Sunday, June 05, 2005
The Tortured Minds of Pampered Partisans
Like some other travelers who take an interest in history, I’ve seen the Toul Sleng “museum” in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. I’ve seen the infamous Nazi prison camp, Dachau. There’s a “museum of torture” in Prague if one is curious about methods of inflicting pain in earlier times. Non-fiction, fiction, and the unpleasant images they can conjure in our imaginations can tell us plenty about torture. Torture is bad – duh.
Although some rather nasty and excessive things occur regularly under governments almost everywhere, the staring role in the left’s concern about torture is, of course, the United States, particularly now in regard to its treatment of Muslim prisoners.
Some horrid and fairly well established examples of torture continue to come out of North Korea but when the mainstream media reports them they typically show up as brief supplementary articles several pages back in the average newspaper. Of course, torture in the name of establishing a “worker’s paradise” or egalitarian prison state has never been much of an issue to the left – on those rare occasions when they’d admit such things occurred at all. Oddly, torture by religious fanatics or under Middle Eastern governments doesn’t raise many eyebrows in leftland either (i.e. pre-war Iraq). The left was going to end Saddam's sadism by, "letting inspections work." -- huh!
Things are indeed different now. Now we have unsubstantiated reports of holy books being flushed down toilets, sleep deprivation, the bizarre sex-humiliation antics of some wayward soldiers and, oh yes, former dictators photographed in their underwear. If you want front page coverage several days or weeks in a row, pile some naked terrorists up and have an army girl mock their -- lack of -- manhood.
I’m not going to claim that tacky humiliations or imposed discomforts are the proper actions of democratic societies at war. Likewise, I’m not going to claim that more horrid examples of real torture haven’t occurred under America’s direction either now or in the past – it’s clear that they have.
I am going to claim that torture is far less prevalent or extreme under an open-society’s diverse and contending interests than a society where the state holds focused and final authority over all aspects of life. Also, while battle with a ruthless enemy may push a democracy to some questionable limits, a one-party statist scheme needs no war or conflict to put it into torture overdrive. It only needs its perennial mission – imposing “the truth” as seen by its “leaders.” “The truth” in such systems is usually a uniform philosophy that is the very opposite of that found in open, diverse, and free society (something leftists claim we don’t have anyway – they are that partisan and that blind).
The American prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba holds about 540 prisoners from Afghanistan and Al Qaeda terrorists in general (in my blog, terrorists will not be referred to as “insurgents” or “freedom fighters”).
540 is not a massive number but it’s certainly enough to consider the possibility of a few innocents among them. The horrible error of people being imprisoned who are actually not guilty has occurred almost everywhere throughout time – a terrible thing, but it happens.
Because innocents can occasionally be accused or punished, should this be cause to no longer accuse and arrest murderers, thieves, or religious fanatics who happen to kill people?
If some of those behind bars (there are some who prefer the more dramatic image of "in cages") just happened to be passing through in the middle of a firefight in Afghanistan, perhaps their own lack of good reasoning is what’s put them in a confined place with three meals a day (to religious diet specifications) and a free copy of their favorite book.
I’m not a leftist (obviously) so I’m going to assume that most of those contained at the “Gitmo” facility are indeed foreign fighters (e.g. terrorists) at war against the U.S., The West, and civilians in general. They are not soldiers drafted into service by governments in a conventional war. They are random fighters who kill for the cause of establishing tyranny. They use schools, mosques, hospitals, and civilians to shield themselves, and play to a naïve, agenda-laden international media. Their nature is little different than if they were merely a band of thugs in a religious cult going through the streets randomly blowing up places of public gathering (actually, this is in fact who they are and what they do). They are not U.S. citizens (which makes me wonder why the American Civil Liberties Union has taken such interest in their “cause”). Somehow I don’t think the U.S. just rounded up 540 random innocents for fun and torture – just a hunch (like I said, I’m not a leftist).
If true cases of torture are occurring under America's hand, one can be certain they will be reported with at least the same enthusiasm as the false or embellished ones are. If the victim is articulate enough, or comes from a Western country, he'll become a celebrity, sell a book, or find out what real torture is when he begins the talk show circuit with people like Oprah.
Amnesty International –- that unbiased opponent of oppression everywhere (I’m joking) -- has called Gitmo a “gulag.” I guess they finally had to call something a gulag since they often miss out on labeling the real ones that exist around the world.
I’ve read diverse versions of prisoner’s treatment at Gitmo. I haven’t seen any photos of prisoners who look even remotely like the ones from Dachau, Toul Sleng, or Bosnian prison camps. Maybe at Gitmo they just fatten them up for photo ops. I’ve seen photos of naked prisoners piled on top of one another (Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq). I’ve heard stories of twisted acts of sexual humiliation by some really dumb low-level prison guards but, I haven’t seen the reports yet of thumbscrews, Iron maidens, or bamboo under the fingernails (I’m sure the New York Times is merely hiding this from us to protect the country it loves so – for the leftists reading this, that’s a joke).
