Why Armies Target Civilians

From Targeting Civilians, by Thomas J. DiLorenzo

"Perhaps the most hideous precedent established by Lincoln’s war, however, was the intentional targeting of defenseless civilians. Human beings did not always engage in such barbaric acts as we have all watched in horror in recent days. Targeting civilians has been a common practice ever since World War II, but its roots lie in Lincoln’s war.

In 1863 there was an international convention in Geneva, Switzerland, that sought to codify international law with regard to the conduct of war. What the convention sought to do was to take the principles of "civilized" warfare that had evolved over the previous century, and declare them to be a part of international law that should be obeyed by all civilized societies. Essentially, the convention concluded that it should be considered to be a war crime, punishable by imprisonment or death, for armies to attack defenseless citizens and towns; plunder civilian property; or take from the civilian population more than what was necessary to feed and sustain an occupying army".

I think it can be safely said that the deliberate killing of civilians by armies engaged in warfare was used tactically, if not strategically, long before the American Civil War. What I want to get at is the continuing practice of it by so called modern armies, operating under, or in non compliance with international law. In recent weeks we've seen the most stark examples of this practice as Israel has launched a massive and sustained bombardment of southern Lebanon. I'm not interested so much in discussing Israel's justification for the attack, but rather what it's military objective is, and how it is allowed, under international law, to continue it's brutal targeting of civilian infrastructure, housing, hospitals, and even convoys of fleeing civilians.

Israel's official stance is that anyone remaining in southern Lebanon is a terrorist. This must also include U.N. Peacekeepers as it appears now that they were also intentionally targeted.

There are many examples of civilian infrastructure and cities being targeted in recent history. In WWII British and American commanders justified the razing of Dresden , Germany because they claimed it was a rail hub for transporting German reinforcements to the Eastern Front. And so, in an effort to aid Soviet forces advancing into Germany from the east they justified the obliteration of an entire city, with the deaths of civilians and refugees reaching into the tens of thousands. Why obliterate an entire city when bombing the railroad centers would likely have been sufficient to to their goal of slowing or stopping German reinforcements?

From Wikipedia, Chuchill's response,


"It seems to me that the moment has come when the question of bombing of German cities simply for the sake of increasing the TERROR , though under other pretexts, should be reviewed. Otherwise we shall come into control of an utterly ruined land… The destruction of Dresden remains a serious query against the conduct of Allied bombing. I am of the opinion that military objectives must henceforward be more strictly studied in our own interests than that of the enemy.
The Foreign Secretary has spoken to me on this subject, and I feel the need for more precise concentration upon military objectives such as oil and communications behind the immediate battle-zone, rather than on mere acts of terror and wanton destruction, however impressive."

There's that word, TERROR. Could that be the reasoning behind such attacks? Convenient though that Churchill thought it wise to give closer consideration to those tactics, but only insofar as not to lay waste to the spoils of war that the victors would claim for themselves.

Others however, considered it a war crime,


The absence of a direct military presence in the centre of the city, and the devastation known to be caused by firebombing, is regarded by supporters of the war crime position as establishing their case on a prima facie basis. They contend that these points are sufficient in themselves, without considering the absence of military necessity, the civilian death toll, and Dresden's cultural significance.

Why then was the attack not prosecuted as a war crime? Especially in light of this. From The Hague Conventions,

Aerial area bombardment and international law
International law up to 1945

Article 25: The attack or bombardment of towns, villages, habitations or buildings which are not defended, is prohibited.

Article 26: The Commander of an attacking force, before commencing a bombardment, except in the case of an assault, should do all he can to warn the authorities.

Article 27: In sieges and bombardments all necessary steps should be taken to spare as far as possible edifices devoted to religion, art, science, and charity, hospitals, and places where the sick and wounded are collected, provided they are not used at the same time for military purposes.
The besieged should indicate these buildings or places by some particular and visible signs, which should previously be notified to the assailants.

I suspect the answer might have something to do with the exceptionalism of the allies.

