Posthuman Blues

I attended the war protest briefly. Now that bombs are actually being dropped (as we all knew they would), the atmosphere is much less "hippie" and much more militant, with factions committed to accepting Dubbya's every whim. There were the obligatory "Support Our Troops" people there; I have no problem with supporting our troops, although my personal method of "supporting" them would be to get them the hell out of Iraq, not urging them on to some ugly corporate "victory" over mythologized "evil-doers."

I certainly support our troops. But I don't support the war they've been commanded to fight. Amazingly (well, perhaps not that "amazingly"...), there's a large demographic that doesn't get the distinction. Apparently they think that antiwar activists secretly hope that our armed forces perish. American binary thought at its ignorant best. "Love it or leave it." What about changing it for the better? Is that an option? Apparently Americans won't entertain any sentiment that can't be reproduced on a bumper-sticker.

Make no mistake: a large portion of the pro-war crowd likes this pyrotechnic display of force. They're getting off on it. And isn't it a bit curious that Iraq has yet to counter Allied devastation with those "weapons of mass destruction" that supposedly precipitated this thing to begin with? As a friend reminded me, we'll find them eventually. Even if we have to plant them ourselves.

Any pretense that "Operation Iraqi Freedom" (I think they're actually calling it this) is about anything but oil and geo-economic control has evaporated into utter nothingness. But now that we're safely committed to wholesale slaughter, minor considerations like this have predictably faded into the background, like mute, red-shifted stars.