I have been wondering about how fast a "PR" hostage situation can turn against the hostage takers or those who share their beliefs.
The hostages taken in Iraq have mostly been civilians, and hostage takers have told that either foreign goverments pull out of Iraq or they will kill the hostages. Clearly their goal has been to put pressure on goverments in their home countries, and stop foreigners comming to their country... until now this has worked for the hostage takers - by showing videos of hostage to the media, which again repeatedly shows them to the public - filling the public with fear... the hostage takers have the "control".
Now as the hostage takers kill their hostages, then they losse that "control" they had before. Now its up to the media how it will be presented, and mostly western media want to show the indepth story - making the hostage into a person, and not just a face on a video. The fear the public had - turns into anger - they want to blame someone for the killing of the hostage... and here is where it can turn against the hostage takers or people who share the hostage takers belief.
Once Europe was seen as "safehaven" for islamic fundamentalists, however that is changing, and with the killing of european hostages, then I´m starting to wonder, if europeans will choose to blame their goverments, or the hostage takers... and since hostage takers are sitting in a small desert city in Iraq, would that lead europeans to take out their frustrations on the islamic fundamentalists living in Europe?
Last edited by Rolo at Apr 16 2004, 12:53 AM
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