Is your Arabic that good?
No, it was just a tentative conclusion from comparing it with the arabic writing on wikipedia for the respective titles, and judging it looked very little alike. I'd wouldn't make any large bets on it, and welcome any input from anyone bilingual in arabic and english
I hate the west's Islamophobia
Like anti-jewishness, anti-americanism, racism, sexism etc, hatred isn't always evenly distributed or constant.
as much as any decent Marxist should
? Maybe I'm naive, stupid or old fashioned, but I like to think avoiding bigotry should transcend any ideology.
this image is being dropped into Syria on the orders of the Pentagon according to the article I borrowed it from.
That's very interesting and informative, thanks. It seems quite credible that it could have come out of some sort of psy-ops work. They must have some talented artists (not that my opinion means much). A link to the article would be interesting, if you had the inclination.
Also you might notice if you've seen any recent ISIS-made propaganda videos that many of their executioners distinctively wear clothes almost identical to those of the guy turning the handle.
Actually that was quite noticeable and quite well done. I don't tend to watch many of those (not a fan of gore), but have seem enough excerpts in news, that the sort of fatigues and anonymous hood seemed strikingly familiar.
Also those guys lining up and looking scared appear pretty middle-Eastern to me.
I actually agreed with this. Quite cunningly they appear like they could come from Morocco to Egypt or from the back streets of Marseille to Stockholm.
Does that make me a racist or am I just assuming because of the target audience?
Not at all, at least I don't think so. It think it's more a question of who should be able to identify with the victims and maybe they were intentionally being quite inclusive about it. I almost wrote that they could include chinese with the black hair (though that would be stretching it a bit). I'm not a great judge of the relation between complexion and race (who beside racists thinks much in terms of the latter?).
Pretty sure you're missing the point here.
You probably entirely right.
I was a little uneasy with a notion that it might be vaguely anti-muslim or racist (against middle easteners!?!), but honestly that was subtle and probably a oversensitive PC overreaction. Sorry for the reflex, everyone's a critic ;)
The main message with the meat grinder and about the stupidity of getting caught in the clutches of extremism is loud and clear and well done. It's not everyday I compliment pentagon propaganda.