New at Reason

Tim Cavanaugh | June 29, 2004

Cathy Young says it's not enough to be a little better behaved than the terrorists.

Comments

|6.29.04 @ 1:00AM|#

You're agreeing, Joe L, that the case for war depends on discouraging thought in favor of strong emotion?

Wow.

Who was it that said, "Feel, don't think?"

fyodor|6.29.04 @ 1:28AM|#

Joe L,

I really don't understand the distinction you're making between "reporting" and "FOCUS." Are you saying the reporting about Abu Graihb is fine but the reporting about Islamist atrocities is not? Do you really think most educated Americans are unaware that the insurgency and Iraqi terrorists have done plenty of bad stuff? Do you think that levels of harm and datstardliness are the only factors that play into newsworthiness (how about the hundreds of murders that likely happened around the world yesterday?)? Couldn't focusing more on all the harm being done to Americans be seen to back war opposition as well? Do you really expect the world to ever conform to how things would be done if YOU were in charge?

|6.29.04 @ 1:28AM|#

...we should hold ourselves and our soldiers to higher standards than the terrorists, or dictators and their henchmen...because we expect better from (them).

Thank you Cathy. What a profoundly pro-American sentiment!

A number of Iraqis have died in US custody under highly suspicious circumstances.

An autopsy has shown that the guy in the picture next to the link to Cathy's article was beaten to death.

(Remember, the worst of the Abu Ghraib photos and videos have not been released, either.)

We have a right to see them. We financed that torture.

Even those who are not motivated by Cathy's appeal to principle should be alarmed by this abuse since history is replete with examples of the same mistreatment of foreign troops later being visited upon domestic dissent.

joe,

Do you not think that if the Dems were in the White House now, that they would use these same psychological tactics that you allege of the GOP?

|6.29.04 @ 1:40AM|#

Going to war always involves strong feelings in a democracy, how else would you get people to agree with it? Does that mean it�s wrong? Of course not, anymore than falling in love or grieving for a dead parent is wrong. Strong emotions motivate us much more than reasoned analysis.

If it weren�t for emotionally caused wars there would still be Nazis in Europe, some type of slavery in the southern states, Czars in Russia, and Saddam in Iraq. We could have either ignored the attack (such as happened after the Twin Towers� bombings) or logically removed our forces from the Arabian Peninsula and whatever else was on OBL�s original list of demands. However, neither action �felt right�.

We�re in the situation we are in now due to hundreds of thousands of citizens (including me) seeing first hand what was done on 9/11 by a group of folks from other countries, and tens of millions via their televisions. That makes us emotional, and therefore both unpredictable and perhaps blinded to reason (as per a post a few weeks ago regarding the effect of love in brain functioning).

drf|6.29.04 @ 1:52AM|#

"If it weren�t for emotionally caused wars there would still be Nazis in Europe, [...]"

could you provide some sort of evidence of what you mean here? i don't think the belgians or the dutch or the norwegians were fighting out of emotion - except of "oh my gawd. there's a nazi fuck trying to kill me after he marched into my country". i don't get your line of explanation here. it seems like one of those ad hoc justifications that give a pass to any and all behavior and decisions.

|6.29.04 @ 1:58AM|#

Rick,

I do not recall seeing such tactics used during the Clinton administration. No graphic shots of Serbian atrocities, no photos from the first WTC bombing, no smooshed bodies in OKC during the debate over the anti-terror bill (this is not an invitation to discuss its merits).

Were John Kerry in the White House, I do not believe that he would base his foreign policy pr on the assumption that people who disagree with him don't care enough about what happened on 9/11.

|6.29.04 @ 2:15AM|#

drf,

What I meant was that the US hadn't been emotionally drawn into WW2 due to the attack on Pearl Harbor, we might have sat out the war. I read that FDR was trying to get a German vessel to attack one of the US escorts of British war supplies, but it might not had the same emotional impact as the sneak attack and sinking of most of the Pacific Fleet.

Most folks when presented with an overseas conflict would say "WTF does that have to do with me?". It's not until it hits their feelings that they will do something such as enlist or vote for a hawk.

Of course the Belgians, etc were fighting, but who is to say the US wouldn't have sat the war out?

drf|6.29.04 @ 2:24AM|#

Hi Tom,

the pearl harbor attack and subsequent attacks in the pacific and conquests of wake and delcaration of war on the US by germany are substantially more than "emotional", i'd say. where you're probably right and i'd need be less flippant is when emotions caused the movement to imprison japanese-americans and stuff.

declaring war is one of those prof searle calls a performative: you say it, you do it. i'd call the maine or "waving the bloody shirt" tactics for war more emotional than WWII. but bringing up WWII is really popular with the justify-the-war-crowd, much as bringing up vietnam is big with the moore-anti-crowd. and that kind of fixed position argument gets us nowhere, grin.

i still am unconvinced that the emotional claim holds in the WWII example, however. (thinking of other examples that show the lack of emotion and subsequent lack of war: maybe the commies taking over in eastern europe? how the west abandoned the polish resistence? hungary 1956. prague spring. would those be lack-of-emotion non responses you're pointing to?)

cheers,
drf

|6.29.04 @ 3:10AM|#

drf,

Do you really think people go to war for logical reasons? How could you possibly get a bunch of farm boys from, say, Vermont in 1861 to go down south and fight for the "preservation of the union" or "freedom for the slaves" without getting them whipped up into a fighting froth?

Never mind getting the southern boys to go out and get shot for the nebulous theory of state's rights.

Your points of non-emotional response are better than any I could come up with, thanks!

|6.29.04 @ 3:24AM|#

A Frenchman once pointed ut that they didn't hate the Germans in 1940... and that they did want to win, but not passionately. The result was a debacle for the French...

