September 25, 2005

• Here's a link to the actual material in question.
• most appropriate domain name ever.
• sweet shit! /bobcat_goldthwait
• This is a link that should never be posted anywhere... why did it get posted on MonkeyFilter?
• This is a link that should be posted far and wide, Bob. The more people that see the images, and the way they are referred to by the posters, the better, imho.
• Did fuckedup crash? That would be fucked up.
• Users post amateur pictures--supposedly of their wives or girlfriends--and for a $10 registration fee, others can take a look. He claims there are about 150,000 registered users on the site He'll soon be spending a good portion of that 1.5 on legal fees.
• How's that, Argh?
• The military doesn't like its dirty little secrets aired. I suspect Mr. wilson will have an IRS audit or two coming his way or maybe a visit to a congressional committee. He's got too much of a spotlight. The truth undermines the war propaganda. Soldiers have been taking battlefield photos for years and years now. This summer I bought out the estate of a WW2 vet. In his closet we found a pile of photos. They were all from the war. Most of the pics were of dead Japanese. In one series of photos, there were Japanese soldiers heads (beheaded) on sticks and the American were posing standing next to them. It's not right, but it is what's happening out there. Certain elements do not want this to come out. This is an administration that will not allow the press to photograph the coffins of our soldiers as they are brought back home. The war is hidden from view. The dead are mentioned but never seen. They learned their lessons in Vietnam. (in relation to the press and its effect on public opinion) I think the gloves will be off on this one. Mr. Wilson is in for a rough ride. And I also I think what Chyren said is the truth.
• Cyren, I understand your point... but, there needs to be a better way to communicate the horror of this war (or any war, for that matter). Something about this is just wrong.... perhaps the profit motive behind the site.....
• HuronBob- Assuming that you are like me (a big given, I just pose it as a starting point) then there is something about this idea that is outraging. But. There is nothing unique about this war. Nothing unique about its horrors. The troops over there aren't, really, different. These sorts of things happened in the past, they'll happen in the future, they are WHAT YOU GET, when you have a war. I am unable to comprehend just what this war could be doing to the minds of the human beings on the ground. But I think that this illuminates the abyss that has been opened for some of them, just a little. And remember, sooner or later, these guys are coming back.
• Under Mars also has a large connection of soldiers' photographs (with, in my opinion, a nobler aim behind it). Beware: some of them are extremely upsetting. I think it's important to have a window into the abyss, and to see the reality of war freedom that TV does't show. Nonetheless, I find graphic pictures of death and mutilation hard to stomach.
• The military doesn't like its dirty little secrets aired. What, that war is bloody, disgusting, horrible, and brutal? That bodies disintegrate and are blown up and remains are left to rot? That soldiers sometimes pose with the dead as a sign of power and strength and mastery over the enemy? I'm not sure it's a secret, though it's certainly dirty. But it's not exactly unpolitic of the military to want to suppress this kind of thing. On the one hand, I want the truth of war to out--people should be aware of its costs and its deadly wages even if they support it (especially if they support it). On the other hand, the appropriateness of airing this truth is somewhat grey, and I certainly don't begrudge the military the right to censor or funnel news it deems as right and necessary and appropriate. If the truth will out, it will out through tenacious journalism and investigative reporting.
• At what point do we cross the line from "see[ing] the reality of war" into the realm of celebrating such things? I agree that we need to fight the urge of the authorities to censor and make-nice the images of war; but I'm unsettled by (and not sure I'm happy about the publicity for) sites which cheerlead such brutality.. I'm not trying to bring down any orthodoxy; just airing my opinion; thinking out loud.
• Scartol- I haven't been to the site itself, but the quotes in the stories show that at some of the people commenting are doing so gleefully, celebrating the good times. Does the existence of such people need to be more widely known? I think so. If only to show that the normal human response to that sort of behaviour is outrage. f8xmulder - I'm going to take your post at face value, especially the last sentence, and absolutely disagree with it. We need George Aspinall.
• That is the kind of stuff authorities should be busting down doors and handcuffing people for, instead of pictures of consensual adult activities. The fact is this sleazebag is profiting from truly obscene, pornographic images of human degradation. War is fucking hell, soldiers are no saints, and those pictures *should* be seen by the public as a warning of what their choices are helping bring about; but, that someone presents them as entertainment, with a subtext of mockery and racism, *that* is just a crime. And yes, I wonder about those returning home, with physical and psychological scars. I pity their loved ones.
• polychrome - Okay.
• The porn site guy is a piece of shit, but it's the chickenhawks who sent the kids feeding this guy photos to Iraq who deserve the fast track to the inner circle of hell. These images should be imprinted indelibly on the backs of the eyelids of every member of W's administration and every member of Congress who rolled over and let the administration start this war.
• some of the people commenting are doing so gleefully, celebrating the good times. This sounds like a much more accurate and honest way of describing the soldiers, rather than the viewers. And it's much better than the spin of soldiers sometimes pose with the dead as a sign of power and strength and mastery over the enemy. It's a celebration, and attempts to downplay it are shit.
