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Watching the faces of the jubilant whites who tortured and killed an innocent child and then were let off by some old boy's jury, I was horrified to see glee in the murderers' inhuman eyes. Such actions as theirs strip all humanity from a soul. Strom Thurmond was one of those types -- a big supporter of our current administration just like every white supremacist (also not true human beings) living today is. I hope that people watched this show tonight and looked at themselves and our country and thought - you know actually had a little self reflection! -- about the kind of gleeful irresponsibility that jumps into a pre-emptive bombing of innocent civilians and pretends this is some kind of manly exercise of a resolute character. In polls it shows a great many Americans who go on believing distortions like that Iraq was connected with 9/11 (proved not to be by the commission), etc. On top of that, just in the scope of our handling of Falloujah this same attitude is seen: the Marines on the ground wanted to handle it in a deliberate fashion, not allow it to be the kind of primitive revenge that ignites a powder keg but Rumsfeld riled the president up into thinking he wouldn't really be a man if he didn't send the Marines in killing and maiming such that 20% of those killed were children leaving school, old women trying to go to market, people on their way to religious services. We are still dealing today with the recruits such barbarism brought to our enemies. But I feel I see the same attitude here today in America that those southern whites had - that it is just okay, fine and dandy to do whatEVER you want to torture, maim and hurt human beings as long as you are able to label them with a less than human tag - like "uppity coloreds", or "terrorists" (even if they're a 7 year old girl). I notice it is usually cowards who behave the way the southern whites did to that poor child - holding him down, a bunch of them, fully grown adults, holding down that child and thinking it proved a GOOD thing about THEM as they ripped his teeth out one by one and heard his terrified screams of pain.
I hope with all my heart that that horrible woman, Carolyn Bryant, who started it all and is the only one still living who took an ACTIVE part, is captured and punished. What a snake of a woman, what a putrid smell her soul must give off.
I am angry and dismayed that I look around at my fellow Americans, some even in my family, who have the same ignorance and self satisfied righteousness as they go about urging the killing of people worldwide, even if it's just by starving them so our companies can steal all their natural resources and they can drive gas guzzling cars and feed their fat bodies with too much food.
Seeing that show about that child's torture and death hurts my heart and makes me weep that even today, almost 50% of our population is ready to vote for someone who advocates things like Abu Graib and Guantanamo. I weep to have lived through the 60s, through Richard Nixon and feeling like the country learned important lessons and now to find us in such a mess today. I am praying fervently that this election brings change and that its not too late for us to be human beings again and turn away from the hatred and fear. Or will we face a future where the Jim Crow south is back countrywide with a few corrupt families running a feudal system and freedom, liberty and justice only for a privileged (white and wealthy) few?
Sincerely,
"White and middle-class
in Studio City, CA"
Thanks. I am still steamed...but I have whittle down a pile of exams today so it will have to wait till the morning.
David,
Looking forward to your comments on it. Just saw it.
Ken