Week 5 - Angela Kang

Angela Kang

ASA 02- A02

Week 5

During the reading “Empire of Death and the Plague of Civic Violence”, the author first explains the different forms of mass killing such as “mass murder”, “race murder”, “serial killings”, and many more. One thing all of these killings have in common is the relation it has to the US militarism. According to the reading, during the Vietnam War, the US military was in support of the killings of the people. There is no difference between the killings made by the US military versus killings made by mass murderers or serial killers. Not only did the US support the violent acts, they also supported sexual acts made by soldiers. With these acts, it's not shocking to see all the gun violence that has happened throughout all these years. What stood out to me was that it seemed as though the US is saying that killings made by the military is understandable while racial murders and other forms of mass murders are wrong. Within the readings, most of the examples that were made for different forms of murders involved ex-military men as the culprit. Also, gun violence and killings are often exposed to young teens through the forms of video games and media play. However, in certain cases these exposures are portrayed in a positive light although it supports gun use. For example, in the video game “Call of Duty”, the motive of the game is to kill people while portraying to be a soldier. With exposures like this, it is uncommon for kids to be influenced while growing up and how it affects them as an adult.

Question: Murder is murder, but why is there different categories where some murder is “acceptable” and the others are not?

References:

Hamamoto, Y. Darrell. “Empire of Death and the Plague of Civic Violence.” Masters of War: Militarism and Blowback in the Era of American Empire, by Carl Boggs, Routledge, 2003, pp. 277-292.

[Digital Image]. (n.d). Retrieved October 22, 2017 from

http://latinalista.com/columns/blogbeat-columns/public-health-research-reduced-smoking-deaths-gun-violence