Because history is not destiny... yet.
Assymetric Assault
People litter everywhere.
Is that assymetric warfare?
I'm probably about the four-thousandth blogger to quote this, but it's so quotable. According to a Navy spokesman, a high-ranking officer at Guantanamo, the triple suicide of detainees was "not an act of desperation, but an act of asymmetric warfare against us."
It's something of a truism now that suicide is an act of anger as much as it is an act of depression or desperation (situations matter, of course), and there's little question that the suicides are intended to draw attention in a harmful fashion. There've been suicides like that for centuries: the most prominent recent ones I can think of are self-immolations by anti-war Buddhist priests. As acts of warfare go, it's the most passive-agressive form of assault possible, in that it only does psychological harm and then only to interlocutors who are thoughtful and open; defining it as "assymetric warfare" implies no distinction between speech, civil disobedience and terrorism, and is both ridiculous and disturbing.
According to the reports I've seen, the suicides were by detainees with reported actual ties to anti-American forces, but given the treatment of unconvicted (and mostly unconvictable) detainees, it falls into the category of "Sure, they hate us. Doesn't mean they're wrong."
Defense Department officials have long expressed their pride in not having lost a single life among the approximately 759 detainees who have at one time been incarcerated at Guantanamo Bay. There have been 41 suicide attempts by about 25 individual detainees -- many by hanging -- but in each previous case, medical personnel were able to save them.
"This is a determined, intelligent, committed element," Craddock said. "They continue to do everything they can . . . to become martyrs."
They succeeded, but it's not likely to change anyone's mind. "Drawing attention" only matters if we are actually embarassed about what we're doing, or if anyone else can make us change our behavior....
Non Sequiturs: I'm not a big fan of animated gifs, particularly cheap-shot humor, but this (found here) just made me smile. And cubicles make you dumber. As if you didn't know.
and Hume's Ghost (blogging as part of the group at Glenn Greenwald's place) has the best list of qualifications and quibbles with regard to Zarqawi's death and its strategic and political meaning.
Posted by Ahistoricality at 8:44 PM
More Bad History, Writing and Thinking
Classic. Liberal.
Bad History, Bad Writing, Bad Thinking: Same Thing
Compare, Contrast, Contrive
Adapted LiveJournal Self-Quiz
Funny things we do....
Murakami's Sofa
Blog Poetry Returns
Knowledge is Power, even (especially?) for children
Were I in a mood to blog...
Carnival!!
Thursday Lyric: Canadian Railroad Trilogy
Blogopedia info request -- from William Beutler
Essay Question: Explain the connection
When you're right...
Photography Index
Political Children
Rainbow Bark and Carnivals
Just for fun: Rabbits
X-Men Personality Quiz, Flowers, and a new result ...
Thursday Lyric: Arrow
Pithy
Legal Humor and Medical.... something
As I was walking through Dublin City...
Image: Refraction Artifact
Obscurity Meme
If My Blogging Were a Sports Car, I'd....
One Song Meme
Good to know....
You Try Taking a Picture of...
We are doomed
Praise where praise is due....
Optimistic Pessimism? Or vice versa?
Carnival of Feminists; other links to follow, I'm ...
"For Its Own Sake" has many benefits
Oopsies from April
End of Democracy and of Web 2.0
Understatement of the Day, or, Why "Middle" and "M...
Sleep Meme
Self-Pity or Other-Pity?
We have high speed access, so I'll make this quick...
eCherry Blossom? For Me?
Separtists Unite!
History Carnival... and more to come