Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen.
- Robert Bresson
Originally posted by Thomas Paul:
I think that last paragraph of your's violates the "be nice" rule.
Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen.
- Robert Bresson
Originally posted by Warren Dew:
Consider the possibility that the soldiers involved didn't take their oath of service seriously in the first place. Keep in mind that they are currently being court martialed, and that the military investigations leading up to these court martials were well under way months before the pictures hit the press.
There are hundreds of thousands of people in the U.S. military. Expecting every single person in any population of that size to be perfect is unrealistic.
Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen.
- Robert Bresson
Originally posted by Michael Ernest:
Doesn't even that fact point to a lack of proper checks and due diligence in making sure, according to convention, that prisoners are treated according to international accords? How does this sort of thing happen with no one else the wiser?
Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen.
- Robert Bresson
Originally posted by Warren Dew:
Restricting ourselves to violent crime, I guess I'd expect a fair number of assaults, and some number of rapes and murders. In fact, the City of Boston crime statistics provide a number of 7174 violent crimes happening in 2003, including 263 rapes and attempted rapes and 39 murders, in 2003.
[ flickr ]
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Originally posted by Jeroen Wenting:
Remember also that people living under constant stress and restraint will at some point snap, especially if those restraints are temporarilly loosened or left without strict enforcement.
As long as checks and ballances are in place to penalise those who do so as both a means of justice towards the Iraqi citizenry and as an example and deterrent towards repeat offenses there is little more that can be done.
What gals me much more is that some of those troopers thought it fun to capture their acts on camera and then brag about them, even sending them to friends and family and in the end causing the pictures to reach the press.
What gals me more than that is that in their eternal strive for sensationalism the press then published all the gory details in vivid colour instead of working through proper channels to get the guilty removed from duty and convicted for their crimes.
Even worse, the press didn't get enough so they staged their own little torture scenes and published those as the real thing (so far proven I think only in the UK).
Most crimes in the US are committed by people between 16 and 35 which is also the ago group that most soldiers fall in. So Ashok is right in the sense that the population of Boston includes many very young and very old people that would never be involved in criminal acts.Originally posted by Jeroen Wenting:
Maybe not Ashok, but it does show the likely makeup of the US Army as a whole which is supposedly a crosssection of US society.
Associate Instructor - Hofstra University
Amazon Top 750 reviewer - Blog - Unresolved References - Book Review Blog
Associate Instructor - Hofstra University
Amazon Top 750 reviewer - Blog - Unresolved References - Book Review Blog
Originally posted by Thomas Paul:
Most crimes in the US are committed by people between 16 and 35 which is also the ago group that most soldiers fall in. So Ashok is right in the sense that the population of Boston includes many very young and very old people that would never be involved in criminal acts.
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Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen.
- Robert Bresson
Originally posted by Michael Ernest:
In her article, Sontag notes one of Rush Limbaugh's on-air reactions to one form of abuse, in which he equates stacking naked prisoners on each other as a kind of fraternity prank, much like a hazing. If she's quoting him accurately, part of his response to this treatment concludes with the rhetorical question, "Haven't you ever heard of emotional release?" I for one don't see this world where humiliating young men in the name of fraternity is thought of as having an appeal anyone should be able to understand, not the least of which are American soldiers who probably haven't been inducted into a college fraternity.
Commentary From the Sidelines of history
Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen.
- Robert Bresson
Commentary From the Sidelines of history
Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen.
- Robert Bresson
Associate Instructor - Hofstra University
Amazon Top 750 reviewer - Blog - Unresolved References - Book Review Blog
Originally posted by Jason Menard:
Just a note to people who mistakenly think that any kind of abuse that goes on must be part of some scheme organized somewhere along the chain of command.
.....
My point is, these things happen, and they are in no way organized or otherwise influenced by people higher up in the chain of command. It is equally as likely that this is the case at Abu Ghraib.
42
Originally posted by Jeroen Wenting:
What is also important though is to get it into the thick heads of the leftist controlled media and those they indoctrinate that there doesn't have to be some sort of highlevel conspiracy and that there almost certainly are no higher authorities ordering any atrocities or whatever.
Of course the leftist media have an agenda and that agenda is to get their favourite fair haired boy Kerry into the white house and they'll do whatever it takes to achieve that goal (up to and including withholding facts, twisting the truth and making up things that never happened).
including withholding facts, twisting the truth and making up things that never happened
If is quite possible that some local superiors knew what was going on (or at least suspected), but this would have been at squad level and not much higher.
