America

American Sniper – Highlighting the Dichotomy in American Society

jimdroberts

1412322586588_wps_3_Bradley_Cooper_is_One_Sha

 

This is what happens when popular culture meets a complex issue head on. For the sake of a public, that doesn’t wish to think too long or too hard about a subject they would much rather be force fed their opinions about. Popular culture has a nasty habit of over simplifying an issue,to  make it black and white, you’re either with us or you’re against us. In reality the majority of us are able to appreciate the nuances and complexities of life, but such subtleties have long since vanished from the art of American movie making.

I was aware of, but had been intentionally avoiding this topic. From what little I’d heard, it just sounded like another dumb American movie glorifying another banal military campaign. But a friend kept drip feeding me links, at first I showed the poise and clarity of mind to ignore them, but then, like a Frenchman living next door to a brothel, I couldn’t resist.

I thought this was going to be simple, to use a fitting simile, like shooting fish in a barrel. War hero writes book (probably badly), Hollywood make a bad movie of a bad book. Conforms to the status quo, nothing new or unusual there. Now believe it or not I do endeavor to lace my rants with some facts, and it was whilst looking for these so called “facts” that I quickly came to realize that this story goes far beyond the movie.

Reaction to the movie has been strongly divided with the movie seemingly representing the dividing line or watershed between liberals and conservatives, below are some of the responses to the movie including links:

Americans showed up en masse for a patriotic, pro-family picture

The New York Timeshttp://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/19/movies/sniper-rules-weekend-box-office.html?_r=0

Bill Maher refers to Chris Kyle as:

He’s a psychopath patriot

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2925077/Bill-Maher-blasts-American-Sniper-Chris-Kyle-psychopath-says-film-successful-s-simplistic.html

A former US intelligence officer was less than impressed when he made a visit to a ‘clubhouse’ for snipers, he recounts:

‘the barroom walls featured white-on-black Nazi SS insignia, and other Wehrmacht regalia. The Marine shooters clearly identified with the marksmen of the world’s most infamous killing machine, rather than regular troops.”

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/01/noam-chomsky-american-sniper-teaches-you-to-hate-the-damn-savages-the-us-murders-every-day/

Dennis Jett from the New Republic ran the following title for his report on the movie:

The Real ‘American Sniper’ Had No Remorse About the Iraqis He Killed

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/120763/american-sniper-clint-eastwood-biopic-misrepresents-chris-kyle

And perennial windbag Michael Moore weighed in with the following bizarre tweet:

What Would Jesus Do if he could be a sniper & save soldiers lives by shooting “savages” in the back?

https://twitter.com/MMFlint?original_referer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cbsnews.com%2Fnews%2Fmichael-moore-clarifies-sniper-tweets-seth-rogen-chimes-in-on-american-sniper%2F&related=null&tw_i=556914094406926336&tw_p=tweetembed

Jesse Ventura Calls American Sniper‘s Chris Kyle a Liar, Not a Hero

http://www.people.com/article/jesse-ventura-calls-chris-kyle-liar-not-hero

A more positive view was put forward by Republican senator and former Navy Seal Ryan Zinke:

My view on Kyle is he’s kind of a warrior and a hero. I think (director) Clint Eastwood did a spectacular job of telling (“American Sniper” co-author) Scott McEwan’s story of Chris Kyle with a twist.

http://missoulian.com/news/local/zinke-discusses-american-sniper-u-s-war-decisions/article_e6b4f3b2-76e7-59cc-9ccc-4fc99d4cadb7.html

And Clint Eastwood believes:

“The biggest antiwar statement is what it does to the families left behind,”

http://www.bostonherald.com/entertainment/movies/movie_news/2015/01/clint_eastwood_talks_american_snipers_antiwar_statement

