E-Surgents: The Latest Attack on Web-Based Media

The Internet is littered with media sites that are now offshoots of YouTube. The most popular of which is referred to as LiveLeak, which promises that it is "redefining the media" by buying out the major gore sites such as Ogrish.com and combining them into a single, YouTube style embedded video Web site. Considered to be the most comprehensive source of "uncensored" adult and violent media on the net, it is a true spectacle and testament for internet freedom. Among the most popular videos are those posted by insurgents from Iraq depicting IEDs, snipers, and other such "bad news" videos in Iraq.

Sometimes these videos backfired for the insurgents of course, as was the case with the ever popular video depicting a planned attack on an American convoy that went horribly awry, where the insurgents launched their attack, only for the camera to shake, distort and cut out. The video then turned to the American perspective, who video taped the after effects of the battlefield with a number of insurgents killed - one of them having attempted to flee, with a camera in his hand.

Usually these videos are met with a chorus of mixed responses. Usually, most responses decry them - ranging from simple condemnation for the cowardly tactics of the insurgency to brazen racism and generalization against Arabs in general. However, almost without fail, there will be at least one voice that stands up for the Fedayeen and insurgents. They will usually be poorly spelled, grammar-lacking comments that decry American foreign policy, or profess how glad they are someone suffered horribly at the hands of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

Often times, they like to talk as though they're either directly on the front line (as if there were one), or was typing it on a wireless internet laptop just as they finished laying an IED in the road. Of course, the truth of the matter is that they're usually posting on desktops outside of their parents' houses - and while I loathe to turn to cliches, this is tragically the case, such as with Samir Khan.

Like so many other parts of the internet, such a tantalizing anonymity is just too good to pass up. Many people either don't have the contacts, money, or simple moral courage to go through with their fantasies, but when your media on the internet is just as valid as those of respected critics and politicians suddenly you're able to live life through an avatar. Samuel Daward, the guy who didn't have many friends in high school and couldn't intimidate the bullies back, was suddenly able to illicit feelings of horror in people by pretending to be Abu Akim Abdullah al-Ghazi, posting his blog and comments from inside of Anbar.

There's a word for these types of people: they're e-surgents.

The only thing they have in common with insurgents is their fierce anti-Americanism and at least a demeanor of intolerance and hatred. But they fail to do little more than actually post their comments of hate and support of terror.

Generally, e-surgents are mostly harmless and are safely mocked off of whatever media they post on - the only real danger comes from the self-indoctrination. These people convince themselves they're actually fighting the United States, and can find themselves sucked into a world they are not actually ready to support. Everything is unreal on the internet - but once one starts getting emails asking for assistance overseas, they're put into a crossroads that may lead them down a path they may never have actually hoped for with their lives.

But for the most part, a good majority of internet media is plagued by e-surgents - and unless one is interested in having a little fun with them, the best bet is to simply ignore them.