As I've said, there are countless examples throughout history and more recently.
U.S. targeting of civilians in Fallujah in 2004. Civilians who were trapped within the city by American forces that ringed that city. And not content to just commit that crime, the U.S. used a banned weapon, white phosphorus to attack them, at first claiming that the weapon was used only for illuminating those they wished to liberate from the terrorists. Only later was the U.S. forced to admit that it used the munition as a weapon, which is not permitted.

Shake and Bake

"WP proved to be an effective and versatile munition. We used it for screening missions at two breeches and, later in the fight, as a potent psychological weapon against the insurgents in trench lines and spider holes where we could not get effects on them with HE [High Explosive]. We fired "shake and bake" missions at the insurgents, using WP to flush them out and HE to take them out," the article said.

A word about the term "shake and bake." Anyone with a family to feed in the US knows what this term, properly "Shake 'n Bake, means. Made by Kraft, it is a seasoning which is put into a plastic bag with chicken and shaken before before baking. Its use gives the article the smack of reality. It's the kind of thing US soldiers would say.

War terminology...Operation Shake and Bake. What I would like to say about this isn't fit to print here.

Further examples from other wars, Rwanda, Myanmar, Nepal, and Kosovo.

But in my opinion, the worst case of targeting civilians was carried out by the one nation that holds itself above all others as a beacon of human rights, the U.S., and it's total annihilation of the Japanese cities of Nagasaki and Hiroshima at the end or WWII.

It's true that there were legitimate military targets within these cities, but that's not why they were wiped off the map. Truman claimed to be saving lives by taking lives. But the lives he sought to save were U.S. military, not Japanese civilians. Of course minimizing your own casualties is only prudent when engaged in war. But to commit the murder of 200,000 people can only be called what it truly is, and what it's purpose truly was, TERROR.

It's not a very wide leap to make from Truman's thinking of 60 years ago to George Bush's and his puppet, Ohlmert's thinking of today. Where Bush and Ohlmert are going a step beyond is in their opposition to a cease fire in Lebanon. Think about that for a moment. The international community and the U.N. are officially calling for an immediate cessastion of hostilities by Israel because of the overwhelming casualties being inflicted on Lebanese civilians. And yet Bush refuses to back a ceasefire. He has his own reasons for prolonging the conflict there, because it's a stepping off point for his long wished for attack against Iran. Widening the so called War On Terror. What the whole world now sees and knows is that it is his actions and his complicity in the targeting of innocent civilians that are the biggest cause of world wide terror and the continuing use of terroristic tactics.

Counting Cherry Stones: The Grocer's Daughter

“Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor, Rich man, Poor man, Beggarman, Thief.”

It’s a rhyme for counting cherry stones. A kind of game.

You count the stones and they tell you who will be your husband. Or rather his occupation, which amounted to the same thing for those of an age to play it. It’s from a time before mine, when girls – or at least the particular girls likely to have leisure for such games – were expected to take husbands (not partners, not girlfriends, nor to live in glorious solitude). And from a time too, when the equivalent rhyme for those particular girls didn’t let them count too many cherries.

It’s cherry season here in a dangerously over-heated summer. I’m counting stones, but the types turning over in my head don’t come from the rhyme.

Grocer’s Daughter, Rosie the Riveter, White-Feather Wielder, Downtrodden Woman.

My typology is no more exhaustive than that of the original rhyme. The world of the cherry stone is contracted. Compressed. In each case, however, something is going on with women (and maybe, ‘womanhood’) and something is going on with war (and perhaps also with the institutions that organise it). So let us take a closer look at these types, these tropes, these cherry stones. Although real women inhabit them from time to time they are not real. Do not let that deter you: it is their irreality which might illuminate. War is also a fiction: it requires the suspension of disbelief. Pretences must be made and accepted; lies told and acquiescence given. Let’s begin with the Grocer’s Daughter.

The Grocer’s Daughter

She has her historical antecedants, usually of nobler birth. But these are liberated, democratic times, no? And in these modern liberated democratic times, up she popped from humble stock: the grocer’s daughter.

“A world without nuclear weapons would be less stable and more dangerous for all of us,” she said straightfaced. Or possibly with an wry smile, over a cup of tea in a bone china service. With lemon.

