[tokai]

>to even call for that upsets people regardless of what their reign is like.

Its was so weird when Gaddafi was killed. He was a murderous villain and the west had directly made sure that his regime would fall or even outright tried to kill him with bombings. But when some of his so-called subjects got their hands on him and finished the job it was much maligned in the press. For some reason the more power you have the less people feel like you should experience consequences.

[throwawaymaths]

Was Gaddafi a murderous villain?

By my understanding he sponsored IRA terrorists and unnecessarily attacked Egypt and Algeria in some minor conflicts and a few public executions (Lockerbie was pretty clearly a Syrian action).... That's it? I do think he claimed to be a murderous villain since that was working for assad

I could be wrong but on raw terms it's not too far off from say any given us president in the last 100 years

[tokai]

So how many people do you need to get killed before you can be a murderous villain? You are actually underlining the point with your apologia for a dictator. It also would be nice if US presidents also took the consequences of their crimes. But your whataboutism is not really an argument for anything here.

[Georgelemental]

Probably most world leaders are "murderous villains" in some way or another. It sucks, but much better than universal anarchy and civil war

[themitigating]

Why is it a choice between allowing leaders to almost never be punished or complete anarchy

[throwawaymaths]

No apologia intended. I would call assad, putin a murderous villain. I would say Gaddafi murdered a few people.

[esperent]

I think this aligns with the common and infuriating Western media trope where the hero can kill any number of low level unidentified grunts but as soon as they come to the big boss guy they suddenly get morals and have to let him live.

All the pain and suffering caused by Gaddafi happened off screen to unidentified people so we were silent. His killing happened very much on screen to a recognizable "bad guy" so suddenly we found moral outrage.

[ch4s3]

I think people is "the west" wanted to see him tried in a court rather than impaled and summarily shot. The whole Western bombing campaign happened specifically because Gaddafi was waging war on the civilian population.

[themitigating]

This is what I'm saying. If you call for Putin's death people go nuts but he's responsible for a war that's killed 10s of thousands.

[peanuty1]

The War in Iraq killed a lot more civilians than that.

[mindslight]

And if you call for justice for those responsible, people get even nuttier.

[themitigating]

Ok, I wasn't excluding anyone.

Edit: I believe the first Gulf War was justified. The second however is a war crime. IMO

[Lendal]

Yep, and if it wasn't for the Iraq war, there are plenty of other wrongs throughout human history we could point to in order to justify the continuation of any particular evil & injustice.