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If you follow news and political blogs, you have likely seen the following quote, from a John Pilger
authored article in The New Statesman:
Four years ago, I travelled the length of Iraq, from the hills where St Matthew is buried in the Kurdish north to the heartland of Mesopotamia, and Baghdad, and the Shia south. I have seldom felt as safe in any country.
No matter where you read it, it would’ve likely been followed by a rant about how silly John Pilger is to
think the Iraq of Saddam was safe and how morally repugnant he was to say this while people were being tortured and killed and so on.
How many blogs however, put this quote in context:
Four years ago, I travelled the length of Iraq, from the hills where St Matthew is buried in the Kurdish north to the heartland of Mesopotamia, and Baghdad, and the Shia south. I have seldom felt as safe in any country.Once, in the Edwardian colonnade of Baghdad’s book market, a young man shouted something at me about the hardship his family had been forced to endure under the embargo imposed by America and Britain. What happened next was typical of Iraqis; a passer-by calmed the man, putting his arm around his shoulder, while another was quickly at my side. “Forgive him,” he said reassuringly. “We do not connect the people of the west with the actions of their governments. You are welcome.”
At one of the melancholy evening auctions where Iraqis come to sell their most intimate possessions out of urgent need, a woman with two infants watched as their pushchairs went for pennies, and a man who had collected doves since he was 15 came with his last bird and its cage; and yet people said to me: “You are welcome.” Such grace and dignity were often expressed by those Iraqi exiles who loathed Saddam Hussein and opposed both the economic siege and the Anglo-American assault on their homeland; thousands of these anti-Saddamites marched against the war in London last year, to the chagrin of the warmongers, who never understood the dichotomy of their principled stand.
You don’t have to agree with Pilger, but wat I’m saying is, you know, read the entire article before
getting indignant. If you need to quote people out of context, your case does not get stronger.