Abu Ghraib, the Media and the Government
When
the images of abuse and torture of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib surfaced, the
initial response of the media was outrage.
However, there have been elements that have not been reported on. For example, not all of the photos are
available to the everyday citizen, and many of the photos that have been
released, only involve male prisoners, and very little is mentioned regarding
the treatment of female and child prisoners.
There has also been a huge amount of media on each of the soldiers who were in the photos, as many considered these 'just the actions of a few'. One of these is the film 'Standard Operating Procedure'
There
is also no mention that the United States Government hires contractors in order
to interrogate these suspects. As
mentioned before, the Government considers insurgent suspects as criminals and
therefore they no longer treated under the Geneva conventions. In addition to this, by using people that are
external to the Government to interrogate prisoners, these contractors are not
bound by the Geneva Conventions either[1]. If both these actions were considered, it
seems hard to believe that the United States Government in no way intended on
using torture on the Iraqi prisoners and it was, in fact just the acts of a few
bad apples.
Source: policalcartoons.com
Additionally,
in the Australian media, there was little reporting regarding the opinions of
those who had been mistreated, and the opinions of those who had worked within
the gaol at the time. For example,
certain coalition military officers have states that they estimate “between 70
and 90 percent of the persons deprived of their liberty in Iraq had been
arrested by mistake[2].” This highlights an entirely different level
of concern for the chain of command in Iraq and Afghanistan. Somehow, people are being arrested with no
evidence that they are in fact guilty of anything, or worthy of suspect.
When
considering the treatment of prisoners in Abu Ghraib, there should be more
thought for what isn’t shown in the
media rather than what is. After all,
the media has their own motives inspired by the bottom line and entertainment
values of their product.
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