Who was Nick Berg?
May. 12th, 2004 07:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yellowrosetxNick Berg, according to his parents, was a hard worker and free spirit that went to Iraq to help in his own way.
After reading news article after news article, I have to wonder if his parents are wishing they'd kept their mouths shut. What do I mean? Several news articles have stated that he was picked up by the Iraqi police and later turned over to the U.S. authorities. His parents allegedly threatened to sue the US government for holding their son without due process. They were in the right and their son was released, but considering a few days later his execution/murder was all over the internet and news services, he probably would have been better off in US custody. Sometimes what is right is not fair and what is fair is not right.
Granted, abuse of prisoners, which is the excuse the terrorists in question have used, is wrong. Take a good look at those pictures, those men have clothes missing, but there's not a bruise on them and no body parts are missing. I'm not saying what is being done is right; I'm saying that after taking a good look at those pictures it's not quite what people have been lead to believe. Interrogation ain't pretty in any shape or form. I think it's interesting how hypocritical this terrorist group is... we can show an American man being decapitated, enemy soldiers beaten so badly their eyes are swollen shut, or drag your dead through our streets to cheering crowds, but don't show our people naked. There was a comment about dignity made in the speech in the video; karma is karma... and no one likes seeing the evil side of themselves in someone else's face.
Whoever is running the AP these days needs to be flogged. It's them being credited with bringing this piece of video to the rest of the world from the site it was originally posted on. To think that a few weeks ago, two people were fired over the publication of pictures of coffins being brought home. Is not a decapitated body also human remains? It was bad enough that my local news aired the part of the video of the guy making his statement, did and does his family need to be subjected to the death of their child splattered, literally, all over the world news and internet?
I would also like to know what creature with shit for brains put a woman in charge of a prison full of Islamic captives and knowing quite well that they would not listen to her as per their cultural beliefs.
I, for one, refuse to provide links to the video not only out of respect for the family, but on the principle of not wanting to give them any more than the proverbial fifteen minutes of fame it's already given them. It is the same reason I refuse to remember the name of the guy that killed John Lennon; he wanted to go down in the history books as the killer of John Lennon, and in the history books he is, along with John Wilkes Booth and others.
Ignoring this sort of heinous act won't make it go away, that's why there's a war going on in Iraq again. This behavior is common place in the Arab world; they cut off the right hand off a thief, not only for his/her crime, but because it makes them an outcast. However, I must ask the question... what did the AP publishing it accomplish besides call further attention to what most of us already knew? That life in Iraq, no matter who does it, is brutal.
For the friend that's concerned about the relative going to work on a civilian contract, I think I now have the answer for you. Have the adult family members involved watch that video and ask them if they someday want their children exposed to seeing the one they love being killed on international media. If they still insist on going then they truly are stupid or just plain greedy.
This also reminds me of a story...
A man during a flood kept saying God will save him. A police car passed before the man's house, the officers try to get him to go saying... "the water is only going to get deeper." The man refused saying God would save him...
He climbed to the roof of his porch and waited, a boat came by and again he was offered a trip to safety and refused because... "God will save me."
The water rose even more... he climbed to the roof of his home. A helicopter came by and for a third time, he was offered transportation to safety. For a third time, he refused again saying that God would save him. However, he drowned not long after refusing the third means of transport...
When he finally got to heaven, he stood before God and asked.. "Why didn't you save me?" God asked him, "I sent a car, a boat, and a helicopter. What more did you want?"
While there isn't exactly supposed to be a moral to the story, there is one. We are often shown pathways away from danger and refuse to take them. God is not coming down from heaven to make himself known until he's ready.. so he makes himself known via choices offered. Man has free will, it's not always a good thing.
After reading news article after news article, I have to wonder if his parents are wishing they'd kept their mouths shut. What do I mean? Several news articles have stated that he was picked up by the Iraqi police and later turned over to the U.S. authorities. His parents allegedly threatened to sue the US government for holding their son without due process. They were in the right and their son was released, but considering a few days later his execution/murder was all over the internet and news services, he probably would have been better off in US custody. Sometimes what is right is not fair and what is fair is not right.
Granted, abuse of prisoners, which is the excuse the terrorists in question have used, is wrong. Take a good look at those pictures, those men have clothes missing, but there's not a bruise on them and no body parts are missing. I'm not saying what is being done is right; I'm saying that after taking a good look at those pictures it's not quite what people have been lead to believe. Interrogation ain't pretty in any shape or form. I think it's interesting how hypocritical this terrorist group is... we can show an American man being decapitated, enemy soldiers beaten so badly their eyes are swollen shut, or drag your dead through our streets to cheering crowds, but don't show our people naked. There was a comment about dignity made in the speech in the video; karma is karma... and no one likes seeing the evil side of themselves in someone else's face.