The latest horror among America’s acts of cruelty and "torture" is the “disrespect shown to the Muslim holy book” – the Koran.
I’m not a Christian (for what its worth, I’m kind of an agnostic) but, like a lot of Christians, I have to wonder why such little fuss has been made in the recent past over desecrations and disrespect toward Christian symbols. I understand that the cross itself – even on a Swiss Army knife – is against the law in Saudi Arabia. I don't recall the Christian equivalent of a fatwa on Andre Serrano's, "Piss Christ" art photo.
Christians have certainly protested plenty after gross insults to their religion, which are pretty regular (in entertainment alone) but, I don’t recall Christians going on any rampages or calling for blood vengeance. I definitely don’t recall any mass-media sympathies to offended Christians as being very noteworthy either. Of course one can dredge up plenty of Christian bad press from the Middle Ages (actually the Muslims didn't behave very well then either -- except in Hollywood movies).
Modern Islam is still lost in the Medieval worldview regarding virtually everything. I think we can fairly say that Muslims get “worked up” more than the average contemporary religious devotee. Its fine for them to destroy the ancient statues of another religion (an act by the Taliban in Afghanistan), just don’t mess with their one true holy – and violent – delusion.
I don’t know how big the Korans are that are issued at Gitmo but, I’m wondering how they could have got one down a toilet even if they wanted to. I guess they could have ripped the pages out, but I’m pretty sure we would have then heard that they “ripped the holy book up and flushed it down the toilet” (I don’t’ think a fervent Muslim would have overlooked such an initial act of desecration).
It may be “mean-spirited” to ask but, why the hell are we giving Korans to these clowns anyway (odd thing to do at a “gulag”)? Why not give them Gideon bibles, like a real hotel? For the fanatical followers of a religion that increasingly sees itself as special, why are we treating Islam as…special?
I’m no scholar regarding Islam, but I’m fairly sure that followers of “the religion of peace” could follow their holy book, submit to their god, and somehow manage to not:
• Treat women like cattle (not that the average academic leftist feminist cares anyway).
• Punish mundane crimes with dismemberment, torture, or death.
• Ban almost everything.
• Deliberately target civilians – their own among them – for the cause of their stupid, “Jihad.”
I know there are many Muslims who are peaceful but I’m less convinced that Islam itself is a, “religion of peace” when it clearly is not (nor has been through most of its history). I’m also a bit skeptical of the "religion of peace" label when the followers who actually do speak out against violence in Islam’s name number so few – very very few.
Okay…I’ve accepted the fact that a bizarre and violent religion is on a psychotic rampage. An auxiliary gripe I have though is with the home grown, pampered traitors who populate so much of the media, academia, and entertainment. We are at war, and these fools are at least giving the strong impression that they support the other side! Remember, in their world, all is relative. Weekend shopping at the mall / suicide bombing of a busy marketplace – equally valid cultural lifestyles.
What exactly is the fifth column thinking? We must, of course, remember that these are the same people who – in domestic affairs – read of torture, sexual assault, murder, and sometimes dismemberment of children and are immediately roused to concern that the guy who did it may be punished by lethal injection (or was himself a “victim” of unloving parents).
A culmination of absurdity has truly been reached in the left’s appraisal of current events. In a time when fanatics deliberately slaughter civilians, the usual cabal from left-think expresses their rage against a coalition’s desire to see democracy take root in former police states and theocratic tyrannies. Of course, why should this be a surprise? When nuclear warheads were pointed at American cities by an unelected leftist political clique’, the former Soviet Union and its “allies” (satellites), the left displayed its sympathies to the socialist international, the safety or freedom of their own home towns be damned – Marx Akbar!
Guantanamo Bay is not a “gulag.” If Americans are currently “torturing” inmates there, the definition of torture has clearly changed considerably and is being applied by “observers” (i.e. Amnesty International) unevenly.
Eventually, the Middle East will be comprised of several free, friendly, democratic nations, and the spark to it all wasn't Noam Chomsky or media talking heads -- it was that clownish buffoon from Texas who obviously knows nothing about linguistics but a good deal more about common sense in distinguishing true evil form left wing PR fabrications.
The minds of socialist scholars, journalists, and useful idiots may indeed be tortured by current events in the war with Muslim fanaticism, but that certainly won’t stop them in their perennial crusade to take the side of any mob seeking to kill our families, friends, or neighbors – be it statist autocrats or religious nuts.
