h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

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Well, err....I hope today is really nice day for you...and how did the dinner go?

I guess this thread went a lil AWOL on the discussion of suicide and painful memories and sad empathic thoughts and strong opine

Today is a good day for living

It's always good when your boss is in a chipper mood...mine scares me somewhat (the director) when he bounces out of his office and bellows 'GOOD MORNIN TRACE how are you?" The last time he did that I had a fire ball in my mouth and could only drool around it trying to say hello back, without having it pop out..

I met a new Managing Director yesterday at just the moment that my nose was bleeding down the front of my shirt.

Damn! I must give up the cocaine!

Okay... back to the suicide bombing discussion (and I apologise in advance for just skimming some of the posts - so if I missed something, feel free to shout at me ).

As for WWII combat facts, I admit that I don't know much, so will accept your statement that bombing of civilian targets isn't a usual tactic. Thankfully. *ahem*Gazastrip*ahem*
But as for this:
>>So what proportion of RAF bomber crews returned?<<

That's different. Every soldier faces the possibility of dying in combat.
Even the Palestinians differentiate (or used to, anyway) between 'sacrificial missions' and 'suicide missions', to supply a somewhat lame translation. The first were cases where a Palestinian activist - or terrorist or freedom fighter, depends on your lookout, I prefer a somewhat more neutral term - was sent to do something like shoot at a group of soldiers, knowing full well that most chances are he won't come back.
It is still not the same as blowing yourself up on purpose - making your death the tool to cause others' death.
I agree the nuance is small, but I think it's important.

And I'll leave the Kamikaze out of it, if you want.


Now, I wonder... when you say >>Aye! And we're the ones who <bleep)ed it up!<<, what 'we' are you talking about? So far I've counted in this convo British, American, Canadian, South African and Israeli nationalities.
I suppose you were meaning the British though. Which is only partially correct. The problems of this region started some time before the British mandate - and most of the more serious events between Palestinians and Israelis were definitely _after_ you guys left already.
I'm not trying to point out 'who to blame', since there seem to be too many factors involved.


Last thing - about understanding the other side. I do, as much as I can; like I said in my previous post, I can't really know the conditions they live in. I know they are very desperate conditions, but I have never myself been in anything remotely like that.
I can understand the hopelessness. And I didn't use 'brainwashing' to imply that they are mindless, or something like that, but that this hopelessness is being cruely and cynically used to convince them that becoming a suicide bomber is the best way out of it.




I'm trying very hard to be optimistic, but it's becoming harder in time. Seems the new government is going to go for the 'Let's build a wall and pretend there's nobody behind it' solution, and I'm pretty sure that after that won't help - because there is no way it would, without any sort of agreement between the two sides - we will just renew the occupation, with a self-righteous feeling that 'We tried and they ruined it for themselves'.
*sigh*
Some years ago, things still seemed like they were going to get better soon. Now I'm still hoping they'll get better, but the point where they will seems further and further away.
*sigh*

I suspect that we're agreeing violently.

I was using the Royal We, of course. But I guess we can absolve the Zuid Afrikans from this one (apart from supplying arms to Israel, cooperating in their nuclear programme, etc, etc...but that was the old regime.)

I'm really not sure that there's a great difference in mentality between RAF bomber crew and Palestinian suicide bombers. Both were young boys who saw it as their duty - in which they were encouraged by peer pressure - to go off on missions from which they probably (RAF) or definitely (Palestinians) wouldn't return. I suppose the difference was that the suicide bombers see the people they are killing wheras a Lancaster bomber flies over in darkness and kills from very high up...so they could block themselves off from the fact that it was women and babies getting killed. But both sets were ordinary, run-of-the-mill boys.

I think that what I'm trying to say is that its neither useful nor accurate to think of suicide bombers as some form of demon. The problem is that they are not. They are ordinary people who act according to their political circumstances. In the case of the more extreme fringes of the intifada, this means that they have bought in to the upping of the ante that says that suicide bombing is the only alternative. Just like (royal) we've upped the ante to the point that civilian casualties on a massive scale are no longer even counted.