I doubt any higher level officer stationed outside the actual prisons themselves had any knowledge or could have had.
Originally posted by Michael Ernest:
ME: Of course I have. I may have even said my words were taken out of context when I was called to account for it.
[QB]PM: So you know what it feels like to have your words taken out of context. Now, why not extend the same courtesy that you would have liked applied to yourself, to Rush.
ME: I don't suspect anyone is tallying the man's remarks. "More compared to less" in that sense strikes as a qualitative, not quanititative assertion.
[QB]PM: The man makes a living by stating the Politically Incorrect. He makes a living by giving otherwise obvious and honest opinions on events. What you and I may think about a particular incident maynot be to the liking of several other ranchers. Would you then accept an assertion that everytime someone dislikes a comment of yours, it is a "qualitative" judgement of your remarks??
ME: To his advantage, I might add. Controversy builds an audience. People tune in to hear what outrageous thing might be said or done. It worked for Phil Donahue, it worked for Morton Downey, Geraldo Rivera, Jerry Springer, Ricki Lake, Jenny Jones, Chris Mathews, Bill Reilly, and so on.
[QB]PM:Also to his disadvantage, I might add. As in this case.. where his remarks, taken out of context, are used to demonize him and villify him. He might, and a big might at that, have had you as his audience member if not for the villification by Susan Sontag influencing your judgement.
ME: I don't know what the FAIR report is.
[QB]PM:Good!
ME: This is just hair-splitting to me. Calling one kind of distortion out of bounds and another kind ok boils down to what each person finds fair from their own perspective and interests. We can hardly agree on something like that.
[QB]PM:I dont see making "assumptions" as distortion. For example, if I were to say "Michael Ernest, thinks Rush Limbaugh is a blowhard without even knowing who he is" that is distortion of information. Because I have pieced together bit and pieces of facts to form up a whole new lie. On the other hand if I say, "Michael Ernet thinks Rush Limbaugh is a blowhard, I think he doesnt know what he talking about.." that is an assumption. The latter is acceptable, wouldnt you say??
ME: I never said anything like that. Have those particular seven people damaged an entire war effort? There is no question about that. Do I personally think only seven people are involved? No. To me that premise is not credible. Is the whole Army implicated? Well, no, but it doesn't matter; we've given to our enemies and their supporters some of the most compelling propaganda they could ever ask for. Our enemy is within, and it's not some tree-hugging liberal in San Francisco with an dyed-in-the-wool anti-Bush agenda, either. It's some GI Joes, serving this country's freedom-fighting cause who can't keep their pants on at work.
[QB]PM: If the acts of 7 soliders makes you think that indiscipline is rampagant in the military. I am going to show you 2 images and tell you that this is what the other 137993 stand for.
More later...
Commentary From the Sidelines of history
Originally posted by Jeffrey Hunter:
It is ultimately up to the viewers to take the reporting with a grain of salt, so to speak, and seek their own truth if so inclined, because, as we all know, not everything is always as it seems.
Tony Alicea
Senior Java Web Application Developer, SCPJ2, SCWCD
Originally posted by Ernest Friedman-Hill:
believe what you read in the papers
Originally posted by Tony Alicea:
NY Times:
Abuse of Captives More Widespread, Says Army Survey
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/26/politics/26ABUS.html?hp
Commentary From the Sidelines of history
Commentary From the Sidelines of history
Originally posted by Tony Alicea:
I bet it will eventually come out that Rummy ordered the tortures himself... I just hope it happens before November, he he!
Associate Instructor - Hofstra University
Amazon Top 750 reviewer - Blog - Unresolved References - Book Review Blog
Originally posted by Tony Alicea:
I bet it will eventually come out that Rummy ordered the tortures himself... I just hope it happens before November, he he!
Originally posted by Thomas Paul:
Why? Do you think anyone will change their vote because some Iraqis were tortured?
Ask Nick Berg.Originally posted by Joe King:
Hypothetically speaking, If it was revealed that the government ordered or ignored the torture, then of course people's votes should be changed. How can someone condone voting for a government which knowingly tortured people?
Associate Instructor - Hofstra University
Amazon Top 750 reviewer - Blog - Unresolved References - Book Review Blog
Make visible what, without you, might perhaps never have been seen.
- Robert Bresson