Which leads me to where I am right now. With so many conflicting opinions there was nothing else for it. I would have to undertake something I hadn’t done for a long time. I was going to have to go behind the enemy lines and into the heart of popular culture and eyeball this bastard for myself. So feeling like a complete idiot I went to buy my first cinema ticket in over two years and promptly discovered I couldn’t do it. You see when I last went to the cinema you bought a ticket from a person, now I was being forced to interact with a touchscreen. This quickly caused me to hyper ventilate, break out in a sweat and just when I was about to find a place to hide whem a member of staff operated the device on my behalf, which to me seemed to rather negate the benefits the cinema were hoping to gain from having the devices installed, but with a ticket and a shred dignity I made my way towards the cinema. I digress, as I dared to delve into the deep, shady, subversive film genre of American propaganda, I armed myself with a vat of coke and a silo of popcorn, setting me back the deficit of a small African country. I knew from what I had read this was a story far complex to experience without popcorn, or through eyes of film reviewers, to use some army vernacular, this needed some eyes on the ground, and I was goin’ in hot.

So I watched it, I survived, but I’m confused(but before I go on, is it only me who gets really nervous whilst holding a gallon of coke and fumbling in the dark for the cup holder? I had visions of drowning the people sat in the row in front of me, would it have caused an evacuation of the cinema? It was a biblical sized cup of coke.) You see, I really don’t like America, its culture and particularly its movies, I find it crass, tacky, superficial and just downright mindless at times. So going into the the movie I was primed and ready to be disgusted by an obscene display of jingoism and patriotism. The disturbing and peculiar thing is, I wasn’t. Now I’m liberal, I’m pro choice, anti-gun, I believe anyone can marry anyone else provided they are of age and I support the voting rights of minorities. I was supposed to have been offended by this movie, for it failed to include a single lesbian, gay, bi-sexual or trans-gender love scene, but I realized early on that this wasn’t that kind of movie. Other liberals may not have picked up on this and had been expecting the protagonists of war to cuddle and kiss one another into submission. This is a war movie and as such people do really bad things, these people don’t appear to be that nice to us because they are doing really bad things. Now it’s another question entirely as to whether or not those people should have been sent there to do the really bad things, but sent there they were and I believe they would have done their best under the extreme conditions they found themselves in.

Yes, I am trying to defend this movie and Chris Kyle (as much as we know about him). For the life of me I struggle to understand what people found shocking or propaganda like about this movie. Any movie about an army at war is likely to side with one set of combatants. A movie focusing on the life of a soldier will probably make a note of that persons patriotism, after all soldiers tend to be patriots. In the movie and the book (I have yet to read) Kyle refers to the enemy as savages. I find this neither surprising nor insulting. When your having to kill people dehumanizing them is pretty common coping strategy to make it easier, it’s not pretty, but then again neither is shooting people for a living.

 

Mistakes, Inconsistencies, Lies, Lies and more Lies

“The first casualty when war comes is truth”

Hiram Warren Johnson (1918)

Eastwood’s movie and Kyle’s book undermine their own credibility through factual inconsistencies and overt lies. Johnson’s quote could be easily corrected so that it read “The first casualty when war or Hollywood comes is truth”. Firstly let’s cover the mistakes in the movie.

  1. Chris Kyle and his wife watch the Twin Towers being hit by passenger planes on the news, the date of this September 11, 2001. The next scene we have Chris Kyle in Fallujah, Iraq 2004. No mention of the war against the Taliban or the search for Osama Bin Laden in Afghanistan, instead erroneously implying that Iraq had involvement in the September 11 attacks.
  2. Mustafa the sniper that plays the adversary of Chris Kyle and a central part in the movie only appears Kyle’s book for one paragraph. The movie has Mustafa fighting first for Sunni insurgents and the Shia. This is a ridiculous proposition given that at the time the Shia and Sunni Muslims were actually fighting one another.
  3. The movie tries to humanize Kyle by making him appear to have a sense of regret. This is not evident at any stage of the book, in fact he admits to his time being a Seal as ‘it was fun, I had the time of my life being a seal’.

