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    St. Borg de Chupacabras ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗStassa Edwards
    5/24/15 12:20pm

    Is there anything we can do to help even a little bit? Does anyone know?

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      thafaxSt. Borg de Chupacabras ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ
      5/24/15 12:22pm

      Build a time machine so we can go back and not invade Iraq in 2003.

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      St. Borg de Chupacabras ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗthafax
      5/24/15 12:24pm

      :( I’m not so smart unfortunately.

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    sowhatiswhat2Stassa Edwards
    5/24/15 12:32pm

    Before the Islamaphobes and racists show up (two groups that practically overlap for all intents and purposes), ISIS has about as much to do with Islam as AUM has to do with Buddhism and Peoples Temple to Christianity.

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      SSLaziosowhatiswhat2
      5/24/15 12:55pm

      I don’t see how. Muhammad was as much of a warmongering savage as these guys. Let’s not even get started on the Ottomans.

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      sowhatiswhat2SSLazio
      5/24/15 1:02pm

      You are going back to Mohammad and the Ottomans? Because other religions and empires were such a great group of people. It was “civilization” that committed the Holocaust. It was Christianity and Europe that did the WWI and WWII, it was Europe that did the most barbaric of colonial regimes. It was the United States that used nuclear weapons against civilian populations and did biological weapons testing on its soldiers more often than not, black men. It was the United States that bears direct responsibility for the horrors that passed in Iraq by invading it. Look in the mirror you fucking savage.

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    courtStassa Edwards
    5/24/15 12:28pm

    This is not a surprise nor is it new news. ISIS released a manifesto months ago justifying the sexual enslavement, rape, and torture of pre-pubescent girls. Another story which is getting a lot of press here in Dubai and other Gulf Countries is ISIS soldiers addiction to Captagon, an old school, high potency amphetamine-painkiller that fuels their rages. These people are animals, plain and simple.

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      veskacourt
      5/24/15 12:49pm

      Come, now. Even animals aren’t as cruel as these...actually, I’m not sure there ARE words to describe them.

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      Ladybug2court
      5/24/15 12:54pm

      Good grief. This is scary.

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    BonMorteStassa Edwards
    5/24/15 12:32pm

    Whenever a society collapses it seems inevitable that women bear the brunt of the horrors that follow. Men can consider themselves “lucky” they are among the dead in such conflicts, because for women or the elderly or weak, the suffering doesn’t end until death...sometimes not even then.

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      benjaminalloverBonMorte
      5/24/15 12:44pm

      These women have fates much worse than death.

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      BonMortebenjaminallover
      5/24/15 12:52pm

      I’d say so. Life can be no joy even at the best of times. At its worst it is a yoke that you can’t wait to throw off.

      I don’t think much of these comments though.

      “Send in the troops!”

      That always works out great. Only slightly more awesome than sanctions.

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    icreateburnerswhenkinjabreaksStassa Edwards
    5/24/15 12:24pm

    To be fair, who - other than literally every sentient being in the universe - could have predicted that US intervention in the Middle East would have horrifying unintended consequences?

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      veskaicreateburnerswhenkinjabreaks
      5/24/15 12:51pm

      The worst part is, even GWB, et. al., knew this was a likely outcome.

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      Bad_Cobbveska
      5/24/15 12:55pm

      I believe that the puppeteers behind Dubya could have predicted this outcome. Georgie himself, not so much, but to be fair I don't believe that GWB would be able to predict getting wet if he were to consider going outside in the rain, so I clearly don't have high expectations of him.

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    BlergStassa Edwards
    5/24/15 12:24pm

    . According to UN Action Against Sexual Violence in Conflict, the vast majority of casualties in today’s wars are among civilians, mostly women and children.

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      LexWBlerg
      5/24/15 2:01pm

      Yeah, and efforts need to be made, especially here in the West, to dispel the WW1/2-driven myth that conflicts mostly kill soldiers and young men. They do not. They mostly kill women and children.

      Our wars where most people who died were soldiers are the aberrations, not the norm.

