Osama Bin Laden has been defeated, so… did we win?
May 1st 2011 is the date that is branded into history as the day that Osama Bin Laden, the most notorious and wanted terrorist of the last decade, was killed. And I mean that quite literally, without ambiguity or hesitation – he is dead. Let’s save the debate on conspiracy vs. paranoia for another day. Let’s not confuse this with Horton saying he’s heard a ‘who’ or the presence of alien’s flying around, with the sole intent of giving us a prostate exam. The fact remains that there is DNA, photographic and eye-witness evidence that this did occur, even Al Qaeda have publicly agreed that their leader is dead. And lets be honest, if the photos were shown as proof, not only would it make any sane decent human being sick-up, the true conspiracy theorists would just commend how good ‘the man’ has got at photoshoping since the moon landings.
So, with the loons and crackpots that say that he isn’t dead aside, what of the loons and crackpots that say we are winning the war on terror? How can we even win a war on an emotion? By demanding of ourselves to not be afraid of the thing we’ve had to declare war on! It’s like saying you’re going to battle impatience to a quick death, “yes, we will win the war on impatience; we just can’t waste any time.” Why not take on hate by telling it how much we loathe it, destroying vengeance in a swift counter-attack. If you really wanted to defeat terror, you would need to stop being afraid. But, by recognising it as a constant unrelenting threat, you let it win. Perhaps it’s time to stop recognising terror as a tangible entity that we could fight and instead, look at what causes individuals and organisations to the extremes of terrorism.
The real driving force and cause of the Islamic extremists, is a long history of both direct and indirect oppression. Michael Scheuer, historian and former CIA chief (who’s job was to track Bin Laden back in 1996), has stated that the primary motivations are: The support of Israel against Palestinians, presence of our military (more recently the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan), pressure to keep Arab oil cheap and the support of tyrannical Muslim dictatorships in the region. So, are we doing anything to negate these underlying issues? That ones easy… No. Obviously we still have a huge military presence in the Arab peninsula, and when an oppressive government suppresses a peaceful protest with tear gas canisters labelled with, ‘made in the USA,’ are we really that surprised?
Sarah Palin, the former Governor for Alaska and potential Presidential candidate, so very deftly examples what could be fuelling the Islamic Extremists’ outrage, with sweet little tweets like, “Show photo as warning to others seeking America's destruction. No pussy-footing around, no politicking, no drama; it's part of the mission.” Not taking the side of the conspiracy theorists, but demanding the photos of the Islamic terrorist’s revered leader, bloody and mutilated by their enemies, as a warning, ‘as part of the mission’!? What is this mission? A mission to piss off the rest of the world, show them how horrifically we can kill them whilst claiming to be more civilised!? On the other hand, I understand that this is a 140 character-restricted statement from a trivial social networking site and can’t be attributed to America as a whole. But it sets the tone for a strong undercurrent of similar ignorant opinion in the US, and how could we ever hope to sedate the violence if the Americans ever validate Palin and her views to the office of President?
The most depressing of all is that this jackassery (look it up at UrbanDictionary.com) isn’t just restricted to the Sarah Palins and gun-toting hicks, it’s making its way into the most innocent areas of our culture… Just two days after the announcement of the military operation in Pakistan, Disney applied for a trademark on ‘Seal Team Six.’ Presumably, to create a cute cartoon team of seals, reporting to ‘Marshal Mouse,’ chasing after every real life historical villain, ending every episode with their brutal killing. Yeah, the kids will love that, “look at that warning to others seeking our destruction, that’s the mission,” They’ll scream.
I’m not saying that we shouldn’t have taken Bin Laden down, or that we should have done it differently. The world is a better place without him in it, but I didn’t go on a bender through the streets day-dreaming about how much pain he was in his last moments of life, how fucked is that!? If we continue to antagonize with abusive and distasteful ‘celebration’ when we bring perpetrators of terrorism to justice, then we will only fuel and perpetuate an already explosive hatred for our way of life. There will always be loons and crackpots selling their own particular brand of shit to the masses, in another word entremaneurs (again, look it up in the urban dictionary), but we don’t have to pay credence to their claims. Where we are truly loosing this ‘war’ is in our own hypocrisy, if we don’t exercise our civility and engage with the underlying problems that cause these extreme reactions, that then lead us to actually feel terror, then we can never win.
