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Thursday, February 16, 2006 12:00 AM

Why we're publishing the new Abu Ghraib photos

America -- and the world -- has the right to know what was done in our name.

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  • Thursday, February 16, 2006 06:08 AM

    Torture? Not really.

    Like others, I was listening to NPR on the way to work this morning when I heard the news of your posting more of Abu Ghraib pictures. Of the entire set of pictires, the only one I found to exhibit true evidense of apparent torture was the one of the beaten and bloody face. The others, which obviously document questionable treatment of prisoners, do not qualify as torture. Nudity? Handcuffs? Panties over the head? Heck, as a comedian remarked way back when Abu Ghraib first broke, that type of treatment would cost you a lot of money in Vegas.

    So they might find it degrading. So they might find it humiliating. So maybe they experience some mental disturbance and are made uncomfortable. Sounds like a personal problem to me. Do they think this is a country club minimum security prision? This stuff is nothing and they need to get over it.

    Physical abuses such as beatings and electric shock are true torture and are abhorent to me. But explotation of a prisoners mores and mental weaknesses, such as represented by these pictures, hardly qualifies as torture. Attaching the label torture to these pictures only serves to denigrate the true meaning of torture.

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