Some of you may have heard of this already. It's in Daniel's blog, but it's not in many other places. As Daniel has pointed out, the press has been strangely quiet about this one (unless I missed something somewhere).
I was never thrilled with the Abu Ghraib situation. Although the pictures were less horrifying than what any terrorist atrocities were, American soldiers have a duty to behave much better than the terrorists because we are supposed to have higher standards. They are animals, but we pride ourselves in our humanity. We have always believed we should rise above such animalistic behaviors. Abu Ghraib showed the world that not all Americans are so noble.
Now we have another instance that once again reminds the world that we have our trash, just as the Muslim world has their trash. I still believe that the majority of our soldiers are more noble than any terrorist. But there is no sugar-coating the fact that anyone who takes trophy photos of mutilated terrorist corpses in order to display them for entertainment is a piece of scum. To make it worse, these photos were used in exchange for porn.
So now we are sending the message to the Arab world that some of our troops are such low-life trash that they violated the Geveva Convention* in exchange for porn. Not only is the first reprehensible, but porn is also seen as repulsive in the Muslim world (and most Americans also frown on it). They will once again be pointing at Americans as a depraved society, and we are running out of excuses.
Where is the military leadership? And what is the Bush administration going to do about this?
*The Geneva Conventions include Protocol 1, added in 1977 but not ratified by the U.S., Iraq or Afghanistan. It mentions that all parties in a conflict must respect victims' remains, though doesn't mention the photographing of dead bodies.
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12 comments:
They've already chosen a scapegoat for Abu Ghraib. I think they'll do the same for this.
I read about this in the paper. It was either the Miami Herald or The NY Times. Or maybe it was on CNN.com. Part of my job is to read up on international news.
Bush will do nothing about this. If it comes down to it he will just claim to know nothing (not hard to believe that one really) and find someone as low in the command structure as possible to blame it all on.
The emperor not only has no clothes, but there seems to be a vibrator stuck in the brown starfish. Will someone please tell him??
Behavior such as this by a few always makes the whole look bad. Those involved are sickos! I won't lose any sleep over dead terrorists, but I think it is sick to relish and find delight in pictures of their corpses. Porn is saturating our society. My husband has counseled many men who are/were addicted to it. It ends up consuming them and ruining their relationships with women.
What Bush will do: NOTHING
I didn't hear about this at all. Sickening.
Wait a minute. I see a chance for a crossover here. What if the undertaking industry took pictures and ... Well, you can just imagine the big bucks to be made out of that one. To be safe, though, they'll probably only run their operation in the Red states.
It is gross, disgusting stuff. Hard to believe people can behave so badly.
Most soldiers get a rush from their first kill. Many deal with this rush in irrational ways. It’s really not until you’ve killed 3 or 4 that you settle down and treat it like a job. Since the military doesn’t let you practice killing a few people before you go off to fight, you’re left with on the job training. The Commanding Officer is not a trained Psychiatrist.
Anon, what a lovely thought. However, no one is requiring the commanding officer to be a trained psychiatrist. Instead, he is asked to make it very clear that soldiers who participate in such atrocities will be hunted down and punished. Zero tolerance.
Unfortunately, America is becoming a gilded box, glossy gold on the outside, rotting filth on the inside.
Slowly but surely we have lowered our standards in the name of tolerance. We have painted a pretty face on lust and greed and in some circles we even praise them.
The bottom line is that America has no self control, we over eat, we over consume, we over sex, and we just diet and medicate the problems that result.
We are a society that is all about immediate gratification. We have no standards because we have thrown the Bible out the window. And if you have no standard, then who is to say what is right and what is wrong?
The majority of the soldiers seem to be young men and women, men and women who were raised on MTV, reality TV, South Park, Horror films and they have been desensitized.
I remember when I was younger the Simpson's were considered shocking and then it was Beavis and Butthead, and then came Howard Stern... and it's not just Television, it's newspapers, magazines, and even parents who are part of the problem.
Sorry to go on such a long diatribe here, it just frightens me to see how far we have gone in such a short amount of time.
This kind of thing just saddens me.
Eddo, as usual, you and I see eye-to-eye. I couldn't (and didn't) say it any better. Thank you
Glad you posted on this, the more the better to spread the word.
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