 These are three poorly thought out, or lazy mistakes made in the movie. Unfortunately Chris Kyle himself made a litany of lies and preposterous statements, after becoming aware of these it throws the whole Chris Kyle, American Sniper phenomena into a tail spin. Chris Kyle claimed the following:

  1. First appearing in his book and subsequently removed, the lie Kyle is most famous for is ‘punching out’ Former governor of Minnesota Jesse Ventura after Ventura had said Seals ‘deserved to lose a few over there’. Ventura started the action against Kyle whilst he was alive and then took the unusual action of continuing with it after Kyle was murdered, suing Kyles wife successfully for $1.8 million.
  2. Kyle claimed to have shot two men in Texas as they tried to steal his truck. There are no police records of any such event but his full story/lie/ schizophrenic/psychotic episode can be read here: http://frontburner.dmagazine.com/2013/02/08/confirmed-american-sniper-chris-kyle-killed-two-men-at-a-gas-station-in-2009/
  3. You have to leave the absolute whopper to the end. What would motivate a man to claim he had done this is far beyond my reasoning. Chris Kyle claimed to have gone to New Orleans and ‘picked off’  dozens of looting bad guys. Again a story Louisiana state police called ‘preposterous’,for source read: http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/07/30/the-complicated-but-unveriable-legacy-of-chris-kyle-the-deadliest-sniper-in-american-history/

Like I said I left the cinema confused, the movie wasn’t fascist nor overtly nationalistic, but then again it wasn’t factually accurate and it told the story of a compulsive liar or someone suffering from psychotic hallucinations.

The only thing I feel pretty certain about is that American Sniper is about America’s most deadly sniper, it also happens to be about one of America’s most preposterous liars and directed by a senile old fart with not respect for the history or causality of events. Based on these facts alone I’m guessing American Sniper will go on to pick up most of the 6 Oscars for which it has been nominated.

Sniper Chris Kyle
America’s deadliest sniper and one of America’s most accomplished liars.

Gonzo symbol

5 Weird but True Halloween Stories

jimdroberts

happy-halloween2-source_h9t

For many people Halloween is an opportunity to wear fancy dress, trick or treat and have some autumnal fun. While for others it is presents an opportunity to shoot someone wearing a costume, a sort of wet dream for the perverse, fetishists gun club. The first two stories provide us with further endorsements of the second amendment, granting every American the right to defend themselves against kids in weird clothes and foreigners just too weird to live, because In America it’s Halloween every night

1.

skunk
When you see something like this it’s always wisest to shoot first and ask questions later.

New Sewickley Township police say the girl was over a hillside and wearing a black costume and a black hat with a white tassel. Chief Ronald Leindecker told the Beaver County Times that a male relative mistook her for a skunk and fired a shotgun, hitting her in the shoulder, arm, back and neck Saturday night.

Leindecker told the newspaper that the girl was alert and talking when she was flown to Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, about 30 miles away. Her condition was unavailable.

Leindecker says the man hadn’t been drinking and he doesn’t know whether charges will be filed. New Sewickley police said Sunday that decision will be made in a few days.

Getting shot is as American as apple pie. In the next story a Japanese exchange student was shot dead on the basis he had a scary walk. Once again we see the value of the second amendment as it allows U.S citizens to protect themselves from foreigners and scary walks,  both completely unacceptable in the Land of the Free.

2.

Defense Depicts Japanese Boy as ‘Scary’

New York Times
Published: May 21, 1993

The fatal shooting of Yoshihiro Hattori, 16, has until now been largely seen as a result of a tragic mismatch of cultural styles: a young Japanese exchange student unused to weapons, trustingly approaching a suburban American householder for whom guns are second nature.

But that scenario, one that has become a Japanese nightmare of America, was turned on its head by a defense lawyer today in a packed Louisiana courtroom. On the night of Oct. 17, he said, Yoshihiro Hattori was acting in a menacing, “aggressive” fashion, like a stranger invading someone’s home turf. And the home was defended by a .44-magnum with a laser scope.

This was the account of events offered by the lawyer for Rodney Peairs in opening statements in the trial of the 31-year-old assistant meat market manager on a charge of manslaughter. Father Appeared Angry

Mr. Hattori’s father sat calmly through the opening remarks by the lawyer, Lewis Unglesby, and the initial testimony that followed. But the father, Masaichi Hattori, an engineer, appeared angered by the lawyer’s portrayal.

“It sounded as though Yoshi was an unusual person, which is not true,” Mr. Hattori said through an interpreter during a break in the trial. “The defense attorney emphasized only points advantageous to him.”

