I Can't Speak

Normally, I'll talk a mile a minute.

But after reading this article, I just can't seem to move my mouth. For the entire time I was reading through it, I couldn't even drink from my coffee mug that was sitting three inches away from my mouth.

Sergio Pelico, a 10-year-old boy from Webster, Texas, hanged himself from a bunk bed last Sunday.

On that same day, a 9-year-old Pakistani boy, Mubashar Ali, hanged himself, with help from his 10-year-old sister.

And three days later, in the suburbs of Kolkata, India, 15-year-old Moon Moon Karmarkar hanged herself from a ceiling fan.

Other than their tragic nature, the suicides of these children shared another link — each of the young victims had viewed the execution video of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein on television.

Simply too disturbing for words. Way too disturbing. The article goes on to say that

The situation may have been different in the case of 15-year-old Karmarkar, who, according to reports by a foreign news agency, hanged herself to "feel the pain Saddam did during the execution."

When I first saw the bootlegged Saddam Execution video on YouTube, the main reason I felt disturbed was that it looked like he was being lynched by thugs pulled in from the street. Which was, in fact, true. They do look like thugs, as the picture to the right shows. Simple, honest-to-God thugs that, if sent to a movie set by Central Casting, the director of the movie would send them back with a pointed lecture about the evils and perils of typecasting. But now, with this further sad tale, I must state that this has gone beyond the pale.

Perhaps there's a child psychologist out there that can break this into simple words for me. Because I just don't understand it, even as the ABC News article tries to explain it.