• Yeah, but Mr. K, if you're 20 years old, and "well trained", and scared shitless, behavior like this is almost to be expected. f8x's "spin" holds water, I think. Of course it's a celebration -- these soldiers are still alive, and the other guy is dead. This kind of behavior has *always* been part of war, whether despicable or not. I'm *much* more pissed off at the people who sent the soldiers to Iraq.
• "This kind of behavior has *always* been part of war" An interesting statement, HawthorneWingo. I would be curious as to the research behind that. how long is "always"? Was there never a time when there was actually some respect, even for an enemy? I can't prove there was, but I don't think you can prove the "always" either... And....other than that, I agree with you.... it is to be expected given how the administration is painting this war...... I think we all agree on this one, perhaps for different reasons.... but we all agree...
• Interesting point, HB. I was operating from the POV of having learned of raping and pillaging being part of armed conflicts since time immemorial. There probably are gradations of how likely this kind of behavior is.
• I was operating from the POV of having learned of raping and pillaging being part of armed conflicts since time immemorial. As was I. Celtic warriors would pile the heads of their slain enemies in into a pyramid, or stake them on the ends of their spears. Some American Indian tribes would scalp their enemies. Some Peruvian Indians would sacrifice alive the enemies they captured in battle and scatter their limbs as a sort of celebration of victory and thanks to the gods. Romans and Greeks both brought back trophies from the dead. I'm not defending it, I merely believe this is not unusual or unique or unprecedented. And I'm not trying to "spin" things. It is a celebration, and a show of mastery and machismo. It is, as I tried to explain, a warrior complex.
• I understand both of your points... I guess the question becomes.... is war with honor even possible....?
• I think war with honour is possible. Look, not every soldier does this kind of thing. Let's not conflate the actions of these to every soldier in every war ever fought. I would venture a guess, though I can't back it up, that the majority of soldiers are, in fact, honourable men.
• As long as there is war, there will be men who participate to let their bloodlust run rampant. Like f8x, I don't believe that most are that way, but they will always play a part of war. I've known veterans (both volunteer and draftees) who are honorable men, and I've known some that are unconscionable, narcissistic, cruel, petty, shit-eating bastards. You can't have an army without some of the latter getting in. There's no acid test for moral fuckwaddery -- would that there were (though, to be honest, any military body on this planet cares more about discipline, obedience, and willingness to kill and die from its soldiers than for a well-plotted ethical system). The test of the honorable military, then, is how it deals with such fuckwaddery when it rears its head. By that standard, the purely honorable military body puts the smackdown on such behavior immediately, without sweeping it under the rug or circling the wagons. No such army or navy has ever existed, of course, so it then becomes a matter of relative measurement, IMO.
• Scalping was introduced by the Whites, copied by the Indians. Celtic warriors did not pile heads, they *worshipped* them. To the Celts, at least those of the Western tribes, the head was a totem source of spiritual energy. This was not the saving of gruesome relics so much as the saving of a holy object of power. Mesoamerican mutilation practices were also solely religious in nature. Propitiations to the gods. In fact, on cursory analysis, almost all ancient gathering of war trophies was ritual or religious in nature, from the head-worshipping of the Celts to the post-battle collection of circumcised phalli by the Egyptians. True, by nature, humans will probably defile the bodies of a hated enemy when driven by passion. In primitive societies, however, there were usually 'reasons' for doing so, whether rational or not. In any case, comparing the actions of modern 'civilized' humans to those of barbarians thousands of years ago seems to be a bit of a cop-out. Do you want your soldiers to be acting like fucking vikings smeared in pig fat? They're going to come home one day and that programming is not going to fade back into the atavistic darkness.
• Nobody's apologizing for their behavior. Just pointing out that it's almost to be expected.
• Chy, like it or not, it's the second side of the same coin. It's still desecration of the dead. Just because past societies did it on religious grounds instead of a power or pleasure basis isn't a factor. The fact is, it HAS EXISTED from time immemorial. We're not likely to scrub this ugly facet of humanity from us just because we can program computers and walk on the moon. I'm just not sure we're any more or less civilized than those who came before us. Yes, we have different values and customs and beliefs, and generally act in accordance with what we believe is a "more civilized" way, but deep down we're all pretty freakin' gross and barbaric. We've got a nice veneer of politeness and "civilization" to cover us in most cases. That falls off pretty easily in situations like war or, as Katrina demonstrated, local natural devastations.
• It's starting
• and here; case closed
• "That falls off pretty easily in situations like war or, as Katrina demonstrated, local natural devastations." Except that all the stories about raping and shooting during/after Katrina were total fucking bullshit.
• I don't know about the raping, but there was certainly shooting occurring. And I notice you didn't deny my basic point, which still stands.
• But the Army Criminal Investigation Command has conducted a preliminary inquiry and said it could not conclude if US military personnel were responsible for the photos. Well, haven't examined all the photos (the half dozen I saw were more than enough to creep me out), but then WHO took them? Are they gonna say it was journalists? Or staged? Oh, yeah, more important things to worry about. Never mind.
• Important = Smut Raid!
• Told yall
• Web Site Creator Arrested. As . .ah, previously noted.