To wonder how all the people wearing the French flag on FB feel now they've bombed Syria?

[TheHouseOnTheLane]

So..."everyone" popped a French flag on their FB profile in sympathy with Paris.

Now France has shot over there and dropped 20 bombs on ISIS HQ and training centre.

So...people are happily condoning war really.

Why not all change profile pics to a peace sign?

I know ISIS are bad...but as we all say, violence solves nothing. Nothing.

It is possible to stand in solidarity with France, and abhor bombing campaigns.

I genuinely don't know the answer to this, but I think it's been proved fairly emphatically that "bomb harder" doesn't work.

It's also been proven that doing nothing and allowing everyone within their borders hasn't been working either. Doesn't mean we need to suddenly stop all immigration, just as we don't need to stop bombing.

The whole area is in chaos. Bomb, don't bomb... it doesn't change that fact, and it doesn't change that they are already organized enough to pull off very coordinated attacks. The problem is that the countries these guys are thriving in have no government control of the area. The change from these places needs to come from within, and at the moment, their government has proven to be less than effective in that regard.

It's going to take a while. Look at Russia, they were public enemy number one for a while. Currently they are is still having problems with rampant corruption and is pulling itself out of the gutter by tooth and nail. The Soviet Union has been dead the last 25 years, and they are just now really getting along sort of with the rest of the world.

There's no quick fix to this.

It's just the unfortunate situation that these guys won't stop until they're dead. They can't be bought or reasoned with.

They made their choice, and the natural consequence of making enemies from several different countries at once, who have more firepower than you is that you will be targeted by those countries. When you're targeted by countries with more fire power and better technology, there is a good chance you will die.

I don't think humans have gone wrong as such, as a PP pondered. I think it's more that we've not yet gone quite right.

We think we're civilised, highly evolved, super-intelligent, rational creatures. But underneath there's a lot of other survival-of-the-fittest stuff fighting to get through.

I say live and let live and let that be in peace where disputes are resolved fairly and timely through discussion and debate. But for some that's just not enough. They believe what they believe and when it's at odds with the ruling majority they consider it worth the fight. It's been that way since the year dot and it's not going to change anytime soon.

I know ISIS are bad...but as we all say, violence solves nothing. Nothing

Oh FFS

"An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind"

Well it's hardly the people who are posting French flags are doing the bombing.

It's a sign of sadness at what happened to those innocents in France.

I put one up but I certainly don't condone bombing especially for revenge but I honestly don't know how to target these vile savages.

My personal view is that people who think it is right to kill in the name of god or their religion should start by killing themselves.

I don't give a crap what people want to do their profile pic to show support to the innocent people who lost their lives in Paris.

I was however surprised to learn that France is currently the fourth biggest arms exporter in the world with Saudi Arabia its biggest client. The same Saudi Arabia where Wahhabism comes from and is pushed by their disgusting excuse of government/royal family.

The French government need to rethink who they are helping on the arms front. The danger is that it gets recycled right back at them.

I have no time for religion but equally no time for governments East or West who support fundamentalist regimes through indirect or direct action.

France going to war with Isis in no way changes my view about what happened to the innocent people in Paris

"An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind"

What happens when a bunch of lunatics with sticks start poking everyone's eyes out and everybody else decides inaction is the correct ethical response?

The problem with very attractive idea of pacificism, is that the worst possible people - the bullies - triumph.

It's a war. This is what happens. Did anyone expect France not to fight back?

"It's also been proven that doing nothing and allowing everyone within their borders hasn't been working either."
So the only choice is to pick one of the two things that isn't working? There has to be a better answer than that. There HAS to be.

"I have no time for religion but equally no time for governments East or West who support fundamentalist regimes through indirect or direct action."
Every militant group in the ME is supported, in some way, by a Western country. This isn't unique to the last 15 years, or the last 50 years, or even the last 100 years.
As far as I'm concerned, the collective governments of the US, UK, France and Russia (among others) have as much blood on their hands in this situation as anybody. None of which justifies a single victim on any side or in any country.

Dont suppose many of them have noticed or even thought it through.
Ignoring the flag thing. What's the point ?

I feel terrible sorrow for all innocent people who die as the result of Isis. I include those who die in air strikes on Isis as dying as the result of Isis.
When Isis targeted the Yazidi people and did terrible things to them including killing the men and taking the women and young female children as sex slaves I thought the world should have responded with air strikes. I do understand that innocent people will be killed during the air strikes but there is a difference between being caught in cross fire and deliberately targeting innocent people (what happened in Paris).
I don't think putting a french flag on ones profile means that innocent victims of other nationalities are ignored or overlooked.

but the real tragedy will be doing nothing and seeing ISIS take over the world like a cancer.

