Posted this in another thread, gonna post it here, too.
“Looking another human being in the eye, making an independent decision to kill him, and watching as he dies due to your action combine to form one of the most basic, important, primal, and potentially traumatic occurrences of war.”
It’s an unpopular take, but I recommend everyone read the book “On Killing” by Dave Grossman. It’s obvious that what Israel is doing is very much a genocide, but I stand firm in my opinion that their boots-on-the-ground infantryman are also victims of the Israeli political machine.
but I stand firm in my opinion that their boots-on-the-ground infantryman are also victims of the Israeli political machine.
Sure, but couldn’t the same be said for many of the literal guards at Auschwitz? A lot of those people were just kids who were drafted and were simply following orders. Even many of those who were there willingly only did such things after being subject to years of ruthless Nazi propaganda.
At some point, regardless of what circumstances led you to that moment, you become responsible for your own actions. There is no set of circumstances that can make murdering innocent civilians justified. And if you do that anyway, you bear full moral culpability, regardless of what may have happened in your life before that point.
We literally hashed this out during the Nuremberg trials. It doesn’t matter what propaganda you were subject to. It doesn’t matter how you were raised. It doesn’t matter if you were “just following orders.” It doesn’t even matter if you yourself would face execution for refusing to kill innocent civilians. It is never OK to kill innocent civilians, to perform genocide, or commit ethnic cleansing. If you do that, you deserve to hang for it. Full stop. No excuses.
It absolutely could, and should. I’m not saying that the crimes should be forgiven, but it is not a purely black and white area. It is very grey. To ignore the fact that they were ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances, just because it’s uncomfortable to think about, would be a disservice towards efforts to prevent things like this in the future. People are complex.
Dave Grossman is full of shit. This is independent to the potential trauma from killing people (there’s a wide range of reactions to that experience). Dave Grossman is full of shit.
Humans are not made to kill other humans. And those who fight the wars of the mighty, are those who are among the ones who suffer the most.
War is really stupid. And it’s astonishing how we continue to be such a stupid species. Given how far we’ve come, one would think that we’ve finally realized how much humanity could achieve if we were working together instead of killing each other.
By the way:
It’s obvious that what Israel is doing is very much a genocide
The international court of justice has not ruled on this yet, but continues to observe and investigate whether such genocide allegations could apply.
However, I am not a fan of anyone who practises or participates in wars and so easily tolerates the deaths of innocents.
Posted this in another thread, gonna post it here, too.
“Looking another human being in the eye, making an independent decision to kill him, and watching as he dies due to your action combine to form one of the most basic, important, primal, and potentially traumatic occurrences of war.”
It’s an unpopular take, but I recommend everyone read the book “On Killing” by Dave Grossman. It’s obvious that what Israel is doing is very much a genocide, but I stand firm in my opinion that their boots-on-the-ground infantryman are also victims of the Israeli political machine.
Sure, but couldn’t the same be said for many of the literal guards at Auschwitz? A lot of those people were just kids who were drafted and were simply following orders. Even many of those who were there willingly only did such things after being subject to years of ruthless Nazi propaganda.
At some point, regardless of what circumstances led you to that moment, you become responsible for your own actions. There is no set of circumstances that can make murdering innocent civilians justified. And if you do that anyway, you bear full moral culpability, regardless of what may have happened in your life before that point.
We literally hashed this out during the Nuremberg trials. It doesn’t matter what propaganda you were subject to. It doesn’t matter how you were raised. It doesn’t matter if you were “just following orders.” It doesn’t even matter if you yourself would face execution for refusing to kill innocent civilians. It is never OK to kill innocent civilians, to perform genocide, or commit ethnic cleansing. If you do that, you deserve to hang for it. Full stop. No excuses.
It absolutely could, and should. I’m not saying that the crimes should be forgiven, but it is not a purely black and white area. It is very grey. To ignore the fact that they were ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances, just because it’s uncomfortable to think about, would be a disservice towards efforts to prevent things like this in the future. People are complex.
Dave Grossman is full of shit. This is independent to the potential trauma from killing people (there’s a wide range of reactions to that experience). Dave Grossman is full of shit.
Humans are not made to kill other humans. And those who fight the wars of the mighty, are those who are among the ones who suffer the most.
War is really stupid. And it’s astonishing how we continue to be such a stupid species. Given how far we’ve come, one would think that we’ve finally realized how much humanity could achieve if we were working together instead of killing each other.
By the way:
The international court of justice has not ruled on this yet, but continues to observe and investigate whether such genocide allegations could apply.
However, I am not a fan of anyone who practises or participates in wars and so easily tolerates the deaths of innocents.
Lmao are you really trying to act like it’s not a genocide because some bureaucratic board has been bullied into being quiet about it?
Caramel Marks, I mean Karl Marx, would probably agree with you.