The Iron Lady not for turning, the woman on top, making the hard-hitting decisions with the hardest of them. Playing with the boys’ toys. She owes nothing to ‘Women’s Lib’ (though her existence will be used to dismiss persistent inequalities – ‘Look at the Grocer’s Daughter! She made it, didn’t she?’).

She’ll drink deep at the well of domesticity when it suits though: what was that she said? Oh yes. “Any woman who understands the problems of running a home will be nearer to understanding the problems of running a country.” The deployment of domesticity here is no accident: it allows the female ‘leader’ to position herself / be positioned as a ‘proper woman’ – a wife, a mother. Her construction as spousal helpmeet or mother relies more on her femaleness than the presence or absence of actual spouse and children. Indeed, sometimes this construction can work better in their absence, since that strengthens the idealised familial bond between the grocer’s daughter and the state. She has no husband: she is wedded to the nation. She has no children: she is mother to the state. The personal subsumed utterly in the political. Her status as exception more obviously evident.

When she supports, orders or advocates the killing of other people’s children, however, this is seldom taken to reflect on her own construction as maternal. Rather it is evidence of her toughness, her firm grasp on Realpolitik. She is able to transcend women’s sentimental weaknesses: she is worth taking seriously. Alone of all her sex.

Yes, its essentialist – it’s the undiluted essence of essentialism, the real deal – but that’s the whole point. What toughness won’t cover, this brand of maternalism will and vice versa. They reinforce each other, they lend each other credibility.

Grocer’s daughters are rare, it’s true, but Maggie was not an only child.

Here comes Madeleine Albright, Clintonian champion of the indispensible nation, making her own “very hard choices” about Iraqi children because the price is right, “the price is worth it.”

If it doesn’t look worth it to me – if indeed it strikes me as perverse to apply such a calculus of thrift at all – doubtless the Grocer’s Daughter would find that perfectly explicable. I’m simply not tall enough. As a foreigner, I do not see far enough into the future. And those Americans, alas too few in number, who also lack sufficient stature? Child-like. Sentimental. Well-meaning but in need of (maternal) protection from the harsh reality of life. And the harsh reality of life is that the price is worth it: it’s a steal at the price.

“If we have to use force, it is because we are America. We are the indispensable nation. We stand tall. We see further into the future.”

(Madeleine Albright 19/2/1998)

If we have to use force, it is because we are America.
Let the words melt sweetly on your tongue like honey. “If we have to use force, it is because we are America.” Roll them around your mouth and spit them out like poison. “If we have to use force, it is because we are America.”

(Do you see? Beyond those borders – within them, yes, possibly it would make some differences – November may not matter terribly much after all if it comes to that. Because the price is right, the price is worth it.” Even if it is a ”“very hard choice.” Straight from the donkey’s mouth.)

Anyway, Maddy is so yesterday. Which is when the Rome Summit failed

“Fighting escalated on both sides as the much-vaunted peace conference in Rome broke up after failing to reach agreement to call for an immediate ceasefire. Condoleezza Rice, the US secretary of state, backed by Margaret Beckett, the foreign secretary, resisted calls from 13 other countries, as well as the UN secretary-general, Kofi Annan, for such a ceasefire. Ms Rice said: "We have to have a plan that will actually create conditions in which we can have a ceasefire that will be sustainable." Mrs Beckett said: "Even if you could get a ceasefire half an hour ago, you would probably be back in hostilities in a few days."

Everyone knows it: a ceasefire – even a temporary, fleeting one that broke down in a few days – would have given some people a chance to find what refuge they could. It would have saved some lives. And even life for a day is still life. Even the Grocer’s Daughters know that. But they are tough. They make hard-hitting choices. They are serious. They understand Realpolitik. It was a ‘very hard choice’ but in the end a ceasefire was not worth the price.

To the Grocer’s Daughters:

Stay your hands.

“I want not to ask you but to tell you not to participate in the oppression of your sisters. Mothers who abuse their children are women, and another woman, not an agency, has to be willing to stay their hands. Mothers who set fire to school buses are women, and another woman, not an agency, has to tell them to stay their hands . . .”

