Disturbing
It's arguable what the greatest invention might be, but the internet itself, wherever it ranks, has to be considered one of the most important. Variations on the phrase, "It has to be on the internet because it has everything," can be heard in many areas of life, and, while it's not technically true, there is some grain of truth, however small, to that notion. Included, obviously, amongst the "everything" is the seamier, more disturbing side of the net. Here I'm not referring to just pornography, which, depending on who you ask can be viewed as a blessing or a curse. No, what I'm referencing here are sites devoted solely to the aspect of death in all its graphic and brutal reality.

Whether one is a casual observer of the current situation in Iraq or a enthusiastic follower, one of the more disturbing trends to emerge, besides the fact that the entire enterprise is one built on lies and distortions, is the wave of kidnappings and beheadings that have plagued the region, our allies, and ourselves. For the most part, the kidnappings are a ploy for either ransom money from the victim's families or withdrawal of all troops from the abducted party's homeland from the region, and sometimes both. The kidnappers, usually, draw out the process by releasing propagandistic videos showing the captured parties pleading for their lives, making withdrawal requests, or even more outlandish demands such as securing the release of all female prisoners held in Abu Ghraib. After a period, the kidnappers release another video, and this one, almost always, depicts the savage beheading of the hostage. They preface the execution with some more religious gibberish, but the final moments almost always play out the same with blood and gore.

Since these groups rely heavily on the internet for communications through websites and various other forums, and, as we all know news travels fast on the web, the footage, inevitably, ends up on other sites as well. The first such tapes to cause wide commotion were Daniel Pearl's and Nick Berg's. Since then, there have been numerous videos released. Not all of the cases result in the beheading of the hostage. Most do, and those are the ones that make headlines.

As one would imagine, the sites that feature this type of content are very disturbing in general, and, when a trend like this isn't occurring, they usually traffic in death in general in the form of videos and pictures. Naturally, one can't resist the curiosity factor when one realizes that this type of content is available. So, I took a look, and, naturally, was repulsed by what I saw. Beyond the fact that the videos themselves are beyond belief in their bloody realism, being real I guess this is inevitable, is the notion that one might feel the need to comment on them, which they do on discussion boards that are featured on the site I stumbled upon and I assume others as well.

What's troubling about this, aside from its inherent ghoulishness, is the reality that people are out there whose sole purpose is to view gore and other outlandishly brutal content while surfing the internet, and nothing more than that. Perusing the board, I came across a comment that was just astonishing and very revealing in its observation. It's incredible when you think about finding such a poignant response in of all places a discussion board where the usual fare centers around commenting on a picture of a dead body. This particular person made the observation that, depending on how you interpret it, is either quite revealing or beyond repulsive. As I mentioned, there are many of these tapes out, and this site seems to have all of them. Also, as one could imagine that when one has watched all of these that you eventually become numb to their reality. The comment in question made just this type of accusation. The point the writer was making was that the videos had started to seem particularly repetitious and lacked, for lack of a better word, anything different. The sameness of the tapes was the real issue.

Not to turn this into some sort of stereotypical critique on the affects of violence, but there seems to be something truly disturbing and, at the same time, revealing about this comment. On the one hand, it appears as if the writer has become more or less totally desensitized to the realities that are being depicted in the videos that they are watching. I've watched several of the tapes, and each one is terribly disturbing and very difficult to come to terms with. I won't lie. I could say that I wanted to watch the tapes to better understand the realities of what's occurring on the ground in Iraq. That's a illegitimate excuse, and I find it highly unlikely that very many people actually feel that way. No, I watched because I was curious. Day after day it seemed as if another news story was appearing in the paper announcing another beheading. Curiosity got the best of me, and that's just how life operates. The reason the cliche about passer-by craning their necks to look at an accident has proliferated throughout life for so long is because it's true. True, seeing the gore itself is more than likely to repulse a normal person beyond belief, but the itching in the back of your mind that wants to, needs to look is hard to resist.

The other idea raised by this comment is that there appears to be a reason why the outrage surrounding these tapes seems to waver and currently has waned significantly. Are we becoming desensitized to this type of violence because it's happening too often? Can others, outside of the immediate families of the abducted, feel outrage, disgust, anger? I fear that, like violence that plagues other countries much more pervasively than our own, we will eventually hear about these types of executions and shrug with minimal pity in our hearts. The very fact that this occurs frequently enough to foster its own cottage industry should be enough to dissuade anyone from re-electing our president. Isn't this a sign of failure beyond a shadow?