Santa brought me The Dark Knight DVD, which I was anxiously awaiting. I saw the movie back in July on opening night, but not since then. As I watched it again into the wee hours of Dec. 26, I was reminded of its (intentional or not) pro-Bush stance regarding the war on terror.
In the movie, Alfred tries to help Bruce Wayne understand the Joker by telling a story from his youth. Alfred and others were in the Burmese jungle trying to help some locals find out who was stealing their precious stones. During their search, the group found a child playing with some of these stones. How was this possible? It turned out that the bandit had been pilfering the stones merely for sport and then tossing them. Their value held no interest for him.
The moral of the story is that some people in this world do things with no rhyme or reason, but rather because they can, because they're disruptive ... because it drives rational people crazy trying to figure out what these bandits "want" in exchange for stopping their disruptive behavior. Alfred explains to Bruce that, like the Joker, sometimes there's no way to deal with these people rationally or logically, because that's not how they think. They do what they do because it's fun for them to cause chaos.
Alfred's discourse is clearly an allegory for al-Qaida, or Hamas, or any other terrorist group you wish to name. They can't be reasoned with. You can't negotiate with them. They aren't looking for you to give them something in exchange for going away ... no, they want to kill us because their radical teachings have shown them that we are vile sinners who must either be converted to Muslim or exterminated.
However, the will of the U.S. government and its citizenry, however, is resolute, and won't be bullied. The Bush Administration understood this immediately after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks against the United States, and logically determined that the only recourse was to fight fire with more fire.
What's interesting about Alfred's story, however, is how it ended. Bruce asks whether Alfred's group ever caught the bandit and how. Alfred turns to him and says, emotionlessly, "We burned down the forest."
The Bush Administration never went this far. In fact, instead of concentrating all its fury against the al-Qaida strongholds in Afghanistan, it inexplicably chose to make Iraq the primary focus of its military operations. Personally, I've always suspected that this was for two reasons: 1) to continue the work that President Bush (41) never finished, and to avenge him for Saddam al-Hussein's assassination attempt; and 2) to make Iraq into an "example" for the rest of the Middle East: Don't fuck with the United States of America, or else ...
Um, President-elect Obama? Forget burning the midnight oil at a negotiating table and start burning down forests.
In the movie, Alfred tries to help Bruce Wayne understand the Joker by telling a story from his youth. Alfred and others were in the Burmese jungle trying to help some locals find out who was stealing their precious stones. During their search, the group found a child playing with some of these stones. How was this possible? It turned out that the bandit had been pilfering the stones merely for sport and then tossing them. Their value held no interest for him.
The moral of the story is that some people in this world do things with no rhyme or reason, but rather because they can, because they're disruptive ... because it drives rational people crazy trying to figure out what these bandits "want" in exchange for stopping their disruptive behavior. Alfred explains to Bruce that, like the Joker, sometimes there's no way to deal with these people rationally or logically, because that's not how they think. They do what they do because it's fun for them to cause chaos.
Alfred's discourse is clearly an allegory for al-Qaida, or Hamas, or any other terrorist group you wish to name. They can't be reasoned with. You can't negotiate with them. They aren't looking for you to give them something in exchange for going away ... no, they want to kill us because their radical teachings have shown them that we are vile sinners who must either be converted to Muslim or exterminated.
However, the will of the U.S. government and its citizenry, however, is resolute, and won't be bullied. The Bush Administration understood this immediately after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks against the United States, and logically determined that the only recourse was to fight fire with more fire.
What's interesting about Alfred's story, however, is how it ended. Bruce asks whether Alfred's group ever caught the bandit and how. Alfred turns to him and says, emotionlessly, "We burned down the forest."
The Bush Administration never went this far. In fact, instead of concentrating all its fury against the al-Qaida strongholds in Afghanistan, it inexplicably chose to make Iraq the primary focus of its military operations. Personally, I've always suspected that this was for two reasons: 1) to continue the work that President Bush (41) never finished, and to avenge him for Saddam al-Hussein's assassination attempt; and 2) to make Iraq into an "example" for the rest of the Middle East: Don't fuck with the United States of America, or else ...
Um, President-elect Obama? Forget burning the midnight oil at a negotiating table and start burning down forests.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment