Why Do We Censor Ourselves?

It's weird.

When posting here I always like to find a picture that illustrates the story. That puts it in perspective, either by being humerous about the point I'm discussing, or to add a simple dramatic image that sums up the point I'm making.

I've just posted a story about the killing of innocent Iraqi civilians and I've balked at using the most graphic imagery. I've settled on a picture of an American soldier rather than the more obvious picture of a slaughtered Iraqi.

Anyone who looks through Googles picture library will know the other options that were available to me.

Why do we censor ourselves?

I know, on one level, it's because I don't want to feel that I'm being disrespectful to the person who's death has been caught on camera.

However, there's another part of me that believes that these right wing morons, who gleefully clap like cheerleaders and encourage this kind of barbarity, should be forced to look at the actual consequences of their actions.

We should see war, not as some tiny blob that occurs on a green screen, but as the human calamity that it is, where the cost is huge and bloody.

And yet... I find I simply can't do it.

There is no picture to illustrate this post.