The shooting of Mr. Hattori, who was looking for a Halloween party in the Baton Rouge suburbs when he mistakenly knocked on Mr. Peairs’s door the night of Oct. 17, shocked the people of Japan, and the courtroom has been packed with Japanese reporters.

Today they listened as a new element added to the story, that the young man’s behavior, in the view of Mr. Unglesby, could reasonably be seen as menacing.

“This is not an American or Oriental or any other known being casually walking up to the front door and saying, ‘Hello, we’re looking for the party,’ ” Mr. Unglesby said in his opening statement. “That’s not what happened.”

It was Yoshi Hattori’s walk that made him, that dark night, frightening in the lawyer’s telling. “Yoshi had an extremely unusual way of moving,” Mr. Unglesby told the jury. “It’s been described as aggressive. It’s been described as kinetic. It’s been described as antsy.

“It’s been described as scary,” Mr. Unglesby concluded. “He would come right up to you, as fast as he could.”

Mr. Peairs, by contrast, was nothing but a regular guy, “one of your neighbors,” Mr. Unglesby began by telling the jurors. He said he was a good mechanic, a steady employee of the Winn-Dixie supermarket, a man who liked sugar in his grits. ‘Cried and Cried’

“No killer,” he “cried and cried” when he discovered he had shot Yoshi Hattori, Mr. Unglesby said.

If the lawyer convinces the jury that Yoshi Hattori’s walk was indeed “scary,” his killing might be justifiable homicide under Louisiana’s 1976 “shoot-the-burglar” law. That law lets a person kill an intruder if he “reasonably believes” the intruder is trying to rob the house and might use violence against the occupants.

There is no dispute that Mr. Hattori was shot at close range, 5 eet away. But in the picture drawn by the East Baton Rouge Parish district attorney, Doug Moreau, it was an innocent movement, born of Yoshi Hattori’s apparent conviction that he had found the right house for the Halloween party. There were Halloween decorations on the outside of the house, a paper skeleton, a plastic ghost.

The prosecutor’s flat, unemotional version of the state’s case amounted to a schematic outline of the events of that night. There was no menace at all in the actions of either Yoshi Hattori or his companion that night, 16-year-old Webb Haymaker, the son of the Japanese student’s host family, he said. ‘Here for the Party’

Yoshi Hattori was dressed as the character played by John Travolta in “Saturday Night Fever,” in a white tuxedo costume and much jewelry. Mr. Haymaker was not in costume.

The two boys approached the front door, and rang the doorbell. Mr. Peairs’ wife, Bonnie, answered, with one of the couple’s three children. “We’re here for the party,” the prosecutor quoted Mr. Haymaker as saying. Mrs. Peairs slammed the door.

She “screamed” for her husband to get his gun, Mr. Unglesby said. The boys had meanwhile walked to the sidewalk, 10 yards away. They heard the door at the end of the adjacent carport open. Mr. Peairs, in the prosecutor’s telling, was not inside his house, but just outside the doorway of the carport. Yoshi Hattori began walking toward him, the district attorney said.

Mr. Haymaker heard Rodney Peairs shout “freeze.” He saw that Mr. Peairs was holding a large gun. But the victim apparently did not see the gun, and he did not understand the word “freeze.” ‘Something Bad Wrong’

He was acting in a way no American would ever act, the defendant’s lawyer said.

Mr. Peairs knew “there’s something bad wrong,” Mr. Unglesby told the jury today. ” ‘This person is not afraid of my gun. He’s not respectful of my property. He has no fear whatever.’ That’s what Rodney Peairs knew.”

Mr. Peairs shot Yoshi Hattori dead through the chest.

“It’s his conduct that you need to consider when looking at the evidence,” Mr. Moreau said. “There is no personal axe to grind.” That conduct, the prosecutor said, was “criminally negligent,” a key element of the manslaughter charge.

Photo: Masaichi Hattori leaving court yesterday in Baton Rouge, La., where he attended the trial of the man who killed his son. (The New York Times)

“It sounded as though Yoshi was an unusual person, which is not true,” Mr. Hattori said through an interpreter during a break in the trial. “The defense attorney emphasized only points advantageous to him.”

