Quote:
Originally posted by punkworld
The fact that footage like this is only available on sites like ogrish and cj makes sure the vast majority of the audience consists of those looking for shocking entertainment.
Is the guy still just another soundbite? No, now he's a "cool" vid with a shock value - much like the "faces of death" series and stuff like that.
Does the war get de-videogamed by stuff like this? I've seen threads on gfy about how "cool" it was to see people get shot to bits in real vids as if they were action movies, and I distinctly remember a thread where everyone pretty much laughed their asses off because of a vid of a woman getting stoned to death.
It doesn't show people the atrocities of war, it shows them something that makes them go "Holy fucking shit!", or maybe "it is hard fucking core" or even "  ".
Really, if people don't get the fact that other people have lives, families, feelings and all that shit, a video of someone getting beheaded won't enlighten them. In fact, I dare say that there is no hope for them whatsoever.
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how does this video NOT show us the atrocities of war? how many people in this thread said the video was "cool"? If you read it I think you'll find most people are rightly saddened and shocked by it. Someone saying "holy fucking shit" doesn't mean they're not empathising with the situation, they're just either shocked, unable to express it in more expressive words, or for lack of wanting to look like a "pussy" not wanting to express it in what you might think are more "acceptable" phrasings.
laughing at stoning vids is what happens when barely pubescent boys talk shit on an adult bbs and want ot come across as hardcore or against the towelheads or whatever.. I wouldn't judge the effect on most everyone else on the few 'tards from the peanut gallery.
And no.. people do not "get" that these people have families and the sadness these deaths bring.. we ARE desensitised.. how do you empathise with the deaths of 10,000 Iraqi's? We have hardly even evolved far enough to be ablet o mentally comprehend that number without BEING SHOWN an image of 10000 people.
why are images more persuasive at trials? why are images the thing that blew the lid of abu garib prison?
we understand these things on a certain level. You know someone was beheaded, you know they had a family, oh shit next story is about a panda that can't get an erection.. it gets part of the mass of human misery for the day.. it is dealt with on a level that doesn't require any real amount of empathy on the viewer's behalf.. If what you said was true and that normal people know they have families and totally empathise then half the workforce would be paralysed at home all day crying at the constant misery around us. But it doesn't work like that.
The same idiots that laugh at a stoning video don't do it because of their basic disregard for human life, they do it because of whatever indoctrination they have undergone to equate the victims to being not worthy of empathy.
Those very same idiots would be the first ones shocked and disturbed and yelling down other people for being anti-american haters if it was a nice blonde midwestern woman getting stoned by muslim men.
The fact that a part of the audience doesn't empathise doesn't mean there aren't plenty of legitimate viewers with their own valid reasons for watching and the behaviour of other people doesn't in anyway impinge on the validity.