(11 am. – promoted by ek hornbeck)
(crossposted from orange)
(h/t to Lady Libertine, who got me thinking about this)
The ACLU fought and won the case to force the Department of Defense to make public by May 28, 2009 “photos depicting the abuse of prisoners by U.S. personnel.”
There’s been a lot of pushback regarding the release of these photos. I have no reason to believe otherwise, yet I wonder if those who are part of this pushback will succeed in keeping the pictures from being released. Guess we’ll find out by May 28.
And when they are released, what will we do? How are we to look at these pictures? How can we prepare ourselves so that this is not just some sensational political event, but a somber confrontation of man’s inhumanity to man?
I do know one thing. Dick and Liz Cheney can talk faster and faster, they can pour out torrents of words for as long as they like, and it won’t do them any good. Harold Ford and Joe Lieberman can equivocate and excuse and that won’t do any good either.
A picture is worth a thousand words, they say.
But more than that, what has been done to human beings, the scope and nature of these acts, is too big to talk away.
The only question is how long it will take for the American people to stand up and say “This is wrong.”
To look at the pictures of naked men and wish for a blanket to cover them, to look at human beings being made to feel horrible pain and wish for a gentle hand to lift them up, take them away from the pit, heal their wounds, for these are people who could be you, could be me. How will we feel when we look at these pictures? Will we be able to look at these pictures?
To those who believe they can talk it all away, scare us yet again with dire warnings of CODE RED danger, you are fooling yourselves. You are running so fast, aren’t you? Running so that you will never see what infinite damage has been done, not only to those who were tortured, but to the young men and women who committed these crimes.
How many suicides resulted from these acts? How do you go back to “normal” civilian life after you have irrevocably damaged another human being? How do you compartmentalize torture?
This is beyond politics, even as politics and politicians try to contain the horrible reality of torture with market tested Luntzian memes and obfuscations. This is beyond even the never ending ability of our mainstream media to suffocate the truth into fake controversies to boost their audience and profits.
A picture is worth a thousand words. And more than a thousand politicians.
We will never be safe so long as the citizens of this country do not face what has been done, stand up, and say “This is wrong.” Never.
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… for the audience at Daily Kos, but I wanted to share it here as well. Lady Libertine has been beating the drum on how we will spread the word about the release of these pictures. We’ve already read what the media and our politicians have to say. It’s not enough, imo.
…another needs to be included: No!
thank you NPK….
dashing off to watch teh Senate Hearings now… theres some live blogging at the orange…
This visceral sub-conscious reaction probably won’t be enacted, I’m a big boy, ex bull rider and all that, but I will look at the photos, the ones that aren’t destroyed by May 28 anyway. First my sorrow that there are humans that can order this type of treatment, and others that can carry out those orders will attempt to overwhelm me, and second I will be so outraged by them I will want to do things that are not in the best interest of my everlasting self.
After that I don’t know, try to find my Laughing Buddha I guess.
There has to be a point that even the jerks on faux say, “Wait a minute, this is so wrong!”. At least, for the human race I would hope so. It would be at least a grace note in the “Song of the Humans” if we could all come together on at least the realization of how wrong torture is, before the world is inundated and the song attenuates to a single pianoissimo high C.
Author
… but Faux News is reporting that Obama is saying not to release the photos.
His rationale sounds eerily similar to that of Faux:
Perhaps my intuition was correct … I guess we’ll see.
another old saying along the lines of “A picture is worth a thousand words” is “The pen is mightier than the sword.”
i am all in favor of torrents of words, well-chosen, if possible, for maximum impact, because it is entirely possible the photos won’t be released.
they do, however, exist.
so, whether they are released or not, they exist. and if it is up to ‘us’ to make them real for our friends, family and co-workers, then we do. or i would say, continue to do. we have imaginations, we all know suffering. we will keep learning to bring it home that Americans did this.
accountability.
god/goddess bless the ACLU.
if I’ll be able to look at many of the photos. I see it as my job to witness, but don’t know how the brain will react to so much. Thats assuming they ever see the light of day.
Salon link
I was so whacked out yesterday, I was all over the place with my comments at the orange…. so I dont remember now what I said where…lol. There must’ve been at least 20 or 30 diaries on it there. Anyway…
ACLU has a new petition up.