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[poliphilo]

On the Daily Telegraph site the jerky footage of a bloodied Gaddafi being roughed up by his captors is preceded (sponsored) by an advertisement for a car. 

Comments

[chiller.livejournal.com]

I really worry about where we're going with this. This week we've had this footage, and footage of YueYue in China being run over twice. Are we really this depraved?

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

They're actually airing that footage of the little girl being killed? I hadn't realised.

These things are essentially snuff movies.

[chiller.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it's been up for days. It's long and horrific.

[chiller.livejournal.com]

Nineteen people apparently walked/rode past/over that child. Nineteen. On the Mail's website they have to edit the footage down, presumably because Mail readers can't maintain the attention span necessary to watch the original, and just want the edited highlights, where vehicles roll over her limbs / pelvis.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

I find it hard to believe this actually happened.

How did all those people come to be so brutalised?

[chiller.livejournal.com]

Apparently the problem is, if you kill someone you have to pay for their funeral costs. If you wound someone, you have to pay for their treatment for the rest of their life. And judges are known for assuming that whoever brings a wounded person in must have done so because they were the party who wounded them (there was a famous case where the good samaritan who brought in a wounded old lady was made to pay for her treatment). So I don't think it's brutalisation so much as people thinking "shit, if I pick this kid up, my own family will be poor for the rest of my life..."

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

China is such a very different society. I once proposed to myself that I would make a study of Chinese culture and history- and then I lost my nerve...

[michaleen.livejournal.com]

It is a richly rewarding field of study. I've dipped into ancient Chinese history and culture off-and-on for the past decade. One of the first hurdles is overcoming the official Chinese interpretation of their ancient history. After that, it gets challenging.

[petercampbell.livejournal.com]

The media over here have this strange concept that, if it's taking place in a distant country, then it's acceptable to show horrific violence in very graphic detail. I can't remember which tabloid it was in a few years back (the Express?) that showed a close up photograph of a severed head, accompanied by "we have to show the horror of war" type justifications.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Yes, because foreigners don't really count as people...

It would of course be unforgivable to show pictures of dead British soldiers.