They despise America because they can. If they were "in charge," I have no doubt we’d come to know what real torture is, for their philosophy has shown its true face through history time and again.
The sympathies of leftland; forever allies of statist tyranny. Pampered partisans in a war with freedom...and mouthpieces of the tortured mind.
Although some rather nasty and excessive things occur regularly under governments almost everywhere, the staring role in the left’s concern about torture is, of course, the United States, particularly now in regard to its treatment of Muslim prisoners.
Some horrid and fairly well established examples of torture continue to come out of North Korea but when the mainstream media reports them they typically show up as brief supplementary articles several pages back in the average newspaper. Of course, torture in the name of establishing a “worker’s paradise” or egalitarian prison state has never been much of an issue to the left – on those rare occasions when they’d admit such things occurred at all. Oddly, torture by religious fanatics or under Middle Eastern governments doesn’t raise many eyebrows in leftland either (i.e. pre-war Iraq). The left was going to end Saddam's sadism by, "letting inspections work." -- huh!
Things are indeed different now. Now we have unsubstantiated reports of holy books being flushed down toilets, sleep deprivation, the bizarre sex-humiliation antics of some wayward soldiers and, oh yes, former dictators photographed in their underwear. If you want front page coverage several days or weeks in a row, pile some naked terrorists up and have an army girl mock their -- lack of -- manhood.
I’m not going to claim that tacky humiliations or imposed discomforts are the proper actions of democratic societies at war. Likewise, I’m not going to claim that more horrid examples of real torture haven’t occurred under America’s direction either now or in the past – it’s clear that they have.
I am going to claim that torture is far less prevalent or extreme under an open-society’s diverse and contending interests than a society where the state holds focused and final authority over all aspects of life. Also, while battle with a ruthless enemy may push a democracy to some questionable limits, a one-party statist scheme needs no war or conflict to put it into torture overdrive. It only needs its perennial mission – imposing “the truth” as seen by its “leaders.” “The truth” in such systems is usually a uniform philosophy that is the very opposite of that found in open, diverse, and free society (something leftists claim we don’t have anyway – they are that partisan and that blind).
The American prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba holds about 540 prisoners from Afghanistan and Al Qaeda terrorists in general (in my blog, terrorists will not be referred to as “insurgents” or “freedom fighters”).
540 is not a massive number but it’s certainly enough to consider the possibility of a few innocents among them. The horrible error of people being imprisoned who are actually not guilty has occurred almost everywhere throughout time – a terrible thing, but it happens.
Because innocents can occasionally be accused or punished, should this be cause to no longer accuse and arrest murderers, thieves, or religious fanatics who happen to kill people?
If some of those behind bars (there are some who prefer the more dramatic image of "in cages") just happened to be passing through in the middle of a firefight in Afghanistan, perhaps their own lack of good reasoning is what’s put them in a confined place with three meals a day (to religious diet specifications) and a free copy of their favorite book.
I’m not a leftist (obviously) so I’m going to assume that most of those contained at the “Gitmo” facility are indeed foreign fighters (e.g. terrorists) at war against the U.S., The West, and civilians in general. They are not soldiers drafted into service by governments in a conventional war. They are random fighters who kill for the cause of establishing tyranny. They use schools, mosques, hospitals, and civilians to shield themselves, and play to a naïve, agenda-laden international media. Their nature is little different than if they were merely a band of thugs in a religious cult going through the streets randomly blowing up places of public gathering (actually, this is in fact who they are and what they do). They are not U.S. citizens (which makes me wonder why the American Civil Liberties Union has taken such interest in their “cause”). Somehow I don’t think the U.S. just rounded up 540 random innocents for fun and torture – just a hunch (like I said, I’m not a leftist).
If true cases of torture are occurring under America's hand, one can be certain they will be reported with at least the same enthusiasm as the false or embellished ones are. If the victim is articulate enough, or comes from a Western country, he'll become a celebrity, sell a book, or find out what real torture is when he begins the talk show circuit with people like Oprah.
Amnesty International –- that unbiased opponent of oppression everywhere (I’m joking) -- has called Gitmo a “gulag.” I guess they finally had to call something a gulag since they often miss out on labeling the real ones that exist around the world.
I’ve read diverse versions of prisoner’s treatment at Gitmo. I haven’t seen any photos of prisoners who look even remotely like the ones from Dachau, Toul Sleng, or Bosnian prison camps. Maybe at Gitmo they just fatten them up for photo ops. I’ve seen photos of naked prisoners piled on top of one another (Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq). I’ve heard stories of twisted acts of sexual humiliation by some really dumb low-level prison guards but, I haven’t seen the reports yet of thumbscrews, Iron maidens, or bamboo under the fingernails (I’m sure the New York Times is merely hiding this from us to protect the country it loves so – for the leftists reading this, that’s a joke).