There is an alternative, of course - negotiation. The current position in Israel/Palestine seems to be that we can't talk to them until Hamas (who aren't currently suicide bombing - although others are) have renounced violence. Ken Livingstone once caused an enormous fuss by saying that we have to talk to Sinn Fein precisely *because* they haven't renounced violence. He turned out to be right.

Hm. I still think there's some difference between knowing you might die in combat - even that you might _probably_ die - and planning specifically to die, as an inseperable part of your mission. Seems like a different set of mind, to me.

But I don't really feel like arguing. It's been a long day, and it's almost midnigh already, so I'm off to sleep. Good night!

I think I see Lady P's point above.

I mean, to me, there's a bit of a difference between "this might get me killed, but it might save other lives, so I think it's worth the risk either way" and "it's worth sacrificing my life to annhilate the ".

I think the second is a lot scarier.

I can see the point too...but I don't think the two sets of people are a world apart. Suicide bombing perhaps isn't quite as incomprehensible as we may like to imagine. I doubt very much that the received wisdom about brainwashing and 72 virgins plays much of a part.

Possible factors:
- The impossibility of death in the minds of the young
- A meaningful, honourable role in life
- Peer pressure
- Desparation
- Frustration
- Anger

The first three fit RAF bomber crew. (and the first one is almost the title of a Damien Hirst installation)

>>"it's worth sacrificing my life to annhilate the ".

How about 'If they get scared enough, they won't send helicopter gunships into my town again.'?

OK, I'll concede that, although in some (many? most?) cases the opposite reaction occurs, and "they" send in more helicopter gunships in. Sometimes "they" use retaliation for a suicide bombing as an excuse to get medieval on a group of people they were just looking for an excuse to beat down in the first place.

Maybe I'm just cynical.

Am I misunderstanding the other perspective, or is it that perhaps a young man who straps a bandolier of explosives around himself and walks into a crowded place sees himself as a soldier who's being shipped off to war sees himself?

I don't get, either. I'm not exactly a pacifist, man, I know that all that "give peace a chance" crap is idealistic and there's no way every dispute in the world can be settled equivocally or peacefully. But I don't see anything noble or honorable in taking civilian life. Collateral damage my ass.

Yeah...I agree. I don't think that terrorism against civilians is a useful tactic . Send in suicide bombers and you get gunships. Send in gunships, you get suicide bombers. 'An eye for an eye leaves us all blind.' But - yes - I imagine that a young man getting on a Tel Aviv bus wearing an explosive waistcoat *does* see himself as a soldier on a mission. Thats how the IRA thought of themselves when on 'active service' in mainland Britain.

>>they" use retaliation for a suicide bombing as an excuse to get medieval on a group of people they were just looking for an excuse to beat down in the first place.

And wasn't there recently a widely reported survey that said that 85% of US troops serving in Iraq thought they were there in retaliation for 9/11? (So the mission isn't 'reconstruction' then?)



Here's something chilling. If an educated, relatively prosperous first-worlder like me has become so angered by US/UK involvement in Iraq...then how do the people there feel? And how will thet react? I suggest that, unlike you or me, they may have been pushed beyond the limits of reasonable thought.

True, that actually seems like a reasonable expectation. I also expect that any proestations of "if it were up to me, we wouldn't be there" you or I or any other educated, relatively propsperous first-worlder like us might make really doesn't mean a thing to them.

Another thought...

Our countries have modern armies. The lower ranks are filled by a relatively high proportion of psycopaths. The talent, on the whole, rises to the top so the leaders are quite capable of thinking about such issues as 'Is bombing civilians a sensible tactic?' They are also, on the whole, well disciplined - although it is recognised that, at the bottom level, soldiers will do what soldiers do.

Elsewhere, we find an entirely different situation. Loose associations of disgruntled people are held together by nothing more than the will to fight. There is no strategic vision. But there is a keeness to do what such people do. Suicide bombing has come to be seen as the ultimate demonstration of their prowess.

I'd already thought about that, too.

I was wondering last night to what extent suicidal people- be they delusional, depressed, desperate, fanatical, whatever- are more likely to follow through, for whatever reason, if they believe in some kind of afterlife. Since you don't believe in an afterlife, either, Edward, what do you think about that? Do you think maybe some people figure they'll be better off "in the next world/life/whatever", and throw in the towel, as opposed to people like me who know we've only got one chance and can't give up trying?

