Saturday August 18, 2007
THE FACE OF THE ENEMY. The Times ran a lengthy disquisition by filmmaker Errol Morris about the famous picture of the "Hooded Man" from Abu Ghraib, and the guy who said he was that guy but wasn't really:
The problem was not a lack of research. Yes, there was archival material that could have cast suspicion on the claim that Clawman was the Hooded Man. But the mistaken identification was driven by Clawman’s own desire to be the iconic victim, to be the Hooded Man, and our own need to believe him. It is an error engendered by photography and perpetuated by us. And it comes from a desire for “the ocular proof.” A proof that turns out to be no proof at all. Indeed. What we see is not independent of our beliefs. Photographs provide evidence, but no shortcut to reality. Photographic evidence – like all evidence – needs to be seen in context. It needs to be evaluated. If seeing itself is belief-laden, then there is no seeing independent of believing, and the “truism” has to be reversed. Believing is seeing and not the other way around.
Uh huh. Well, it was a picture of somebody with electrical wires stuck to him. Which is why I was at first puzzled by a post at the site of war journalist/supporter Michael Yon which linked to it:
While we sleep, enemies define us.
What enemies did Yon mean, I wondered? Ali Shalal Qaissi, aka Clawman? Was his quest for fame some sort of Al Qaeda psy ops? Did his moment in the spotlight convince people there was torture at Abu Ghraib, or did all the photos of other tortured subjects, and the subsequent courts-martial, do most of the convincing? Was Yon suggesting that Qaissi's story proved the whole thing was a hoax -- one that took in even the United States Army?
I got a clue as to his meaning from the commenters on the Morris story who, it is reasonable to assume, would not have bothered with some artist's musings in the treasonous Times unless directed there by a higher authority:
...How many Iraqi prisoners died as a result of “torture” at Abu Ghraib? Now compare that to the number of American soldiers who have died as a result of an emboldened insurgency, emboldened by an agenda driven New York Times splashing 40 straight front page stories on this self-esteem “war crime"...
...To the left, gwbush is the real enemy. nothing else matters. More muslims are free than any time in history but their diseased minds can only fixate on that which he had no direct control (and if you THINK about it, was direct result of the clinton policy of eliminating regular army divisions and using national guardsmen and women to do jobs professionals used to handle)but what difference does any of that make. If a republican does it, its EVIL...
... Show me beheadings, severed ears, fingers, genitals, etc., then I’ll buy “torture”. Oh wait, that’s the ENEMY who does that. Until then, this constant braying about how this is “torture” only serves to embolden the enemy...
...The self loathing hate America leftists so overplayed this story that my perception of the overwhelmingly leftist American media becoming cemented in it’s disgust...
For them, Abu Ghraib's just another Beauchamp -- another MSM assault on our fighting men who guard us, as Kipling said, while we sleep. And that is what they mean by "enemies."