Today’s guest post comes from Jen Rudolph, Program Animal Specialist at Rhode Island Zoological Society

On January 1, 2008, after a very difficult time in my life, I woke up and made a promise to myself that I would find a way to change the world for the better.  Of course, this is an overwhelming goal if you look at all the world’s problems but if you can identify one problem at a time, like any other task, it becomes possible.

For me, working in corporate America, specifically for a retailer whose main goal was to produce more “stuff”, I began to realize that I had stopped listening to that little voice inside me that had always looked to nature for comfort.  I began my search for opportunities at one of the places I would go as a child to connect with animals, my local zoo.

When I went to…

This image of the Omar al-Farouq brigade was taken from the group’s website; Syrian Sunni rebel Khalid al-Hamad, who mutilated a corpse, is a member of the brigade.

I wrote this piece for  Al-Monitor, look forward to your comments.

The recent gruesome video of a Syrian rebel soldier, Khalid al-Hamad, mutilating a corpse has triggered shock and outrage, fueling a tense debate over the wisdom of supporting the armed uprising against President Bashar al-Assad. While some consider the video as the ultimate proof that backing the rebels is a bad idea, others view the radicalization and increasing brutality of the armed opposition as a direct result of the weak Western response and US dithering. This later opinion is based on the assumption that an early and decisive intervention in support of the moderate factions of the Syrian rebels would have marginalized the radicals and reduced their recruiting abilities.