RoPma

September 7, 2004 3:41 PM

Russian TV broadcasts siege video: [BBC link: RealPlayer/RealAlternative/Windows MPC] SFW
Unknown provenance of footage, but clearly genuine. Terrorist uses 'Dead Man's Brake' switch on a bomb, also shots of Hoop Bombs'. Beware: NewsFilter
posted by dash_slot- (39 comments total)

I couldn't get the second, 'watch the video' javascript link on this page to work - but it will probably call up a Real window for you.
posted by dash_slot- at 3:44 PM on September 7, 2004

Yeah, it's on CNN too.
posted by dhoyt at 4:14 PM on September 7, 2004

Except on CNN the video actually works.
posted by smackfu at 4:54 PM on September 7, 2004

The sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach as I watch this is indescribable. I have two daughters, 1 and 4 years old.

This nightmare hell that many thousands of people will never recover from; physically, mentally, emotionally.

I wonder if there is worse to come...
posted by erebora at 8:35 PM on September 7, 2004

Our president misspeaks and it warrants a 90+ comment thread.

Extremists commit the ultimate atrocity of murdering a school full of children and Metafilter is silent.

No one steps forward to condemn the killers, not in this thread or any of the others.

Yet something like Bush's benign quote has everyone wetting their pants and fighting to squeeze in one more "me-too" comment.

Why?

Putin was right--these are not "freedom fighters". These are ruthless, soulless sociopaths. No more, no less.


So why the silence, guys?
posted by dhoyt at 9:05 PM on September 7, 2004

So why the silence, guys?

Oh for Christ's sake. Because these are ruthless, soulless sociopaths. Is everyone required to post a me-too that they're also opposed to ruthless, soulless sociopaths?
posted by Armitage Shanks at 9:20 PM on September 7, 2004

Why the silence? Vast left-wing conspiracy.
posted by eatitlive at 9:25 PM on September 7, 2004

I would prefer a respectful silence over a thread that seeks to exploit another horrible event for some political pissing match.
You're the one that wants to pull Bush into it.
I was up till after 4:00 a.m. watching it live and was sickened for the rest of the day, especially watching the emphasis on weathermen standing in the hurricane that the networks chose to go with.
I didn't really feel like arguing with people on the internet about it.
posted by 2sheets at 9:25 PM on September 7, 2004

It's idiotic to judge MetaFilter by the number of comments on a particular topic. This was a horrible atrocity and honestly, I don't feel like I can say anything that does justice to how much grief and pain has been caused by those madmen. I'm sure a lot of people feel the same way I do.

But GW Bush's gaffe was just that - a stupid gaffe and full of comedic value. Of course everyone's going to jump on it and one up - it's close to home and it's funny and he is going to get snarked relentlessly for it. Why not? It's par for the course for public figures in the US.

But if you are hinting that, somehow, MeFites are on the side of the Chechen terrorists only because they hate Bush so much ... well, I'm not sure what to say to that other than it seems pretty small-minded and foolish to think other people are that small-minded and foolish.

Great posts on this site often get small numbers of comments and stupid NewsFilter posts often turn into the 100+ comment monsters. The number of comments often has an inverse value to the worthiness of a post.

Do you want to see chants of "Wait till Spetsnaz snipes these fuckers" or "Kick their asses"? I'm not sure where the 101st Keyboarders are, but I'm sure they are somewhere chanting something along those lines.

In the end, does any number of angry denunciations mean anything to the families who lost their loved ones?
posted by rks404 at 9:30 PM on September 7, 2004

> So why the silence, guys?

Because this fills me with rage, and rage makes me destructive and stupid. I already feel guilty enough about that. So stop slamming your fist, and just let there be silence, if need be. Don't tell me what to believe, what to say, what do do. Not now. We've got the rest of our lives to point fingers.

Just let there be silence for a time, while inside I scream.

(on preview, precisely what 2sheets and rks404 were getting at.)
posted by SteelyDuran at 9:32 PM on September 7, 2004

God this sucks - a Russian school got slaughtered and for some reason we're talking about how mean everyone is to Bush again. AmericanPoliticsFilter anyone?

Fuck Bush - I feel bad for the families.

I totally fell for it too. Feel free to kick me for being troll-bait.
posted by rks404 at 9:34 PM on September 7, 2004

(I couldn't get the video to work b/c of my biz's crap videoplayer setup, so I've nothing to say. Also had nothing to say in the Bush thread, where I haven't posted.)
posted by onlyconnect at 9:38 PM on September 7, 2004

Berate me if it makes you feel better.

