Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: the obsessive-compulsive disorder

Un volontario yankee in Libia.
 
La sindrome che lo affligge, the obsessive-compulsive disorder.
 
Malattia che denota poco equilibrio mentale e rapporto disagiato con la 
realta'.
 
Pare si stia espandendo, la cura?
 
Portare il proprio disorder per il mondo.
 
Nello yankeestan 1 su 50 ne e' affetto.
 
Forse la causa del loro perenne stato di guerra.
 
 
 
During the months after VanDyke, 32, disappeared on the frontline of Libya's 
revolution, some people tried to gently tell his mother to expect the worst. 
Other missing Westerners - usually journalists who had mistakenly gotten too 
close to the action - had been found. But despite the efforts of diplomats 
and rights organizations, there was no trace of VanDyke.
 
He had left Baltimore in February, a few days after the uprising against 
Moammar Gaddafi started, telling his mother and girlfriend that he wanted to 
document it for a book and film.
 
But he really went to Libya to fight.
 
"I had friends there," he said. When they e-mailed asking him to tell people 
about them if they died, he decided to go help them.
 
He arrived in Benghazi, where a friend, once a hippie, was now a fighter. 
VanDyke told him, "I'm really here to fight; give me a Kalashnikov." He was 
given a uniform, plus a hat and sunglasses that helped him blend in.
 
Six days later, he was captured by Gaddafi forces while on a reconnaissance 
mission. He was knocked out and has no memory of what befell him or his 
three companions, who haven't been found.
 
After seeing photos of VanDyke with ammunition and videos of him vowing to 
fight until Libya was free, an interrogator told him, "You'll never see 
America again."
 
In his cell, he marked the days with scratches on the wall. He sang Guns N' 
Roses songs to himself and tried to remember all the characters from "Star 
Trek." He scraped his fingernails and toenails down to nubs, in case the 
guards tried to pull them out the way they had to the George Clooney 
character in "Syriana." Sometimes, he thought about suicide.
 
Five and a half months passed.
 
In August, Tripoli's notorious Abu Salim prison was liberated, and VanDyke 
walked out. Disoriented, unaware that NATO had intervened in the rebels' 
favor, he briefly recovered in Tripoli.
 
Then, instead of taking the flight home arranged by the State Department, he 
joined a rebel brigade fighting in Sirte, Gaddafi's home town. He pledged to 
stay until the Libyan dictator was vanquished. The organizations that had 
spent months searching for him said they would not look for him if he 
disappeared again.
 
VanDyke knows some people don't understand. He has already begun to hear 
their voices - journalists who greeted him at the airport Saturday night 
asking what he had to say to government officials who made such efforts to 
find him; radio and online commenters who have called him a leftist fighting 
alongside al-Qaeda, or a Zionist.
 
"I don't live my life worried about what people are going to say when I'm 
there to help my friends and to overthrow a dictator, who also killed a lot 
of Americans, Gaddafi, and also people all over the world he was the - 
Misty! Hey, Misty!" An orange tabby appeared in the doorway. "Misty, do you 
remember me?"
 
With piercing blue eyes, long hair pulled back in a ponytail, hollow cheeks 
and a full beard, he looked like Rasputin. His mother, Sherry, blond and 
bespectacled, neatly folded his rebel flags. She brought him ice water and 
jalapeno cheese cubes and quietly basked in his presence as he unpacked. "I 
always knew he was alive," she said.
 
The next time he flies away, she said, "I'll drive him to the airport 
 again."
 
His girlfriend, Lauren Fischer, is not so sure. VanDyke's excursions caused 
friction between them before he left, and he has promised he will stay in 
the United States for at least three months.
 
He plans to work on a book about his experiences and regain the 20 pounds 
and muscle mass he lost in prison. When he went to church Sunday, his pants 
were sliding off his hips. Fischer arrived at his house later with two belts 
from the Gap.
 
With a touch of a Maryland drawl, VanDyke said he doesn't know why his 
actions seem strange to some. "Gaddafi was probably the most active sponsor 
of international terrorism ever .?.?. I didn't think there would be a 
problem, and I really didn't care very much if it was, because I was doing 
the right thing," he said.
 
Comparing himself to foreigners who fought in the Spanish Civil War, he 
added, "Why don't more people do it?"
 
VanDyke, who holds a master's degree from Georgetown University's Walsh 
School of Foreign Service, had always planned to get overseas one way or 
another. He had wanted to work for the CIA, but his anxiety caused him to 
fail the polygraphs. He had considered joining the Marines or the Green 
Berets but ultimately decided to ride a motorcycle through North Africa and 
the Middle East. The idea was to get to know people in war-torn countries, 
and to conquer the fears that sometimes paralyzed him.
 
During the fighting in Libya, the obsessive-compulsive disorder that had 
plagued him since his teenage years subsided. He no longer worried so much 
about trash, sugar or striking a pedestrian while driving. Life took on a 
sharper edge.
 
It wasn't that he liked war. But "when it became more routine and more like 
my existence, that combined with just the camaraderie of the other fighters 
.?.?. and the constant unpredictability of it, and being part of something 
that important, all of those things combined made it like the best time of 
my life," he said.
 
 

 Pare si stia espandendo, la cura?
 
Rivolgiti al SERT.

 wrote in message 
news:e05f575b-75d2-45f5...@8g2000vbw.googlegroups.com...

Per il volontario yankee o per te? :-)) 
 
 


l'hanno chiuso, perchè così chiedeva il Dio Mercato. Adesso i cocci te
li suchi tutti...

 l'hanno chiuso, perchè così chiedeva il Dio Mercato.
 
Pensavo perché la sanità regionale era ridotta in bancarotta.