Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - Your opinion please. Wikileaks vid of U.S. Soldiers gunning down civ/children/photogs

roachboy · 04-06-2010, 11:45 AM

dippin anticipated one of the moves i was about to make.

second is that i cannot imagine a situation in which the rules of war as attributes of some "perfect world" scenario. those scenarios would exclude war altogether i would think. maybe once the Revolution comes and international socialism is the self-generating order of things we can talk in these terms.

the rules of war are what prevent utter barbarism. this is not the same as the distinction walt (for example, because he made the argument explicitly...plan9 alluded to it as well, but via a link to a book synopsis) between people who have killed and those who haven't. the first are to prevent atrocities. the second is a characterization of anyone who has been a combattant and who has fired a weapon--so undergone the conditioning required to break down the social prohibitions on killing. but simply because you've undergone the second doesn't mean that therefore anything--at all--goes, does it? that's an implication of the arguments that are happening in this thread.

the sub-argument seems to be: if you civilian person haven't been subjected to the same conditioning as i, military or ex-military, have been, then you cannot judge my actions or those of anyone else who is in a war theater. but that's absurd. taking that seriously you lead you to argue for jettisoning not only all civilian oversight of the military but also all subordination to the law.

but it's exactly because combat is a sociopathic space that rules are required. and it's because the institutions that surround those sociopathic spaces self-evidently cannot be relied upon to conduct themselves by the rules of non-sociopathic society BECAUSE in order to reproduce the space of combat, of killing, these institutions HAVE TO normalize it.

but maybe you're all making a narrower argument.
i don't think you are. i just dont see you taking your own logic far enough to see how strange it really is.

[[btw in order to back the debate away from simple yes/no, i should say that my own position is more where i started in this thread. i began pushing at the fact that what you're watching in it could well be a war crime as the thread developed, in reaction to those whom i saw as poo-poohing it. but i think there's an interesting question in here about law and war and such. not new, but interesting.]]

04-06-2010, 11:45 AM	#48 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	dippin anticipated one of the moves i was about to make. second is that i cannot imagine a situation in which the rules of war as attributes of some "perfect world" scenario. those scenarios would exclude war altogether i would think. maybe once the Revolution comes and international socialism is the self-generating order of things we can talk in these terms. the rules of war are what prevent utter barbarism. this is not the same as the distinction walt (for example, because he made the argument explicitly...plan9 alluded to it as well, but via a link to a book synopsis) between people who have killed and those who haven't. the first are to prevent atrocities. the second is a characterization of anyone who has been a combattant and who has fired a weapon--so undergone the conditioning required to break down the social prohibitions on killing. but simply because you've undergone the second doesn't mean that therefore anything--at all--goes, does it? that's an implication of the arguments that are happening in this thread. the sub-argument seems to be: if you civilian person haven't been subjected to the same conditioning as i, military or ex-military, have been, then you cannot judge my actions or those of anyone else who is in a war theater. but that's absurd. taking that seriously you lead you to argue for jettisoning not only all civilian oversight of the military but also all subordination to the law. but it's exactly because combat is a sociopathic space that rules are required. and it's because the institutions that surround those sociopathic spaces self-evidently cannot be relied upon to conduct themselves by the rules of non-sociopathic society BECAUSE in order to reproduce the space of combat, of killing, these institutions HAVE TO normalize it. but maybe you're all making a narrower argument. i don't think you are. i just dont see you taking your own logic far enough to see how strange it really is. [[btw in order to back the debate away from simple yes/no, i should say that my own position is more where i started in this thread. i began pushing at the fact that what you're watching in it could well be a war crime as the thread developed, in reaction to those whom i saw as poo-poohing it. but i think there's an interesting question in here about law and war and such. not new, but interesting.]] __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite Last edited by roachboy; 04-06-2010 at 11:48 AM..