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Edited on Fri Sep-29-06 11:06 AM by sparosnare
The Difference Between US and Them?
I'm not sure how this once great nation has reached the point of allowing torturing other human beings to be acceptable. I’m not sure how it came to be discussed on the floors of the House and Senate, with our elected officials quite calmly justifying why it’s necessary to do horrible things to people who are deemed “the enemy”. As I went to bed last night, I wondered if, by opening this pandora’s box, we will ever be able to go back to the United States we were before. It’s almost like losing one’s virginity, one’s innocence. While other events over the past 6 years have often made me think of this, I have to say the passing of this bill has been the icing on the cake.
It struck me that during the course of these discussions in the House and Senate, not once did those in support of the soon-to-be-law even consider that even some of those detained by our government might be innocent. I listened as John McCain (who at first resisted the legislation, although probably an act), stood at the podium and tried his best to make torture sound perfectly legitimate, that there would be only 9 techniques they would use. I wondered how a man, who himself was held as a POW and tortured, could even entertain the thought of others enduring such things. I realized that in his mind, he has found the perfect justification. These people being held SHOULD be tortured because they are really bad men and want to harm us. When he was captured, he certainly was “the good guy” and bad men did bad things to him. In this case though, the United States is the good guy, and the detainees are the bad guys, so it’s perfectly OK to do things to them in the name of protecting the country. He may even have a subconscious desire to harm the enemy (whomever they may be) as vengeance.
In order to make the subject of torture acceptable to the American people, it is imperative to make all of us think the same way McCain does. Those detained must be demonized and considered 100% guilty – they are terrorists and if they aren’t kept in prison indefinitely, they will surely try to kill us.
I caught a bit of Imus this morning; interviewing Monica Crowley about her recent trip to Guantanamo Bay. Ms. Crowley is a mouthpiece for Bushco and clearly has an agenda when she presents herself as a ‘journalist’. According to her, those detained have pure evil in their eyes, you can see it when you look at them. They also have formed terror cells within the prison and have knowledge about intelligence before our government gets it. These terrorists are so ruthless and diabolical that they know the addresses and names of the guards’ family members, and tell them to their faces that when they get out, they will go kill their families. She expressed her disgust over the fact they have access to psychiatrists, and stated that all of them have severe psychiatric disorders. After making many more statements meant to scare the hell out of the audience, she threw up her ands and said “that’s the difference between us and them”. And that’s why we should be able to torture them.
Now, I am not making the assumption that what Ms. Crowley said isn’t in part the truth, but it was clear she was embellishing and trying her best to make those people seem as scary as possible. She claimed she’s bipartisan, but I know she’s not. Of course others watching don’t know her background and just saw and heard a pretty blonde woman talk of how if we don’t torture and detain indefinitely, we will surely all die. There is great danger in any of us accepting this way of thinking and ignoring the fact that torture is wrong, period.
As Americans, we have always had an air of superiority, an air of specialness, of “it can’t happen here”. We owe that to the unique beginnings of this country - fighting and winning a war we probably never should have, the underdog defeating the imperialistic behemoth, and the magnificent works of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States that broke new ground in human rights. So ever since then, we have always been the good guys in the world, aiding our allies, defending our dear nation from harm.
We are at the point in our history though, when our good guy status has dissolved. Americans must realize that we can’t continue to do harm to other countries and other people because we are ‘right’. Power hungry men have hijacked the government under the guise of security and use fear tactics to manipulate; all the while repeating the “good guy” meme. These same men ignore the rules of law that have been in place for centuries and make up their own rules without any resistance. Why? Because Americans think “it can’t happen here” and choose to do nothing (this includes elected officials).
We are on a very slippery slope, and it’s quite fathomable a lot of Americans may end up on the wrong side of the good guy/bad guy argument. We must also understand that it most definitely can happen here and it will if the people do nothing to curb the unchecked power of this administration. The idea that this country is above reproach and could never go the way of Rome or the USSR or Nazi Germany is foolish.
The future of this country is in the hands of the people and their commitment to the Constitution we hold dear. Regardless of political party, I do have hope “we the people” will prevail. Otherwise, see you in the gulag.
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