The shooting of Mr. Hattori, who was looking for a Halloween party in the Baton Rouge suburbs when he mistakenly knocked on Mr. Peairs’s door the night of Oct. 17, shocked the people of Japan, and the courtroom has been packed with Japanese reporters.

Today they listened as a new element added to the story, that the young man’s behavior, in the view of Mr. Unglesby, could reasonably be seen as menacing.

“This is not an American or Oriental or any other known being casually walking up to the front door and saying, ‘Hello, we’re looking for the party,’ ” Mr. Unglesby said in his opening statement. “That’s not what happened.”

It was Yoshi Hattori’s walk that made him, that dark night, frightening in the lawyer’s telling. “Yoshi had an extremely unusual way of moving,” Mr. Unglesby told the jury. “It’s been described as aggressive. It’s been described as kinetic. It’s been described as antsy.

“It’s been described as scary,” Mr. Unglesby concluded. “He would come right up to you, as fast as he could.”

Mr. Peairs, by contrast, was nothing but a regular guy, “one of your neighbors,” Mr. Unglesby began by telling the jurors. He said he was a good mechanic, a steady employee of the Winn-Dixie supermarket, a man who liked sugar in his grits. ‘Cried and Cried’

“No killer,” he “cried and cried” when he discovered he had shot Yoshi Hattori, Mr. Unglesby said.

If the lawyer convinces the jury that Yoshi Hattori’s walk was indeed “scary,” his killing might be justifiable homicide under Louisiana’s 1976 “shoot-the-burglar” law. That law lets a person kill an intruder if he “reasonably believes” the intruder is trying to rob the house and might use violence against the occupants.

There is no dispute that Mr. Hattori was shot at close range, 5 eet away. But in the picture drawn by the East Baton Rouge Parish district attorney, Doug Moreau, it was an innocent movement, born of Yoshi Hattori’s apparent conviction that he had found the right house for the Halloween party. There were Halloween decorations on the outside of the house, a paper skeleton, a plastic ghost.

The prosecutor’s flat, unemotional version of the state’s case amounted to a schematic outline of the events of that night. There was no menace at all in the actions of either Yoshi Hattori or his companion that night, 16-year-old Webb Haymaker, the son of the Japanese student’s host family, he said. ‘Here for the Party’

Yoshi Hattori was dressed as the character played by John Travolta in “Saturday Night Fever,” in a white tuxedo costume and much jewelry. Mr. Haymaker was not in costume.

The two boys approached the front door, and rang the doorbell. Mr. Peairs’ wife, Bonnie, answered, with one of the couple’s three children. “We’re here for the party,” the prosecutor quoted Mr. Haymaker as saying. Mrs. Peairs slammed the door.

She “screamed” for her husband to get his gun, Mr. Unglesby said. The boys had meanwhile walked to the sidewalk, 10 yards away. They heard the door at the end of the adjacent carport open. Mr. Peairs, in the prosecutor’s telling, was not inside his house, but just outside the doorway of the carport. Yoshi Hattori began walking toward him, the district attorney said.

Mr. Haymaker heard Rodney Peairs shout “freeze.” He saw that Mr. Peairs was holding a large gun. But the victim apparently did not see the gun, and he did not understand the word “freeze.” ‘Something Bad Wrong’

He was acting in a way no American would ever act, the defendant’s lawyer said.

Mr. Peairs knew “there’s something bad wrong,” Mr. Unglesby told the jury today. ” ‘This person is not afraid of my gun. He’s not respectful of my property. He has no fear whatever.’ That’s what Rodney Peairs knew.”

Mr. Peairs shot Yoshi Hattori dead through the chest.

“It’s his conduct that you need to consider when looking at the evidence,” Mr. Moreau said. “There is no personal axe to grind.” That conduct, the prosecutor said, was “criminally negligent,” a key element of the manslaughter charge.

