h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hi Blicky.

I think i did in fact make this point on my previous posting, but am perfectly willing to get my head looked at, if you think it might help.


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Blessings be; have a nice day all!

zdt

2006 seems a bit overly optimistic to me.

Blicky I am not shocked.
I am sickened.
If you read my journal you would know I am aware of the touture of innocents. (Not asking you too)
Since you are on my journal-
My brother was tortured from the time he was 3 till his death (may 1st)at 5 1/2.
I am not so jaded as to accept it or any other torture without horror.
I know it happens.
The *constant showing* (that means showing hourly on Tv probably on every magazine at a 5 year olds level in the stores et.)
Of
These picturs will flare the PTSD of millions that have never looked closely at this war or any other. Many that cannot see past their own hand because of such activities happened to them or someone they love.
Many of those viewers will want revenge.
*still here, aware and nauseated*

I do not want revenge.
I want it to stop.
I want humans to be humane.
I am not in the least bit shocked, they all, are not.

I'm not shocked, just sad. I've never been a supporter of this w*r to begin with, and am even more sickened and saddened by these recent news reports. American soldiers are not above torturing civilains or soldiers of those they are "opposing". I'd like to think that kind of soldier is a small minority, but they still exist.

The fact that human beings can comit such cruelty toward each other reaches far beyond the w*r. I, and many of my dearest and most beloved friends, have experienced and/or witnessed the most heinous cruelties imaginable. It is frightening to me that people can become so jaded and hateful that they can do such horrible things to other human beings, and imagine for even a second that ANYTHING could justify it. Maybe I need my head examined, too, eh? I have to say, if people like Abbi and Terri and myself are to be considered delusional for finding this kind of stuff sickening and reprehensible, then I am proud to pad my walls and certify myself a nutter.

Abbi, love, I'm sorry that these kind of "news" reports are so upsetting and triggering for you. Your brother would be grateful, and proud, for the way you speak out and give your all to work to prevent this kind of hatred and cruelty. I know I am! Thank you.

I am glad, though, that these things have come out. It will perhaps give some people who supported this w*r and all that goes along with it a different perspective on what it is really all about. Nothing could ever justify the loss of human life, but if even one mind is changed, then the news reports have done some good, I think.

PC, you have eyes, any chance you can phone,PLEASE?

zdt

You know, in the midst of all this publicity, we do need to remember that there are some good guys, like Spc. Joseph M. Darby, whithout whom, the actions of his fellow soldiers may never have been known.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/prisoner_abuse_hometown

"The military started an investigation after a unit member, Spc. Joseph M. Darby, slipped an anonymous note to the Army's Criminal Investigation Division saying he had seen pictures of naked detainees, according to this week's issue of The New Yorker magazine."

As long as people like him are around, there's at least a flicker of hope.

NBY

Yup.

But anyway, apparently the photos were staged:

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Yoop de doop, that's fine then isn't it?

*flicker of hope burns slightly less brightly*

zdt

Good guys, like Spc. Joseph M. Darby

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/prisoner_abuse_hometown

"The military started an investigation after a unit member, Spc. Joseph M. Darby, slipped an anonymous note to the Army's Criminal Investigation Division ...

Yes I wanted to come and post that today, glad you did.

I am sure the truth is not out.

The photos are "real" but in what way, for what purpse, by whos command? Who was surprised by what and why is not known.
Particuarly the Presidents reaction.

I still say that was a sloppy and difficult big ego apology.
He realyed to the press that he has been advised by the King of Jordan, and he took his advice. He apologized to the King of Jordan.
Pretty wimpy apology.

Bush had something to be afraid of in that counseling session or he would have not. The King of Jordan said before the war began he would strike if neccesary to protect his interests. If Bush wanted to apologize he would have, the first day.
I think there are a lot more lies and truth hidden in all of these manuevers.

