From CNN: Torture House, Mass Graves Found in Iraq.
Given our own “torture houses,” the tapes of which we’ve illegally (not to mention, immorally) erased, how exactly is an American to process such an article? I feel myself going all Derrida and po-mo: that article is clearly meant to stimulate feelings of shock, awe, horror, disbelief etc… But how can an American legitimately muster such feelings when we, too, now are torturers and propogandists?
I read this with a clanging sense of cognitive dissonance; one the one hand – how dare they, the Iraqis, commit such overtly heinous crimes against humanity? Still, can’t be too surprised; isn’t that just like them? Isn’t that why America gave it’s ok to invade, those lowlifes?
Simultaneously, I have to think – how dare we, Americans, ask how they dare when we dare every day, apparently since two weeks after the Bushies took office?
Exactly who, and what, are we anymore?
