Conflicting Values - Not

I mentioned the Michael Vick case earlier this month. Whereas I find the libertarian take on cruelty to animals, that places property rights above the suffering of a mammal, unethical albeit intellectually honest, I happened to come across a liberal take I find hypocritical and -- worse -- dumb. At a blog called Daily Kos, which is part of a liberal blogging network, I found the following statement:

Michael Vick is an All American, of this America more than any other time. He may have to go to jail, but surely he deserves the Medal of Freedom every bit as much as Donald Rumsfeld, L. Paul Bremer and the rest of the cast of characters who lead our country into our international arena of violence. Vick brutally wantonly and without empathy killed a hundred dogs, while these men destroyed the lives of hundreds of thousands of humans.

Vick is a product of our culture, in fact, he epitomizes it. He is a criminal because he picked the wrong species to torment. Pigs, chickens, and, of course, humans would have been just fine; but not man's best friend.

So he must pay for his mistake. But, let's not get too much satisfaction out of his punishment, since he is also the victim of a larger injustice, that most of us quietly condone every day of our lives.

Excuse me, WHAT is the tu quoque- (or rather iste quoque-) argument doing here? Should the fact that other people did criminal deeds (whether real or perceived is not relevant in this context) make Vick's treatment of dogs any less cruel?

And the "you are only denouncing Vick because it's about that soppy 'men's-best-friend' thing"-argument would be nothing but yawn-worthy if it weren't so vile. Of course there are people who give an aviating fornication for what happens to humans or to animals who are expressing their disapproval of dog fighting, but then, there are many who DO care for all that (myself included) and STILL find dog fighting and tormenting animals to death wrong. And again: Does the fact that hypocrites and morons are denouncing dog fighting and other cruelties make those cruelties any less repulsive?

And if the writer of the above REALLY thinks that an individual like Vick "epitomizes" his (and the writer's) culture, it should be considered a miracle that nobody has fastened electrodes to his balls yet and electrocuted him slowly to death as punishment for his drivel. [sarcasm on] That this did NOT happen must be one of the disadvantages of a free society. [sarcasm off]

But the last paragraph tops it all. What is wrong about getting "satisfaction" out of a punishment? Of course, the gloating of revenge is disgusting and detrimental to society, but what is punishment for? Deterrence? Theoretically yes, in practice a doubtful thing. Rehabilitation? The same applies here. Incapacitation is often mentioned, but that's a measure, not a punishment. A dangerous lunatic, who is not responsible, has to be incapacitated as well as the responsible dangerous criminal. Restoration can under certain conditions be part of it, but rarely is. However, I think that punishment is about honouring the values cast in law, values that mirror society. And any satisfaction based on that is not just appropriate, but necessary. But then, "values" are slowly becoming anathema anyway.

And the "victim of a larger injustice" bit? What "larger injustice" might that be? Because Vick is Black? Because (I presume) he grew up in less-than-privileged circumstances? Don't those bleeding-heart-apologists don't see how unjust and condescending their stance is towards the millions of Black and underprivileged people who do NOT torture dogs to death? Or do not turn to crime at all?

But I guess one needs values to see that.

To Express Our Sincerest Hypocrisy

Approaching the tenth anniversary of her death, the ever-growing impression that the late Princess of Wales was in some way a neurotic, irresponsible and manipulative troublemaker who had repeatedly meddled in political matters that did not concern her and personally embarrassed Her Majesty The Queen by her Mediterranean love-romps with the son of a discredited Egyptian businessman, is temporalirly performing a strategic withdrawal. We, together with the rest of the world-wide media, now state for today that the Princess of Hearts was in fact the most saintly woman who has ever lived.

She died for our sins.

We would like to express our sincere and deepest hypocrisy to all our readers on the anniversary of this tragic day and hope and pray that they will carry on reading our blog notwithstanding.

My private memorial? Good riddance.

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I stole the idea from Private Eye.

The woman from whom Marlene stole Lili Marleen

I love "Lili Marleen"! It is archetypically German, artless, yet deep and full of heavy melancholy. A young German soldier, Hans Leip, wrote the words 1915, in WWI.

"Marlene showing her loyalty to the 3rd Division."
I've never seen a more absurd euphemism. Loyalties indeed, my behind! When I walk my dogs in bad weather I hide my loyalties in green gum­boots.

To be honest, I do heartily dislike Marlene Dietrich. Was there really any NEED baring her legs to American GIs while her brothers were killed in Russia (metaphorically speaking)? No doubt whatsoever that it was right to support the American war effort, but it wouldn't have finished the war one day earlier had she stayed at home in Hollywood or had at least kept her legs covered. As it is, she appears as both, a war profiteer and an attention whore. So many Jews, who, different from her, HAD suffered, came back to Germany after the war, including Lucie Mannheim, another notable performer of yet another version recorded by the BBC in 1943. What effect did that pompous "...never on German soil again!" have, but some brownie points with the Americans? Germany had become a seventh-rate-entity when it came to arts and entertainment anyway. Gosh, WAS her anti-Germanism a cheap shot!

Here's the background: In 1940, a song appeared which, at first, nobody seemed to like. It was called "Lili Marleen" and Lale Andersen was the singer. Her feminine voice seemed somewhat incongrous for words, supposedly those of a soldier recalling the farewell from his girl in front of the barracks gate. After its launch, the record remained on the sales shelves. No one wanted to hear it.

By sheer chance, in 1941, "Lili Marleen" became the hallmark of the German armed forces radio station "Soldatensender Belgrad", broadcasting to the German occupation army in Yugoslavia.

The rest of the story is history. The slow, melancholic tune became addictive to all who listened to it, first the Germans from Spitzbergen to El Alamein. Later, people, soldiers, all over the world hummed the melody to themselves or sang out loud "Vor der Kaserne, vor dem großen Tor…" ("Outside the barracks, at the great big gate…"). In its melancholy, its artlessness and simplicity — the antithesis of dyke-drama-queen Marlene's version. And, as some might say, a voice of normality and humanness in the ferocity of war and thus so appealing to every soldier on both sides.

Unknown until then, the singer, Lale Andersen (Lieselotte Helene Berta Bunnenberg) born on March 23, 1905 in Bremerhaven, Bremen's seaport, became a star. A woman as unpretentious as the song, that led her into a legendary personal drama, when the borders between song and singer disappeared as it happens often if an artist is strongly identified with one performance only. For millions of listeners, Lale Andersen became Lili Marleen and the song for her both, her lucky charm and curse. However, at the height of her fame, Goebbels banned the singer from performing and from leaving the country because of her correspondence with Jewish emigrants in Switzerland. But in the meantime, the song had become so popular and the soldiers' demand for "their" Lili Marleen so high, that Lale Andersen was allowed to perform again after nine months.

Lale Andersen had considerable talents, one of them was the performance of folksongs in Plattdeutsch, the tongue of her native North Germany, but she continued after the war to sing Lili Marleen at every concert, and up unto her death, as if it were her only tune and her only talent. She sang it in other languages as well and it always made me smile. How can anybody sing as little as: "Outside the barracks…" and it is clear ALREADY that she is from Bremerhaven?

Lieselotte Helene Berta Bunnenberg, Lale Andersen to the world, died on a promotional tour in Vienna today, 35 years ago.

Norbert Schulze, who wrote the tune of "Lili Marleen", was (before the end of WWII, that is) a prolific composer of military marches, usually to aggressive texts. It is a sort of historical irony that this soft, un-martial song would be what mainly survived from his work. After the war he composed quite a few popular, though, somehow not surprisingly, unmilitary, tunes again and used to be, for many years, President of the GEMA, the only too-important German society for the protection of performing rights for composers, arrangers, authors and publishers. He died on October 14, 2002 in Bad Tölz at the age of 91.

The "Official Lili Marleen Page" contains several versions of the song, including the original version from 1939, Marlene Dietrich's version and the bitter parody recorded by the BBC in 1943, performed by Lucy Mannheim.

Jumping through The Hoop

Every language contains the words it needs. The German word gemütlich has only a very inadequate translation in cosy, as has Schadenfreude in spitefulness. I always think that is because Schadenfreude (i.e. gloating at other people's bad luck) isn't one of the main states of mind of the Anglo Saxons and because they have a different understanding of what is considered gemütlich. The term Gemüt, from which gemütlich is derived, is well nigh untranslatable because English speakers don't deal in soppiness, the simple term Körung needs at least a major historical essay about the role of governmental control in every aspect of German life to become understandable, and the German word Waldsterben has found its way into the English language presumably because English speakers don't seem to worry enough about it to coin their own term.

Last week, an interesting article by the author and Islam-critic Hans-Peter Raddatz was published in the Frankfurter Neue Presse. The headline "Zwischen Dialog und Dressur" alone is a manifesto and – virtually non-translatable. How can Dressur be translated? Between Dialogue and Dressage? Hardly, because this is not about horses and riding. Between Dialogue and Training then? Even less, because the English word training is not burdened with a negative overtone, whereas Dressur (in any other than a horsey context) is. Here we are talking about the kind of training to which – say – a dancing bear is subjected or a lion until he finally jumps through a hoop. I have chosen to translate "Dressurelite" as "hoop jumping elite". I could have as well termed it "dancing bear elite". Should somebody know the correct English term I would be grateful to receive it.

