Butterflies and Kalashnikov's

This post is a difficult to write since I'm a bit confused about what I really think about all this.
These images show us some of the most wretched, war-torn places on earth, with drugged-out, child-soldiers brandishing kalashnikov's in a strangely beautiful and horrifying ballet...

Is it possible to write about these images from a pop-cultural perspective without losing sight of the reality of civil war in, especially, Africa?

There is something strangely fascinating about the contrasts here, fragile, "girlie" butterfly wings and the heavy weapons...
A pink cuddly-bear back-pack, not very unlike something my own kid would wear on his way to kindergarten, here instead worn by a 9-, maybe 10 year old, brandishing his assault rifle...
Is it Miss Piggy of Sesame Street, or some other loved charachter on the back of a crazy-eyed 10 year old killer...

These (western) symbols of innocense and childishness, here gets completely turned inside out in a gut wrenching, macabre display of cherished symbols being completely ripped out of their context and mashed-up and re-used to fit some other needs...
Needs not ours...

Marc Scheffler / SLATE writes about the "dress-code" in the Liberian civil war and especially the beliefs held by the fighters:
"According to the soldiers themselves, cross-dressing is a military mind game, a tactic that instills fear in their rivals. It also makes the soldiers feel more invincible. This belief is founded on a regional superstition which holds that soldiers can "confuse the enemy's bullets" by assuming two identities simultaneously."

Former warlord Charles Taylor himself is currently on trial in Hague for crimes against humanity.

Author: Per Zennström

Home | Top