It wasn't a "troll", it was an honest question about why people hesitate to express either grief or condemnation when something like this happens. No one's saying you're on the side of the Chechens or part of a conspiracy. That's silly. I just noticed there have been multiple threads on this subject so far, yet no one has chosen to condemn the perps in order to (understandably) release anger. Say what you want, but that seemed strange to me, and still does.

And yeah, it was also strange to me that so much energy could be expended on a fluff thread while this one remained empty. I do appreciate explanations like rsk404's, however "idiotic" he considers my questions to be.
posted by dhoyt at 10:02 PM on September 7, 2004

-- So why the silence, guys?

Because some of us can't view the video on our Macs or on our PCs.

Can't comment on what you can't see.
posted by pixelgeek at 10:11 PM on September 7, 2004

So why the silence, guys?

Sometimes actions speak louder than words.
posted by azazello at 10:12 PM on September 7, 2004

Oh for Christ's sake. Because these are ruthless, soulless sociopaths. Is everyone required to post a me-too that they're also opposed to ruthless, soulless sociopaths?

Numerous times have I heard: "So where are MeFi's mouth-foaming righties? Why aren't the condeming this outrage? [Insert outrage]" But it's a nice try.

</bush>


Putin was right--these are not "freedom fighters". These are ruthless, soulless sociopaths. No more, no less.

They most certainly are. Sadly, I fear Putin is secretly ecstatic about all of this. This is his chance at another power grab, driving Russia back to the "good old days." But will he bring better security? I doubt it.
posted by Krrrlson at 10:18 PM on September 7, 2004

No one steps forward to condemn the killers, not in this thread or any of the others.

Oh really?
posted by dig_duggler at 10:27 PM on September 7, 2004

Numerous times have I heard: "So where are MeFi's mouth-foaming righties? Why aren't the condeming this outrage? [Insert outrage]" But it's a nice try.

Where did dhoyt say that his observation only applied to left-leaning MeFi members? Why would you choose to make that distinction?
posted by Armitage Shanks at 10:55 PM on September 7, 2004

> It wasn't a "troll", it was an honest question about why people hesitate to express either grief or condemnation when something like this happens.

Raaaaaaugh! Graaaaaaaaaaaagh!
posted by SteelyDuran at 11:02 PM on September 7, 2004

I just noticed there have been multiple threads on this subject so far, yet no one has chosen to condemn the perps in order to (understandably) release anger.

One reason people may be more likely to express sorrow than anger is because they know that anger will be used by wingnuts to justify their own agenda.
posted by Armitage Shanks at 11:08 PM on September 7, 2004

Our president misspeaks and it warrants a 90+ comment thread.

Extremists commit the ultimate atrocity of murdering a school full of children and Metafilter is silent.

Bush supposedly represents those of us who are Americans. Your argument is like a kid telling his mommy, "But this boy in the paper killed somebody, all I did was steal your vodka and punch somebody! Why aren't you yelling about him!!"

Also, metafilter isn't silent on the subject.
posted by callmejay at 11:28 PM on September 7, 2004

No one's saying you're on the side of the Chechens or part of a conspiracy. That's silly.

But somehow "you guys don't feel bad that those terrorists were shooting escaping children in the back" is not as silly? Because that's the implication of your original post.

Anyway, the short answer, if you can't figure this out by yourself, is that no one will get to vote either for or against terrorists staging such incidents in the future. Those of you in the US will be voting as to whether Bush will remain a daily MeFi feature for the next four years.
posted by clevershark at 11:41 PM on September 7, 2004

It wasn't a "troll", it was an honest question about why people hesitate to express either grief or condemnation when something like this happens.

You're back-pedaling. You put up a loaded post with some clear implications (as other MeFites noted) and now you're backing down because you got called on it. Honestly, I don't much care about baiting the lefties on MeFi because, well, we're all big kids here.

But the galling part is how cavalierly you invoke the horror and bloodshed of a few hundred murdered children and somehow make Bush the sympathetic victim. "Oh those poor children were murdered by terrorists, and President Bush still can't catch a break from MetaFilter."

It's a sad state of affairs when we have when a terrorist outrage and all we can worry about is why our pet candidate isn't getting the love we think he deserves on our favorite website.

I can only wonder how we look to the rest of the world.
posted by rks404 at 12:08 AM on September 8, 2004

Frankly, I'm surprised Russian TV released what little video they did. Still, I assume there's much more footage we'll either see later or never.

