Amnesty Intl protests Iraqi TV station bombing

[juju]

When Nerds Fight -- Film at 11.

[Cam]

Originally posted by juju
When Nerds Fight -- Film at 11.

Damn juju, almost ruined my keyboard on that one. Water everywhere.

[Undertoad]

The flip side of the original thread topic:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/features/iraq/anti_war_iraq.html

"Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch criticized the British government for a report on Saddam’s use of torture and summary executions. The two groups usually welcome such documentation of human rights violations, but they criticized the British government for using the report as propaganda to justify an attack on Iraq."

In other words, We're all against torture and summary executions, but we hush it up in certain circumstances for political correctness.

The left used to be against torture and summary execution. Times have changed and now the very organizations charged with stopping it are actively trying to cover it up.

[Elspode]

I imagine they would characterize their position as more along the lines of "don't use the fact that we said Saddam was a torturing murderous jerkoff to justify causing more death and destruction."

However, I'm with you...I think that AI would be pleased that someone is trying to do something about the crap that they so gleefully pointed out to the rest of the world.

[jaguar]

You know considering the US's very two-faced approach to human rights it's not too shocking that Anmesty is wary about supporting anything which gets used as propaganda in a war like this. It's not about political correctness, it's about avoiding being politicised which for a non-partisan group such as Anmesty is something to be avoided at all costs.

Anmesty does outline thier position here if you care to look. Anmesty's key issue with the war is outlined here and can be paraphrased as:

While security and geopolitical arguments have featured prominently in support of the use of force, human rights considerations—including explicit references to Amnesty International’s work—have been advanced also by some governments to justify forceful action against Iraq. However, the mention of human rights in the debate has been selective and manipulative, and little or no attention appears to have been given to the human rights and humanitarian repercussions of military action.

Which i think does vindicate my point about politicisation. Of course that only applies of you care about the reality of the situation rather than sensationalised selective soundbites resulting in warped conclusions.

[Undertoad]

...little or no attention appears to have been given to the human rights and humanitarian repercussions of military action.

It's funny you would pull that particular quote, when anyone seriously watching now knows that it is insanely wrong in almost every way. It's almost as if you wanted to prove they had their heads up their ass. But you'll be happy to know that it has served to piss me off royally. In fact I've sat here for the last ten minutes, deleting one statement and writing another, trying vainly to come up with words for how insanely wrong that sentiment is. I've decided that it's better to my mental health if I just let it go.

[Elspode]

I'm with you, UT...I've heard endlessly from our military commanders that we are attempting to minimize the civilian impact, even at the risk of our own troops (example - not blowing up the mosque from which we are being shot at...stupid military move, positive civilian sensitivity).

But since everyone is lying (as I've stated before), I'll just include AI in my list of prevaricators.

[Whit]

     Relax UT, surely you realize that by AI standards war is just about the worst violation of human rights there is? Yep, even worse than a plasic shredder or a mountain of skulls. Yeah, this is nutty but just shake your head and move on, it's not worth the stress. AI has a specific world view, it assumes all wars work like the ones in the past. Like we are getting to give Bagdad the Hiroshima treatment. Obviously this isn't true but it IS an organization based on moral absolutes, which means ignoring the situation around what is happening is par for the course. War=Bad=rape and torture=Awful human rights violations. They'll adapt, just not during this conflict. They'll adapt or the organization will fail. That's life, if you get too pissed your the one that suffers for their idiocy. Much like the UN (IMO anyway) it's a flawed organization that does serve a funtion.

[jaguar]

I agree UT, my guess is that the article predates the discussions on the last week which may explain the statement. *shrugs* I'm not defending AI, merely elaborating on the rather selective cherrypicking of information.

[xoxoxoBruce]

That may be why http://dear_raed.blogspot.com/ has not been updated fom Baghdad. It was very interesting.

[Undertoad]

Various dear_raed watchers figured out that his link to the net was one of the Baghdad buildings that was bombed. I know, "Duh", but it was interesting that they worked it out down to the building, up until which had not been hit and up until which the guy was still posting.