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22 comments

1 Thanos  Feb 4, 2015 5:00:35pm

There’s an exception here - if you are with an investigative organization tasked with hunting down the evil murderers you might have to watch the video for clues and analysis. Otherwise I pretty much agree.

2 Great White Snark  Feb 4, 2015 5:04:35pm

Agreed. We had a TV news boycott last night and this morning. it’s enough to just know. And it’s also worthwhile IMHO to insist we recognize that for all the claims and trapping this is not Islam. Nor a Caliphate. According to a released hostage there was not a Quran in sight, nor religious talk. It’s just the #DaeshCaliphake

3 Aunty Entity Dragon  Feb 4, 2015 5:10:01pm

I disagree.

This is evil that should and must be seen. The professional graphics and high quality of the camera and lighting techniques give evidence that we are not merely facing ‘medieval’ barbarians, but rather sophisticated and brutal totalitarians.

If there is anything that would convince us of the magnitude of evil, and the utterly unreachable nature of the mindset we face, this video gives us that evidence.

Every adult in America should see it. This is who we are fighting, and this is what they do.

4 Great White Snark  Feb 4, 2015 5:15:24pm

re: #3 Aunty Entity Dragon

I disagree.

This is evil that should and must be seen. The professional graphics and high quality of the camera and lighting techniques give evidence that we are not merely facing ‘medieval’ barbarians, but rather sophisticated and brutal toltalitarians.

If there is anything that would convince us of the magnitude of evil, and the utterly unreachable nature of the mindset we face, this video gives us that evidence.

Every adult in America should see it. This is who we are fighting, and this is what they do.

Sorry, Falling Man was enough for me. Thats it. Done with letting them damage my mind. My anger and understanding of how evil they are is already 100%. My resolve to support their opposition (as much as an ordinary man can) is maxed out. Can’t get any higher. I get your sentiment but trust me about me at least-I’m already there.

5 Aye Pod  Feb 4, 2015 5:17:43pm

re: #3 Aunty Entity Dragon

Does anyone really need to watch the video to understand the magnitude of evil that IS represent? Just knowing the facts about what they are doing should be enough to convince anyone.

I also think it greatly disrespects the victims here too to ‘attend’ IS’s presentation of their murders, or invite others to.

6 Aunty Entity Dragon  Feb 4, 2015 6:44:23pm

re: #5 Aye Pod

Does anyone really need to watch the video to understand the magnitude of evil that IS represent? Just knowing the facts about what they are doing should be enough to convince anyone.

Yes, it needs to be seen. That is the primary way that humans absorb information.

You can hear about atrocities in Rwanda…but most people simply don’t believe in it viscerally unless they see it. It isn’t a moral failure or lack of empathy…it is simply how humans process data.

Seeing that video…and seeing the last moments of that mans life does not disresect him. Quite the opposite. It is the surest way to understand and empathize with him…and we owe him that. We should not, and must not turn away from this. He died fighting an enemy of the civilized world. He died, quite literally, on our behalf. Turning away from his death (and his murderers) does him no honor, in my view.

7 Decatur Deb  Feb 4, 2015 6:50:13pm

The Internet, supposedly backed by CNN, reports that King Abdullah of Jordan is prepping to lead a strike against ISIS. From the front.

8 Decatur Deb  Feb 4, 2015 6:58:32pm

I’m not finding confirmation where it should be reported—like CNN.

9 CuriousLurker  Feb 4, 2015 7:29:15pm

There might be a lot of things I disagree with you on, Jimmah, but this isn’t one on them. As Thanos said, apart from the people who are tasked with watching it because it’s part of their job, we shouldn’t assist Daesh in disseminating their propaganda if for no other reason that it’s exactly what they want.

I’ve never watched any of the beheadings and I’m sure as hell not going to watch some poor soldier die in agony surrounded by leering, sadistic strangers. I don’t need to see the deaths to be able to imagine them and to be deeply saddened, angered and thoroughly disgusted by them.

10 CuriousLurker  Feb 4, 2015 7:39:58pm

re: #4 Great White Snark

Sorry, Falling Man was enough for me. […]

THIS. I sat for days watching those planes crash into the towers and seeing people jump out of them before they fell. It was on a constant loop on TV. It was… let’s just say that it was more than enough to last me for the rest of my life.

The photos & video of that plane in Taiwan clipping the bridge as it was crashing? Major flashbacks.

11 Romantic Heretic  Feb 4, 2015 7:42:25pm

I won’t watch those videos but that is a personal choice.

News organizations may choose, if they wish, not to show them.

