Video on Marine Killing Iraqis Draws Ire

By LOLITA C. BALDOR Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) - A music video posted to the Internet, telling a tale about a U.S. Marine killing members of an Iraqi family, is being condemned by an Islamic group and investigated by the Marine Corps.

Lt. Col. Scott Fazekas, a spokesman for the Marines, said Tuesday that the Marines were aware of a video posted on the Internet that "purports to show a Marine singing an insensitive song about Iraqis." Fazekas said officials don't know the identity of the singer or whether he is in the military.

. . .

The video was posted anonymously on the http://www.youtube.comWeb site, but was removed. It is still available on CAIR's web site. A Hadji is a pilgrim who journeys to Mecca, but CAIR said the word has often been used as a disparaging term by U.S. troops in Iraq.

. . .

The singer is shown playing a guitar and singing about meeting an Iraqi woman and then being confronted by her brother and father, who have guns. The lyrics describe the Marine pulling the woman's little sister in front of him and watching blood spray from her head.

He then sings about blowing the father and brother "to eternity."

http://www.wtopnews.com/index.php?nid=114&sid=819986

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

Why isn't EVERYONE condemning this shit?

You can bet this doesn't get through the fog of allBushallthetime frenzy spewing forth from the media these days.

"The propagandist's purpose is to make one set of people forget that
certain other sets of people are human.": Aldous Huxley

It's about the 'hadji-girl' luring him back to the house after some firefight, so her brother/father can kill him. He's smitten, she says 'I'm on a jihad' but he doesn't understand because of the language difference; he's in love, or just horny, so he goes when she wants him to visit the family--he couldn't say 'no', since he didn't speak Arabic. She opens the door, and he hits the floor because he's shot at. The guys say they're on a jihad. He pulls her younger sister in front of him and her brother/father kill her; sickly, blood sprays from between her eyes and the soldier laughs 'maniacally'. He lunges behind the tv, loads his M16 and kills them before they kill him. Then he says he's on a jihad, and they should have known better than to f**k with a Marine.

"Confront" is an understatement, the 'meeting' is hardly neutral. Besides the love aspect that elicits a few hoots from the audience, and the mismatch between the music and the content at the end (luring us into thinking 'love ballad' when it's very much not), the trick is that she says that she's on a jihad; then her brother/father say they're on a jihad. It would be a kind of warped "don't make this mistake" kind of song, except for the conclusion.

Sociologists will have an interesting time with this kind of record, and the attempt to treat such a topic with humor. Linguists, too, since 'hadji-girl' goes, (in context), from being a term of endearment to what might be an insult, all the while with the same intonation and melody. I guess a formalist critic would be obliged to point out the hadji~jihad quasi-parallelism; I'm glad I'm not one of them. I wonder what reception a short-story treatment of this plot would receive.

If anybody else listens to the video, is the guy saying 'turka, turka' or 'sherpa, sherpa'?

In any event, I don't understand why 'fuck' was bleeped out, or why there's such a large lag between the video and audio. It's like they were recorded separately, and edited together very, very badly.

This is perhaps about reframing what happened in Haditha in a way the average American will find palatable. This fable in which the iraqis are properly evil and marine properly good will, I bet, be the preferred version of reality as far as the majority of Americans are concerned. It's only a question of how it takes for this version to displace reality.

The Marine is culturally unaware.

Personally, CAIR might have had a more convincing point if they said that the song portrays all Iraqis as insurgents. It wouldn't be a very convincing point, but more convincing.

But it's also not Haditha: the two Iraqi men killed their younger womenfolk; the Marine killed no civilians in the song, he wasn't even armed when they were gunned down. In Haditha, the Marines say they killed civilians. The quibble is over whether they followed the rules of engagement. In this song, no quibble possible.

I tend to agree that it's an example of trench humor, and that it isn't what people are making it out to be. This IS NOT a song about killing Iraqi civilians. It's a song about a soldier hoping to get laid, who gets lured into a trap by a bunch of Jihadis. It DOES have the soldier grabbing a young girl to use as a human shield, but doesn't say who shot her...only that she caught a bullet in the head during the firefight. Bad taste? Perhaps, but really no different than the kind of trench humor you find in any war.

Nowhere does the song describe the marine as killing innocent civilians. In fact, if you listen closely, the words actually describe him diving for cover as they opened fire on HIM, because his weapon wasn't even loaded.

CAIR mischaracterized it, and people don't like telling CAIR they're mischaracterizing things.

No, actually it's clear as to who didn't shoot the girl: the marine. He grabs the girl before the bullets start; she's hit, he hides behind the tv, and 'locks a load in my M16'. His gun wasn't loaded; only the father and brother had loaded guns at that point.

The words aren't always clear; there's apparently a claim that when the cute first 'hadji-girl' opened the door, she was also killed.

This might help explain the maniacal laugh: they want to kill him, and they kill both their daughters; possibly knowing that the younger was in the way. Or perhaps the soldier just snaps at that point. Or sees justification for more killing. Hard to know.

It's also funny that at the beginning the Marine is the dolt, but in the end they're the jerks: At first, not understanding the language, and not much caring, right after a firefight, balls in an uproar, the Marine's running after tail. But then he kills the guys using the girl as bait.

Written by the South Park group. This is a spoof song about and from the movie. GOD, get a sense of humor and try to stay up on current references. I am sure John Stewart would have gotten the reference.

<snip>

Full article: http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/special_packages/iraq/14816366.htm