Category: The Dish

Torture and America

A reader writes:

Again from "Band of Brothers", page 250

"It is worth pausing here to see the Americans as conquerors through the microcosm of # Company. They took what they wanted , but by no means did they rape, loot, pillage, and burn their way through Germany. If they did not respect property rights, in the sense that they commandeered their nightly billets without compensation, at least when they Germans moved back in after they left, the place was more or less intact. Of course there were some rapes, some mistreatment of individuals Germans, and some looting, but it is a simple fact to state that other conquering armies in WWII, perhaps most of all the Russians, but including the Japanese and German, acted differently."

Indoctrinated since birth in the idea that America is different, there aren’t words to express the anguish that I feel that my country now finds itself in the position of saying "But the other guys torturers are much worse than our torturers."

Arab Youth and the West

Well they love pop music:

"If you look at 10, 20 years ago, the Middle East was one of those few places where parents and children enjoyed the same music – and today there is that generation gap that is forming for the first time in the Middle East," he says.

One of those who spearheaded this change is the Beiruti singer, Yuri Mrakadi. As an unplugged version of his biggest hit, Arabiyon Arab ("I am an Arab") plays in his snug studio in an old apartment in east Beirut, he recalls how he helped shake things up a few years back. "Because I came up with red glasses and I had bleached hair and I was on guitar and I had like these jeans, I was representing my generation," he says.

A Muslim country where kids bleach their hair is a sign of hope.