The Way Americans Like Their War (Robert Fisk)

Published on Saturday, June 3, 2006 by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer
The Way Americans Like Their War
by Robert Fisk


Could Haditha be just the tip of the mass grave?

The corpses we have glimpsed, the grainy footage of the cadavers and the dead children; could these be just a few of many? Does the handiwork of the United States' army of the slums go further?

I remember clearly the first suspicions I had that murder most foul might be taking place in our name in Iraq. I was in the Baghdad mortuary, counting corpses, when one of the city's senior medical officials, an old friend, told me of his fears. "Everyone brings bodies here," he said. "But when the Americans bring bodies in, we are instructed that under no circumstances are we ever to do post-mortems. We were given to understand that this had already been done. Sometimes we'd get a piece of paper like this one with a body." And here the man handed me a U.S. military document showing with the hand-drawn outline of a man's body and the words "trauma wounds."

What kind of trauma is now being experienced in Iraq? Just who is doing the mass killing? Who is dumping so many bodies on garbage heaps? After Haditha, we are going to reshape our suspicions.

http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0603-27.htm

I especially blame COP SHOWS. I despise them.

Just this week something called "Bones" was broadcast on Murdoch tv over here. It was the complete whitewash of what is going on in Iraq - all US soldiers heroic, noble and suffering, the Iraqi woman slaughtered "proved" by American hi-tec know-how (ie forensic wizardry) to be an evil terrorist. I groaned. I bet 70 per cent at least of Americans think this is "the truth". There was a crushing put-down of a liberal as well - supposedly all talk and no listen. Oddly the war-supporter putting the point wasn't listening at all.

Beyond Good & Evil: Children, Media & Violent Times

The belief that �good triumphs over evil� resonates deeply in our psyche through religious, cultural, and political discourses. It is also a common theme in the entertainment media where the struggle between good and evil is frequently resolved through violence. The potential negative impact of media violence on children has long been a public concern. It is even more troubling when U.S. military violence, both in the news and in the entertainment, is often glorified as heroic and patriotic.

Children's worlds of fantasy and reality collided when our political leaders, in response to the September 11th tragedy, simplified the complex international relationships into a fight between good and evil. The Bush administration used the narrative strategically�and the news media perpetuated it with enthusiasm�pumping up patriotism and generating public support for the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.

This video examines how the "good and evil" rhetoric, in both the entertainment and the news media, has helped children to dehumanize the enemies, justify their killing and treat the suffering of innocent civilians as necessary sacrifice. The interviews include media scholars (Robert Jenson, Robin Andersen), child psychologists (Diane Levin, Nancy Carlsson-Paige), teachers (Merrie Najimy, Brian Wright), educators (Eli Newberger and Betty Burkes), and the children themselves.