So here's an article on the earthquake in Turkey

[conuly]

I remember after the one in Haiti seeing a picture of rescue workers from Israel and Iran working together to save somebody. (Iran? I think it was Iran.)

More than 50 nations also offered aid, including Israel, whose relations with Turkey have been strained since the Turkish deaths last year in an Israeli commando raid on a flotilla that was trying to run the blockade of Gaza.

Mr. Arinc strongly denied initial reports that his government had refused the Israeli offer, saying that the two countries had always cooperated at times of natural disaster. Relations with Israel might not be as good as desired, he said, but “it would have been highly inappropriate and unpleasant to refuse the offer by the Israeli government.”

“Nobody should even think about such a thing,” he said.

We may have found the distasteful solution to international relations. Clearly, we need more natural disasters so that everybody works together in solidarity. (Hopefully we also will get improved infrastructure so fewer people die in these disasters, but they won't be dying in wars either, so it's all a win.)

Okay, so it's slightly insane, but can't you see it as the ultimate plan of a misunderstood supervillain or something?

(Fun fact: Etymologically speaking, villain is related to villa. It's almost as bad as silly!)

Comments

[delphi]

Okay, so it's slightly insane, but can't you see it as the ultimate plan of a misunderstood supervillain or something?

That would be Ozymandias in Watchmen. :-)

[conuly]

Oooh, really?

[delphi]

The exact threat differs between the graphic novel and movie, but [spoilers for something twenty years old, etc.] the technically well-intending villain unleashes a non-human scapegoat to defuse the threat of nuclear war, with the theory that if several nations are equally debilitated by an external force, everyone will band together and build a stronger world.

[conuly]

Oh, wait, wasn't that also one of the alternate universes in Lathe of Heaven? George was told to dream of a united world, and he dreamed up an alien threat on the moon so that humanity would stop infighting to mobilize against the potential invaders.

[delphi]

I haven't read that since I was small, but that definitely rings a bell. Watchmen definitely gets bonus points in my book for having a villain exposit his cunning plan, then, when asked by the hero when he'll do it, say, "Do it? Do you seriously think I'd explain my master-stroke if there remained the slightest chance of you affecting its outcome? I did it thirty-five minutes ago."

[conuly]

Oooh, goodie!

(Do they manage to affect the outcome anyway?)

[delphi]

One hero decides he has no choice but to go on with it for the greater good (else all the carnage would have been for nothing), and the other sacrifices himself, but not without having planted evidence that might help conspiracy theorists of the new order figure out what really happened.

[conuly]

Conspiracy theorists, like anybody believes them! Still, I guess it was the best he could do.