Tuesday, January 4, 2011

The important thing is not the number

(ES)

After consulting various sources on the number of civilians killed in the Iraq war since 2003, I note that the figures range from 100,000 to over 1,000,000 deaths since the start of the invasion, according to the source.

These figures are of the magnitude they are, reflect only the violent deaths. It should be added because the effects on mortality caused by UN sanctions imposed during the conflict.

But without going into the parallel war figures, and comparisons with other armed conflicts, perhaps the single most insidious is the anonymity of victims, treatment of information about the invasion of Iraq and large numbers and dates, which isolates the receiver of the same in a bubble, and makes you keep your conscience unchanged over the seriousness of the facts reduced to a single figure.

Currently we use social networks to maintain contact with family and friends. Turning to the figures, there are studies that limit the ability to maintain stable relations of human beings in 150 contacts. The mean number of contacts on social networks like Facebook is 120 friends, which is regularly interact with between 7 and 10 of them.

This leads me to think about the magnitude of the suffering of the Iraqi people, for every civilian killed had a family and friends who came in contact. Simply multiply the number of civilians killed by ten, and maybe I fall short, and will result in the number of people who mourn the death of a relative or friend.

Still, I believe that the number does not matter. What matters is people and their stories.

Visiting the website IRAQ BODY COUNT we can imagine some of them. Just visit the following link:

http://www.iraqbodycount.org/database/individuals/

Victims are entitled to be remembered, and those who survive to be heard, to never forget their stories and not be reduced to a simple number.



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