It's probably hypocritical to state... but I'd rather not see any more than what's already been released... despite my extreme dislike of censorship.

The only positive I can pull from this is that it hopefully pushes some into researching the situation between Russia and Chechnya...
posted by cinematique at 12:53 AM on September 8, 2004

Extremists commit the ultimate atrocity of murdering a school full of children and Metafilter is silent.

You, sir, are a fucking moron.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 1:51 AM on September 8, 2004

I was going to say something emotional here, but after the little spit-war going on above it seems neither appropriate nor worth the effort.
posted by Hogshead at 2:18 AM on September 8, 2004

-- So why the silence, guys?

Cos Miguel was right?

Personally I think people cannot process the full horror of this, it's not like a denial, it's like a defence mechanism.
posted by fullerine at 4:10 AM on September 8, 2004

Why the silence on this? Because I'm generally for independence and autonomy for people who want it - but in this case their methods of achieving it are horrifying. The internal conflict there renders me incapable of saying anything. I'd love to view the Chechnyans as freedom-fighters, but at the moment terrorism - real terrorism, like 9/11 and other real atrocities before the word lost its meaning - seems to be ruling that effort.

Freedom: good
Terrorism: bad
Situation: complicated

. . . means I'm feeling trapped and more than a little confused by what's going on (dhartung's post helped a lot, thanks Dan) so there isn't much I can intelligently say, dhoyt, and I'm still not sure how I feel about all this. This isn't the Palestinians getting off one suicide bomb for every five Hellfire missles that land in their backyard where one can honestly make an argument of reciprocity and having to fight the war on poorer terms due to lack of resources/training - hostage-taking and the mass slaughter of children by terrorists (who want freedom?) points towards a very nasty ethical morass that I haven't worked out yet. Neither, I suspect, have a lot of other people.
posted by Ryvar at 5:37 AM on September 8, 2004

To change the subject here, does anyone have any thoughts as to how Putin should respond to this attack? Join forces in the "war on terror"? Build a giant wall around Chechnya and say "You're on your own"? Bomb the hell out of them again?

(Somehow, I get the feeling it will be the latter.)
posted by fungible at 8:17 AM on September 8, 2004

now you're backing down because you got called on it. Honestly, I don't much care about baiting the lefties on MeFi because, well, we're all big kids here

I got "called" on nothing. I rephrased my initial questions more sensitively in hopes of soliciting a more meaningful response, but I don't back-pedal on the intent. And since I've never identified with either The Left or The Right, and since I didn't bring Left vs Right into the arguement, and since I don't know a whit about your personal politics, I'm perplexed as to how you turned this into "baiting the lefties".

No one said anyone was being "mean" to Bush. It could have been any fluff topic about any politician. The point is that so much outrage is expressed on MeFi daily over silly things. When something truly gruesome like this happens, it would be natural to say, "I hope those bastards spend the rest of their life in prison" as part of the purging process. When there's total absence of that, it seems strange to me, as I stated before. I think I'm allowed to be curious.

You, sir, are a fucking moron.

You, sir, are not capable of expressing something as specific and difficult as what Ryvar said, so you reach for desperate insults. Thanks for your proud contribution to the discussion.

As I said, berate me if it makes you feel better. I'm a big boy, I can take it.
posted by dhoyt at 9:18 AM on September 8, 2004

Some things Mefi does very well, and one of those is snarky/funny comments on things that are ripe for the snarking, like the latest Bushism.

One thing that Mefi may not do as well is to demonstrate depth of feeling, especially if you're just going by the number of comments. In a situation like Beslan, what the fuck is there to say? It's nothing but grief and despair, and just because there aren't endless iterations of 'God, this is so terrible' in a thread doesn't mean that people aren't overwhelmed by feeling.

Often grief on Metafilter is symbolized by posting a single dot, or line of dots. It means 'There are no words". That pretty much sums it up, I think.
posted by jokeefe at 9:40 AM on September 8, 2004

I'm with erebora. Just the desciption of the video brought me near to tears. This is unspeakable, and the perpetrators are vile.

dhoyt, it's funny to post on the Bush says something funny thread and sad to post here. Number of posts is not a valid indicator of thread quality or the feelings of Mefites.
posted by theora55 at 10:12 AM on September 8, 2004

Speaking of berating, what's with berating MetaFilter for it's lack of condemnation?


