Fri Oct 5 12:36:20 EDT 2007 Charles Robinson wrote: > > On Oct 5, 2007, at 11:13, Daniel J. Matyola wrote: > > The images are difficult to look at, and they are posted on a Russian > > site, probably for their anti-American propaganda value more than > > anything else, but that does not detract from the images, in my view. > > They are quite moving. > > > > I've found that there are a number of Russian sites which are > dedicated to simply posting interesting/funny/sad/noteworthy/sexy/ > whatever photos on a regular basis. Without browsing the rest of > that site I can't speak for them but it's quite possible that someone > found these, thought "these are great portraits" and wanted to > share. Or, you could be right and it's a slam at America but I > don't see that. >
Let me clarify, - yes, indeed, this is one of those sites that post whatever images that attract people's attention, - usually for the purpose of driving web-hits and earning money from banner advertisers. In this case these photos are posted with the caption "Shocking photos". (Which is, in my opinion, is not a "kosher" thing to do: making a circus out of these people. But this is one of those things that tabloids do.) The comments left by the visitors of the pages are polarized: half of them feel sorry for these soldiers. Another half of them, either being filled by propaganda or just having natural hatred to all people that are different from them, - indeed feel anti-american. Some of these people distinguish these poor soldiers from the politicians sending them to the war, but some don't. Having had an opportunity to compare people and life in different countries relatively objectively, I concluded long time ago: despite all cultural and historical differences, propaganda and people (with their both kindness and hatred) [and bureaucracy] are much more similar in different countries, than one may expect. Igor -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.