In F911, when was the footage of Baghdad taken?

[TNDemo]

The early part, that showed children playing in the streets? Was it actually taken the day the bombing started? The right wing argument is that that footage implies all was sweetness and light in Iraq and everyone had a wonderful life. I took it to mean that normal life was going on and even in a dictatorship people can find nice moments but I think it is being taken far out of context. Anyone know about that clip that has the right wing's knickers in a twist?

[HuckleB]

1. Dunno.

I do think it's probably the weakest part of the film. I do understand that Moore was trying to make the point that life was "normal" in Iraq. Yet, the sequence is a bit too sticky sweet, in my opinion. I think he overdid it, especially with the bit about weddings and such, which is why the wingers are jumping on it. It's one of the few parts of the film they can say much about, even though it's really got little to do with the main substance of the film.

[Skittles]

3. I disagree

a large part of the American public had no idea life in Iraq was not all bad.

[HuckleB]

8. That's not my point.

Please respond to my actual post. Thank you.

[AP]

12. The point wasn't that life was good before Sadaam. The point was...

...contrasting then to now.

Life may have sucked then, but at least Baghdad didn't look like Flint, Michigan.

The point is to question how we could possibly be making things better when we're making them so much worse.

To make lives better, did we really need to ruin the lives of so many innocent people???

As for the wedding shot, I thought it was a sublte reference to The Battle of Algiers, and sort of meant to contrast with the Christmas scene. I thought it was to remind people of the religious angle (free practice of religion before, and now a cultural imperealism today...which was the point in the BofA).

[HuckleB]

19. We all know what the point was.

My criticism is that it was overdone, and I'm not alone in this. Sometimes subtlety is far more powerful. I think that would have been the case here.

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

5. I think it was effective, and offered a humanizing view of Baghdad.

It pointed out that the Iraqi people are like us...with families, homes, friends and normal day to day activities. Bushco and the media painted a picture of the Iraqis as oppressed, starving and living in unbearable conditions, in constant misery, due to Saddam. I feel that the administration trivialized and continues to trivialize the devastation we have visited upon the civilians.

I know S.H. was brutal, killed thousands, and terrorized the country's population, although, I think atrocity for atrocity, and for true oppression, S.H. had nothing on "our" former buddies, the Taliban. I wish we could have done some covert operation, and removed Saddam, without destroying the country's infrastructure and killing so many, however, as Rumsfeld said Baghdad offered such "attractive bombing targets". MKJ

on edit: spelling

[HuckleB]

7. And I think it was overdone.

Which made it less effective than it could have been. In fact, this was the general consensus of the crew of very liberal folk with whom I discussed the movie on July fourth. This has nothing to do with Saddam, it's just about the movie-making. I mean that piece would be overly sweet sticky, if he did the same thing about any city in the states. It was just overdone. That's all.

It's just our opinion. Nothing more.

[AP]

13. That's exaclty right. We dehumanize them by putting them in cages in Cuba,

torturing them in Abu Graib, talking about how they live in caves, etc. -- every DA in America knows that the less human your defendant appears to the jury, the less resistant the jury will be to punishing them severely.

Think of the way the crazier soldiers thought of them: burn their houses down, their just characters in a heavy metal song, or video game.

When you see people as human beings, you care a little more about them.

[libbygurl]

2. Yes,

...totally agree that the point of the sequence was to show life was normal, that at least kids could still fly kites and friends and families could sit together normally -- and I didn't take them to indicate all was 'sweetness and light' in Saddam Hussein's Iraq at all -- before the bombs started to rain down upon Baghdad. If I recall correctly, there was a date (?) and time onscreen indicating the footage was taken the day the first bombs hit, but will have to see the film again (plan to do so) to make sure.

[soothsayer]

4. Saddam was a dictator, but Iraq was the best place in the ME for women

cuz they got treated as people, and there was none of that fundamentalist cover-yerself-up-walk-ten-steps-behind-me-no-school-for-you unenlightend crap (which, btw, is not what Mohammed wanted---he advocated equal rights for women---very progressive.)

So, yeah, people had fun and loved and lived their lives DESPITE the horrible sanctions we imposed on them to break them and make their lives hellish for ten years or so, which didn't work, obviously, so then we had to bomb the hell out of them.

And STILL there is no or very little electricity (and it's 110 degrees), no potable water, raw sewage in the streets, no phone system, no postal system. I guarantee there's little fun now.

Sooooo....I think Moore makes a fair point. I remember the footage of women and men railing about that little playground (with the hand operated ferris wheel) being bombed to smithereens by the US. Just like the one he showed in the film as a before pic! Had he done his homework, he could have used the news footage I saw.

[Francine Frensky]

14. There was a NYT front-page article about two weeks ago on girls

in Iraq who now are afraid to leave their houses because of the random kidnappings (not terrorist related, just local gangsters), and because the conservative religious types have started showing up at the schools demanding that the girls cover their heads, etc. FEWER girls attend school now then did one/two years ago.

The basic theme of the article was on how the girls have no hope.

And it will only get worse as more the taliban-type religious leaders take over.

[alphafemale]

6. December Maybe?

I remember a site where there were faces of every day people in Bagdad going about their daily lives. Many of them were quite westernized, though some women wore the headscarves. Many of them were stamped December of 2002.

The site urged us to print these images out and post them everywhere to put a human face on those we were about to "shock and awe."

Someone later took those images or some very like them and set it to Nat King Cole's "Wonderful World." It was sappy, but it broke through the barricade I had built against my over-whelming emotions and allowed me to weep like a baby over what we were about to do.

I printed out many of those pics in wallet size and handed out hundreds of them. I still have a few and wonder if the people in them are collateral damage. :(

[cureautismnow]

9. As I recall, March 2003...

The title of that opening sequence was something like, "Baghdad, March 2003." No specific day in March was given that I can remember and I've seen it twice.

Edited for typo.

[LibDemAlways]

10. I picked up an old People from early March 03

in a waiting room not long ago, and there was an article about
life in Baghdad - ordinary people interviewed - none ready or
willing to believe that the US would invade their country with bombs and bullets. None wanting it to happen. Awful thing to read in retrospect.

[K-W]

11. Baghdad wasnt an aweful city to live in, especially pre-sanctions

The administration wants people to think that under saddam, Iraq was a third world country where average people were being tortured in the streets.

[AP]

15. I'm inclined to think any oppression can make life suck, but that's not...

...the point.

It wasn't an argument about whether SH was good to the people. It was just an attempt to put a human face on people who turn up dead, mangled, or in handcuffs later in the film, regardless of how oppressed they were under Hussein.

[K-W]

18. agreed, and conservatives should be ashamed

the idea that putting human faces on the victims of war is inappropriate is horrible

[rhino47]

16. I would imagine its kinda like here under bush

What I mean is people living their everyday life.Just trying to get through their days.I still go to the movies ,play with my kids etc. while * does evil things in my name as an american.
Im sure those people shown in f/911 thought the same way.Trying to work ,raise kids,and enjoy the small pieces of life that they can.

[Francine Frensky]

17. If you read the excellent blog --"Baghdad Burning", you would know

something 99% of Americans don't -- that Baghdad used to be "the place to be" in the middle east if you were an educated young person, that women in Iraq were well educated and could work alongside men in any profession, and that life was probably pretty decent, considering this is the mid-east we're talking about.