  You thought you'd seen it all, didn't you, of man's ability to commit cruelty to one-another. I fear that you ain't seen nuffin' yet, and that gradually we deteriorate into a breed so used to our own atrocities, that beheadings end up as compulsory items on the daily agenda.
La decapitation du jour , so to speak. At least I think it's fair to say that we're no longer shocked by the monstrosities surrounding us on a more or less daily basis. I'm sorry, but I see little cause for optimism on behalf of the collective humanity. Alas, the word "humane", in a contemporary context, is synonymous with "cruel".
What's more, I don't think we've really noticed. A couple of Americans recently lost their heads [not trying to pull puns here], a South Korean this week and who knows; a couple of Turks in a day or two. So what? Of course you could argue that our moral standards haven't deteriorated at all. On the contrary, we've regained the moral code of ancient times, asserting our right to claim an eye for an eye and so forth. The only deterioration taking place, is the decreasing support of the misguided[? ] 20th century belief in humane ways. Be that as it may. Indisputably, most of us are products of just that century, and thus coloured by the era's standards. It isn't easy to put into words what it is that I'm really getting at here, but I suppose this isn't too far off: In order to stay sane we have to observe a certain callousness, which in its turn is bordering on insanity by 20th century standards.
In other words, we need to go a little crazy for the sake of our sanity, meaning our sanity equals yesterday's in sanity. Being a 20th century guy, marked by the standards of that time, I'm destined to deem us collectively stark raving mad, which is exactly what I do, I suppose. In the middle of it all, I'm slightly confused by my own duality in these matters. On one hand I'm engaged in urlLink hand-to-hand combat and other, more traditional military disciplines, whereas I on the other despise the eventual outcome of many an armed operation.
Of course I want to defend my country and the western way of life! After all, we are the good guys, right? Well, that's just where I seem to falter, as I am not altogether convinced that we are. Could it just be that we're all entirely depraved? I'd say chances are good we are. And we've only just begun. 