Toni Morrison, Commencement Address, Barnard College, 1979.

Stay your hands.

Arms and the Poodle

It’s true. He has stood up on his hind legs, widdled on His Masters Trousers and bitten the hand that feeds him. Bravo. Perhaps that crack about sweaters was the last dog biscuit, and after carefully considering the bowl (which says Fido) and the collar (which says Fido) and the flea-infested kennel (which says Fido) he decided the time had finally come to use those back legs of his to get that collar over his ears and skip the light fantastic.

Don’t hold your breath. This is spinnery on speed: Hargreaves would down tools and stop tinkering with that Spinning Jenny to look on in dumbstruck awe. Business as usual: an attempt to position the U.K. as the conciliatory, humane ones whose soldiers take their sunglasses off and wear berets all the better to reassure a fearful populace. Certainly not the kind of folks who would take photos of themselves sexually abusing and torturing Iraqi civilians for their personal gratification. Thumbs up, anyone?

Yes. Tony made a phone call to Olmert to voice his deep concern. And he has urged the U.S. to ‘understand.’ Apparently this constitutes “dramatic criticism” and is a startling and unprecedented display of independent foreign policy making.

Kim Howells, a British Foreign Office Minister (ie not very high up the tree) has also been speaking out, calling for Israel to show “proportionality and restraint”

I’d planned on having a bit of a field day at Howell’s expense. I thought I’d ask that awkward question “So, Mr Howell, what would have been “proportionate?” One of those photographs? Two? One fifth of them? A half? Inquiring minds need to know. If something is disproportionate, there must have been some another portion that would have been proportionate no?

And – I was going to wonder – has he simply been misinterpreted in his calls for ‘restraint?’ After all, according to Clare Short (admittedly She Who Is Known For The Foundation of the ‘I’m Going – I’m Going – Really Any Minute Now I’m Going. Honest’ School of Resignation -- but still it’s true that in the end she did go) and as documented by Mark Thomas in As Used on the Famous Nelson Mandela; Underground Adventures in the Arms and Torture Trade ,

“. . .every minister who makes a foreign trip has three briefings: one from their department detailing the purpose of their trip, a second from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office explaining the political situation in the country the minister is to visit, and a third briefing, talking points, from Downing Street, things to mention and plug, like Arms Deals. Every time there is an arms deal in the air it is a minister’s duty to talk it up, no matter what the purpose of the trip. They could be visiting victims of the tsunami or having a meeting about carbon emissions, and somewhere on their to-do list scrawled in biro are the words – ‘Big up the guns.” (123)

‘Was this what that phrase ‘restraint’ was about?’ I was going to muse. After all, various U.K. companies do an excellent line in handcuffs and other assorted accoutrements of the torture trade. And they’ve got good contracts in high places: the handcuffs used in Guantanamo have “Made in England” stamped on them. (Thomas, 212). Perhaps Howell was taken out of context, I was going to speculate – perhaps there’s a big deal in hand-cuffs going down and he’d been told to ‘big up the cuffs and tell them BOGOF on the netting.’

According to the Guardian , an anonymous ‘senior Israeli diplomat’ described that ‘Poodle To The Poodle Phone’ moment thus: “'The tone was very positive. We agree on all major aspects of this crisis and are greatly appreciative of Britain's position.”

Well may they be, since the U.K.’s sales of arms to Israel almost doubled to a not insignificant £25m.

The Foreign Office claims that “ that all exports were considered under the government's official criteria. "The bottom line is that no piece of kit is used for external aggression or internal repression."

Children’s parties. That’s what they’re for. An alternative to Bonzo the Happy Clown and purple dinosaurs.

So yes. Field day. Planned excusion to the sunny uplands.

But looking at Howell’s words again and doing a bit of reading between the lines, I think that perhaps (just perhaps, I wouldn’t venture anything stronger than that) there may be a bit of a cri de coeur going on there. Albeit expressed unfortunately not in its vehemence but in its moderation. And yes, in its argumentation too: the reason to refrain from killing children is not that

“Every person who has got a mobile phone, every person who can take a photograph of somebody being blown to bits, or a child with a limb missing, is a reporter now.”

