Erstellt am: 26. 3. 2013 - 12:39 Uhr
Today's Webtip: The Drone Wars
Are you freaked out by the increased use of drones for warfare and policing activities? I am.
Every time I hear a European news report that uses the term "militants" or " "enemy combatants" it makes my blood boil. Because all it takes to qualify as a militant to be a military aged male in a strike zone.
That's also one of the ways the current U.S. administration has been able to keep civilian death rates so low. Because the friends, neighbors or families of suspected targets are no longer civilians. Sort of a deadly version of guilt by association.
Opposition to the drone program isn't really new, even if the media (in the U.S. and over here) tends to play along with the governments narrative. There is an excellent site that was put up based on the results of a Stanford and NYU report about the drone program and its' impact. www.livingunderdrones.org
Glenn Greenwald has been very vocal on the subject both at Salon and at the Guardian. Heck, even the Washington Post has seen fit to get a bit snippy.
But one of the best examples of reporting on the drone program has just come out. Made in cooperation with the Bureau for Investigative Journalism, it's an interactive info graphic.
It's informative, well done, and proves that the change that you get, might not always be the change that you want.