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by Polly Mann, W A M M
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Sign up against torture. It becomes legal today.
On Tuesday, October 17th at 9:30 a.m. I stood beside my car in the parking lot of the Minneapolis post office on 31st Street holding my sign, which read, “Sign up against torture. It becomes legal today.” It was a big sign—eighteen by twenty four inches. I also carried a clipboard with a statement against torture which, when signed, was to be mailed to both U.S. senators from Minnesota. To make certain that the sign was observed by people driving into the post office or those coming on foot, from time to time I held it aloft or turned it to the side. Shortly, Patty Guerrero arrived with material to be handed out, leaflets and invitations to a lecture by Dr. Steven Miles of Minneapolis on the subject of torture.
We were at the post office at the e-mailed suggestion of the National Religious Campaign Against Torture (nrcatlist@nrcat.org). The statement concerned the Military Commissions Act of 2006, which gives the president the power to apply the label of “enemy combatant” to anyone he chooses. That could be you or me. The majority of the U.S. Senate, including Sen. Norm Coleman of Minnesota, passed this legislation. It gives the aforementioned president the right to decide what kind of interrogation methods he considers permissible; it denies the rights of detainees in U.S. military prisons to be provided legal counsel and it denies the rights of detainees for a court appeal to their imprisonment. This is all so outrageous that I had to act.
Business at the 31st Street post office was fairly slow. It increases as the day progresses. Approximately 30 cars entered the parking lot between 9:30 and 10:30, and the occupants of about ten signed the statement. I wondered if postal authorities might not come out and tell us to leave. I was telling myself it was a question of free speech and if they did, I just might get arrested, though I absolutely did not want to. Patty and I discussed this possibility. Almost as if to calm our fears, a postal employee, identified by a badge, walked by, smiled, and stopped to sign our statement. We were safe.
One quick-moving, sharp-eyed woman admonished us as she hastened by: “Ladies, you really should be better informed. Torture is better than murder.” A few people were unwilling to sign the statement, claiming they needed to know more about the subject, but did take a leaflet and invitation. The neighborhood is one where many Somalis live. Patty and I agreed that if we were naturalized, as opposed to native-born U.S. citizens, we would be reluctant to sign any statement critical of the government.
It is rather amazing that little has been written about this legislation and that there have been no major demonstrations, sermons, or sidewalk harangues. This was also true in Germany during Hitler’s time when civil rights were being abolished. When I’ve mentioned this to friends, the reply has been, “People were afraid. They could be imprisoned and put to death for speaking out.” But before Hitler gained total power, there must have been a “window of opportunity” during which people could have opposed fascism. That’s where this country is today. We have the right to oppose, to speak out, and to harangue on street corners. No minister or priest need fear that the Gestapo will be walking up to the altar after a forceful sermon. No journalist need fear for the tread of the Gestapo as she walks from her office.
All of this brought to my mind the German White Rose society of the Nazi era, composed of brother and sister Hans and Sophie Scholl, four other male students, and a professor at Munich University. All of the men had experienced war and were totally disillusioned with it. Influenced and supported by their Christian beliefs, the group mailed anti-Nazi literature to cities throughout Germany; they leafleted; they painted walls with slogans such as “Freedom” and “Down with Hitler,” and eventually were discovered and beheaded.
It’s hard to imagine a similar movement in this country today. The great majority of the media, both print and electronic, is owned by corporations whose chief concern is the bottom dollar. The majority of the electronic media pundits present few profound or concise antigovernment viewpoints. From the churches is heard almost no criticism of a war that has brought about the deaths of an estimated 655,000 Iraqis, untold Afghani deaths, torture in US-run prisons, and a lopsided budget that provides less and less for needed programs such as education, health care, housing, and aid for the poor. What’s wrong with us? Why are we so complacent? Is it possible that a fabled frog might provide the answer as to our lack of a White Rose Society? You know the frog I mean? Well, I’ll remind you.
This frog, who found himself in a pot of boiling water, simply permitted himself to be boiled to death. Why? It seems he was placed in the pot when the water was cold. The heat was gradually increased and the frog was unaware that he was on the way to oblivion as the heat reached the boiling point. Poor frog! Whereas, if he were simply dumped into a pot of boiling water, his instincts would kick in and he’d jump out. Voilà! He’d be saved. Is it possible that we tolerate injustice and torture because we’ve somehow become inured to it? Every “cop show” on television and an occasional newspaper article tell us that there is torture in the jails and prisons of this country. We know about Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. We mostly shrug our shoulders and go on. We know we were lied to about the reasons for the war in Iraq. We read about corruption at the very highest levels of government and major corporations. We’ve been promised years of perpetual war, and we say to ourselves and each other, “Well, what can we do about it?” We’re like that sorry frog. The water gets hotter and hotter and we become evermore used to it. When will we say, “Enough”?
Red Cross officials recently visited 14 new Guantanamo Bay prisoners who had previously not been seen by anyone but their captors since they came under CIA custody. A human rights report released by British Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett said that holding hundreds of people without charges for years was “unacceptable in terms of human rights” and “ineffective in terms of counter-terrorism.” (Star Tribune, 10/13/06) |
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Word UP!
It is never right to do wrong or to requite wrong with wrong, or when we suffer evil to defend ourselves by doing evil in return.
—Socrates 469 - 399 BC
Our men . . . have killed to exterminate men, women, children, prisoners and captives, active insurgents and suspected people from lads of 10 up. . . . Our soldiers have pumped salt water into men to “make them talk,” and have taken prisoners people who held up their hands and peacefully surrendered, and an hour later . . . stood them on a bridge and shot them down one by one, to drop into the water below and float down, as examples to those who found their bullet-loaded corpses.
—Philadelphia Ledger
newspaper in 1901, from its Manila [Philippines] correspondent during the U.S. war with Spain for the control of the Philippines
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© 2006 Women Against Military Madness. All rights reserved.
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Complete November 2006 Index - click here
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