But such errors in argument are not uncommon when one is desperately trying to persuade. Who can say for sure what is in his heart or where it might eventually lead him?

Enough.
What is to be done.
Opposing the arms trade is a piece in this jigsaw puzzle I think.

It’s late in the day, but here are three things you can do (depending of course on what you already are doing -- you may already be running at full tilt – whether on this or any of a myriad of connected issues).

1) Knowledge is the beginning of power. Inform yourself and inform us. Places to start reading include Control Arms and also the Amnesty International USA pages on arms control. And there’s this for some recent (sad) history. And as in all things, google is your friend.

I must admit – digressions, diversions, excursions and expeditions are always very welcome - but I’d kind of like it if one of the things people used this thread for was ‘here’s what I found out.’ That could be ‘here’s what I found out about who is selling what to whom.’ It could also be about ‘what can be done to stop it?’ Or ‘What have people done? What worked? What didn’t?’

2) These folks Campaign Against the Arms Trade could probably use some support. If you know of other similar organisations – whereever they may be based – that could do with any of the various kinds of support and involvement that such organisations can generally use, tell us about them.

3) Do you have stocks? A portfolio? (Unlikely, I know) But on that slim off-chance, take a look at who you’re investing with: maybe do some rethinking and reorganising if it strikes you as necessary. Do you have a pension? (Unlikely, I know) But again, on that offchance, take a look at who they invest in. Do you need to do something about that?

Ringing the Changes

“I shall not keep you long, he cried. Cheers from all the assembly. I have called you all together for a Purpose. Something in the way that he said this made an impression. There was almost silence, and one or two of the Tooks pricked up their ears.
Indeed for Three Purposes!

J.R.R. Tolkien, The Fellowship of the Ring.

Alas, it's not my eleventy-first birthday party, but like Bilbo, I shall not keep you long. I do however have Three Purposes. And purposes well worthy of their italics I think. If I’m really lucky, I might even manage an Announcement.

Actually the Announcement should come first.

InFlight is changing.
No, that's not quite true. InFlight has changed.
And now it's about to change some more.
InFlight is becoming a group blog.

Which brings me to those Three Purposes. Or Three Graces perhaps, because certainly I consider all three of them to have grace in abundance.

I've asked Nanette, supersoling and DuctapeFatwa to become -- well I'm actually not sure what the right term should be. FPers? That's a bit arrogant for what is a very little blog. Contributors? But everyone who posts makes a contribution, often far more of a contribution than the 'post' per se as one can plainly see by looking back through the archives.

Hmm. People who post articles and/or facilitate other people posting articles on occasion and/or generally keep things ticking over. That's what I've asked them to be. All of them were doing that already, but I've asked them to do it here as well, as they see fit. And to my delight (and immense relief!) Nanette, supersoling and DuctapeFatwa have all agreed. Logistics are still being sorted out (what a wonderful euphemism that is for 'dove is still figuring out how blogger works!')

And while I'm at it there are a couple of other things I wanted to say as well. (If brevity is the soul of wit then alas. . .)

There is something about InFlight that I'd like not to change. Doesn't mean it won't of course.

I'd like it to be non-national space. I think it has, for the most part, been non-national space so far and I'd like it to continue to be.

I guess I've also been thinking about homes and coalitions and how these things are not like each other.

And I've been reading and thinking a bit about Bernice Johnson Reagon's speech, Coalition Politics:Turning the Century

I'd like to discuss her speech: I'm not quite sure where to begin. The century she spoke of turning has of course turned in the interim. But twenty-five years on (more or less) since she spoke it seems to me that her words could have been said for the first time this morning. Anyway, every time I think I've got the beginnings of a coherent sentence, I find myself turning my head this way and that, saying 'hmmm. Do I really mean that?' and going back to her words.

So I'd like to invite someone to start. And someone else to join in. And when I find some words, so shall I.

Typing (and Thinking) out Loud Part II

In the last Typing (and Thinking) out Loud thread, Nanette observed something 'weird' while writing about bell hooks's conclusion that "This means that the world we have most intimately known, the world in which we feel "safe" (even if such feelings are based on illusions), must be radically changed. Perhaps it is the knowledge that everyone must change, not just those who we label enemies or oppressors, that has so far served to check our revolutionary impulses." ( bell hooks, From Margin to Centre 166).