But trying to dictate to others what they can and cannot see? That I cannot support. In fact I’d argue that would make us similar to Daesh. They’re undoubtedly not big on the people they misrule seeing video from outside their small world.

12 Kid A  Feb 4, 2015 9:31:04pm

Fox is so heavily invested in terror porn, it disgusts me.

13 lostlakehiker  Feb 4, 2015 10:13:20pm

There’s an episode in “the winds of war” TV series based on Herman Wouk’s book in which the character of the SS officer goes to show his SS buddies some very special home movies he’s made about his work.

And then you see the footage, and it suddenly clicks:

my God! This is real. This is the actual home footage they shot. Snuff stuff. Stacked bodies and all.

Damn those producers.

They shouldn’t ought to of put that in a work of fiction, not one that wasn’t rated XXXZZZZ or what have you.

And double damn the ones who did it in the first place, but that’s another story.

I don’t need to see that stuff to hate ISIS, or SS. Reading about it will quite suffice. But the images those producers aired at me are burned in my memory.

14 Alyosha  Feb 4, 2015 11:42:45pm

I do watch the video sometimes and can agree that media outlets should be respectful, confining footage to headshots of the victim. But I don’t feel that every adult should see them. Some simply won’t have the fortitude and I suspect it will radicalise others.
I tell myself, aware of my morbid curiosities that I wish to see the unvarnished reality of the situation or that I’m viewing it for historical context. At bottom, though, it’s probably the same thing that drew otherwise civilised people to the Colloseum.

15 Prof. Backpfeifengesicht, PhD  Feb 5, 2015 2:40:12am

I haven’t seen any of those snuff videos. Not because of some principle (and I certainly disagree about “complicity”), but because I don’t see the need. This may change if e.g. CTs about these videos being fake spread and a debunking will be necessary. Otherwise: I know what ISIS is about. Seeing those videos won’t change it.

OTOH I do think that these videos must be readily available as documentation.

16 goddamnedfrank  Feb 5, 2015 3:12:04am

re: #6 Aunty Entity Dragon

Yes, it needs to be seen. That is the primary way that humans absorb information.

You can hear about atrocities in Rwanda…but most people simply don’t believe in it viscerally unless they see it. It isn’t a moral failure or lack of empathy…it is simply how humans process data.

Seeing that video…and seeing the last moments of that mans life does not disresect him. Quite the opposite. It is the surest way to understand and empathize with him…and we owe him that. We should not, and must not turn away from this. He died fighting an enemy of the civilized world. He died, quite literally, on our behalf. Turning away from his death (and his murderers) does him no honor, in my view.

I do not feel the need to see it. Others may, that’s their business, I don’t judge. For me the fact that others do see and report is enough for me to believe.

I’ve spent a large part of my life studying the science of photographic imaging and the psychology of how humans perceive and respond to visual information.

I actually almost fainted once a couple of years ago in a medical imaging lab at the sight of a patient’s blood. Took me totally by surprise and required a concerted effort to desensitize myself to it. The reaction wasn’t normal squeamishness either, I was intellectually fascinated by the procedure, not at all upset by it psychologically, but my body had a deep primitive response, loss of coordination, rushing sound in my ears, I saw stars and if I hadn’t gone and sat in a corner I definitely would have passed out and fallen down.

I’ve since looked into it and the sight of blood especially can trigger this kind of hardwired response in people. The effect is visceral and totally bypasses the normal higher order thinking centers, personality and human psyche and reaches straight down to an instinctive, animal, genetic impulse. This response is buried so deep inside my biochemical self that it took a massive amount of concerted effort to get past even in a sterile, clinical setting.

With that in mind I don’t want to in any way become inured to the kind of barbaric, savage and dehumanizing imagery ISIS creates. I don’t want to watch it at all, ever. Without making a value judgement on what, I think watching it does something to the watcher, and I think this is what the people who create it want to happen, to cause that change, to push the viewer. I decided long ago I would refuse to participate. I am very careful not to gaze into the abyss. It’s simply not for me.

17 The Ghost of Tonalite Gneiss  Feb 5, 2015 3:59:14am

I wouldn’t go so far as complicit, but I would say that maybe people should think very deeply about what they’re going to derive from a “text” written, developed, and staged by Daesh, about Daesh, for the purpose of conveying an image of Daesh.

This is not casual filming of an event.
It is not record-keeping through film.
It is a series of productions for an English-speaking audience: the executions are staged for someone to watch.

The climax being an actual death does not change that Daesh is putting on a show for an audience. To what end? need to be in the forefront of the viewer. Whom is the primary audience? too.

