, then they were a pair of deeply unpleasant bastards who had it coming. Shame about the 14 year old though.

I'm also planning a little jig for when Idi Amin kicks the bucket which he seems likely to do soon - and good riddance to him too.

[borusa.livejournal.com]

They had it coming? Who are you to judge?

What they had coming was arrest, a trial and a life of incarceration. A trial where the magnitude of their crimes could be put on show for the world to see. A fair, open trial that would mean we could turn around to the rest of the world and say we are better than they are. That is the civilised thing to do.

There is no question that these men were responsible for thousands of deaths, and were, by any stretch of definition, evil beyond belief.

But for someone to sit a couple of thousand miles away and say "they had it coming" smacks of arrogance.

As for Idi Amin...wasn't he supported by your beloved British establishment (source : 1971 government documents - check out here (http://www.afrol.com/News2002/uga004_amin_uk.htm))?

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

Well, aside from the fact that they'd have got their trail if they'd surrendered rather than opening fire with automatic weapons and rocket launchers, I shall shed no tears for them, preferring instead to save my sympathies for a) their victims, and b) the civilian casualities of the necessary actions taken to remove them.


...beloved British establishment? When have I ever said that?

A bunch of people who I've never met, didn't vote for, and were in power before I was born supported a mass-murdering tyrant, so I should think he's okay on the basis of that?

Robert, please.

I wouldn't shed any tears if Kim Jong-il, Fidel Castro, Sani Abacha, Robert Mugabe, and a whole host of others were hit by trams on the morrow, either.

[borusa.livejournal.com]

There's a difference between not shedding any tears (one only has a limited amount of said tears, and there are people more deserving) and actively celebrating. I'm not mourning their deaths, particularly, though it would still have been better for them to have survived to stand trial. The thing I (and the writer of the article) have problems with is celebrating their deaths in the same manner as one would celebrate a victory by a football team.

It's over-simplistic and dehumanising. For the celebrators, that is, not for the dead.

Robert
PS I've lost my "can I get away with straw-manning a debate with Dave" competition. Damn. :)

[davywavy.livejournal.com]

I think the reasonm I disliked the original post so much was because it's emotional blackmail to make a politial point. In a similar way to how I felt about 'Bowling for Columbine', I really resent people trying to manipulate my emotions to get me to agree with them.
The author conveniently skips over the 10-minute loudhailer demands to surrender. He skips over the fact that the inhabitants of the house opened fire, thus effectively committing suicide and, by presenting just one graphic example of death, he skips over the option he had of graphically describing someones testicles getting nailed to a chair during torture by Uday Hussein
It's simplistic. It's emotional blackmail. One flagrantly one-sided.

Yes, you can go with the Donne-ist viewpoint of everyone is dimished by death. However, some deaths diminish us less than others and with the removal of the torturing, raping, murdering Hussein brothers the sun shone a little more brightly and the sky was a little more blue in my world.
Whilst I wouldn't cheer at the Tv (because that's just so un-British a thing to do at the best of times), I can understand why someone would.
I don't think many of those doing so understand why they should do so however; cheering a 'win for our team' is small-minded in this situation. Being heartened by the suicide of two genuinely evil men isn't.

[borusa.livejournal.com]

The author doesn't mention the circumstances of their deaths at all? Have you read the article? I suggest you do so!

This isn't about the rights and wrongs of them being killed. It's about what is an appropriate reaction to their deaths. Perhaps some hint of relief, yes. Perhaps some moment to consider their victims, yes. Bunting in the street and a big knees-up? No.

This isn't a "win for our team". That's a dangerously simplistic viewpoint.

And the article isn't really about their deaths at all. And it certainly isn't, whatever you might think, emotional blackmail (never use that phrase again on this journal, by the way).

Because we are talking about peoples lives. American and British soldiers, Iraqi military, Iraqi civilians. Even the criminals who ran Iraq. And who still run Burma, North Korea, Zimbabwe and so many other countries. Because this is about death, about destruction. And if we lose sight of that, in any way, and reduce it to a question of "sport", or "teams" or even "strategic wargaming", if we let the news networks reduce the loss of life to computer graphics and a nice fading title bar, then we lose sight of what is actually happening. And we should be viewing that with compassion, with humanity, and with a large amount of saddness, regret and guilt.