Nanette said:

You know how sometimes you hear a word or a phrase that you've probably heard thousands of times in your life, but at that particular point in time it just sounds... weird? Like it's a new thing, and maybe doesn't belong there. This happened to me yesterday when reading an article and having it say "human rights organizations say... ".

Human rights organizations. Care for the children charities. Anti poverty/feed the poor organizations.

Don't those just seem... well, weird? Why, at this point in time... or really, at any point in time, should we need huge, international organizations that have to lobby for human rights? Or beg for food to feed people? It doesn't usually seem weird though, it seems like well... that's how things are supposed to be. After all, someone has to do it. Right? But it all seems backwards.

Yes. I think it does seem backwards. I think we've come to take some things that we shouldn't have as 'natural', 'inevitable', 'that's just how it is.' Human nature.

When one is told 'but that's just naturally how it is,' I think it can be useful to take a long hard look at who benefits and who does not benefit from that particular natural state. And how? Because asking those questions might lead us to wonder whether 'it' -- whatever the 'it' may be -- is in fact an intractable 'state of nature' or whether it is instead no more than a 'state of affairs' that just happens to be wearing a convincing disguise.

So. What are the 'it's' you would like to make unnatural? Why? And where would you begin?

---
As a postscript, I just wanted to say 'welcome' to everyone who has come here to write over this last week. It's good to see you here, albeit not always under the easiest of circumstances and certainly in far from the happiest of times.

Words fail

It looks like where my grandparents lived
when they were still alive.

Bushfire country.
The forest burned and given to gorse,
parched scrub, sharp stones and dusty heat
that burns again each summer.

These tinder-dry days olive groves are grown there
and olives but not infants.
I mean there are no infants hanging in the olive branches,
no tiny legs, no little limbs.
The infants are alive not in the olive tree.

Don't cry. She has no use for your tears.
She had a water bottle.
If that will no longer serve, your tears will not revive her.
Light no candle. This is bushfire country.
A candle is the last thing anyone in their right mind needs.
You comfort no-one but yourself
with tears, candles, poetry.

Typing (and thinking) Out Loud Thread

Alas, I'm not going to be able to do anything but sporadic typing and thinking until tomorrow. However, the last thread may be getting a bit big and unwieldy so I thought I'd provide a brand new comment thread for people to keep talking here as well if they wish. (Obviously people should feel free to keep posting to the previous discussion though, especially if they are replying to comments there -- this is 'another' space, rather than an 'instead of' space)

People might want to post questions too for people to discuss -- I've heard from at least one person who would like to do that, and this would be a good place for that.

In the interim, because I see (in inchoate ways thus far) this issue as being so closely linked with and to feminism, I thought I'd quote something bell hooks said at the conclusion of Feminist Theory; from Margin to Centre

The formation of an oppositional world view is necessary for feminist
struggle. This means that the world that we have most intimately known,
the world in which we feel 'safe' (even if such feelings are
illusions) must be radically changed. Perhaps it is the knowledge that everyone
must change, not just those we label enemies or oppressors, that has so far
served to check our revolutionary impulses. Those revolutionary
impulses must freely inform our theory and practice if feminist movement to
end existing oppression is to progress, if we are to transform our present reality.

Anyway, I think there are things to muse on here. Just very briefly in terms of contextualising her conclusion. I don't think bell hooks is saying that oppression doesn't exist, that it shouldn't be called what it is, or that those engaged in oppresion shouldn't be called on that (or that doing that calling is itself an act of oppression). I do think she's saying that it's a rare person who isn't or hasn't been complicit in oppression themselves in one way or another. Certainly, that's one I'd have to put my hand up to.

Alex through the Looking Glass

Mr Eldritch has always known just what to say.
Harsh words for harsher places, but that is, after all, his vocation.