Whoever is running the AP these days needs to be flogged. It's them being credited with bringing this piece of video to the rest of the world from the site it was originally posted on. To think that a few weeks ago, two people were fired over the publication of pictures of coffins being brought home. Is not a decapitated body also human remains? It was bad enough that my local news aired the part of the video of the guy making his statement, did and does his family need to be subjected to the death of their child splattered, literally, all over the world news and internet?
I would also like to know what creature with shit for brains put a woman in charge of a prison full of Islamic captives and knowing quite well that they would not listen to her as per their cultural beliefs.
I, for one, refuse to provide links to the video not only out of respect for the family, but on the principle of not wanting to give them any more than the proverbial fifteen minutes of fame it's already given them. It is the same reason I refuse to remember the name of the guy that killed John Lennon; he wanted to go down in the history books as the killer of John Lennon, and in the history books he is, along with John Wilkes Booth and others.
Ignoring this sort of heinous act won't make it go away, that's why there's a war going on in Iraq again. This behavior is common place in the Arab world; they cut off the right hand off a thief, not only for his/her crime, but because it makes them an outcast. However, I must ask the question... what did the AP publishing it accomplish besides call further attention to what most of us already knew? That life in Iraq, no matter who does it, is brutal.
For the friend that's concerned about the relative going to work on a civilian contract, I think I now have the answer for you. Have the adult family members involved watch that video and ask them if they someday want their children exposed to seeing the one they love being killed on international media. If they still insist on going then they truly are stupid or just plain greedy.
This also reminds me of a story...
A man during a flood kept saying God will save him. A police car passed before the man's house, the officers try to get him to go saying... "the water is only going to get deeper." The man refused saying God would save him...
He climbed to the roof of his porch and waited, a boat came by and again he was offered a trip to safety and refused because... "God will save me."
The water rose even more... he climbed to the roof of his home. A helicopter came by and for a third time, he was offered transportation to safety. For a third time, he refused again saying that God would save him. However, he drowned not long after refusing the third means of transport...
When he finally got to heaven, he stood before God and asked.. "Why didn't you save me?" God asked him, "I sent a car, a boat, and a helicopter. What more did you want?"
While there isn't exactly supposed to be a moral to the story, there is one. We are often shown pathways away from danger and refuse to take them. God is not coming down from heaven to make himself known until he's ready.. so he makes himself known via choices offered. Man has free will, it's not always a good thing.
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no subject
Date: 2004-05-12 06:31 pm (UTC)I read that story about God sending help for the man in the flood; it makes a lot of sense :)
I have not seen the video of the decapitation. I never saw the one of Daniel Pearl either.
This afternoon, on my way to pick Ari up from a friend's house, Sean Hannity played 30 seconds of the shouts of the killers and Nick Berg's screams of pain, fear and then the silence of death. I could not believe what I was hearing. Ari got into the car all smiles, but I could not smile back. I told her why.
This whole thing, this war, strikes primal urges in me. I am not politically astute, and my husband calls me a "tree-hugging liberal." I get too emotional and talk straight from my heart. I spent my formative years with my maternal grandparents, who were staunch Democrats until the days they died - so perhaps that is why I think the way I do ;)
Lately, I've been thinking horrible thoughts of us just leaving the country of Iraq, and letting the various fundamentalist Islamic sects to fight each other to their deaths. Perhaps then we could nuke the country off the world map! Instead, my husband, a staunch Conservative Republican who shakes his head at me when I say things like that - explained that if we leave Iraq, it will become one of the largest terrorist training camps in the world...and that terrorist acts around the world will increase 100 times.
What do you think?
This whole world situation is worse than any horror/war movie I have ever seen.
And it brings back lioness traits, albeit somewhat cowardly ones, that if the United States Military Draft is reinstituted - this mother will hide her only son from the horrors of war. Even my stepfather, who is a 70-year-old Retired Lieutenant Colonel - United States Air Force for 26 years - agrees with me. He still cannot talk about what he saw in Vietnam, and drank himself into oblivion as a way of dealing with it all up until the fall of 1992, and he has been sober since then :)
no subject
Date: 2004-05-13 03:33 am (UTC)Your husband is right, IMO. If the troops withdraw from Iraq at this point, it will be one of the largest terrorist training camps in the world.
Like your step-father, my husband is retired military. He had some things to say about life in the Middle East that I won't repeat. He doesn't like the idea of reinstitution of the draft either, we have a 16 year old son.
no subject
Date: 2004-05-12 06:47 pm (UTC)