Interesting Letter About The Arab World

[Aaron]

CBC once again

I find it odd that other societies and cultural beliefs are always considered to be more sensitive than those of North Americans.

I consider the degradation of Iraqi prisoners at the hands of US soldiers to be reprehensible. However, most of these acts would hardly raise attention if done as part of hazing rituals in basic military training or on college campuses.

Yet, I don't recall reports of disgust or sorrow from Arab leaders when American security guards were shot, dismembered, burned and hung from a bridge in Iraq.

Am I to reason from this that Arab leaders believe that forcing someone to wear lady's panties on your head is worse than unthinkable physical brutality and murder?

Brian Burrill | Smithers,B.C.

This guy hit the nail right on the head.

[Darth Wong]

I find it odd that other societies and cultural beliefs are always considered to be more sensitive than those of North Americans.

Not more sensitive; just more worrisome when we violate them. It's like asking why black guys are allowed to call each other "nigger" but white guys aren't. It's like asking why it's OK to spank your own kid but if you grab some other guy's kid and start spanking him, he'll come after you with a crowbar.

I consider the degradation of Iraqi prisoners at the hands of US soldiers to be reprehensible. However, most of these acts would hardly raise attention if done as part of hazing rituals in basic military training or on college campuses.

Those hazing rituals are voluntary; the person is not being forced to undergo them at gunpoint. He is only "forced" to do them because he wants to enter some kind of closed group of his own free will. When these kinds of rituals are clearly involuntary, there is outrage.

Yet, I don't recall reports of disgust or sorrow from Arab leaders when American security guards were shot, dismembered, burned and hung from a bridge in Iraq.

And why would you expect to, unless you're a racist idiot? Why should every person of Arab descent feel responsibility for what some Arabs in some other country decided to do? Do you feel personally responsible whenever a white person does something bad? And these security guards were armed combatants in an occupied country, remember? Mutilation after death is a bad thing, but I don't recall anyone saying that the people who did this were "spreading freedom" or any other such pseudo-noble bullshit. When you claim that an invasion is justified by a lot of lofty rhetoric, you have to live up to that rhetoric otherwise you're just full of shit. Believe it or not, the invader has to do more work to justify himself than the invaded.

Am I to reason from this that Arab leaders believe that forcing someone to wear lady's panties on your head is worse than unthinkable physical brutality and murder?

Am I to reason from this that electrodes on one's genitals, beatings, and several deaths should be regarded as harmless hazing rituals?

This guy hit the nail right on the head.

Sounds more like this guy was hit on the head. Several times.

[Thinkmarble]

However, most of these acts would hardly raise attention if done as part of hazing rituals in basic military training or on college campuses.

WTF.
That's a statement about american culture which I would find troubling.
If you are into college you ought to be old enough to forego hazing.

Yet, I don't recall reports of disgust or sorrow from Arab leaders when American security guards were shot, dismembered, burned and hung from a bridge in Iraq.

One of these little thing hammered into my head since I was little is that "the others do it too" and "the others are worse" is not gonna fly, seems that some people still have to learn this.
So much for the moral highground.

[PainRack]

I find it odd that other societies and cultural beliefs are always considered to be more sensitive than those of North Americans.

I consider the degradation of Iraqi prisoners at the hands of US soldiers to be reprehensible. However, most of these acts would hardly raise attention if done as part of hazing rituals in basic military training or on college campuses.

Really? If so, why is it that Fox News and 60 minutes described "bullying", and its social exclusion all the way into college in the forms of fraternity as a terrifying social pheomena?

Yet, I don't recall reports of disgust or sorrow from Arab leaders when American security guards were shot, dismembered, burned and hung from a bridge in Iraq.

So, just like the President Bush, this guy forgot who the President of Pakistan and Egypt is.

[Grand Admiral Thrawn]

Please tell me what college rituals involve threatening to fry someone's balls, sodomizing someone with a broomstick and killing them.

[Ravenwing]

If you are into college you ought to be old enough to forego hazing.

you obviously havnt heard of some of the reports about what kids go through to become a part of some school's sorority houses, some people have gotten killed and in girls cases, rape can happen frequently, i remeber one report that said a girls had to roll a pair of dice and whatever the number that cvame up,was the number of guys she had to have unprotected sex with. ( its in a back issue of Cosmopolitan- australian i might add, just in case someone looks in the wrong one or something)