Granted, the day after this article came out, the White House decided not to release any death photos of bin Laden. Thankfully, they realized that anything that might both piss off Tea Baggers AND al-Qaeda is probably the way to go.
I have chuckled at friends and family who have gotten viruses or had online accounts hacked by trying to view supposed Osama death photos and video. Thank God none of them have called me for help. I probably would have hung up the phone given that most of these folks consider themselves good Christians most days.
I have no interest in seeing a corpse, much level the added joy(?) in reveling in who it is.
I have also been disgusted in some folks who I had previously believed were more mature than in what they have shown themselves to be. As asinine and pointless as it actually is, I went about un-friending those folks from Facebook in most cases. Does that wake them up or change their mind? Oh no, they'll just be pissed at me in reality, at least the ones I mentioned it to. Some mere acquaintances just got the bump.
Am I morally superior to these folks? No, of course not. But I know enough that if you gloat over someone's demise, that says a hell of a lot more about YOU than it does the target of the violence, necessary or not. I haven't always been this calm about it, but the more I see of this world, the more I realize that some folks are more alike than others. And the folks bleating to see death photos have more in common with suicide bombing poor Muslim street kids being used by rich Saudi pricks like bin Laden than with me.
As for how I heard the story in the first place, it was part of this discussion on Talk of the Nation. Stick around for the phone calls, they are sadly instructive of the kinds of folks we live alongside.
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