Gee... After seeing this, I wonder why the Taliban have the support of the populace in Afghanistan.
The same people that are trying fleeing the country?
U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults
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Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
It’s worse that it’s not “out of the norm” than if it was an isolated incident.
....was only saying that this video doesn't prove it was innocent lives....
Since the the actual drone operator is claiming that they were innocent, then it seems strange to insist that they could have been combatants based on no evidence?
Here is another reversal comic/satire about killing civilians:
https://thenib.com/yemen-bombs-yet-another-wedding-in-americ...
Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults
#43I wonder if Facebook Twitter etc. banning violent and bloody content has prevented the public from protesting these things more widely. It is well known that TV broadcasts of Vietnam led to outrage growing against that war.
Indeed it was. It is a potent infoweapon. Israel tried hard to prevent release of news coverage with blown to bits Palestinian children on every silly pretext, including "gory content." Yet, when it were blown to bits Israeli children from bombings, they were all over CNN. The world's outrage is clearly not poweless.
Israeli media and the state doesn't release gory pictures of their dead children from terrorist attacks for propaganda, out of respect for their citizens. Palestinian Media and Hamas have absolutely no problem releasing footage of dead children to manipulate you on the other hand, no matter how out of context, old, fake, or even children they accidentally killed with failed rockets. They know you want to root for the underdog!
Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults
#44I wonder if Facebook Twitter etc. banning violent and bloody content has prevented the public from protesting these things more widely. It is well known that TV broadcasts of Vietnam led to outrage growing against that war.
Did they broadcast violent and bloody content from there? Genuine question. The downside to fb/Twitter etc allowing bloody/violent content would be that you’d get gore trolls and it would turn into /b
They did. Facebook, and Twiter both have plenty of it. The enforcement is obviously very selective.
The selective enforcement is much harder to prove than selective endorsement, and much sneakier at influencing the public opinion.
Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults
#45This reads like an AI-generated translation. It looks like the source that they're plagiarizing is this Daily Mail article:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9924567/US-drone-pi...
The points of difference have a strong smell of machine translation. E.g. "Killing for the sake of killing" turns into "I’ll kill you for the killing"; "Connecting Vets" becomes "Veterinary connection".
@dang This article should probably replace the submitted URL (edit: or alternatively, that article in the top reply comments)
related discussion thread: (identifying abuse of machine translation in published journal papers)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28107614 ("Tortured phrases: A dubious writing style emerging in science")
Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults
#46Gee... After seeing this, I wonder why the Taliban have the support of the populace in Afghanistan.
It seems like the general population very largely don't support the Taliban, but for whatever reasons the urban populations aren't willing or able to stand up a credible defence.
I suspect the problem is the Taliban are 'only' instituting Islamic law. It's hard to fire up a Muslim population against implementing, er, Islam even if they are against the actual resulting policies.
Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
Indeed it was. It is a potent infoweapon. Israel tried hard to prevent release of news coverage with blown to bits Palestinian children on every silly pretext, including "gory content." Yet, when it were blown to bits Israeli children from bombings, they were all over CNN. The world's outrage is clearly not poweless.
Israeli media and the state doesn't release gory pictures of their dead children from terrorist attacks for propaganda, out of respect for their citizens. Palestinian Media and Hamas have absolutely no problem releasing footage of dead children to manipulate you on the other hand, no matter how out of context, old, fake, or even children they accidentally killed with failed rockets. They know you want to root for the…
> Israeli media and the state doesn't release gory pictures of their dead children from terrorist attacks for propaganda, out of respect for their citizens.
Please, I want to be proven wrong here
Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults
#48I wonder if Facebook Twitter etc. banning violent and bloody content has prevented the public from protesting these things more widely. It is well known that TV broadcasts of Vietnam led to outrage growing against that war.
Pretty sure the protests during Vietnam were just as large, if not more so.
Journalism finds a way, like internet, and genetically modified dinosaurs.
Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults
#49Is it cynical to think this was intentionally leaked to boost support for withdrawing from Afghanistan?
Because spending trillions of $ on war instead of other things isn't enough.
Re: U.S. drone pilot leaks footage reveals accidental killing of children and adults
#50Can someone explain the origins of the slang for 'charger'? That one would not occur to me.
We didn't use this term in Iraq, so I wouldn't call it "military jargon for child" like the article does.
It is common for units to come up with code words for various things, especially when the topic is emotionally charged or could be used for propaganda or intel. For example, almost nobody would use the term "FKIA" over the radio, even on a secure channel; they might say "flowers" instead.