You withhold condemnation of the lunatics who took hundreds of children hostage, but you're experiencing much pants-wetting because of a US Media which has, in fact, been giving this plenty of coverage. Fascinating. And Typical. And Pitiful.
posted by dhoyt at 8:55 AM PST on September 3

So you've found a way to totally evade condemning extremists who murdered a school full of children, yet reserve plentiful criticism for a US media which did, in fact, cover the story in its entirety. I guess feigning outrage is a bonafide lifestyle-choice for some. Good luck with that. Keep it off the front page, though, would you?
posted by dhoyt at 12:25 AM PST on September 4

Our president misspeaks and it warrants a 90+ comment thread.
Extremists commit the ultimate atrocity of murdering a school full of children and Metafilter is silent.
No one steps forward to condemn the killers, not in this thread or any of the others.
Yet something like Bush's benign quote has everyone wetting their pants and fighting to squeeze in one more "me-too" comment.
...
So why the silence, guys?
posted by dhoyt at 9:05 PM PST on September 7


three requests for condemnation over three threads over four days. So much commentary does give the appearance of trying to provoke a reaction. If you are truly interested in why there are different number of comments to various posts, it might be worthy of MeTa post where discussions like that are normal. But commenting on Bush's verbal gaffes in the midst of such horrific developments seems incredibly insensitive and narrow-minded.

on preview: eh, theora and jokeefe just said it succintly and without being inflammatory - much better than I was able to. So with that, I am outta here!
posted by rks404 at 10:35 AM on September 8, 2004

commenting on Bush's verbal gaffes in the midst of such horrific developments seems incredibly insensitive and narrow-minded.

I agree.

Perhaps you should tell that to the 90+ posters who participated in said thread.
posted by dhoyt at 10:42 AM on September 8, 2004

Where did dhoyt say that his observation only applied to left-leaning MeFi members? Why would you choose to make that distinction?

dhoyt said nothing of the sort, I brought it up. Patly because you are always quite vocal on the subject of Bush, whereas with this topic, I am to somehow infer your opinion without your participation.
posted by Krrrlson at 11:27 AM on September 8, 2004

commenting on Bush's verbal gaffes in the midst of such horrific developments seems incredibly insensitive and narrow-minded

In between this topic and the Bush gaffe topic, there were also posts on surfing, an Arnie iTunes link, and "Big Dick Lit". Were they all insensitive, or only the one about Bush? If the Bush gaffe comments had taken place in this thread, I'd see your point, but otherwise, I'm genuinely mystified by why that particular thread is deserving of condemnation.

Patly because you are always quite vocal on the subject of Bush, whereas with this topic, I am to somehow infer your opinion without your participation.

You're having trouble inferring my opinion on the subject of people kidnapping and killing children? I'm with rks404. This thread looks more like a failed smear attempt all the time. And that's truly insensitive.
posted by Armitage Shanks at 11:56 AM on September 8, 2004

This thread looks more like a failed smear attempt all the time.

Uh huh. It's a big frame-up.

Remind us again who's being "smeared"?

All those outspoken militant Chechen MeFites?

Eh?
posted by dhoyt at 12:16 PM on September 8, 2004

Let it go, dhoyt.
posted by jokeefe at 2:22 PM on September 8, 2004

Why the silence?

Well, speaking for me: because I expressed my grief by crying, you prick. The thought of just one of those children going through a split second of this horror filled me with such wordless rage -- such rage and grief and horror all at once -- that words fucking failed me. I was perfectly willing to debate in one of the other threads the sub-issue of whether or not the horror was, in fact, sufficiently considered "big news" in the U.S. as the situation was unfolding, but I was unable (and uninterested, freankly) to try to give voice to the deeper feelings engendered by this unspeakable crime against humanity. And for that, you think that I (and others) don't condemn what happened? I mean, seriously: Do you really believe the horror doesn't speak for itself? Do you really think we all must line up and explicitly clarify that each of us is against the tactic of kidnapping 1000+ mothers and children, tormenting them for days, then blowing them up or shooting them in the back? Do you really think so little of the rest of us that you require such public declarations, just to make sure?

So let me know if that's good enough for you, dhoyt; otherwise, I'll be sure to take a picture of myself the next time I start crying over the situation (I've been in tears about it off and on for days -- it's sure to happen again pretty soon). Or better yet, want me to email you directly? I had a terrible nightmare about children being tortured the night the news of this broke -- would you like me to send you the details? And oh, I'm sure I should add that I condemn the torture of children, too. In the strongest possible terms. Just in case that wasn't fucking clear.
posted by scody at 3:47 PM on September 8, 2004 [1 favorite]