Iraqi sues over Abu Ghraib treatment

There is outrage. The thing is, most Americans expect the terrorists to be, you know, evil. They expect that they will target women and children, and to have very little qualms about torturing people who do not share their point of view.

Most Americans expect their soldiers to be, when they are not fighting a war, somewhat civilized. There's a higher standard to be expected.

 

Oh, for fuck's sake.
Abu Ghraib is done in our name, by our people, with our money, and has been lied about by our people, in our name, with our money.
Jesus, why is this so hard?

 

I think that's the point I've been trying to make.

 

Look, I think what happened at Abu Ghraib was idiotic.
But I've never once heard FB or SP display even an inkling of the vitriol they reserve for that crap when the subject is American soldiers tortured and killed.
Not once.
Why is that so hard?

 

You think I didn't feel outrage over what became of him? Since when did you become a mind reader? But at the same time, I like to think that we're better than those animals, and I also like to think that we live up to the ideals upon which this country was formed. The fact that you can't seem to reconcile that is what's all the more disturbing.

 

I think I answered that.

 

Maybe we should retaliate by invading Iraq.

 

WHAT AN IDEA!

 

I'm not reading minds, Alley.
I'm reading posts.
I'm going by what I see here.

 

So if we don't post on a topic, that must mean we don't feel something about it?

Hmmm....let's see if any of these other possibilities might apply...
1) It's too difficult for some of us to find the right words to respond to a particular post.
2) The thread gets locked before we can respond.
3) We don't see the thread because it was started on a weekend.
4) We had taken a break from the thread because of, well, life.
5) We didn't feel there was anything for us to say.
6) The direction of the thread didn't lend itself well to our potential response.

You claim not to be a mind reader, then you apply those same non-existent mind-reading talents to those of us who responded to this thread and chided us for not doing the same for Maupin.

Keep the bullcrap out of these arguments and I think a lot of these discussions could go much better. Twoback, you certainly can/have brought better debates before. Don't devalue what you've contributed by taking the Yawn approach.

 

I object to my country acting like a nation of barbarians.
I do not apologize for that, nor am I required to put on some useless flag-waving dumbshow to earn the right to do it.
You want Pavlovian reactions when terrorists act like terrorists, go look somewhere else.

 

I'm sure there's plenty of outrage here over tragic fate of Sgt. Maupin, but there are a few distinctions you seem to be missing:

This is not the right thread to express that outrage, because THIS topic happens to be the Abu Ghraib lawsuit. If you'd like to see an outpouring of outrage and sympathy for Sgt. Maupin, you can start a thread about that topic. Why haven't you? It belongs there, not here.

We've come to expect terrorists to do barbaric murderous things, because we've been taught that's how they are and we've no control over their conduct. But Abu Ghraib was done in OUR name, with our tax dollars, under our elected leaders, and we've been taught that our society is above that stuff.

What happed to Sgt. Maupin was reprehensible, but he was a soldier who voluntarily agreed to join the military and travel to their backyard and take part in a war against them. Soldiers in wartime assume the risk that the enemy will kill them. But it sounds like this Abu Ghraib plaintiff was just an innocent civilian when we came to his house when his family was home, took him away, and subjected him to 10 months of imprisonment and torture. I was shocked to learn that we were doing that stuff, but I'm not surprised at all to learn that terrorists would murder a U.S. soldier.