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      mrasarethefuckingworstLexW
      5/24/15 4:23pm

      There is always some fucking MRA screeching about how more men die in wars, aren’t there? Aside from the fact that they’re straight-up wrong about that...

      Don’t they care about method of death? I wonder how many of them would choose to be gang-raped and set on fire rather than shot in the head.

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    Misty BerkowitzStassa Edwards
    5/24/15 1:09pm

    We are getting this news now in more horrific detail, but to some extent, we already knew how brutal and evil ISIS is, so why are idealistic kids running off to join them? Especially girls?! That's what I can't wrap my head around.

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      LexWMisty Berkowitz
      5/24/15 2:21pm

      Because the kids ideals aren’t your ideals. Also they’re kids.

      Not every ideal is equal - and the sort of kids running off to join them are not cool, well-off, well-adjusted Muslims (of whom I know many), they’re horny, repressed kids, who’ve been exposed to Western culture very heavily, and often were gang-members, wannabe rappers, etc., but also made to feel guilty about it by their parents etc., and who are offered this effective “way out”, where they get to:

      A) Live out all their ridiculous fantasies (which so many of us had or even have) about being some kind of badass fighting for a cause (“What are you rebelling against?” “Whaddya got?”), where they get guns, chicks, bling/loot, and importantly, the esteem and respect other men (“brotherhood”).

      B) Redeem themselves, in a way - because this is phrased as a religious deal, and one that is often directly in-line with the religion they were raised with, and had previously rather been rejecting, they are in a sense coming home.

      That’s a messy explanation, and I’d refine it if I had time, but basically it comes down to living out fantasies whilst getting let off for anything wrong they’ve done or will do.

      I’m looking at British kids who’ve joined up here, note, pretty much universally they are:

      1) From poor-ish backgrounds.

      2) From hardline Muslim backgrounds (even where the parents claim to be moderate, their dress, lifestyle, and choices of mosque call that into question, frankly - as a senior Muslim police officer was pointing out, actually).

      3) If male, were involved with crime/gangs.

      It’s not like we’re seeing this attract rich kids who just want to help people - this is a way out, as much as anything else.

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      mrasarethefuckingworstMisty Berkowitz
      5/24/15 4:27pm

      Because ISIS is lying. They’re running a successful PR campaign. Those sad (probably low IQ - let’s be honest) women will quickly find the truth when they get there and are immediately treated like sex slaves.

      I’ve never believed those female ISIS member twitter accounts. That’s all men. I doubt those men allow women to get online at all or even have phones.

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    Dances with PeepsStassa Edwards
    5/24/15 4:37pm

    I read an article, probably over a year ago, discussing young Islamic Arab men, and it noted that many of them become radicalized when they reach the age where most would be expected to marry and settle down. This has a lot of implications.

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      benjaminalloverStassa Edwards
      5/24/15 12:30pm

      “They do need help. But if the UN cannot protect their human rights, we would prefer these innocent girls be brought to Canada where they can recover and live in peace and freedom as human beings with dignity.”

      If they come to Canada, I will absolutely volunteer to help in any way I can. This is a humanitarian crisis, not a crisis that armies can solve.

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        Wendi MuseStassa Edwards
        5/24/15 12:38pm

        unfortunately, this is all standard procedure in war...the only difference is that we rarely get the full story on our side when we are the ones waging it (victims, who rarely get attention, tell a different story). and more unfortunately, it’s not unique to isis by any means. but it’s important to note that anyone who is a warhawk is far from feminist, especially when you consider the dire consequences armed conflict always has on women and children, many of them girls.

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          Wendi MuseWendi Muse
          5/24/15 12:39pm

          and by all of that, i mean that we cannot decouple our previous military missions, which stretch back centuries at this point, from their political effect (i.e. creating a vacuum for instability to thrive) and their social impact (women/girls bear the brunt of the chaos)

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          LexWWendi Muse
          5/24/15 2:07pm

          Being a generic warhawk is definitely anti-feminist.

          I would suggest, however, being generically anti-interventionist, and spending time recounting the woes of past wars, instead of trying to help people, is also definitely anti-feminist.

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