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Loewak is an independent news & media network based in the Netherlands. We offer news, articles and perspectives with an alternative and philosophical edge.
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Gary Brooks Faulkner, the bountyhunting construction worker

A construction worker from California has been caught in the forest of Pakistan with a sword, a gun and nightvision equipment, on his alleged seventh hunt for Osama Bin Laden. He was planning to decapitate Bin Laden once he’d manage to find him.

A newsitem that makes us laugh, perhaps. This sort of local folklore always does well in the media. But think about it: if the same guy would have been captured in the forests outside of washington on a hunt for George Bush our media would have obsessed for weeks how it was possible that this ‘terrorist’ entered the country. Airports would have been shut down, security would have been on debates for weeks.

Gary Brooks Faulkner was caught wearing several christian religious regalia in a foreign muslim country. How would you feel if a pakistani was caught in the forest of Washington, hunting for someone the Pakistani governement had declared a criminal, covered in religious koran texts? Right.

As long as we apply these double standards to our media coverage there simply isnt anything ethical about our approach of the world or the news.

8 Responses to “Gary Brooks Faulkner, the bountyhunting construction worker”

  • Wilkerson:
    Comparing the President of the United States to an internationally wanted fugitive is a bit specious.
  • It doesnt make any difference. The idea that a muslim would come to the States to hunt some maffia boss in the name of his religion wouldnt be received very well either. And as far as I know there has never been any evidence presented about bin laden – in our western system someone is innocent until proven guilty in a court of justice. You cant simply skip that ‘justice’ bit.
  • Dave:
    If “It doesn’t make any difference” that you likened threatening Osama Bin Laden to threatening George Bush, then why did you bring it up in your article?

    There are at least a couple of pieces of evidence that Bin Laden arrogantly presented himself via audio and video tape intended for broadcast to the entire world, and in the name of Allah no less. He declared war on the US in the form of jihad and admitted to participating in the attack on the WTC. If you want to protect him from being killed before justice can be administered, you’d better get him to Guantanamo before our real soldiers find him.

    What double standard? It looks as though Faulkner is receiving plenty of press. Have you read the news on him from Pakistan’s news agencies?

    By the way, I didn’t laugh when I heard about his adventure, I cheered!
  • Sorry to say this, Dave, but such videos do not constitute ‘evidence’ since in this media age almost anyone could have fabricated them. And it doesnt make a whole lot of sense, does it, to publish a video in which you brag about something when you know this will result in people hunting you down. So it seems to me he would have had no real motive to publish such a video.

    Im all in favor of putting the people who organized that terror attack in court and give them a life or even death sentence. Im not in favor of skipping the court and go bounty hunting. I think that bypasses the foundation we build our respective systems on and such bypasses are simply never a good idea.
  • Steve:
    Who, exactly, voted Osama Bin Laden into office? Comparing an independent manhunt for an international fugitive from justice to a hypothetical assassin hunting down the elected leader of our nation is a little ludicrous.
  • Not at all, since those ‘independant manhunts’ are completely illegal and therefore in conflict with the idea of justice. You cannot have justice without a proper court case. That means someone is innocent until proven guilty. An ‘independant manhunt’ is by definition guilty. That someone is elected or not makes no difference to the argument at hand.
  • Paardestaart:
    “You cannot have justice without a proper court case”

    No? So you think Hitler should have had a proper court case? You are happy with the goings on in The Hague, where pathetic cases against war-criminals drag on endlessly, driving victims and survivors to despair with the incongruity between their tortured memories and the legalist hairsplittings in the court?
    I’m not. I find the pretensions of these ‘tribunals’ obscene and naive
    Sop I think it was a mercy when the rumanians instantly executed their satanic majesties the Ceaucescu’s when they had the chance, and that someome like Andy Mc Nab says he would behead OBL before handing him over to the Americans when claiming his just reward

    The only people entitled to judge these ogres are their immediate victims – the rest should shut the hell up and keep quiet. There is no justice in the shadowy realms of terror – only killers, murderers and their victims, and traumatized survivors

    So, although it is very commendable of course that you are such a correct individual, I very much hope it will not fall on the likes of you to decide in matters like these, if and when our turn comes, although I am not holding my breath
  • Paardestaart:
    Very telling, incidently, that you took your cue for what a construction worker looks like from the mainstream liberal press in the USA.. :-) A redneck with a beergut and a silly hat – your typical teabagger tormenting Obama, I suppose..?
    But he looks much more like a UVA-teacher or a Groen Links politician – look:

    http://www.aolnews.com/the-point/article/gary-faulkner-would-be-bin-laden-beheader/19517115

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Comments
  • Hello!: you have a poor perception. Clearly you do not have the depth of a brain to understand the message of this movie. The movie shows more than...
  • Ryan Seymour: Why are there so many people who are convinced down to their very core that movies such as the Batman films and other pop culture...
  • Daydreamer: In de filosofie zijn er meerdere ‘soorten’ idealisme, dat is maar net of je de filosofie van Kant volgt, of die van Plato,...
  • Little Sunshine: Native Amerikaanse Indianen hebben geen Shamanen in hun Cultuur, maar Heilige Mensen en Medicijnmensen. Het is een woord afkomstig...
  • Mcan: Prachtig! Ik vind het allen al heerlijk om daar te fietsen.. laat staan me hele leven daar nog door te brengen….
  • Anthony Struth: You quoted Mark Twain to attack the dark knight because of its unrealistic genre (comic book) I find that strongly hypocritical...
  • Martijn Benders: Well, Zfree, if being wealthy is a good enough reason to be attacked by stooges then any sort of structure becomes impossible....
  • zfree: Oh those pirates mindlessly attacking the wealthy super-nationals out for a cruise dumping toxic waste in their waters and over-fishing...
  • Martijn Benders: There’s probably international laws that prohibit firing on the mothership. I know the dutch navy cant even fire guns at the...
  • Tim Michigan USA: Yes, you make some good points. There is something missing to this story, and to the story in general of fighting these pirates....
  • Martijn Benders: Well yes, they should have done something about this problem a long time ago. Who ever heard of any empire paying pirates huge...
  • FB: The stupid pirates had a pretty good gig but now they have monumentally misjudged their power and have sealed their fate. They can expect to be...
  • Martijn Benders: Yes, but also competent enough to at least lead that country for fourty years. Thats not a schoolbook definition of madness, but...
  • Compay: >That is the possibility that he is genuinely insane. He looks like an exhibitionist bag lady, like one of those awkward looking...
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