Photo: Masaichi Hattori leaving court yesterday in Baton Rouge, La., where he attended the trial of the man who killed his son. (The New York Times)

yoshihiro hattori
 From the first two stories it would be easy to jump to the conclusion that Halloween provides the America with nothing more than a set of novel circumstances under which to shoot one another. That would be tarring everyone with the same brush whilst ignoring all the parties where someone doesn’t get shot . One such party took place in Frederica, Delaware.

 3.

Corpse mistaken for Halloween decoration

Woman’s body hangs from tree after apparent suicide

updated 10/27/2005 3:39:04 PM ET

FREDERICA, Del. — The apparent suicide of a woman found hanging from a tree went unreported for hours because passers-by thought the body was a Halloween decoration, authorities said.

The 42-year-old woman used rope to hang herself across the street from some homes on a moderately busy road late Tuesday or early Wednesday, state police said.

the_hanging_tree_by_alwayspercabeth-d4k9l8w
Still at least they were not shot.

The body, suspended about 15 feet above the ground, could be easily seen from passing vehicles.

State police spokesman Cpl. Jeff Oldham and neighbors said people noticed the body at breakfast time Wednesday but dismissed it as a holiday prank. Authorities were called to the scene more than three hours later.

“They thought it was a Halloween decoration,” Fay Glanden, wife of Mayor William Glanden, told The (Wilmington) News Journal.

“It looked like something somebody would have rigged up,” she said.

 Hanging one self appears to be as traditional as shooting someone on Halloween. Many deaths by misadventure occur when people try to act out a hanging as some kind of Halloween entertainment. Several people find out the hard way why hanging is an effective and popular method of suicide and execution.

4.

NATION : Teen Dies in Halloween Accident

Los Angeles Times October 29, 199o
    •

YORK, S.C. — 15-year-old staging a gallows scene at a Halloween party accidentally hanged himself when the noose somehow tightened, authorities said today.

William Anthony Odom of Charlotte, N.C., was pronounced dead Friday night amid fake spider webs and plastic bats decorating an aunt’s home. Odom and several of his friends had staged a haunted house in the basement.

A week ago, a 17-year-old died while staging a similar Halloween hangman gag along the route of a hayride in Lakewood, N.J.

As it is Halloween it only seems reasonable to leave the scariest story and the biggest monster till last. The previous 4 stories have a humourous edge when compared to the Halloween classic.

5.

East Coast Rapist pleads guilty to Halloween attacks in Prince William

Rapist_2
Law enforcement show they have a sense of humour by dressing the ‘Halloween rapist’ up as a pumpkin.

The Washington Post

By Josh White November 30, 2012
In the series of attacks attributed to the East Coast Rapist , the Halloween 2009 assault in Prince William County was perhaps the most brazen. He stepped out of a borrowed gold Chrysler into the cold night rain, gripped a fake 9mm handgun, pulled his jacket’s hood tight over his face and forced three teenage trick-or-treaters down a steep ravine.The attack — the last in a string of 13 since 1997 that are linked by DNA evidence — also was the closest police had come to the serial rapist. Their sirens and footsteps interrupted his rapes after one victim summoned help via hidden texts and phone calls. He disappeared into the darkness, leaving the weapon, his DNA and the victims behind.On Friday, more than three years after the attack, that man — Aaron Thomas — appeared in Prince William County Circuit Court to take responsibility for the crimes. He entered guilty pleas to two counts of rape and three counts of abduction. Unlike his previous appearances in court, including a failed plea hearing two weeks ago, Thomas was alert, responding quickly and forcefully to Judge Mary Grace O’Brien’s questions.

“I would like to take responsibility for my problem and the pain I’ve caused,” Thomas said. “I am guilty.”

O’Brien accepted Thomas’s pleas, meaning Thomas, 41, has been convicted of three rapes, including the guilty plea he entered Thursday in Loudoun County for a 2001 attack in Leesburg. The rapes are fewer than a quarter of those both Thomas and police say he committed, but they are enough, potentially, to land him behind bars for a maximum of seven life terms.

Five true, disturbing stories from recent Halloweens past. Remain vigilant, don’t try and hang yourself and if you feel uneasy at any stage start firing your gun. Please sleep easily, don’t have nightmares.

halloween anim