Hacker News Reader

> Maybe there's some minimal good in just knowing how violent others can be, but when I wonder if our communication tech can be put to far greater and more beneficial uses like promoting peace and resolving differences, I remember the words of Douglas Adams:

> "Meanwhile the poor Babel fish, by effectively removing all barriers to communication between different cultures and races, has caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation."

That's a good quote, but I think modern society's take on violence is to make it highly scenarised. A Brave New World kind of violence, where you know where the good guys and the bad guys are. One could hope that increased media coverage would lead to less wars, because people would realize how disgusting it actually is. That is, until you realize the Romans watching the gladiators also got their violence along with the daily bread.

> It was wrong when the Syrian rebels posted video of the execution of 10 Syrian Army members.

And I'm sure you ran to HN to protest when it happened, right?

> It was wrong when the Libyan rebels posted video of the execution of Kadafi.

And you were vigorously denouncing it then too, right?

> It was also wrong for the Israeli Defense Force.

Oh. We finally get to the reason you posted.

I think rather the opposite is true. People communicate about violence, especially warfare. As Twitter et al transition from 'businesses' to 'methods of communication' this sort of thing will become more and more common.

The alternative, of course, is irrelevance. (Or convincing people to stop being violent. Ha.)

Unlike in Europe and here in America, a war is happening in Israel and all Israelis under 45 are either active soldiers or reserve soldiers. I have family in Tel Aviv that was forced to run into a bunker earlier today. I have a friend from high school that is stationed at the Gaza border. It's not an abstract, far away event. The tweets are directly relevant to Israeli society.

That still doesn't make it right to post tweets glorifying murder.

I've been following their updates all day and haven't seen any that have 'glorified murder'.

That would be the one in the article: http://nyobetabeat.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/enhanced-buzz...

I suppose you also believe the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden was murder.

Yes, yes it was.

Why not arrest him and try him for war crimes? Assuming that there's enough evidence to convict - and if not, why is that enough to go and kill him?

I disagree but I respect your consistency.

The rule of law is important. Tit-for-tat exchanges like the ones that Israel and Palestine are engaging in solve nothing. It descends into monkey hindbrain us-against-them.

Another very similar scenario recently was Northern Ireland. That didn't get solved by the UK grinding Ireland into the ground or posting inflammatory things in the news - it was solved by both sides showing restraint and good will.

Currently neither Israel or Palestine are showing anything of the sort, but as the larger, more powerful party (eg. I doubt Palestinans have bunkers), it's up to Israel to show some restraint... but they aren't, they're still posturing about how tough they are.

It's maddening to watch.

Why not? It is quite natural to want your war enemies to die, and for the whole country (both soldiers and civilians) to celebrate destruction of enemy troops.

Think about the tweets and newspaper articles about the successful murder of Osama bin Laden, for example - it's the same concept.

"natural" != "right"