"Alice in her party dress
She thanks you kindly
So serene
She needs you like she needs her tranqs
To tell her that the world is clean"

For Alice, read Alex. Her party dress is blood-stained and her eyes have that familiar glassy look. Serenity in a bottle, composure in a needle. Alex is innocent: it's not the world she needs to be reassured is clean (though it isn't) it's her party dress. And her works.

As I've written elsewhere (Let's talk about Alex), Alex isn't a real person. She's a stock character, but she resembles something that exists in the world: I should know, I've resembled her.

Before I get stuck in, I should probably start out with a warning: long, long, meta ahead. It's not even meta about In Flight: it's meta about BT. And yes, I will be naming names and linking to posts, because on the whole I'd rather people weren't wondering who I'm talking about. But I probably won't cite many actual quotations because I don't want to give them room here.

But I'm going to start out with a brief and pointed digression.

Catherine McKinnon has asked some really tough questions about what female consent to heterosexual sex means in places where, by and large, rape happens with impunity. The places I think of when I read her work are the places I've lived: New Zealand, the United States and more recently the United Kingdom. (I must confess, that while I'm naming names, my sources in this case are still languishing in a garage in the United States. I am writing from memory: as a result I am probably grossly simplifying her argument or simply getting parts of it wrong: the inevitable shortcomings should therefore be ascribed to me, not her.)

If I remember her rightly, she argues in societies such as New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States, some women are generally understood to be unrapable. They cannot be raped because their consent is already presumed: any sexual act involving them is therefore automatically by definition consensual. On its face, it might seem a bit of a nonsense, but let me try and give a couple of examples.

It is well-known that women who work as prostitutes find it almost impossible to obtain rape convictions: as sex workers, they are understood to be 'unrapable:' their consent is presumed.

Until quite recently in New Zealand (1985), it was legally impossible for a husband to rape his spouse. While a married woman might be rapable by a stranger, she was unrapable by her husband. Despite the change in law, convictions for spousal rape (and its relative, date rape) remain very rare. One might conclude from this that while girlfriends and wives are legally rapable by their boyfriends and husbands (which is to say they can be raped because they can refuse consent), in practice they are still considered unrapable within the context of that relationship (they can't be raped because their consent is already given).

Part of the reason why McKinnon's taxonomy (if I'm describing it correctly) is hard to get one's head around is that one would normally think of being 'unrapable' as a good thing, as implying that one is not powerless, but powerful -- but within the context of her argument, to be 'unrapable' is to not have one's right to refuse consent recognised or acknowledged within the broader society, which actually puts one in a weaker position than the 'rapable' woman who at least has the possibility of some kind of redress.

Anyway, when a rapist rapes an 'unrapable' woman -- a woman whose consent is automatically presumed -- he often won't think that he's done anything wrong and he will vociferously claim innocence. And most of the time, a majority of people will agree with him. I don't think there's anything particular controversial in that observation: certainly it matches what I've seen in the world closely enough.

Here endeth the digression.

What does any of that have to do with meta? What does it have to do with Alex? What does it have to do with what's been happening at BT?

Resemblance is what it has to do with these things -- not identity, but resemblance. I am expressly not saying that anyone has been raped on BT. That would be a bit silly. But I am inviting you to keep in mind a more general idea that might be abstracted from McKinnon (or rather from my crude and possibly inaccurate recollection of a paraphrase of part of her argument). That is, the concept that there may be constructed -- through language, because language matters here folks -- classes of people whom it is by definition impossible to injure. Not because they are powerful, invulnerable superheroes who cannot in fact experience injury, but because an injury to them is not considered to be a real injury (raping one's spouse was 'impossible' in New Zealand until 1985, remember?) . Such 'uninjurable' people can be injured with impunity: innocence and goodness is maintained throughout. And I must admit, whenever I think of innocence I think of Alex in her bloody party dress. So serene.

What I see happening at BT (and elsewhere too, but most clearly at BT, perhaps because that's where I look most closely) is the gradual construction of a class of people whom it is, by definition, impossible to injure. A class of people about whom and to whom anything may be said, with no moral consequences -- with no loss of 'goodness' or 'innocence.' There are, as it happens, some social consequences and these are seen as sad and perhaps even inexplicable. After all, nothing is being done that is wrong.

