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@human power:
«That said, giving him eye-for-an-eye "justice" should be beneath us. Torture should be beneath us. Selective prosecution should be beneath us. Maybe a certain new President will inspire us to leave the dark ages behind and rejoin the enlightenment. It will be a sweet day when our prisons are used for rehabilitation rather than revenge and the rule of law applies to all, regardless of circumstances.»
I grew up in post-fascist Italy, and some horrendous things had gone on in the village where I lived. I met some of the people who were rumoured to have participated in the atrocities, and heard many stories.
And I must say, at some point, when I was 15 or so, I looked at myself and, thinking of those so ordinary people who lived as I did, asked: «Are you sure that if you had been trapped in the circumstances they were in, with your brains washed by fascism taught by your elders, you would not have done as they did?» I have been asking myself that question for 40 years now, and if I am honest, I can still not answer: «No, I would never ever done those things».
Those people had been in prison, and had been released after a few years. Charles Graner should probably be in prison, even though I have to ask, why him alone (even not taking Bush & Co into account), why not his immediate superiors?
And what I cannot condone are the conditions. What do they want? Show him what it felt being tortured? Does this have to go on and on and on? I am ready to bet he got it now - he should be rehabilitated. That would be democracy. Nelson Mandela has shown the way.
I suppose the way Graner is treated is a way the poeple who decided on treating him thus use to show they have nothing in common with him.
I have to ask them my question: «Are you sure that if you had been trapped in the circumstances he was in, with your brains washed by theories taught by your elders, you would not have done as he did?»
The way Graner is treated is already the beginning of an answer. Not a good one.