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When Bush placed his hand on his heart all I could think of was his statement to teh press about him going to the 9-11 commision with Cheney and how they were able to "view his body language" and that was good.

He has been taking lessons for a coreographed dance for persuasion of the masses. He is not supposed to tell the masses that!

I seem to recall some little German bloke with a funny moustache was good at that sort of thing?



zdt

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I'll join you as a nutter, there psychocandy.

* sigh ... *

To me this isn't very shocking ... it's 'business as usual'. These things are part of the routine of war.

That, among other things, is why I hate war so much!!!

What is seen in these photos is psychological warfare ... humiliation of 'the enemy'. Muslims are forced to violate their own sexual taboos. I just wonder what kind of force or threat of violence they used on these prisoners to force them to pose like that?!?

It's good that these photos came out ... but I do agree with abbi, it's not necessary to show them every hour! At least here in South Africa they only showed somewhat sanitised versions of the 'tamer' photos in the newspapers, and there wasn't much talking about them.

I don't know about TV though ... I don't really watch TV.

But anyways I have lots of questions about the photos. I'd like to know who took them, and I'd like to know *why* photos of such activities were taken at all. The photography might have been as a way to degrade the prisoners even further... to use them against their wills as subjects for sick pictures. Many people get off on stuff like that.

* sigh ... * this makes me feel old, way too old ...

I wonder what photos there exist that are in private circulation and haven't yet come to light ...

I wonder what kind of activities happened that were *not* photographed ...

* sigh ... *

I find this stuff sickening and reprehensible and I *am* a nutter!

Bookmarking.

A few choice excerpts from the Sunday Times today:

"There are other photos that depict incidents of physical violence towards prisoners, acts that can only be described as blatantly sadistic, cruel & inhumane" Rumsfeld said. "It's going to get a great deal more terrible, i'm afraid;"

"what really goes on at Guantanamo Bay....and what about the other prisons that the Pentagon rarely mentions?"

"the soldiers would tell us in Arabic "teezak helweh" which means "your ass is nice"

---*I can absolutely confirm this is a true Arabic phrase.zdt*---

"unfortunately a lot of the abuse that we've seen in Iraq happens in the U.S on a fairly regular basis without attracting very much attention." (Alan Elsner, author of Gates of Injustice, a new book on US prison conditions.)

*see NBY thread "Land of the free,"*

And lest it be said that only Americans do this, a shop assistant in UK, whilst developing a film from a returned British soldier found photos of such horror she called the police a YEAR AGO!!!

"Royal Military Police are reccomending prosecution after a year-long investigation of photgraphs that appear to show Iraqi prisoners in British custody being forced to engage in homosexual acts;"

The latest i have seen is of the naked guy being attacked by dogs. Lovely. Can somebody, anybody please explain to me how any of this is different, or more justifiable, than the holocaust?

Yes, September 11th. Yes, Madrid. Yes, Omagh or Eniskillen..Yes, any other act of wanton terrorism. BUT does deliberate individual torture actually help stop that? I somehow doubt it, more likely to inspire people to become extremists & perpetuate the supidity & horror.The individuals who have done this are getting off on it. Wow, glad they're not in bed with me.

Off to snooze with Yoda, who is an animal with very sharp claws, who has been trained, through kindness, that there are occasions she shouldn't use them on other life forms like me! BUT still retains the claws, i don't believe in removing them as i believe is common practice in US. So, if she catches a mouse or bird, she will "play" with it. Is this torture comparable? i think not. The human has somewhat more knowledge of what it is doing.

"What a wonderful world"

zdt

"a shop assistant in UK, whilst developing a film from a returned British soldier found photos of such horror she called the police a YEAR AGO!!!"


