Mass infanticide by US state terrorism - thou shalt not kill children

“Thou shalt not kill children” is such a fundamental human behavioural imperative that it is not even a specific item of the Ten Commandments of the Mosaic Decalogue that is the moral foundation of the Abrahamic religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

However care for children is fundamental not only to Man but to other social primates (monkeys and apes) and indeed to a huge range of organisms. The evolution of maternal altruism and indeed of paternal altruism has been brilliantly explored by Oxford’s Professor Richard Dawkins in his seminal book “The Selfish Gene” (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1976). Such altruism is selected for evolutionarily because it enhances the survival of offspring to reproductive age and hence the survival of the genes promoting altruism towards the young.

Such altruism can extend to children within a social group that are not one’s own, this being called “allomothering” or “aunt behaviour” in the case of females who care for the children of others. Indeed such care and solicitude extends in humans to the infants of other species as most endearingly evidenced by the affection of humans for puppies and kittens.

Unfortunately, while we are hard-wired for altruism to members of our own group through our DNA-based genes, this altruism often does not extend to members of our own species who are not close relatives. Indeed horribly violent and murderous behavior of chimpanzees to members of their own species encroaching on their territory suggests primate behavioral evolution of hostility to strangers of the same species.

Nevertheless Man can overcome this “moral” deficiency through the passing on of societally-selected ideas or “memes” such as “love thy neighbor as thyself”, “all men are created equal and have an unalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”, “thou shalt not kill” and “thou shalt not kill children”.

The final sentences of Richard Dawkins' seminal book "The Selfish Gene" expound the following hope for humanity:

"We are built as gene machines and cultured as meme machines, but we have the power to turn against our creators. We, alone on earth, can rebel against the tyranny of the selfish replicators".

Decent, anti-racist humanitarians hope that “memes” relating to truth, reason, racial equality, non-violence, respect for Mother and Child, “thou shalt not kill” and “thou shalt not kill children” will become universal IN PRACTICE. However there is a long way to go on Spaceship Earth before the humanist ideal of “respect for equality in the dignity of everyone” becomes general IN PRACTICE.

This “thou shalt not kill children” blog explores these deficiencies that are horribly evident in our world. It is estimated (2003 figures) that about 9.5 million under-5 year old infants die AVOIDABLY each year on Spaceship Earth with the educated, prosperous First World in charge of the flight deck (see my book “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950” (G.M. Polya, Melbourne, 2007: http://mwcnews.net/content/view/1375/247/ and http://globalbodycount.blogspot.com/ ).

UNICEF (see: http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/index.html ) and the UN Population Division (see: http://esa.un.org/unpp/ ) provide very detailed statistics on the welfare and mortality of children. The Infant Avoidable Mortality Holocaust (9.5 million avoidable under-5 year old infant deaths annually) is continuing due to a combination of violence, deprivation, disease and LYING. The prosperous Western World by and large IGNORES the horrendous reality and especially that part for which it is directly responsible through actual military occupation.

Thus most of the Western World has been variously involved in the last 2 decades in Sanctions against Iraq, the Iraq War and the Afghanistan War. From UN Population Division data (see: http://esa.un.org/unpp/ ) it can be calculated that Indigenous under-5 infant deaths totalled 1.2 million (Sanctions War against Iraq, 1990-2003), 0.6 million (Iraq War 2003-2007) and 2.2 million (Afghanistan War, 2001-2007), a grand total of 4 million under-5 year old infant deaths in these US-violated territories, 90% avoidable (i.e. 3.6 million avoidable infant deaths) and largely due to gross US and US Alliance war crimes in gross violation of the Geneva Convention and indeed of what Catholic theologians call the Natural Law, specifically "thou shalt not kill children" (see: “Children of Lesser God. MWC News and Gideon Polya #1 for “thous shalt not kill children””: http://mwcnews.net/content/view/19454/42/ ).

However the active and passive mass murder of Subject Children by US state terrorism and its surrogates extends beyond the killing fields of Occupied and Occupied Afghanistan. Thus the following analysis of under-5 infant mortality data from UNICEF for 2005 for countries occupied by the US or its surrogates (Occupied Haiti, Somalia, Palestine, Iraq and Afghanistan) (see: “US terror & occupation. War crimes & huge infant deaths”: http://mwcnews.net/content/view/11968/42/ ):

“Year 2005 under-5 infant deaths” / “year 2005 population” is 370,000 / 29.9 million (Occupied Afghanistan); 122,000 / 28.8 million (Occupied Iraq); 82,000 / 8.2 million (Occupied Somalia); 31,000 / 8.5 million (Occupied Haiti); and 3,000 / 3.7 million (Occupied Palestinian Territory) – as compared to 1,500 / 20.2 million (Occupi-er Australia) and 800 / 6.4 million (Occupi-er Israel).
“Year 2005 annual under-5 infant death rate” (i.e. as a percentage: deaths for every 100 under-5 year old infants in 2005 in a particular country) was 6.7% (Occupied Afghanistan); 2.8% (Occupied Iraq); 5.5% (Occupied Somalia); 2.7% (Occupied Haiti); and 0.47% (Occupied Palestinian Territory) – as compared to 0.12% (Occupi-er Australia) and 0.12% (Occupi-er Israel).
The sheer criminality of what the US and its allies Israel, the UK, Australia, Coalition countries and complicit NATO countries are doing can be most dramatically seen by comparing the above “annual under-5 infant death rates” in currently US- or US surrogate-occupied countries (0.47% - 6.7%) with the “annual death rate” of 10% for Australian prisoners of war (POWs) of the Japanese in WW2.
The fundamental reason for the horrendous infant mortality in these US- and US surrogate-occupied countries is non-provision of life-sustaining requisites unequivocally demanded of Occupiers by Articles 55 and 56 of the Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War (see: http://www1.umn.edu/humanrts/instree/y4gcpcp.htm ).
Thus a major contributor to the carnage in Occupied Palestine, Occupied Iraq and Occupied Afghanistan is the war criminal failure of the Occupiers to supply life-sustaining requisites as demanded unequivocally by the Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War. According the World Health Organization (WHO: http://www.who.int/en/ ), the “annual total per capita medical expenditure” permitted in Occupied Iraq by the US Coalition is $135 (2004) as compared to $19 (Occupied Afghanistan), $2,560 (UK), $3,123 (Australia) and $6,096 (the US) (see “United State Terrorism. 8 millions deaths & media holocaust denial”: http://mwcnews.net/content/view/17139/42/ ).
The Bush War on Terror (post-invasion excess deaths totalling 8 million in the Occupied Iraqi and Afghan Territories is in horrible reality a cowardly and racist War on Women and Children, a War on Arab Women and Children, a War on Muslim Women and Children, a War on Asian Women and Children and a War on Non-European women and Children – and indeed an extension of a Five Century War on Non-European Women and Children by Western Europe and Anglo-Celtia.
You can do YOUR bit by informing others of these horrendous realities that are generally IGNORED by lying, racist, holocaust-ignoring Mainstream media in the American Murdochracy and the US-allied Western Murdochracies. Silence kills and silence is complicity. We cannot walk by on the other side. Tell those responsible – the voters of the mass infanticide-complicit Western Murdochracies – that “Thou shalt not kill children”.