Why the euphemisms?

[bernee51]

I posted this in another thread then realised it was probably more apropos to this one...

Over the past few days there has been an immense amount of bloodshed, death and misery in the Tal Afar, in the north of Iraq. It is a case of Sunni killing Shia and vica versa - i.e. muslims killing muslims for no good reason other than they hold a different view of the source of their beliefs.

The media seems to want to change this from a religious conflagration to something else - an 'ethnic' dispute. The Sunni wanting to clear their perceived homelands of Shia is described as 'ethnic cleansing" when it is religioius cleansing. They are not of different ethnicities - they are all Iraqi arabs.

Exactly the same as happened in Bosnia with the muslims being religiously cleansed by christian Serbs. Both the same race. Not ethnic cleansing at all.

Why the use of euphemisms?

[juliod]

I think the word "ethnic" includes religion and culture. It's somewhat different than "genocide" which is based on real or imagined genetic differences.

DanZ

[micatala]

I thought most of the residents of Tall Afar were ethnic Turkmen, rather than arabs.

I am not sure why the change in terminology. The one report I saw on this was on U.S. Public Television. THe identified the actors as being primarily of the same ethnicity, Turkmen, but of the different branches of Islam, so they were not employing the euphemisms bernee refers to.

I don't know, but it seems to me that the source of the conflict is more likely to be political than religious. To the extent that the Sunni and Shia groups are not only religious, but also create political identities and groups that wield power, I would think it is the power that they are fighting about. Who will govern? Who will benefit from oil revenues? etc.