"What’s at issue is the inexcusable historical comparison
between focused genocide and individual criminal behavior.
Amnesty has cheapened and diminished the language of suffering.
Their defense that “we went after Saddam” is pitifully
weak and is a deflection operation that once again attempts
to use the false frame of “moral equivalency.”."
Fisking Amnesty, Persevering After Moral Compromise
Austin Bay Blog
Filed under: General— site admin @ 8:25 am
Thanks to powerline for the tip: from NRO, a careful examination of Amnesty International’s foolish comparison of Gitmo to the Soviet gulag.
Amnesty International is paying a hard price for its PR cheap shot, and it should. Amnesty’s current leadership inhabits a self-referential echo chamber, and over the next few months will find that there is such a thing as bad publicity, particularly when an organization relies on “moral principles and human rights”. An organization with genuine moral principles and genuine respect for human rights must be able to distinguish between scattered crime and focused genocide, between criminal actions at Abu Ghraib and Gitmo (on the one hand) and 9/11, the Taliban, Bali, Saddam, suicide bombers (etc) on the other.
Koran flushing?
Does anyone remember the Taliban’s destruction of the Buddas of Bubiyan?
Does Amnesty?
Amnesty has cheapened the language of suffering, and for an organization espousing Amnesty’s principles, this is a grievous error.
Here’s the beginning of a column I wrote on September 25, 2001.
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Every war is complex, chaotic, physically and emotionally debilitating and – no matter how right the cause – at some point morally compromised. This war (i.e., The War on Terror) will be no different. America’s biggest strategic challenge will be one as old as war itself: maintaining the will to persevere and pursue the task of victory despite understandable fears, gnawing doubts, the occasional coward and inevitable body bags.
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Yes– two weeks after 9/11.
I included this quote in a speech I gave to the Houston World Affairs Council in early November 2001. During question and answer, a seventy-ish man in the audience (well dressed, white hair) stood up and with red-faced anger demanded that I tell him why I said all wars are ultimately morally compromised.
How could I say that after 9/11?
You could have heard the proverbial pin drop.
I replied ” That’s history. All endeavors of this magnitude, at some point, are morally compromised, because people are involved. That’s why you have to maintain perspective when it happens. You’ll be embarrassed, you’ll have doubts, but you’ll have to focus on the long-haul.”
After the speech thirty or so people continued to ask questions. As that clatch broke up, here came the red-faced fellow. I got a good look at his suit, too – gray silk, immaculate. But he surprised me. He spoke in a forceful but calm voice. “I’m very upset by what you said…but I’ve thought about it…You’re right. That’s what happens.” He told me he was a retiree, and he had been senior vice-president of an international oil company. I am certain, given the job he described, he had had to deal with huge corporate mistakes and –at some point– criminal activity by individuals. A leader has to deal with the mistakes, punish the crimes, and continue to press on.
The collective leadership of Amnesty International –in pursuit of a public relations coup– has demonstrated an inexcusable historical blindness. The false frame of moral equivalency compounds their mistake.
UPDATE: A reminder on the rules for comments. No obscenities, no unsubstantiated charges, and no name-calling. Out of the hundreds of comments on this site since January I’ve only had to delete ten or eleven, but violate the rules and you’ll get deleted. If you insist on comments like that, there are places on the Internet that thrive on them– there’s a place for you, go there. Yes, you’ll find a few obscenities cropping up, including one by a vet who opted for a touch of drill sergeant realism– it worked stylistically and his comment is the exception that proves the rule. There are a few comments that push the edge on name-calling, but I realize people often write in a fit of passion. There are examples of commenters posting apologies or “thoughtful clarifications.” None of us are perfect. Which leads to this:
The comments addressing the demand for perfection on behalf of the US are very thoughtful. Thanks. The hysterics who constantly grind about Abu Ghraib fail to comprehend the depth of anger and embarrassment felt by US soldiers. The actions at Abu Ghraib are shameful and criminal. But there is a larger perspective, and there is the healing effect of one’s own positive efforts. Some of the hysterics lack that positive channel and certainly lack the broader, positive perspective direct, sustained service in Iraq and Afghanistan gives the troops.
UPDATE 2: Provocative post from Roger L. Simon. He’s as disappointed in Amnesty as I am, and points to a possible cause of Amnesty’s mistake.
rogerlsimon.com
UPDATE 3: I guess I have to put this up again. I still belong to Amnesty because of what the organization does for forgotten political prisoners in many of the world’s hard corners. They are welcome to investigate US criminal behavior– as I’ve pointed out repeatedly, Americans make mistakes and commit crimes, too.
The US also tends to investigate the crimes and prosecute the criminals and then we discuss crimes, criminals, intention and detention, often ad infinitum (welcome to liberty and freedom of speech). What’s at issue is the inexcusable historical comparison between focused genocide and individual criminal behavior. Amnesty has cheapened and diminished the language of suffering.
Their defense that “we went after Saddam” is pitifully weak and is a deflection operation that once again attempts to use the false frame of “moral equivalency.” The gulag accusation hurts the organization, and at some level its leaders know it. Amnesty’s leaders could beat their own mistake by coolly retracting the gulag comparison and then insisting they stand for the human rights of prisoners everywhere, even the rights of mass murdering terrorists. Now that would be a tough, principled action – accepting responsibility for a mistake and then making a plea for the fair, just treatment of prisoners. But I doubt if the organization’s leaders have the class and wits to do this. As part of the PR campaign they wanted a tussle with the Bush Administration. They got that– but because of their inexcusable excess the argument’s not framed the they their corporate PR mavens planned it. It’s “meme blowback.” This entire, sad incident suggests that Amnesty’s leadership cadre desperately needs some real diversity. In this time of ugly, intricate, and global warfare it needs leaders with maturity and balance.
Let’s end this with the Washington Post editorial’s final points (see link below):
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…But we draw the line at the use of the word “gulag” or at the implication that the United States has somehow become the modern equivalent of Stalin’s Soviet Union. Guantanamo Bay is an ad hoc creation, designed to contain captured enemy combatants in wartime. Abuses there – including new evidence of desecrating the Koran – have been investigated and discussed by the FBI, the press and, to a still limited extent, the military.
The Soviet gulag, by contrast, was a massive forced labor complex consisting of thousands of concentration camps and hundreds of exile villages through which more than 20 million people passed during Stalin’s lifetime and whose existence was not acknowledged until after his death. Its modern equivalent is not Guantanamo Bay, but the prisons of Cuba, where Amnesty itself says a new generation of prisoners of conscience reside; or the labor camps of North Korea, which were set up on Stalinist lines; or China’s laogai, the true size of which isn’t even known; or, until recently, the prisons of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.
Worrying about the use of a word may seem like mere semantics, but it is not. Turning a report on prisoner detention into another excuse for Bush-bashing or America-bashing undermines Amnesty’s legitimate criticisms of U.S. policies and weakens the force of its investigations of prison systems in closed societies. It also gives the administration another excuse to dismiss valid objections to its policies as “hysterical.”
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