We're everywhere aren't we . . . .
Porn, Drugs, Weapons Hit Baghdad Streets
BAGHDAD, Iraq - A Quranic verse plastered on a monument to freedom carries a simple message ? God will send a plague on those who deal in drugs and spread corruption.
But the message is being widely ignored.
Across the busy highway from the monument, built in 1958 after the overthrow of the monarchy, traders have set up gambling tables and are openly selling pornography, fake ID cards and looted goods ? including laboratory microscopes, industrial fuse boxes and pills stolen from psychiatric hospitals.
"Now we have freedom and democracy," said a 34-year-old trader selling pornographic DVDs with titles such as "The Dirty Family" and "The Young Wife," and photocopied postcards of couples in various sexual positions. "We could not sell them when Saddam was here."
This is Baghdad four months after U.S. troops took over the sprawling city of 5 million ? jobless, insecure, and in many cases taking "freedom and democracy" as license to do pretty much what you want and get away with it.
The trader, a father of two young daughters, was too embarrassed to give his name. Pornography is strictly forbidden by Islam. "It's too bad, but there's no job for me," he said.
Formerly a government civil engineer earning about $150 a month, he said he lost the job the day before the March 20 U.S. invasion. His streetside sales are now netting him about $1,500 a month.
As he speaks, young men gather around, some appearing drunk or high. Gunfire erupts in the background. Hardly anyone appears to notice. "This is democracy, but what kind of democracy?" said Hamed Hameed, yards from where minutes earlier armed youths had been fighting over prostitutes down a dirty, narrow street.
The new freedoms also mean satellite telephones and TV for those who can afford them. Iraq as never had a mobile phone network, and satellite dishes were banned.
Now, Baghdad's flat-roofed houses are dotted with dishes imported from Syria, Jordan and Kuwait. These provide much of the pornography sold in markets.
Sheikh Muayiad Ibrahim al-Adhami, an Islamic preacher, said banditry and the trade in pornography, drugs and alcohol were "the natural result" of a people being released from years of oppressive rule.