6/10/03
Okay, I lied last time about writing about something very interesting. It's the same crap. But here we are anyway.
Actually I was thinking about Chechnya. Here's some background off the Web:
During the Soviet era, Stalin, in order to maintain power and to prevent overthrow "by external powers manipulating internal ethnic groups", was pretty brutal in his control of the Chechen people. The Chechens were believe by Stalin to welcome Nazi-Germany if they recognized an independent Chechnya. This led to a mass deportation and relocation of Chechen people (and others) to Kazakhstan and Siberia. Around 800,000 people are said to have been relocated this way. Perhaps 100,000 or more, of these people died due to the extreme conditions.
Chechnya declared independence in 1991 after the collapse of the Soviet Union. In a move that looked as though Russia wished to show the world it could also do what the US did to Iraq, it attacked Chechnya. The 1994-96 war left 80,000 casualties. The Russian assault devastated Grozny and other parts of Chechnya. However, the Chechens defeated Russia revealing how poor Russian military capabilities were.
I was thinking about how viciously cruel Russians (and Chechens alike) seem to be. Here in my nice, warm, torture-free basement I don't have any right to pass judgment. However, I've seen the photos. I've read the accounts of torture and abuse. I've seen the infamous decapitation video clip [Please don't ask me where to find it. I know being so mysterious makes it all the more enticing, but believe me, you truly don't want your soul darkened by seeing this atrocity.] If a small portion of what I've seen and read is true then hell has set up another franchise operation just outside of Turkey.
I'm not saying it's any worse than it is in Sierra Leone, Mogadishu, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Basra and other places we've all heard about. But Chechnya seems to have the edge in the horrifying department for me. I think Mr. Rogers has something to do with it.
There's an episode of Mr. Roger's Neighborhood that has footage of Fred in Russia visiting the set of a Russian children's program. You really should try to see this show. Mr. Rogers is standing in the middle of a park with his hand inside his Daniel Tiger puppet trying to lure Russian children into coming over and stroking his little kitty-cat that wears a watch. Now, most of us all know Daniel Tiger and think he's something special. The problem is I'm sure to a Russian kid Daniel Tiger looks like something a child molester might have pieced together from parts of toys he gathered from his victims. It creeped me out a little. Especially when the only Russian word Fred knew was, spasibo (or thank you) and he kept saying over and over again in his weird Daniel Tiger voice.
The point is, I can't make the leap. How do little boys, who grow up watching shows similar to Mr. Rogers Neighborhood, wind up in a Russian military uniform arbitrarily executing entire families?
I know there are a host of explanations. I know that plenty of Americans have perpetrated horrible acts under the auspices of military orders. Yeah, I remember the diorama I made depicting a Civil War battle field (lots of red clay). And it's not just the Russian soldiers but the Chechens are torturing and brutalizing captured Russian civilians and soldiers alike. But right now it's easy for me to try and relate to the boys who probably grew up watching a show similar to Mr. Rogers Neighborhood. They wound up killing their neighbors. And that isn't history, it's happening right at this very moment.
I'm sure you know where I'm going next.
I think about the lives of my children. I think about all the things from which I want to protect them. And then I see photos of dead people that look like the lady that lives across the street, or the guy at the supermarket and I realize just how weak the bubble of protection I can create probably will be.
Whoa. I feel like I just woke up from a trance and I've been channeling Bono for that past six paragraphs. Sorry about that...
See, this is why I try not to write about anything other than trips to Grandma and Granpa's and how the cat keeps sticking her ass in my face every morning. And if it weren't for the fact that I'm lazy and I've already invested half an hour in this post I would have deleted it and started over. Not that I haven't done that in the past. You should read some of the morose turds I've typed out in the name of this Web site that never make it to the server. So don't expect to see crap like this here anymore. I've learned my lesson.
It's all Jon's fault. He wrote and said that if I wasn't dead then he was disappointed because I wasn't doing a good job of keeping up-to-date. Squeeze me like that you get Chechnya.