What’s so sick about it is that the sexual nature of the torture seems so unnecessary. I mean, even if we were going to torture them, we could have stuck to waterboarding, pulling some fingernails or just beating the shit out of them. But menstrual blood smeared on their faces? Rape? What kind of people do that? What possible purpose does that serve that outweighs becoming known as the country that ass-rapes people? We couldn’t get enough answers, or false confessions, or whatever we were looking for, from regular brutality? We had to go all BDSM on these people?
The upshot is this: America is the country that rapes its prisoners. We’re sex criminals. That’s our thing now. And Obama’s refusal to “look back,” i.e. prosecute these incredibly serious crimes, ensures that it’s our permanent legacy. No national reputation can survive this simply by shrugging it off.
We used to be seen as a bastion of freedom and decency around the world. That shit is over, folks. Now we’re like the Soviet Union, with better movies. When we talk about human rights, we are an international joke.
And when we talk about torture, we stick to waterboarding, because nobody, not even the “liberals,” are willing to face what we’ve done.
What’s so sick about it is that the sexual nature of the torture seems so unnecessary. I mean, even if we were going to torture them, we could have stuck to waterboarding, pulling some fingernails or just beating the shit out of them. But menstrual blood smeared on their faces? Rape? What kind of people do that? What possible purpose does that serve that outweighs becoming known as the country that ass-rapes people? We couldn’t get enough answers, or false confessions, or whatever we were looking for, from regular brutality? We had to go all BDSM on these people?
The upshot is this: America is the country that rapes its prisoners. We’re sex criminals. That’s our thing now. And Obama’s refusal to “look back,” i.e. prosecute these incredibly serious crimes, ensures that it’s our permanent legacy. No national reputation can survive this simply by shrugging it off.
We used to be seen as a bastion of freedom and decency around the world. That shit is over, folks. Now we’re like the Soviet Union, with better movies. When we talk about human rights, we are an international joke.
And when we talk about torture, we stick to waterboarding, because nobody, not even the “liberals,” are willing to face what we’ve done.
Allan Uthman | Alternet