Miss Cam is very, very angry

[misscam]

What kind of shit is this?!

Seriously, what the hell is this Abu Ghraib thing?

So I've been following this lovely little tale of Abu Ghraib, Saddam's notorious prison which has now gained yet more notority. And this time it can certainly not be blamed on Saddam.

American soldiers humiliating and torturing Iraqi prisoners. Now there is a lovely image. And apparently this was investigated and a report on it was finished in *March* (and apparently Mr. Rumsfeld had not yet read this report by May 4th). The more I hear about this, the more disgusted I get. And if this turns out to be part of some wider practice (which some do suggest, but proof will have to be put forward to show if it is true or not), woe betide the US government.

Links, in case you've missed the story:
The Pentagon reaction.
Bush to speak to Arab TV on the scandal.
BBC on the report into prison abuse.
Aftermath in Falluja.

You know, this is getting worse than any of my very gloomy pre-war Iraq predictions. I feel like I'm watching a trainwreck. Whatever good the US has done in Iraq gets eaten up by scandals like this. How the hell did this happen? And it's especially bad now that the US government is trying to sell that this war was for humanitarian reasons (given that those pesky WMDs turned out to be rather ghostly) and you get images like that. An image is worth a thousand words and right not all those thousand words are all slamming the US. The Pentagon can talk about rotten apples all they like (and even be right about it) and that image of smiling Americans next to humiliated and abused Iraqis will still be as clear as ever in people's mind.

This is just so not good. There's even been pictures of British soldiers involved in abuse as well, though their authenticity has been questioned, so I guess it remains to be seen on that account. If it's true, woe betide the British government as well.

And of course, the sovereignty the US talked about giving on June 30th turns out to at best be a kind of half sovereignty, if that. It'll still be the US army that is the real power in Iraq. And from sneering at the UN and lob not-too-inventive insults at it, the US is now busily trying to draw it back to Iraq. Troop numbers that were to be reduced turned out not to be reduced at all, an ex-Saddam military commander sent to fix the problem of Falluja... All this just screams 'making it up as we go along' to me. Maybe I'm wrong and there was some great plan here, but I'm certainly not seeing it. I see rising deaths and rising anger and neither is filling me with confidence about where this is going.

I mean, Abu Ghraib, for crying out loud. Saddam's own little torture prison, one of the very symbols of his badness. Now with American soldiers abusing Iraqis. I mean, the link there is just appaling. And that aside, it's just appalingly stupid too. Abusing prisoners where Saddam used to do so. Yeah, that's real smart.

So I say again: What kind of shit is this?!

And don't even get me started on the US-Israeli thing. I've run out of energy to hiss at Bush now (there's a first).

Good grief. Abu Ghraib, of all places!

Comments

[greyladybast.livejournal.com]

No. We CAN'T learn from history. At least, we can't without some very real risks. Scary risks.

And all this shit is why I am beginning to feel suspiciously like Random Schmuck #32 on the Death Star, or in the Haradrim army, or whatever Evil Regime you care to name.

I fretted about this in my own LJ, but the questions still remain.

What do we do? How far are we willing to let this go, not just on an American level, but worldwide? What are we going to do to try to stop it? And if we CAN'T stop it, are we going to try to protest it? Do we harness the power of the Internet, or do we pull the covers up over our ears and hope it will go away? And what happens to our loved ones if we fight? What happens to them if we don't?

I have no easy answers for these questions. Every time I think to myself "Of course I must fight!!!", I look at my little Boychilde, or the adolescents on the bus who, for some unfathomable reason, look to me for guidance and fairness and a good example, and think "How can I risk myself and let them down?"

This is why I don't fight harder. Does that make me a collaborator with Evil? I fear that it does, but I don't know how to stop it.

So, what do we do? What DO we do? "What would you say, if your mother asked you?" to quote Dr. Seuss.

I have no answers. Does anyone else?

Bast, worried and frightened

[misscam.livejournal.com]

I don't think anyone has *the* answers because what is true for me might not be true for you. But it's always a good sign if you are at least asking the questions. I worry about some of the same things sometimes - how can I truly know that what changes I want are the right ones? And the answer is of course that I don't. I cannot know for sure.

But I think doubt is good, in this case. It leaves you open to listen to others. This is what scares me about Bush and Rumsfeld. I sense no doubt in them, I hear no doubt in them, I see no doubt in them. I might be wrong, of course.

But you're asking questions and showing doubt, which means you're open to listen. That is a good thing. We can only do what we think is best. We can never know. Deluding ourselves to think we do know that our course is right is to me where the greatest potential to go wrong lies.

*shrugs* Not much of a comfort, I fear.

[maureenlycaon.livejournal.com]

Robin Morgan pointed out in The Demon Lover that a lack of doubts and ambivalence is a common trait of these dangerously deluded men. I've come to believe that we should celebrate self-doubt and ambivalence as positive virtues, because (as a pundit once said) "It is rating our conjectures too highly to burn people alive for them".

[misscam.livejournal.com]

Might be right about that.

All I know is that a lot of bad comes from people who seem to be utterly convinced they are a force for good (and sometimes, a force for God).