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U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Afghan Allies’ Abuse of Boys

nytimes.com

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Re: U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Afghan Allies’ Abuse of Boys

#81

Post by erikb »

steven2012 wrote: post #41
erikb wrote: post #7

"Afghan soldiers told to ignore American Allies' eating pork" Well, reading this you might think "how can that compare to raping boys? Boys are human beings and human beings have rights, just like you and me? But at the same time a Muslim may consider refusing to eat pork a law by god which is way higher than anything considering humans. The point I try to make is this: In an intercultural environment you need to acc…

Your analogy is utterly wrong and broken, because you are mistakenly calling raping young boys "cultural". It's not cultural, and it's not something that happens across all of Afghanistan, otherwise all Afghani males could be considered pedophiles. It's a select group of pedophiles that have attained military status such that they won't be prosecuted for their crimes. That's not culture, that's corruption. It's the s…

>you are mistakenly calling raping young boys "cultural".

I'm not.

Re: U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Afghan Allies’ Abuse of Boys

#82

Post by rjsw »

6d0debc071 wrote: post #74
6d0debc071 wrote: post #36

Things might have gone better if they'd been told to ignore drugs instead.

I honestly don't understand why this was down-voted. The planting of opium formed a major part of the Afghan economy - roughly 50%[1] of their GDP in fact - and outlawing parts of that economy is both expensive - the US spent $7.6 billion trying to stop it[2] - and likely to alienate the people who you rely on for intelligence. That doesn't mean that the intelligence will stop coming, it's worse than that. It means i…

We also have a worldwide shortage of opiate painkillers for use in surgery, it could have been a lot better to just buy the opium from the growers.

Re: U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Afghan Allies’ Abuse of Boys

#83

Post by jscheel »

coldtea wrote: post #16
afarrell wrote: post #4

This has been known since 2009. This US Army Human Terrain Team report is interesting reading, if you find strange & violent forms of misogyny and pederasty morbidly fascinating https://info.publicintelligence.net/HTT-PashtunSexuality.pdf """ Another example of cultural misinterpretations of Islamic tenants, bent to support homosexuality over heterosexuality, comes from a U.S. Army medic completing a year-long tour i…

> She and her male colleagues were approached by a local gentleman seeking advice on how his wife could become pregnant. When it was explained to him what was necessary, he reacted with disgust and asked “How could one feel desire to be with a woman, who God has made unclean, when one could be with a man, who is clean? Surely this must be wrong. The dialogue sounds fishy and constructed to me. Local "gentlemen" surel…

Remember not to place these men in the same socio-economic and cultural categories you grew up in. This comes from the same culture that believes it is not homosexual to penetrate another man (receiving is what makes you effeminate to them). IIRC, this was the same for pederasty in ancient Greece.

Re: U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Afghan Allies’ Abuse of Boys

#85

Post by MichaelApproved »

jacquesm wrote: post #63
MichaelApproved wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't be rude.

He's not rude, at a guess that's quite restrained (compared to what my version of that comment would be anyway).

From the guidelines

> When disagreeing, please reply to the argument instead of calling names. E.g. "That is idiotic; 1 + 1 is 2, not 3" can be shortened to "1 + 1 is 2, not 3."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Afghan Allies’ Abuse of Boys

#86

Post by ZeroGravitas »

theworstshill wrote: post #84

Anybody else here remembers the picture of Reagan with the Taliban and a heading along the lines of "These gentlemen are the moral equivalent of our founding fathers". I am not surprised in the slightest.

I'm not sure when the Taliban officially started, but it's probably a bit after Reagan was involved in funding the Mujahadeen.

Plus, the individuals mentioned in the linked story are actually warlords that are fighting against the Taliban, in conjunction with the US forces. This is complicated further by the fact that I think many of the warlords switch sides between Taliban, US & freelance depending on whatever seems to be the most lucrative at any point in time.

Re: U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Afghan Allies’ Abuse of Boys

#87

Post by crpatino »

erikb wrote: post #44
crpatino wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not that I disagree with you on the morals of this comment, but a lot of confusion would be avoided if everybody just accepted that the US is a normal empire; an empire with geopolitical interest in the region and every reason to keep happy the cadre of monsters they got themselves as alleys. It is not that they hate the local population, but they don't gain anything by defending them and may loose a lot by playing t…

That's also a good point. Gaining access to trade routes and natural ressources might be more important than protecting innocents to the agenda givers.

Or preventing unfriendly third parties from gaining access to such resources. Both China and Russia are better positioned geographically to take advantage of those territories.

Re: U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Afghan Allies’ Abuse of Boys

#88

Post by crpatino »

LoSboccacc wrote: post #57
crpatino wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has to make you wonder if the Taliban have not been the "good guys" from the very beginning?

eh, memory is such a short and controversial thing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqWjJdXKIXA mind you, there is no such thing as good guys, the groups which we don't pay to kill the others are generally pictured as the bad guys by the media. That's what makes the Syria situation so hairy, for example. which one are the good guys to help? There are terrifying claims on both sides by now, because at the beginning the…

Right, my bad... I think I did not made myself clear. It is not that the Talibans are angels.

I was thinking more along the lines of Ender's Game... when at the end it is reveled that it is humans, not insectoids, who are playing the role of the genocidal, invading, alien force.

Re: U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Afghan Allies’ Abuse of Boys

#89

Post by afarrell »

jscheel wrote: post #83
coldtea wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> She and her male colleagues were approached by a local gentleman seeking advice on how his wife could become pregnant. When it was explained to him what was necessary, he reacted with disgust and asked “How could one feel desire to be with a woman, who God has made unclean, when one could be with a man, who is clean? Surely this must be wrong. The dialogue sounds fishy and constructed to me. Local "gentlemen" surel…

Remember not to place these men in the same socio-economic and cultural categories you grew up in. This comes from the same culture that believes it is not homosexual to penetrate another man (receiving is what makes you effeminate to them). IIRC, this was the same for pederasty in ancient Greece.

I believe Rome too. I've wondered for a while if this is a long holdover from the short-lived Alexandrian empire.
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