Us? Daesh? Other Muslims in the conflict zone? Other Muslims outside the conflict zone?

The executions are staged to incite fear, anger, awe* and revulsion; they provoke. And as we’ve seen for decades, provocation is the meat and bread of terrorist organizations…and especially Al Qaeda. The more we get angry, the more we dwell on the “pure evil,” the more we’re buying into an image constructed by our opponent. The enemy wants an existential conflict, wants us invested in their bogeyman status. They sharpen the conflict between “Islam” (any Muslim they can radicalize) and “The West” (a word that encompasses everything they don’t like with the same purposefully-amorphous flexion as “Illuminati”) because it grants them power.

They want to be our antipode.

And atop of all of that there’s a second-order problem of what are the intentions of the person doing the showing, which is also about provocation and how provocation will drive decision-making. No, I don’t think Fox hosting these videos is about our freedom to watch, or about our understanding of what’s at stake. There’s an agenda…the exact same agenda as the terrorists: to create a sense of fundamental division.

This is the white, this is the black.

And it will kill us. It will kill us by presenting a false choice between two tyrannies. It will kill us by making us see the opponent as inhuman while having no clear picture of who the opponent is, so there’s just an ever-widening expanse of acceptable cruelty.

* I’m using awe as in “feeling of amazement.” Most people will never see someone die like that, let alone execute someone in such a manner. It’s novelty and extreme nature produces awe, just like public executions and lynchings produce awe. Even if you hate what you’re seeing, you are drawn into it.

18 Aye Pod  Feb 5, 2015 6:40:07am

The tone of the article could be seen as judgemental or bossy - but it’s an opinion piece, designed to get conversation going - not an attempt to enforce anything. Urging and commanding are not the same. And there is urging on both sides of this debate.

Bottom line for me is that I will not watch a snuff movie. That’s what we are dealing with here - entertainment made out of someones last terrified agonising moments, created by sadistic monsters, who want you to watch it and share it with everyone you know. Imagine how the families must feel knowing this is being watched over and over again. I honestly don’t see where we even get the right. If ISIS make a video of a woman being gang-raped to death will we be urged to watch that too?

19 missliberties  Feb 5, 2015 7:27:29am

I refuse to honor evil by watching their sensationalist brutality.

Anyone up for a night of popcorn and watching Abu Ghriad torture videos. Which btw the 𠆎vil ones’ use as a recruitment tool to fight the big bad west.

20 Romantic Heretic  Feb 5, 2015 8:33:59am

I’ll just post this again; 5 Reasons Humanity Desperately Wants Monsters to Be Real.

Also; To be angered by evil is to partake of it, stupid. - Phrases of Import and Salvation, Chapter IX, The Book of Universal Truths and Other Humorous Anecdotes

21 team_fukit  Feb 5, 2015 9:30:44am

I’ll look at it. But I’m an educator, and history/religion is my thing.

But in general I think atrocity should be seen by thoughtful people where ever it is documented. People should see it as to know why we fight to prevent those atrocities from happening again. It’s not functioning as propaganda in our hands.

But Fox News airing the whole 22 minute video of the pilot’s demise…. Not very useful. And selective. I don’t recall them showing the Highway of Death the US left just outside of Baghdad too

22 CuriousLurker  Feb 5, 2015 11:42:15am

Andy Carvin wrote a thoughtful (and quite long) piece on why he’s chosen not to share imagery of the pilot’s murder. IMO it’s well worth reading, even if you disagree with his conclusions.

NOTE: The article contains some graphic images, but they’re old (Civil War, WWII, Vietnam) and in black & white. There’s one color photo showing the caskets of U.S. servicemen on a transport plane, coming home.

Graphic footage: fanning the flames or bearing witness?
Reported.ly editor-in-chief Andy Carvin challenges his own assumptions of when it’s ethical to publish graphic footage and when it isn’t.

THE SLIDESHOW BEGINS with a photo of a trail of flame traveling across the dirt from right to left, like a scene from a movie where the bad guy — or maybe the good guy — leaves a thin trail of gas and drops a match to blow something up. The next photo pulls back to a wider shot, showing the flame headed directly to a man dressed in an orange jump suit, standing in a cage. The man faces the flame as it speeds toward him, his body erect hands raised in front of his chest. Yet another photo shows the flames dancing around the man’s legs, his body and hands unmoving, initially resisting the agony. Then the flames consume him, a waxy human wick, melting then going up in smoke, the image of an unspeakable conflagration seared into the depths of my soul.

There is no way in hell I am going to share this footage with the public. […]

medium.com


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