War is an Act of Will, it's not an entirely reasonable act. So yes, FEEL, don't think... If you want to win.

Or as Aquinas said, "I believe in order to understand, I do not understand in order to believe." At the core it is the emotional "take" on an issue that drives forces, not the rational.

Now on this board ambivalent, at best about the war, less emotion is good, after all that makes it easier to win ones arguments.

Or mayhap its a deeper symptom of the malaise of Libertarianism... it has no fire in the belly. On has to believe, breathe fire, first, in order to win.

I'm not downplaying morality or intellectualism in debate or war, simply pointing out that intellectual struggle, moral dispute, or war are at there core, passions. Anyone that wishes to remove the passion from them dooms him or herself to defeat.

drf|6.29.04 @ 3:25AM|#

cool! have a good one, tom!

cheers,
drf

|6.29.04 @ 6:01AM|#

joe,

I can imagine Kerry using the same political tactics though.

|6.29.04 @ 8:50AM|#

Although, it is hard for me to imagine anyone else stooping to the intimidating "if you're not with us you're against us" crap.

fyodor|6.29.04 @ 11:26AM|#

To those still claiming Al Qaeda beheadings "deserve" more media coverage than Abu Ghraib, ever heard of "man bites dog"???

|6.29.04 @ 12:01PM|#

I think the beheadings are covered enough. Reasonable people realize that AQ has evil goals and that its members are evil by association.

Abu Ghraib on the other hand is evil perpetrated by people in an organiztion that reasonable people find good. I think the media failure at Abu Ghraib is that the girl holding the guy on a leash is the story and the rape and "real" crimes have been put in the background.

|6.29.04 @ 12:05PM|#

Who is "we"? Those who were punished?

|6.29.04 @ 12:08PM|#

The human mind, when confronted with extremely grisly images, reduces higher order thinking, and rat brain thinking kicks in: fight or flight, safety in numbers, don't draw attention to yourself, desire to find someone strong to protect you, better him than me, etc.

This is why supporters of Republican candidates, and cult leaders, are so so eager to expose people to images of graphic violence.

drf|6.29.04 @ 12:16PM|#

hey joe!

"This is why supporters of Republican candidates, and cult leaders, are so so eager to expose people to images of graphic violence"

considering the quote from mitch cumst.. er.. michael moore below, i would put it that there are many on the left who want to see the iraqi prison pics for the exact same reason: "toldjaso". it's the all-too-ugly appeal to disgust that julian tells us in this month's print edition. and many on each side of this fixed-position "debate" are equally (disgustingly?) guilty.........

cheers,
drf

|6.29.04 @ 12:31PM|#

I'd like to hear more of joe's thesis. Particularly how it squares with the vocal desire of many on the anti-war side for the news networks to show footage of both American and Iraqi casualties on the nightly newscasts.

It could just be that joe's thesis is stupid, but I'm not quite willing to commit to that.

|6.29.04 @ 12:37PM|#

It seems to me that Ms Young confuses a number of things, "reporting" and "holding accountable" and "focus" and "perspective". I have no problems with reporting about Abu Ghraib or holding the malefactors responsible, or even a debate about what IS torture and what is not and how far we may go in attempting to get information from prisoners. What I and others find objectionable is the FOCUS, continual focus on Abu Ghraib. "Oh yes, the Islamo-Fascists beheaded someone toddy, but lets talk about ABU GHRAIB. Oh yes there was a car bomb today outside a hospital but lets talk about something REALLY important, Abu Ghraib!" It's as if the only bad thing that has happened in Iraq is Abu Ghraib, when the reality is far more complex... Oh HECK no it isn't. Bad things happened in Abu Ghraib, but a whole bunch of nasty vicious thugs are doing infinitely worse things in the region and I guess I'd like to see proportional outrage. Yeah, threw the perpetrators of Abu Ghraib in prison, and hunt down and kill the Islamo-Fascists that like to kill folks and put their deaths on TV! I think a lot of folks in these rooms and rooms like them aren't comfortable with that because if we do, then their opposition to the war looks kind sad.

|6.29.04 @ 12:42PM|#

Phil,

The biggest "show us" argument from the left I've seen was about flag draped coffins. A distant second was people in Iraqi (and DoD) hospitals, receiving care. There is a qualitative difference, in that neither set of images contain the gory horror to which I was referring, but would in fact tend to put people in a more, rather than less, contemplative state.

Compare this to the demands for action/snuff movie images (burning bodies falling in New York, headless bodies with...I'll stop there. One is visceral and provokes, and provokes horror and rage. The other evokes sadness and introspection.

|6.29.04 @ 12:54PM|#

"One is visceral and provokes, and provokes horror and rage. The other evokes sadness and introspection."-Yes, Joe, EXACTLY. One says, "This is why we fight" The other is a call to surrender... And I'm pretty sure which side the Left is on.

|6.30.04 @ 5:42AM|#

If the malefactors abusing prisoners at Abu Ghraib or the murdering thugs of the Qaedist/Fedayeen squads were only animals, their actions would have no moral weight. It is precisely because they are human beings that their behavior is so reprehensible. And, yes, they are reprehensible in different ways, and to different degrees. Don't read any moral equivalence into my statements.

If we manage to extricate ourselves from Iraq without undergoing a debacle of some kind, either in harm to our forces or a failure of the jury-rigged administration we have set up to transition into some kind of stable non-tyranny, our ability as a country to mete out justice to those in our forces who have committed crimes or otherwise brought dishonor to the uniform, and to be seen as doing so by other nations will be important to keeping the lid from blasting off from the boiling pot.

Kevin