Anybody who watched Monday night’s episode of 4 Corners would be as appalled as I am that the situation in Syria is continuing on, with the rest of the world watching, mildly interested, but mostly apathetic.
And a warning, this post contains images that should disturb….
For those that missed it, it can be summed up quite simply… Torture, brutality, torture, inhumanity, torture, and misery, with a bit of torture thrown in for good measure.
In Syria, the regime that is running the country make Saddam Hussein look like Santa Clause. It is clear that there is systematic torture happening on a grand scale. Unmistakably clear.
What pisses me off in all of this, is that we do nothing. By we, I mean the West. We are big on talk and finger pointing, but at the end of the day, we would far rather have committees to discuss things for months on end, and official enquiries etc. Then a vote at the UN, next time they meet, which will decide whether anybody helps these poor souls or not. This will invariably be voted down by Russia, China, and Israel, America will back the Israeli’s every time and vote no, and nothing will happen.
So, what do we do? We shrug and go “that’s sad, I’m glad I wasn’t born there”…. Then we get some ice cream out of the freezer, forget what we just saw, and settle down to watch Julie Bishop look like an idiot, once again, on Q&A.
What does it take to get people angry these days? Have we, as a society, become that apathetic? Is human life that cheap?
What the 4 Corners program missed, that may have helped anger the public enough to act out and starting a campaign is this… animals were reportedly harmed.
Yes, there are thousands upon thousands of men, women, and even children being tortured, right now as you read this. Last night we saw images of 10 year old kids who had been battered within an inch of their lives, 12 year old kids with their bones crushed, teeth knocked out, penis cut off, then riddled with bullets. We heard stories of girls as young as 12 being raped and then tortured, old men having their teeth ripped out with pliers.
All these things are terrible beyond words, but what will probably upset people the most, is that I have it on good authority, that during these months of upheaval, at least one dog, and a couple of cows, like in the pictures below, may have been harmed.
I do not want to make light of the battle for the humane treatment of animals, far from it…But what I find truly disturbing is, knowing that last night, as I watched video of people being tortured and beaten in virtually the same manner as the cattle in Indonesia, that next week nobody will be talking about it, whereas we were still talking about the cattle program months later.
I think we as a society, have taken a wrong turn somewhere, when the poor treatment of animals in abattoirs gets more of a public outcry than the wholesale torture of people. Also, don’t bother with that animals are helpless argument either, a 10 year old child is just as helpless, especially when confronted with 12 troops from a brutal regime.
Something else that really gets under my skin, is when we see politicians visiting sites like the concentration camps in Germany and Poland, and when they say things along the lines of making sure this “Never Happens Again”…. What utter crap…. we see it over and over, in Africa, in the Middle East, all over ther world, and both sides of politics seem to agree on doing nothing, the apathetic approach seems to have bipartisan support world-wide…. One of those lucky rare things I guess….
Let me tell you, if Hitler was alive today and slaughtering Jews, he would have no trouble keeping right on going…. The UN would stuff about trying to form a resolution to sit down and meet to get another resolution for an agreement to put forward a ballot to allow debate on the matter at the next meeting so that a resolution may be formed……………………..grrrrrrrrrrrr
These horrendous memorials to genocide are supposed to serve as a grim reminder to world leaders so this doesn’t happen ever again…….. but yet it does, almost daily it seems… In Syria currently, it is daily, every minute of every day….
I don’t want to be a heartless bastard, but I do hope that a cow was hurt in Syria, maybe then something will actually get done…..
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The left whine about the removal of despots in Iraq and Afghanistan, about the loss of life when “we” do intervene and now when we don’t you complain further?
Complaints about Russia and China who have vetoed any UN action on this horrid atrocity are most notable by their absence.
I’m no expert on UN and military interventions, I don’t really loke to see the despots killed, I would rather see them stand trial, even if they are executed, at least they have stood trial….
I just know that all the sitting around and doing nothing only helps the perpetrators…
Wixxy
like you i would like to see despots stand trial but who is to try them?
The so called “international” courts are bloody woeful and what it boils down to is that until the despots are forcibly removed from power there is no chance that they will face any sort of court.
We just have to face the fact that the brutality of the Assad regime won’t be addressed until Assad is toppled, and he won’t be toppled any-time soon. Now its fine for you to say that WE should feel “shame” about the situation there but I think you are calling for the wrong emotional response, disgust is far more appropriate for something that we are powerless to stop.
Disgust is absolutely right Iain….
You are right about the courts too… maybe arming the civilians as in Libya, I know it is risky as you may have someone just as bad take over, but I don’t see how it could be worse…
I feel so sickened that these sort of atrocities still happen today. How can people hurt these little children?
While I did not see the show and am sickened by the atrocities happening there, I have to agree that our outrage can sometimes be misdirected. We screamed (and rightly so) about the live exports, something we (Australia) could and should be able to control. Yet on this issue the ‘greater’ world is silent, is that because of our sense of helplessness or frustration that those powers that be, would ignore our involvement anyway?
We need to support those willing to stand up and make sure we don’t do what was done to the Greens over the BDS, a matter that garnered both positive and negative feedback for issues considered important and defence-able. We need to support those willing to fight for what they believe is right even if we don’t agree…or else people will stop fighting these atrocities altogether, which in itself is abhorrent.
We must speak out against this disgusting cruel regime
I’ve wanted to get into this topic but the events of the last couple of days have diverted me. All of us, more like it.