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February 23, 2008
The Wog Nigger Gook Korean, Nicaraguan And Haitian Doesn't Value Life Like We Do
As we already know, it's okay for us to kill Africans, Iraqis and Vietnamese, since they don't care whether they live or die.
But what about Koreans? We engaged in massive bombing of North Korea cities during the Korean War, in the theory this would cause them to surrender. This turned out not to work. Why? The answer, as I.F. Stone explained in a review of Curtis LeMay's autobiography, is obvious:
LeMay [argues] that bombardment failed because of an "undying Oriental philosophy and fanaticism." He says, "Human attrition means nothing to such people," that their lives are so miserable on earth that they look forward with delight to a death which promises them "everything from tea parties with long dead grandfathers down to their pick of all the golden little dancing girls in Paradise."
As always, there was only one answer to this conundrum in Korea: we had to kill even more of them.
What about in this hemisphere? We've certainly beaten the crap out of lots of countries nearby, and it would be terrible to find out they valued human life like we do. Fortunately, as Greg Grandin points out in Empire's Workshop, this is not the case:
Colonel Robert Denig observed in his diary, "Life to [Nicaraguans] is cheap, murder in itself is nothing." When asked if he ever witnessed American brutality in Haiti, General Ivan Miller replied that "you have to remember that what we consider brutality among people in the United States is different from what they consider brutality."
You've got to admit, we have a great record at finding the people who don't care whether they live or die, and then killing them.
(Thanks to AT for telling me about Empire's Workshop.)
—Jonathan Schwarz
Posted at February 23, 2008 03:05 PM...pick of all the golden little dancing girls in Paradise.
Whodathunk that the Koreans were the same as Muslim terrorists 50 years later? Progress doesn't change us much -- we still label people that want self determination as fanatical. How insane of them to stand in the way of inevitability.
It's also a strange choice of words: "...golden little dancing girls". Does he mean the Orientals want to debase little blond valley girls? (I've never seen a blond Oriental.) Because if he did, he certainly was an astute fellow seeing that every time some white girl goes missing or dead it becomes a news event of national (if not global) proportions.
At the center of our psyche, we have always been drawn to imagine the depravities inflicted on our golden dancing girls. A timeless reaction really.
Posted by: angryman.at.2410 at February 23, 2008 05:11 PMIt's simply what rich people everywhere think about poor people. T'was ever thus.
Posted by: Mike Meyer at February 23, 2008 05:35 PMJon, I don't know if you're watched the new Battlestar Galactica series, but...
The Cylons, the machine race, commit nuclear genocide against the human species, leaving only a few tens of thousands of human survivors, which they then proceed to chase through the galaxy to destroy.
A few times throughout the series there are Cylons remarking to the effect 'humans don't value life like we do'.
Great show.
Posted by: g at February 23, 2008 06:49 PMYou know who doesn't care if they live or die? Canadians. You pretty much have to go nuclear right off the bat when you're dealing with Canucks.
Posted by: Guest at February 23, 2008 07:13 PMI didn't realize that LeMay was the vice-presidential candidate with Wallace. Wow, we sure wouldn't have had all of these problems over all of these years if they had won in '72. In fact, we probably wouldn't have survived to experience any problems at all.
Posted by: Aaron Datesman at February 23, 2008 07:36 PMLeMay was Wallace's running mate in '68, not '72. Wallace was back in the Democratic fold, running in the primaries when Arthur Bremer shot him.
Posted by: darrelplant at February 23, 2008 08:05 PMwell, as a matter of law, not all human life has the same value. and it is a fact that different societies assign differing values to the worth of a human life. You saying otherwise is just cheap moral posturing. or jerking off, in plainer terms.
Posted by: xyz at February 24, 2008 05:07 AMSimilarly, in the South circa 1955, different values were assigned to the worth of certain kinds of life. MLK's saying otherwise was just cheap moral posturing, or jerking off, in plainer terms.
Posted by: Mark at February 24, 2008 11:47 AMI did not know that "moral posturing" was the euphemism of choice for "jerking off" among the kids today. Crazy kids!
Posted by: at February 24, 2008 12:45 PMSo they don't care about their lives, and the U.S. government doesn't care about their lives. See how nicely that works out?
Posted by: catherine at February 24, 2008 01:31 PM"different societies assign differing values to the worth of a human life"
just so; in particular the US war machine places no value on the lives of citizens of countries they're busy destroying. they famously "don't do body counts".
Posted by: ran at February 24, 2008 01:46 PMI for one believe that 'xyz' intended to make a substantive point and that 'xyz' would be surprised to find out that he/she just sounded like he/she was jerking off. I also believe, however, that he/she will not bother to actually make that point clear. :-(
Posted by: Guest at February 24, 2008 02:51 PMxyz, you're a moron.
The point I wanted to make, though, is that the mass bombing of German populations in the Second World War also didn't make the Germans surrender -- not even the firebombing of Dresden.
That's because Orientals like the Germans don't value human life like we Westerners do.
NO! Stupid gits. It's because bombing people doesn't make them give up. Jesus. It just pisses them off, and they want to kill you even more -- they'll continue to walk down to the corner store, stepping over the bodies, just to give you the finger that you can't make them give up. This is the glory of the human spirit, and calling it a failure to value human life is just plain missing the point.
Idiots always lose.
Good job, America.
Posted by: Michael at February 25, 2008 08:55 AM
