[Ammi]

Originally Posted by Toy Soldier

I don't think anything was meant by it at all but I do think it's illustrative of something that's really quite evident, and I don't think there's much point in avoiding: people are shocked because he's young and white, not because he's young. People struggle to get their heads around it because he looks like the boy next door, and therefore can't be dismissed as some "foreign devil, not like us". Which has been a big theme for me in these threads recently... People having a constant struggle with cognitive dissonance relating to war / terrorism.

..honestly TS, I just don't get it/don't see it as you do at all...for young people, any of the three young men in that pic to be so easily indoctrinated into 'hate' and into a total lack of any empathy for human life is extremely shocking, how could the belief of such extremism not shock...