^ this.

OP YANBU in asking the question but you presume that those who have the FB flag or their own tribute are ignorant of the wider situation. For this YABU.

For me being supportive of friends and family in France is not at to exclude others who are suffering or in support of the bombings.

As a PP said these bombings have been going on for a very long time.

The tricolore is the symbol of a nation not the Government - unlike in England for instance, where flag-waving can be seen as being politically divisive (not always but it can be) in France the flag is a very real symbol of the values of the Republique.

Some of the people who have changed their profile will disagree with the bombings, some will agree, some won't know. Easy one to answer. The choice to put a flag or not put a flag has nothing to do with their views on bombings.

Of course there are bombs. It's a war.the bombing countries may or may not have signed a pretty declaration, but they're still at war with isis.

Isis are not open to reason or suggestions that we all get along. They choose to kill, maim, rape instead. So forcing them into submission is going to be the only way to stop them. This will take bombd, economic pressure and eventually men on the ground.

Or alternatively we can leave them to create a new Holocaust, brutally exterminating everyone who doesn't fit in with their twisted view of Islam. So far they're after the homosexuals, yazidis (sp?), shias.

So to answer your question - I'm fine with bombing their hq and training centre.

The tragedy of all wars is that innocent people suffer.

In WW2 innocents of all nationalities were killed in bombings. Is there such a thing as a "just war"? I'm glad it isn't my decision to make.

ISIS is responsible for far more deaths than those who oppose them, they aren't even an elected government, if that could be seen as a legitimate position.

The IRA eventually came to the negotiation table. Does anyone really believe that ISIS would ever do that?

Vive la France.

A note on the flag thing:

• As someone living in Paris, I changed my profile picture to the flag. Seeing so many of my friends with the same picture makes me feel something like solidarity, like we are all touching base with each other somehow.

• I know that at least one of my French (Parisienne) friends thinks it is odd that her fellow French are changing their profile pictures to their own flag but says she can't deny she feels 'warm' seeing her international friends do it as a sign of sympathy and support

• I agree it is unfair that Paris has had so much attention when other cities who have suffered equally or more have had so little. But I can't stand people just posting about how unfair it is when THEY THEMSELVES have previously appeared to give no attention or messages of support to said cities. You can't go straight to 'but no one is talking about Beruit, only Paris, its so awful' when you yourself have never talked about it. Do something productive rather than trying to make people supporting Paris feel bad.

As far as I'm concerned, the collective governments of the US, UK, France and Russia (among others) have as much blood on their hands in this situation as anybody. None of which justifies a single victim on any side or in any country.

Yes and as for Tony Blair now living handsomely from the conference circuit - he should be taken to court for involving us in Iraq .

Agree that Isis need wiping out but don't like the way that the innocent people that must surely be killed by every airstrike, never seem to be given a mention on our TVs. The other day there was the casual mention of 45 people being killed by an airstrike. It is doubtful that they all would have been members of Isis et al.

I've put the flag on my profile in support of my many friends who live in France, some of whom were caught up in the attacks. I haven't asked any of them directly but none the less I'm certain they didn't make the decision to drop the bombs. It is possible to express your support with the people of France without agreeing with everything their government does. FWIW I'm not sure how I feel about the bombing, the whole thing's a bloody mess.

Haha what a thick op!!

Trying to be 'right on'

Won't someone think of the poor terrorists

As far as I was aware, France was already bombing Syria- hence ISIS attacking Paris.

Great argument OP. Good one.

It's a war. I've picked my side, and accept that the moral consequence of my symbolic action is to condone the real actions of my ally.

Not sure why it's so morally murky for some. Regardless of the reasons for the war beginning, from my perspective there's only one acceptable ending: The one where my gay friends don't get executed and my girlfriend isn't forced to wear a head scarf. Even if the war against ISIS goes on for a decade, it is only going to be a small part of the much larger conflict. Innocents are going to die in both sides and the only way to limit that will be actions which defeat the enemy in the most rapid possible fashion. To pretend otherwise is to embrace paralysis and invite defeat for ourselves and subjugation for our children.

It is a cold, stark reality which we have denied for far too long.

All I will say is that the one person I know who is actually doing something real to help the people most directly affected by ISIS - the Syrian refugees - has not changed their FB image to the French flag.