Sunday 1 March 2015

purge or dead reckoning

Though the aspiring Caliphate is committing far worse atrocities than the unabashed destruction of antiquities in the museum of Mosul, this has been the only unfiltered footage (at least that not involving the execution of Western hostages up close—there’s been quite a few sweeping vistas of massacres I guess counted as less discriminate since they’re countrymen and innocents in the way) shown of their ruthless violence.
There has of course been far worse examples too of wholesale looting, pillage and revision of mankind’s common history and heritage with the Cultural Revolutions of China and France and the censorship and looting of the Third Reich, along with countless other examples. Surely, any and all of the gruesome propaganda is available out there to anyone who wants to confront this vileness directly, and it is a delicate arras that the media uses to protect the public from such images, but maybe nothing further need be witnessed. Out of respect for victims and their families, such sensationalism ought not be shown, but in general, should the public be shielded from facing the terrors—and be allowed for our imaginations to limn, complete the scene or not?