Dear Editor,

Disturbingly, in this Palestine-Israel conflict and most others, many human lives are perceived as not being of equal value when, morally speaking, they all definitely should.

In fact, human beings can actually be perceived and treated as though they are disposable and, by extension, their suffering and death are somehow less worthy of external concern, sometimes even by democratic and otherwise relatively civilised nations. And matters are typically exacerbated when one is convinced that God is on his/her side.

A somewhat similar inhumane devaluation is observable in external attitudes, albeit perhaps on a subconscious level, towards the daily civilian lives lost in protractedly devastating war zones and famine-stricken nations.

The worth of such life will be measured by its overabundance and/or the protracted conditions under which it suffers and those people can eventually receive meagre column inches on the back page of the First World’s daily news.

And while some identifiable groups have been brutally victimised throughout history a disproportionately large number of times, the victims of one place and time can and sometimes do become the victimisers of another place and time.

Frank Sterle Jr

fgs2013jr@gmail.com