From what I understand, Libya has little experience with democracy and few civic institutions, and it's largely a tribal society.
Historically, when an occupying or autocratic power falls you get a power vacuum followed by civil strife, war or, at least, a reshuffling of society.
I hope these newly restructured N. African states get it together and manage to form free and benign societies, but I wouldn't put any money on it.
well yes, it's not fair to hold them up to such high standards just yet. I think I'm mostly frustrated with "us". I know it isn't entirely comparable, but I had to think of the sudden expiration of bin laden. not that he was killed without trial so much, I simply can't know wether that was avoidable or not.. would I order people to take him down alive, even if that puts those people at risk? I have no idea, and I won't be the armchair judge. but I can judge from my armchair all the other people sitting in their armchairs cheering about the bloodied corpse of a "bad guy". in the case of bin laden, that "we" didn't at least say "meh, a trial would have been preferable", instead of cheering blindly, like killing someone was a great feat. so while these cases aren't comparable, what my peeve with them is exactly the same. I'm not annoyed with lybia, I am annoyed with "the west" and the mindless cheering, once again.
maybe it was a bit too much to bring up eichmann (that's just the most depressing trial I know of, so pointless in a way -- and still, I think it's good it took place), but my point was, the WORSE someone is, the more necessary a trial is, even though the result may be obvious from the start. so what if it gives people a platform to spout their views one last time. people weren't that squeamish about the nazis, that is, they accepted that cost for the greater good of a thorough process. what happened? was that the zenith of our humanity and courage, have we passed it since then? I'd hate to think that's true. and another thing just occured to me, that hitler commited suicide to avoid having to face a trial...! in my mind, just killing "similar people" is doing them a favour, and is no grand success for justice. that's all. there's no use to cry over spilt milk, and it's silly to be patronizing towards lybia and hold them up to "our" standards, but the celebrations have to proceed without me anyway.
