Now imagine “U.S. drone strike kills 30 pine nut farm workers in France” and feel the difference (which is non-existent). Then it goes on tv and reads the list of this morning’s evil men who must be stopped.
I think you’re conflating morally worse with practically worse. It’s not propaganda to note that certain countries attacking each other spell out graver consequences
That fact that you distinguish between morally worse and "practically worse" make me thing you are already under the influence of the propaganda.
But it does not mean you are right: Afganistan cannot attack the US over 30 dead civillians, the US can attack Iran for some Saudi property destruction by Yemenis who are being raped by Saudi using US weaponery on them.
Yeah? And why is that? Is it that certain countries' farm workers' lives are worth more than certain others? It sounds to me that the propaganda got you too.
... no, they’re worth the same. Hence morally vs practically. The difference is that killing some third world farmers doesn’t cause a war between first world powers.
Alternatively if Yemen rebels attack Saudi Arabia, that’s bad. If Iran does it, everybody in a thousand mile radius starts sweating.
> Alternatively if Yemen rebels attack Saudi Arabia, that’s bad.
Why is it bad? I mean, after they've been at the receiving end of Saud's war machine, why can they not retaliate? They sure did not cause as much boodshed (zero, just material damage) as the Sauds have caused them.
I get that you have a gripe with Saudi geo politics. And it’s probably one I agree with, but I’m really just trying to say that blowing random innocents can vary in the severity of repercussions and that you’re not “falling for propaganda” or following racist ideas if you acknowledge this- and that moral and practical concerns are separate things.
> that moral and practical concerns are separate things.
I agree. This separation I find problematic. How often we hear "I want to be vegan (for the animals = moral) but I cannot give up cheese/meat/etc (too convenient/tasty = practical)"
To me they are not separate. Oppression is oppression, I hate it regardless who does it or how inconvenient it is to stop it.
Because freedom and democracy. Wars of attrition for political purposes are nothing but state sponsored terror by another name. More than 16,000 dead and 30,000 injured. Talk about Afghan 9/11 ever year for the past 10 years probably 20 to 40 on which way you are counting. Who destabilized the country? Was it the Soviets or was it the Americans?
Both, what you mean is who keeps it instabil. But that's also not as simple as just looking at US drone strikes. Though they are a non small reason due to the mental trauma they caused in a lot of people in some regions, which IMHO is likely to caused more people to radicalize.
Maybe not the right time and place to being this up, but I personally believe that such illegal activities conducted by the U.S. is hurting people of other nations who is fighting for their own democracy.
Just imagine China start to playing news such like this in those concentration camps, free golden material for showing people how rightful it is to follow the lead of CCP I'd say.
While it is true the U.S. is benefiting from it's strong global influence, but it is also true that nobody wants to be threatened. If the U.S. don't want to be the good guy in this game, at least don't be the bad one.
Afghanistan does not harbor 9/11 terrorists. The 9/11 terrorists were all from Saudi Arabia, they did not learn how to fly in a cave in the Afghan mountains and their funding did not come from a financial center in Kandahar; Bin Laden was found hiding in Pakistan.
That war is absurd and should have stopped a long time ago. It's just fueling more terrorism. All western countries should leave the middle east, for good, forever (except maybe the odd ship to secure shipping lanes and stuff like that, but you get my point).
Yo, u are aware Afghanistan and Taliban two different things, right? Afghanistan didn’t harbor 911 terrorist, Taliban did. Afghanistan doesn’t carry out car bombing, Taliban do. Now while those afghan pine workers do share land with some of the worst scums on earth, they are not anymore guilty for Taliban's action than some random french farmers.
There is a historical reason for everything. Who attacked US in the first place? It is not even reachable from countries they ‘democratized’, except for caribbean guys.
I’m pretty sure there aren’t people in France trying to establish a violent worldwide theocracy, and even if there were, the French government would have a handle on it/not be complicit.
We don’t conduct missions in Afghanistan for funsies. We do it because there is no State we can lean on to stamp down on the extremists.
Extremists in Bangladesh are locally organized, capable of coordinated attacks, and part of an international movement. Extremists in the US are neither of those things. Often, Incidents in the US are chalked up to “white national extremists” based on nothing more than some murdered having searched such websites. There used to be an organized extremist threat in the US back when the KKK was active, but that was crushed. What’s left is remnants. That’s not true in Bangladesh. Extremists systematically killed journalists a few years ago. Before it was banned, the Islamist party got 3 million votes in national elections. Extremism is being bankrolled from foreign countries through schools that teach such views. There is a deep well of support for such views among the people—1/3 of Bangladeshis believe that people who leave Islam should be executed. And, finally, there is a real risk of extremists taking over the State, as happened with Pakistan and Afghanistan.
None of that is true in the US. People who say “hurr durr but Republicans are a white nationalist party” do so out of ignorance, because they have no idea what it’s like to have extremists actually threaten your democracy. And their ignorance is dangerous. It’s dangerous to a world that needs US leadership to overcome extremism. Their false equivalency and apologism undermines the people in countries like Bangladesh who continue to fight for liberal democracy and the rule of law.
We already know that the current US administration and senate majority does not care about the lives of their own citizens either. Mass shootings, police brutality, the stoking of hate crimes and the absence of a modern social safety net, withholding support to domestic climate refugees, inadequate industrial regulation, are directly killing many US citizens right now. Those deaths could be prevented but our government willingly chooses not to.
The normalizing of imperialistic murder abroad is not an anomaly; it is a core part of US identity. The US itself is a product of imperialistic murder, its crowning achievement even.
To this day US soldiers deployed abroad use the term “indian country” to designate occupied territory where they conduct counter-insurgency operations. That term dates back to counter-insurgency operations conducted by the very same institution against Native Americans until 100 years ago. What was once abroad is now domestic - such is the nature of empire.
So do you care about the civilians, or not? It seems possible US engagement saves more civilians than it kills. At least that is presumably the general idea.
Unlikely. There were massacres during the Taliban rule outside of war, but it was at much lower scale than in the current war, and US only helps taliban grow by its intervention, it seems, if you look at the numbers of fighters.
It's not like killing a person with certain beliefs stops the beliefs from spreading.
The idea was that "possible US engagement saves more civilians than it kills", and I was reacting to that, as it is very doubtful.
I didn't say it would be ok to live under Taliban. But there are other weird islamic countries, where I wouldn't want to live either. Do you propose US making war there, too?
The US is in afghan for one reason only, opioids. It's no coincidence that US opioid addiction rates skyrocketed in the years following the Afghan invasion. The big pharma companies benefit from the US controlling the worlds major poppy fields, and in turn they pushed their product unto the masses.
I'm sorry but your explanation makes no sense.
Oil is wherever it is located, so you have to go there if you want to take it or protect it. But you can grow poppies in most places. It makes no sense for the US to spend something like a trillion dollars and thousands of lives for something they could grow in California or Texas.
The Taliban were a tiny splinter group before the US financed and trained them. They have always been fanatics. Funny how they were not called terrorists while the US thought they could use them for their own ends.
