[ExI] beheadings etc.

[Nacho Martín]

I found this article by Gary Brecher very good on this topic:

http://pando.com/2014/09/03/the-war-nerd-the-long-twisted-history-of-beheadings-as-propaganda/

Basically, he argues that people have been beheading enemies for propaganda
reasons for a very long time. Until Victorian times, when western powers
became so powerful, being able to slaughter thousands of natives without
suffering casualties, and from that moment the victims started to inspire
pity.

"In fact, it’s only very recently that human cultures have learned to be
coy about that fact. Before the Victorians came up with the brilliant
notion of depicting conquest as a dreary but needful chore, war propaganda
was an innocent, constant celebration of horrors committed by the victors,
incised on the bodies of the losers."


On Tue, Feb 24, 2015 at 4:26 PM, William Flynn Wallace <foozler83 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Help me out here.  Although I am a psychologist I am at a loss.
>
> Randomly killing school children, adults, worshipers, beheading Christians
> and other foreigners or other sects of their religion  ......
>
> Just what message is being sent here?
>
> "Hey, look at us.  We behead people, kidnap children and make them carry
> guns......."
>
> What do they want us to think?  Is it
>
> "Look at how important these people are.  How brave, how strong.  Yes,
> these are the people I want to run my country.  Also, their religion sounds
> really wonderful if it leads to these killings"
>
> Or just what?
>
> bill w
>
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