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A Washington state lawyer whose partial finger print is found on something having to do with the Madrid bombing.
It sounds like your h2g2 friends bad fingerprint case Terri. There were 8 points out of 15 matched to a partial finger print of one finger. Spain said it was inconclusive. The US is taking it more seriously. Staying tuned to that one.
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You are right about some of these things in Iraq happening to criminal prisoners at home(US). The NY broom handle caseyears ago was brutal. The man was still in the police station being arrested
I think it was an innocent man too.
It is not right happening to the guilty any more than the innocent.

My family has a strong soldiering tradition, which I must have internalised on some level despite trying to be ostensibly a peacenik. My paternal grandad was a Hussar, after generations before him and later CO in the Middle East Commandos. Dad was a trained marksman who joined the reserve British South Africa Police anti-terrorist forces in Rhodesia, where he met my mum.

Very little was ever said about the true nature of the horrors of war, what it does to a man's mind and so on, that sort of thing just wasn't done. But cinema sure filled in some blanks. Dad had a favourite film 'The Whispering Death', which told of an albino terrorist orchestrating some hideous atrocities on Rhodesians during the Civil War (things which are now being *trained* for by Mugabe). Platoon, Full Metal Jacket, that one with Michael J Fox in, the name of which escapes me; all Vietnam movies portraying institutional cruelty toward prisoners. Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence, there's another. All vividly bring home the cruelty of war, but disconnected and sanitised by the fact that it's a film, recounting horrors which belong in Recent History, which is over.

I guess it would be disingenuous to believe a 150,000(?) strong coalition presence won't contain some elements who are similarly motivated. But while that doesn't forgive it, it stands a far better chance of ending since this outrage has become so unavoidable back home.

If nothing else, we can at least be grateful for the presence of those media that are now flooding our lives with the terrible truth of what is going on, and more pressure can be put upon the powerbrokers to justify the mandate allowing these things to happen, sooner.

This may be the most graphic and up-to-date coverage of a war ever but everything I was brought up to understand war to be, says this isn't one. By rights I should be quaking in my boots wondering when I'm going to get called up to endure myriad horrors in a foreign land I don't understand, not built for; likely to die of malnutrition or illness as much as anything else. Instead I'm intellectualising it in comfort over the interweb, while newspapers squeeze photos of it between stories about Posh and Becks.

We should at least be fortified that the immediacy of it is giving us a chance to voice disgust at what's going on closer and closer to the time it is actually going on. People are saying this has been known about for *a year*. Could you imagine the press screaming in disgust at similar pictures in 1945, of torture going on in 1944? You had to wait for the movie.

This is a very unpopular war which has revealed more about the machinery of foreign policy than it has about weapons threats or third world regimes. I can honestly say I heard a lot more about Saddam's human rights record before 9/11 than since, but I've heard plenty about ours. It's really changed my attitude to the military.

The flood of images is at least giving us far greater opportunity to act on our feelings about them. Hopefully future elections will reflect that - and Bush and Blair will count the cost of their defence of democracy, as well they should.

Well said Krispy.

If this is the sort of democracy that is being defended, count me out.

Interesting what you said about the army background. P too is from a very strong army background, father, mother (despite the fact she is & Russian Buddhist!)brother, twin sister & himself all in the Army.

He adores war games & movies & can at times show a pretty warped & sadistic sense of humour (in my opinion)yet is very strong on social justice....er...he will fight to make sure it happens.

Interesting discussion about the psychology of all this here:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3700209.stm

One thing that occurs to me, which possibly may not have been brought up, is that it is highly likely the prisoners could not understand what was being said to them most of the time. i doubt that translators were there to say "Excuse me sir, would you mind disrobing & committing a sexual act on that young chap over there, or if you do object, my nice here will quite possibly remove your genitals."

I know from personal experience that having aggressive commands barked at you in a language you don't understand is pretty horrific. When you are aware that if you don't do what they want, the result is likely to be torture or death......

zdt*not proud to be a human*

Just silently reading..

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We heard about this on the TV news the other night. The only photo they showed was just *before* the attack. Sickening. Absolutely stomach churning.