Of course, sometimes even I feel like things are hopeless. I know I seem pretty lackadaisical, but I'm no perpetual optimist. I like to call myself "pragmatic", but people close to me say it's a bit closer to cynical or jaded. Pitching the rosy colored glasses and getting some contacts really improves your hindsight.

My take is that people who not only consider suicide but then go through with it are seriously suffering from a type of chronic depression that neither you or I have ever experienced, PC.

Which is why we don't 'get it'.

Not sure if religious people who believe in an afterlife are more prone to commit suicide. I reckon when it gets to that point not a hell of a lot is making much sense to the person so I don't know if religious stuff has much to do with it.

Although I've gone through times when I seriously felt I *could not get through another day*, suicide never presented itself as an option to me. And I don't know why.

Just as I don't know why it presents itself to others as a 'way out' of their suffering.

All I know is that I'm in no position to judge others who are feeling things I've never felt.


az

Well now...

A couple of weeks ago we took the kids on a day trip to Inverary, where you can look around their old jail and courthouse. They had an exhibition on crime and punishment in days of yore. Religiosity was legally enforced in the 17th/18thC - you'd get put in the stocks for missing church - so I guess we can assume there was some buy-in to the idea of an afterlife. We read of one case where a woman's family were punished for her suicide by having a third of their property being taken away, which would have made the difference between survival and starvation.

So...we had a woman who probably knew she was going to have her body left to rot on unconsecrated ground, would suffer eternal damnation, and her loved ones would starve. But she still did it. I think the point I'm trying to make is that there's not really a rational choice involved...just a lot of pain.


When I was suicidal - I just wanted the world to stop. My fantasies included, at best, running away to Cornwall and living in a tent (I'd heard of a lawyer who'd done that) - but mostly I wanted to just lie very, very still until I faded into the earth and the grass grew over me. But that started sounding too slow. Then I heard about someone who'd bought a length of rope from a diy store, tied one end to his neck and the other to a lampost, sat in his car and accelerated...It's when I started obsessing on that that I decided I'd rather be in hospital. And what triggered it all? Nothing more than an aggressive boss, really. Boo bloody hoo. *see below
<\uncomfortable personal revelation bit>

As for suicide bombers...perhaps they do buy the 72 virgins malarkey...but I doubt anyone has that much faith. No, I think it's more the impossibility of death in the mind of the living. (http://dh.ryoshuu.com/art/1991physic.html) I mean...are any of us *really* afraid of death? Afraid of pain, yes, or heights or drowning...but not of death itself.





*but the longer story is an aggressive boss + a build up of stress from working away from home + a life history which hadn't taught me goodn stress-handling skills + a genetic disposition to bi-polar disorder...etc.

So how do you cope, Edward?


az

Medication!

Only that?

Seems hootoo chatting might also help a bit . . . maybe?


az

Oh, indeed. I was oversimplifying. Medication alternately stops me killing myself and being involuntarily incarcerated.

For the 'leftovers'...Chatting here was a great help - I have JEllen to thank. I see a Community Psychiatric Nurse regularly, and an occasional shrink. I have a supportive wife. I've learned enough self-management to challenge my negative thoughts and recognise where they're coming from. I understand it's an illness. I've (just about) managed to let myself off the hook as regards comparing myself to more succesful people. I've recently started going to a b-p support group. I'll not risk hashish any more. I make sure I go to bed at a reasonable time.

Edward, I'm glad you've had the meds, the supportive wife, the counseling, and all, because I like having you as a friend.

I'm withholding further comment and contemplation, for the time being anyway. I'm not judging anyone, but it's hard for me to think about stuff I can't make sense out of; I wind up ruminating obsessively and getting frustrated.

This will probably come out wrong, but the best way I can find to describe the feeling I've had on and off for the past week is that it's so unfair that I'm so happy when I'm no more deserving than that guy who flung himself off the bridge. It kind of makes you feel guilty for still being alive, much like I did after my car wreck (though not nearly as badly so).