When it comes to the "dialogue with Islam", apart from the headscarf there is hardly any other topic that causes the same sort of stir like the building of mosques, which are supposed to turn Germany and Europe into a "Land of Peace". Not without force, a pressure group of "advisers", "agents" and other "experts" are propagating in the name of their organisations – party, foundation, university, church, media – the message of Islamic "tolerance", which is entitled to demand "respect" from the West.

This is ensured by the Islamic side as well, who has not just oil and money as convincing arguments. As the Turkish Ditib [Turkish-Islamic Union in Germany] told the Chancellor lately, it are the Islamic representatives on whom the security of the Federal Republic is depending. No wonder that the German pro-Islam pressure group performs successfully as one of those "hoop jumping elites" who are acting in the interest of the opposite side… [This] means, in effect, that the "dialogue" demanded and sponsored in this country is not a tool for discussion, but for education of the masses.

Therefore it becomes obvious why a super-organisation emerged, who are fending off any resistance against the call to jump through the hoop as "Islamophobia". This strategy, which ought to be rather called "demophobia" because it reduces "the people" to a racist bar room politicking mob, has, without doubt, its rewards. When it comes to the building of prayer rooms, the "silent minority" has, since 1970, jumped almost 3000 times through the ever-alike hoop called "tolerance" and "freedom of religion" in Germany alone.
[…]
The "hoop jumping elites" can be quite laid back about the fevered discussions, present and past, covering outsized mosques in Munich, Cologne and Frankfurt. All they need to know is that the nose ring "right wing extremism" works a treat when it comes to the effectiveness of their control language and the disciplinary action against the public.

Within this context, a treadmill as peculiar as efficient becomes obvious, a hamster wheel of intercultural trophy hunting, in which the "advisers" are battling for the favour-laurels Islam is awarding.

Even people critical of Islam and the mantra of multiculture seem to have grown weary of the ubiquitous anticipating obedience which has become the standard attitude towards minorities and their members, I certainly have, but the example Raddatz cites at the end of his article is rather frightening and should jolt even the most jaded bystander out of his lassitude. The laurel for a hoop-jumping effort of Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey The Greatest Show on Earth dimensions goes to the public prosecutor's office in Hamburg.

Following [the statement of the public prosecutor's office in Hamburg], a Muslim perpetrator "does not reject the national legal system because he is lacking a law-abiding disposition", but "because he feels the higher call of the faith, which he has to follow." This will have to lead to a "retreat of the penal law" should the conflict between the obligation to abide the law and a religious commandment result in an "emotional hardship compared to which the punishment for a criminal act will turn into a societal reaction, which is effusive and thus violating his human dignity."

And nobody laughed.

In plain terms: A call for abiding the law can potentially violate a Muslim's human dignity and any Muslim who appeals to his faith has carte blanche to commit any crime within the jurisdiction of this public prosecutor – the logic of a dancing bear.

About Michael Yon's Report -- Somewhat Belated

Thanks to Joel I was made aware that there is another report about one of those hard-to-believe atrocities the media (and not even just the mainstream media) seems to shun. I had covered one of those cases in April on the strength of Robert Spencer's (who had reported it first) authority, but made my readers later aware that the only source was taken down from the website.

Robert Spencer took his blog entry down as well, although, so he said, he trusted the source.

Now Michael Yon, an independent and respected war reporter and former Green Beret, covers the discovery of mass graves filled with decapitated male children outside of Baqubah at his blog.

Speaking through an American interpreter, Lieutenant David Wallach who is a native Arabic speaker, the Iraqi official related how al Qaeda united these gangs who then became absorbed into “al Qaeda.” They recruited boys born during the years 1991, 92 and 93 who were each given weapons, including pistols, a bicycle and a phone (with phone cards paid) and a salary of $100 per month, all courtesy of al Qaeda. These boys were used for kidnapping, torturing and murdering people.

At first, he said, they would only target Shia, but over time the new al Qaeda directed attacks against Sunni, and then anyone who thought differently. The official reported that on a couple of occasions in Baqubah, al Qaeda invited to lunch families they wanted to convert to their way of thinking. In each instance, the family had a boy, he said, who was about 11 years old. As LT David Wallach interpreted the man’s words, I saw Wallach go blank and silent. He stopped interpreting for a moment. I asked Wallach, “What did he say?” Wallach said that at these luncheons, the families were sat down to eat. And then their boy was brought in with his mouth stuffed. The boy had been baked. Al Qaeda served the boy to his family.

