The Story of Numbers

This morning before I went to school I decided to watch a little news. According to CNN 75% of Americans supported Bush and the war efforts. The number shocked me. I searched around for more numbers but they jump up and down and my brain just can’t interpret their meanings anymore.

I know these are just numbers, and what’s important is still what I feel inside. But another number came today: 1. The first American casualty of the war. I wonder when the news of the marine’s death gets back to his family and friends the earlier percentages mentioned might change. Probably not. These brave soldiers probably already knew that there was a chance they weren’t coming home standing and so did their family and friends. And he was only one person right? Even if everyone around him changed their minds about war the change is minuscule.

At least the numbers would say so.

I wonder what the body count on the other side is. They don’t tell us that stuff very early do they? I guess they wouldn’t know. Probably don’t want us to know.

It’s rather ironic that, since we are supposedly the most democratic country and our valiant goal is to rid the world of the dangers of an evil man, we just decided to ignore the rest of the world’s protests. Yeah, of course, we are just better than everyone else because we are richer, stronger, smarter, and we got all this through democracy (I’m a little confused on that concept right now) so you Iraqi people should thank us for giving it to you whether you want it or not.

If that’s the case, let’s try this scenario: remember that big country in Asia called China with its own arsenal of nuclear weapons and supposedly a very fast growing economy? Well, it still claims communism’s the solution to the world’s problem. I wonder what U.S. can say when China decides that it would just share this wonderful form of government with the rest of Asia.

Oh, I guess there’s really nothing to say, we can just throw a few bombs at each other, then sign some agreement for a new world order organization, and bully everyone else into maintaining it until one day we decide that since it doesn’t fit into our agendas, it can go to hell.

People like numbers. We remember the dates when the Constitution is signed but sometimes conviniently forget what it promises its citizens. We pass resolution # this after that and they all come to nothing. We see the numbers in the history books: WWI, WWII, Vietnam War, and leaves them in the past covered with dust. On perhaps a less sentimental note we measure our expenditures in billions and watch millions of dollars turn into flying debris and destroyed lives, while at home a soldier’s pregnant wife has only enough money to put plain bread on her table.

In a few years, the War on Iraq will also be a series of numbers. We spent $##### in military expenditure, ***** died on the American side, XXXXX many people died on the Iraqi side, &&&&& of those were civilians, @@@@@ were children, %%%%% dollars worth of infrastructure was destoyed and $^^^^^ will be spent to build it back.

The story of numbers. Isn’t it scary how simple things can be when they are reduced to numbers?


Comments

2 responses to “The Story of Numbers”

  1. 几个?#25265;抱?#30340;说法怎么让我身上汗毛立正啊,哎有(不好意思,用南京方言了,哈哈)。取消英文站了么?希望多贴英文啊,也让不才多学习学习!还有,我喜欢SHMILY的域名。

  2. 沒有啊, 但是这篇文章用中文写不出来,就用英文贴了 =p hugs 中文讲出来还真有点奇怪… 换吧换吧… 还有shmily已经被别人用了:(

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