[Leica] The Horror, The Horror

[frank.dernie at btinternet.com (FRANK DERNIE)]

Adam, this is the most admirable and honourable
statement published on this list regarding this issue.
I could not agree more.
Frank

--- Adam Bridge <abridge@dcn.org> wrote: > On 5/28/04
<bdcolen@earthlink.net (B. D. Colen)>
> thoughtfully wrote: 
> 
> >
> >But why? Let me see: because this is above all, a
> list of people who are
> >supposedly interested in things photographic;
> because the presentation
> >relates to the role of photography in the modern
> world; because the
> >presentation relates to how the uses of photography
> may or may not
> >reflect our social values; because it's interesting
> to read varying
> >viewpoints on issues on public importance.
> >
> 
> The photos are very troubling - in much the same way
> as "reality television" is
> very troubling to me.
> 
> Clearly a process was at work in Iraq, and
> Afghanistan and possibly in Getmo
> although I don't know it, in which prison guards
> were given extraordinary power
> over those in their care and then made to feel good
> about acts of what, to me
> and most people I know, amount to torture. And they
> were made to feel that what
> they were doing was so normal that it was just fine
> to take snapshots for the
> folks back home.
> 
> And it's that cheapening of empathy that truly is at
> the heart of what troubles
> me the most. I would suggest that, in the United
> States that cheapening is
> purvasive in the mass media. It's what I was writing
> about when I was talking
> about Janet Jackson's Super Bowl stunt.
> 
> It's good that people can easily document what is
> going on around them. It's
> awful when they do horrific things and don't see
> them as horrific.
> 
> I've talked to many survivors of WW II and Vietnam
> who have awful memories of
> those events. None of these were things they would
> have taken snap shots of for
> the folks back home.
> 
> There's a cynical and cruel streak within American
> culture that I find
> disgusting. It fills the media and it's a part of
> the local teen and college
> culture -- even though those displaying the behavior
> would deny it was any such
> thing. And it's a part of what passes for political
> discourse - the vicious
> "take no prisoners" approach in which winning is the
> only thing, that winning is
> "best for the country."
> 
> I know of no professional military men who feel
> anything other than revulsion at
> the prison photos. Not because they were released
> but because of the clear lack
> of honor and empathy they represent. It's not that
> they want them hidden - they
> want them never to have existed in the first place -
> that the actions were wrong
> and the command structure damaged so badly that they
> could be allowed.
> 
> I heard Al Gore this morning demanding that at least
> six administration figures
> should resign for what is happening. He's right. At
> at least that many in the
> military chain of command should do the same. It's
> shameful that the lowest in
> the chain of command - those who were encouaged -
> should be left as scapegoat
> while those who commanded and should have been
> over-seeing escape.
> 
> I'm angry about this. Hurt that we could undermine
> our soldiers by freely
> allowing them to explore their baser instincts on
> those in our custody and care.
> And I think the problem is cultural and that we will
> not see it that way.
> 
> Adam Bridge
> 
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