Soon after it appeared, I sent this to several German Islam-critical co-bloggers and writers and asked what they think of such a bit of news. I got not a single reply.

Why do those who otherwise freely write about so-called honour-killings, rape of Western girls by Muslim men, efforts to gain supremacy by building grotesquely inflated mosques in our cities and other shows of contempt towards our Western culture obviously stop here? A Google search with the terms "Michael Yon" Baqubah boy clocks up 19,300 hits, none of the first 50, after which I stopped looking, from the mainstream media, although, regarding their history of falling for canards and sloppy research, I wish the unavoidable WND had missed it as well.

Why is that? Does human nature as we know it, i.e. the average mind of a Westerner, not allow for the comprehension of such an atrocity? Can only pure evil understand something so stunningly depraved? Haven't the pictures from the liberated death camps in Germany and Poland taught us once and for all to what depravity human nature can be up? Even granted that was forgotten some time ago, has it been forgotten, too, already that Al Qaeda somewhat routinely cut off the heads of living human beings while chanting praise of their god -- and immortalising it all on video? Is it cowardice and political correctness even from those who usually do not shun open criticism of Islam and who would be horrified at the thought of being politically correct? Does the courage stop here?

But nobody stood up and called Michael Yon a liar either. (And if, I missed it.)

As the sage from Texas put it in a different context: "I've been reading Rudyard Kipling all my life. Nothing muslims do ever surprises me. It merely disgusts me."

I wish I could say she is wrong.

Conflicting Values

Have a look at Ilana Mercer's Barely A Blog.

Are animals, as libertarian thinking tells us, limited to their position as chattel under all circumstances? Is a case of dog fighting just "in the tut-tut class" or do we have a responsibility towards creation and can be hold accountable for how we treat our living, breathing, feeling chattel?

This topic is particularly interesting because conflicting values, such as property rights and responsibility for a fellow creature meet head-on here, something for which libertarian thinking has no answer. At least so I think.

There is an interesting discussion going on and some excellent points made from all sides of this many-faceted issue.

In Memoriam Peter Fechter

Or: "This is not our problem."

Many of my non-German readers will have never heard of Peter Fechter.

Who was Peter Fechter?

Peter Fechter was a young bricklayer from East Berlin. He had tried to flee from the GDR (German Democratic Republic) to the free West together with his friend Helmut Kulbeik by climbing over the Berlin Wall near Checkpoint Charlie.

When both had crossed the death strip and reached the six-foot-high barrier with barbed wire on top, border guards fired at them. Kulbeik managed to cross the Wall, Fechter was shot in the pelvis in full view of hundreds of witnesses. He fell back into the death strip where he remained in view of Western onlookers, journalists and the American military. Despite his screams for help, he received no medical assistance either from the East or the West side. The only bystander who made any effort to help Fechter was a West German policeman who dropped two first aid packages over the Wall.

According to a TIME Magazine report:

One conscience-stricken U.S. second lieutenant could stand it no longer, picked up the "hot line" telephone to Major General Albert Watson II. the U.S. commandant in West Berlin. Back came the order: "Lieutenant, you have your orders. Stand fast. Do nothing." Not knowing the reason for the Americans' inaction, an agonized crowd swirled around the command post crying: "For God's sake, go get him." When a German reporter asked why the American troops did not rescue Fechter one G.I. replied, "This is not our problem."

World War III was thus safely avoided and Peter Fechter bled to death within the hour. Today, 45 years ago. He was 18 years old.

Was justice done after the fall of the Berlin Wall?

In March 1997, two former East German border guards, Rolf Friedrich and Erich Schreiber, faced manslaughter charges for Fechter's death. They were both convicted, and sentenced to one year's imprisonment on probation.

The successor party of the SED, governing party of the East German dictatorship, can currently boast 8.4% in the German Bundestag (the federal parliament) and 6.1% in the European Parliament. In the federal states within the realm of the former GDR, they clock up a vote between 16.8% and 28.0%.

The official count of the Berlin public prosecutor knows of 270 deaths at the German-German border and the Berlin Wall. In 2005, the Senat, the Berlin city council, refused to elevate Peter Fechter's grave to the status of an Ehrengrab because such a status is confined to the circle of those "who deserve credit for services for Berlin and performed beyond Berlin's borders".

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My older blog entry A Collective Psychogram may be interesting in this context as well.