Glum

[poliphilo]

I stayed up till midnight- just. Ailz and I stood at the bedroom window and watched fireworks bristle along the skyline.

I got a call from Bolton in the wee, small hours. Happy, shining people wishing me a happy new Year. The lads had gone back to Sara's house and were partying with her parents. 

I'm not a party person.

I keep coming back to Saddam. There's a jolly picture in the press this morning showing him with his neck broke. His executioners (more like a Shia lynch mob actually) jeered him and loosed the trap door while he was still saying his prayers. All through the process he showed courage and dignity. The new Iraq makes the old Iraq (Saddam's Iraq) look good.

I'm so ashamed of what America and Britain have done.

Comments

[idahoswede.livejournal.com]

I'm in total agreement with you. Why on earth would you have to jeer a dying man who is saying his prayers? Who the hell was in charge and if this was a legal proceeding, those doing the jeering should be demoted, punished, whatever. I'm just disgusted by this rush to execute as well.

[red-girl-42.livejournal.com]

I too am ashamed of our countries.

Someone's death, even if it's necessary (and I'm not saying this one is or isn't), is never cause for celebration, jeering, or rubbernecking. And victory over your enemies does not give you the right to behave as badly as they have.

I noticed that two photos of Saddam (one being hanged, the other dead) were on Yahoo!'s "Most emailed photos" list the other day. I find that horrifying. What the Hell is wrong with people?

[happydog.livejournal.com]

I'm so ashamed of what America and Britain have done.

I don't say enough about it, but me too, cap'n, me too.

[jackiejj.livejournal.com]

I heard him say in an interview in 1990 that he "hoped God would be satisfied with him."

That opens up a big area to ponder.

How on earth do we know what "satisfies" God?

I've read that people like Hitler are handled gently but firmly in the Beyond while they heal from their horrible crimes.

This sounds like the "beating-to-fit-and-painting-to-match" description of Heaven--someone wistfully wants to fill in all the blanks.

I think--oh, boy, as if it matters--that in the long, long scheme of things, we're all pretty much alike, and that is to say very primitive and young and ruled by our chemicals and our isolation.

Did you happen to notice the eerie juxtaposition of the Crucifixion and this hanging? I did, without wanting to. It was like the Antichrist version...

[solar-diablo.livejournal.com]

We supported him for years while he provided a geostrategic counter to Iran. During that time he used chemical weapons on his own civilians, he repressed the Shite majority through tactics as diverse as rape and torture, and he engaged in a war with Iran than led to the death of an estimated 1 million+ people.

Given the culture that has existed in the region for centuries (a tribalist "blood for blood" mentality that will not be easily erased by "progressive" Westerners any time soon) and given Hussein's treatment of them during his reign it doesn't surprise me one bit the moment the Americans handed Hussein over to his countrymen they jeered him at his execution. Frankly, I have a hard time casting judgment on the behavior.

Capital punishment is barbaric, don't get me wrong. The West's dealings with the people of that region has often been deplorable, I understand. But I think to cluck our tongues at the behavior of the executioners betrays a sort of reverse colonialist mentality toward Iraqis with little understanding of the culture and history behind it. And while Hussein might have gone to his death with defiance and insults rather than blubbering, to characterize him as dignified, or the old Iraq with its systematic oppression and murder as somehow better than the free for all bloodshed of the new Iraq just seems out of place.

[besideserato.livejournal.com]

I keep hearing about the execution, but I didn't know what had happened. That's horrible. Here's to 2007... being better. Somehow.