"WAR IS NOT A MOVIE"

 We are only two weeks into President Donald Trump's bombing war in Iran, and already things are looking black: while taking out much of Iran's missiles and killing its leader  Ayatollah Ali Khamenei,        happened quickly, the remaining Iranian leaders have effectively gone after America's finances by mining and choking off  oil shipments in the Straits of Hormuz, which has severely hurt the world's supply of oil, causing fuel prices to skyrocket all around the world.  The fact that we now know that Trump and his administration were warned of this possibility and went ahead with the bombing anyway is a testament to just how incompetent his reign has been.

But I want to focus on another part of this new war: how it's being sold to the American public.  Specifically, on how the White House has posted on its official social media outlet truly disgusting videos that combine scenes from movies like John Wick and Deadpool and sporting events with real examples of bombings taking place in Iran.  While almost any war has leaders attempting to dehumanize their enemies as a way to inspire their country,  the Trump administration is the first I can think of to actually equate real bombings killing real people as something out of a movie, complete with a hyped up, fist pounding soundtrack.  Now Trump himself may not be making these posts, but it shows the macho, testosterone drenched mentally that surrounds him.  And these aren't just some right wing media types, this posts have been put up on the White House's official site.  The  effect of these posts is clear: they're are not just justifying the bombings, they're supposed to pump up the viewer and make war look like an exciting adventure (or an "excursion", as Trump has horrifically characterized it). 

This all becomes even more despicable when you consider the recent tragedy that occurred in which a girl's elementary school in Iran was wrongly targeted and bombed, killing 175 of them. All reports are saying that the bombing was carried out by the US. It was one of the worst killing of civilians in recent American military history.  Putting it bluntly, what kind of mentality can post videos that make the war look like a big action movie or video game after the accidental killing of innocent children?  Has America really sunk so low under Trump that we can only briefly  pause to recognize the killing of children before getting back to watching more "war is fun" propaganda postings?  Is it unreasonable to expect that our government should take every military action, no matter how necessary, with all the seriousness and gravity that war requires?  It used to be, but not with Trump and his cronies.  While I certainly was no supporter of George W Bush's Iraq invasion, at least his administration spoke about the war seriously. 

Although the accidental killings of civilians is a tragedy of pretty much every war, the casual way that Trump and his administration have shrugged off this utter tragedy is shocking.  When Trump first decided to get into politics ten years ago, I almost immediately pegged him as a narcissistic psychopath,  incapable of caring about anyone other than himself.   Certainly the posting of these videos and Trump's general attitude about the war seem to prove me right.  Or, as Ben Stiller, the star of Tropic Thunder, one of the movies used in these posts, who asked it be removed, put it, "War is not a movie."