NBC News has leaked a white paper based on the secret memo used by the Obama Administration to justify assassinating American citizens with drones. Left unspoken is why it’s more controversial to kill an American citizen than, say, a Pakistani.
Previous Pakistani Lives
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication, WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "The Stringer."
9 Comments. Leave new
Yep, just two totally comparable cultures here.
Oh, but in one of these cultures women must be covered head to toe, must not drive, work, or be educated.
In one of these cultures the penalty for renouncing your religion is death.
In one of these cultures the penalty for speaking against your religion is death.
In one of these cultures the penalty for homosexuality is death.
What others do in their cultures is their business.
It is NOT our business to kill those of other cultures then justify it because of the difference (which is one of ever diminishing degree)
@ Falco
Disagree with your cultural relativism. Some things are just wrong. Genital mutilation (aka female circumcision), for instance. Or no music or dancing, as in Sharia.
That’s not the justification for killing though. We are in a war with Al Qaeda specifically and Islam in general. You may remember 9/11? We can either kill or be killed.
Sam Harris does a far better job of explaining the threat from Islam than I ever could. Check out his book, The End of Faith, or any of his many blog posts on the subject.
MY cultural relativism? You’d be hilarious if your agenda of preemptive cultural annihilation weren’t so absolutely vicious.
The treatment of women in the US (like the country’s well-publicized, general narrative) demonstrates a wider gap between the national myth vs. the national reality than any other nation on earth.
We attack others (besides for their resources) to obfuscate our miserable failure to achieve our self-proclaimed potential.
So, Sam Harris, the high-profile, self-avowed atheist, is actually a religio-relativist? So much for his integrity.
Do you ever read what you’ve written before hitting the “submit” button: “Some things are wrong. Islam is wrong. However, that is NO justification for killing. BUT we are in a war against Islam anyway.”
Please straighten out that “logic” in your next epistle of paranoia.
So, dead genitals are preferred to genitals under threat of mutilation? I guess we are about to unveil our new drone that kills only mutilators and NEVER the mutilated? This would be like our domestic drones that will ferret out and eradicate ONLY “the bad guys.” http://tinyurl.com/awv7z9x
Aaron,
Ted is not comparing cultures here, he is giving voice to the absurdity of American “liberals” getting their panties in a bind over the US government authorizing itself to kill AMERICAN CITIZENS as if we some how possess more rights to life than citizens of other countries (which, we of course do…however that is a different discussion I will gladly debate with Ted or anyone else about). The absurdity is in the idea that we are more equal than they are. Your attack on cultural differences reinforces Ted’s observation….that Americans think they’re somehow special. We only care about abuse when it happens to us.
Your statement about other cultures equates to an ad hominem fallacy…your reference to Sam Harris equates to an Appeal to (perceived) Authority fallacy. You, sir, are fallacious!!
Falco, you should have a stronger faith in The Force and not argue down to the fallacious level of Aaron. Our view of other cultures record on human rights is irrelevant to the absurdity of only being pissed off when Americans feel the tyranny of unchecked power. The rest of the world has been feeling the tyranny of our unchecked power for 60 years!
I think that Pakistani commander in the azure uniform is a spy – note how he lost his obviously fake mustache in the last frame !…
Henri
Ok, well, lot’s of venom here, but not much rebuttal.
Falco, Cultural Relativism is the Anthro 101 idea that we can’t say that any particular culture is any better than any other, or that one is right and another is wrong. I disagree with that concept. I say that some cultures are better than other cultures. I gave a couple of examples. Here’s a couple more: slavery, child marriage.
I said that the reason we are at war with Al Qaeda and Islam is that they attacked us on 9/11. I guess you missed that part. Related, you left out the most important reason that we attack others: to defend ourselves.
I don’t know what you mean when you say that Sam Harris is a religio-relativist. Before you knock him, give him a read. One quick synopsis is: faith based religion is bad in general, and, some religions are worse than others, particularly one that espouses world domination, jihad, and martyrdom.
Aggie dude, I don’t understand your appeal to authority fallacy comment. If I cite an expert, and he’s right, then what’s the problem? Have you read him? Is he wrong?
“Islam” didn’t attack us any more than “Christianity” did in the Oklahoma City bombing. A specific group of Islamic terrorists did.
As far as “self-defense” goes, we proceeded to exert the largest part of our military effort against Iraq, a country that was not involved. No actions at all were taken against the country- Saudi Arabia- from which the majority of the terrorists involved originated.
Making this a war against “Islam” has cost us several opportunities; for example, early in the search for al-Qaeda in Afghanistan, the Iranians offered their help. The offer was credible; Iran is a Shi’ite nation and was already in conflict with the Taliban and other Sunni terrorists like the ones who attacked us. By spurning the offer, we missed an opportunity to improve relations with a country that is becoming increasingly problematic for us. (And ironically, Iran has benefited significantly from our arbitrary war in Iraq, an outcome undoubtedly not intended or desired by us or by al-Qaeda.)
Yes, Dammit, he’s wrong!!!!