The latest horror among America’s acts of cruelty and "torture" is the “disrespect shown to the Muslim holy book” – the Koran.
I’m not a Christian (for what its worth, I’m kind of an agnostic) but, like a lot of Christians, I have to wonder why such little fuss has been made in the recent past over desecrations and disrespect toward Christian symbols. I understand that the cross itself – even on a Swiss Army knife – is against the law in Saudi Arabia. I don't recall the Christian equivalent of a fatwa on Andre Serrano's, "Piss Christ" art photo.
Christians have certainly protested plenty after gross insults to their religion, which are pretty regular (in entertainment alone) but, I don’t recall Christians going on any rampages or calling for blood vengeance. I definitely don’t recall any mass-media sympathies to offended Christians as being very noteworthy either. Of course one can dredge up plenty of Christian bad press from the Middle Ages (actually the Muslims didn't behave very well then either -- except in Hollywood movies).
Modern Islam is still lost in the Medieval worldview regarding virtually everything. I think we can fairly say that Muslims get “worked up” more than the average contemporary religious devotee. Its fine for them to destroy the ancient statues of another religion (an act by the Taliban in Afghanistan), just don’t mess with their one true holy – and violent – delusion.
I don’t know how big the Korans are that are issued at Gitmo but, I’m wondering how they could have got one down a toilet even if they wanted to. I guess they could have ripped the pages out, but I’m pretty sure we would have then heard that they “ripped the holy book up and flushed it down the toilet” (I don’t’ think a fervent Muslim would have overlooked such an initial act of desecration).
It may be “mean-spirited” to ask but, why the hell are we giving Korans to these clowns anyway (odd thing to do at a “gulag”)? Why not give them Gideon bibles, like a real hotel? For the fanatical followers of a religion that increasingly sees itself as special, why are we treating Islam as…special?
I’m no scholar regarding Islam, but I’m fairly sure that followers of “the religion of peace” could follow their holy book, submit to their god, and somehow manage to not:
• Treat women like cattle (not that the average academic leftist feminist cares anyway).
• Punish mundane crimes with dismemberment, torture, or death.
• Ban almost everything.
• Deliberately target civilians – their own among them – for the cause of their stupid, “Jihad.”
I know there are many Muslims who are peaceful but I’m less convinced that Islam itself is a, “religion of peace” when it clearly is not (nor has been through most of its history). I’m also a bit skeptical of the "religion of peace" label when the followers who actually do speak out against violence in Islam’s name number so few – very very few.
Okay…I’ve accepted the fact that a bizarre and violent religion is on a psychotic rampage. An auxiliary gripe I have though is with the home grown, pampered traitors who populate so much of the media, academia, and entertainment. We are at war, and these fools are at least giving the strong impression that they support the other side! Remember, in their world, all is relative. Weekend shopping at the mall / suicide bombing of a busy marketplace – equally valid cultural lifestyles.
What exactly is the fifth column thinking? We must, of course, remember that these are the same people who – in domestic affairs – read of torture, sexual assault, murder, and sometimes dismemberment of children and are immediately roused to concern that the guy who did it may be punished by lethal injection (or was himself a “victim” of unloving parents).
A culmination of absurdity has truly been reached in the left’s appraisal of current events. In a time when fanatics deliberately slaughter civilians, the usual cabal from left-think expresses their rage against a coalition’s desire to see democracy take root in former police states and theocratic tyrannies. Of course, why should this be a surprise? When nuclear warheads were pointed at American cities by an unelected leftist political clique’, the former Soviet Union and its “allies” (satellites), the left displayed its sympathies to the socialist international, the safety or freedom of their own home towns be damned – Marx Akbar!
Guantanamo Bay is not a “gulag.” If Americans are currently “torturing” inmates there, the definition of torture has clearly changed considerably and is being applied by “observers” (i.e. Amnesty International) unevenly.
Eventually, the Middle East will be comprised of several free, friendly, democratic nations, and the spark to it all wasn't Noam Chomsky or media talking heads -- it was that clownish buffoon from Texas who obviously knows nothing about linguistics but a good deal more about common sense in distinguishing true evil form left wing PR fabrications.
The minds of socialist scholars, journalists, and useful idiots may indeed be tortured by current events in the war with Muslim fanaticism, but that certainly won’t stop them in their perennial crusade to take the side of any mob seeking to kill our families, friends, or neighbors – be it statist autocrats or religious nuts.
They despise America because they can. If they were "in charge," I have no doubt we’d come to know what real torture is, for their philosophy has shown its true face through history time and again.
The sympathies of leftland; forever allies of statist tyranny. Pampered partisans in a war with freedom...and mouthpieces of the tortured mind.
