Suppressing images? Text is enough.
Oct. 27th, 2009 11:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
novapsycheJust for kicks, I picked up the Atlantic at the library, mainly to research the level of craft for poetry submissions. I flipped through and decided to read the cover story, "Dear President Bush," an open letter that laid bare the horrors of torture under the Bush administration.
I was not prepared for what I read. I'm not the squeamish type, especially when it comes to text--as an audile, I think in words (specifically word sounds), not images. But even that remove could not keep me from turning my head and wincing no less than thrice. The things done in our collective name, they are hard to digest.
As a critic of the war before it ever began, I disagree with Mr. Sullivan on several of his points: he continues to collude September 11th with the war in Iraq, whereas I see them as completely separate things; where he says "I don't believe you were lying" I wholeheartedly see Bush contradicting his words with his actions; he flatly states without any support that "Some civil liberties may need to be curtailed somewhat in a new kind of war; almost no one, apart from doctrinaire libertarians, would disagree". However, where we agree, we really agree. It's an important read, especially if you are like myself, a liberal wondering what it must feel like to be a conservative duped into war, looking back at the destruction and peering forward with approbation.
(Not relevant to the subject itself--what it means that the US has joined other regimes that have tortured prisoners and the effects on the individual and collective psyche--is this sentence that the article could have stood very well without: "If liberty is white, torture is black." Why not say "as white is to black, liberty is to torture"? Mr. Sullivan is aware of the weight of his words. My phrase indicates a relationship between and among attributes; Mr. Sullivan's equates them.
(Also, I remained aware of his use of the personal pronoun; as a writer, this device can be used so as to manipulate the reader into adopting opinions as hir own. I know that Mr. Sullivan believes some misinformation, but I don't need to have the very words I receive crowbar [or creep] completely antithetical viewpoints into my consciousness.)
I was not prepared for what I read. I'm not the squeamish type, especially when it comes to text--as an audile, I think in words (specifically word sounds), not images. But even that remove could not keep me from turning my head and wincing no less than thrice. The things done in our collective name, they are hard to digest.
As a critic of the war before it ever began, I disagree with Mr. Sullivan on several of his points: he continues to collude September 11th with the war in Iraq, whereas I see them as completely separate things; where he says "I don't believe you were lying" I wholeheartedly see Bush contradicting his words with his actions; he flatly states without any support that "Some civil liberties may need to be curtailed somewhat in a new kind of war; almost no one, apart from doctrinaire libertarians, would disagree". However, where we agree, we really agree. It's an important read, especially if you are like myself, a liberal wondering what it must feel like to be a conservative duped into war, looking back at the destruction and peering forward with approbation.
(Not relevant to the subject itself--what it means that the US has joined other regimes that have tortured prisoners and the effects on the individual and collective psyche--is this sentence that the article could have stood very well without: "If liberty is white, torture is black." Why not say "as white is to black, liberty is to torture"? Mr. Sullivan is aware of the weight of his words. My phrase indicates a relationship between and among attributes; Mr. Sullivan's equates them.
(Also, I remained aware of his use of the personal pronoun; as a writer, this device can be used so as to manipulate the reader into adopting opinions as hir own. I know that Mr. Sullivan believes some misinformation, but I don't need to have the very words I receive crowbar [or creep] completely antithetical viewpoints into my consciousness.)