So who is this class of people? At BT, I would suggest, they might be defined as presumed foreigners who critique the United States in ways that USun's find uncomfortable. Though generally presumed exempt by citizenship, USuns who are critical of the U.S. military and of U.S. empire, or who dissent (as several have) from the construction of this class of 'uninjurable' people' can easily enough be included in it on a case-by-case basis. How? It's easy. Describe them as having been corrupted -- led astray -- by that seductive foreign voice.

"I do not like Ductape Fatwa's diaries, I don't believe they serve useful purpose and that now they actually cause some of my fellow countrymen to lose touch with honesty and integrity."
militarytracy, (July 7th 2006)

Which brings me to Ductape Fatwa, the current Unacceptable Other du jour at BT. Widely perceived and portrayed as the bringer of dissent, disruption, disunity, divisiveness, broad brushes, sweeping generalisations, negativity and all manner of outrages.

Hmm. I suppose I should declare where I stand in this: I'm one of the evil co-conspirators, no less. Apparently, catnip and I have magical powers of appearance and the ability to bless people with our mere presence. Who knew! Seriously, I consider Ductape Fatwa a friend, an ally and yes, an honorary ancestor. He's one of the people whom I'm lucky enough to get to think in writing at and whom I'm lucky enough to get to read.

And Ductape Fatwa has said that it's 'not about him' except in a symbolic sense.

But that symbolic sense is important. Close attention to the language used to justify the ad hominem attacks tossed his way -- and language usually rewards close attention -- reveals that his detractors often justify their ad hominem attacks by gesturing towards aspects of DTF's identity. From their perspective, this presumably locates him within a class of people who are 'unattackable' or 'uninjurable,' whose words need not be read and to whom anything may be attributed. I say 'presumably' because I think that's what's going on: I see no other rhetorical purpose for such gestures.

For example, one of Sallycat's ad hominem attacks was predicated on Ductape Fatwa's 'foreignness.'

"If you don't like this country and the people trying to take it back - stay
away. If you don't like soldiers doing a job they were ordered to do - and
their generals are trying to stop - stay away. If you hate what America
stands for that much - go find a European Blog...or some other country -
just go away. This is my country and I will defend my fellow
countrymen...from those that do not understand the people and the government
are not always the same. Go elsewhere...or just stay away we are mostly
American's here and you are offensive to those of us that believe in what we
stand for as a people."

What is being claimed here, at least on my reading, is that BT is a place for Americans and those who are not 'my fellow countrymen' (presumably both naturalised citizens and permanent residents are excluded from this group, as well as those who live elsewhere in the world) are not welcome unless they 'believe in what we (Americans) stand for as a people.' DTF is quite right: it's not about him -- it's about anyone critical of 'what we stand for as a people' who is not among 'my fellow countrymen.' And if you are in that set of people, you are offensive. You are in that 'uninjurable' group.

More recently, DTF's words were discounted on the basis of his presumed origin as a refugee.

When one's words can be discounted on the basis of foreign origin, presumed or actual (and I would argue, equally on the basis of religion in DTF's case) or presumed refugee origin -- when one's words can be dismissed on the basis of the writer's religious, national, or ethnic identity, it is not surprising that they are often misread. It requires increasing amounts of charity to interpret such misreadings as innocent or unintentional, especially when the same misreadings occur repeatedly.

For example, DuctapeFatwa has repeatedly been accused of supporting FGM, where casual perusal of what he has actually said on the subject -- on my interpretation at least -- indicates a position in line with the practices being advocated by UNICEF in its efforts to end FGM.

"UNICEF is working with partners who have identified several critical elements necessary for mass abandonment of the practice. These include using a non-coercive and non-judgmental approach; raising awareness in the community about the harmfulness of the practice; encouraging public declarations of the collective commitment to abandonment; and spreading the abandonment message within communities."

For example, he is repeatedly accused of making generalisations about all Americans, when as supersoling recently pointed out, this is simply not the case.

Now, this might sound like it's all about DTF after all. But actually it's not -- except in a symbolic and exemplary way. Really, it's more about what can be done and what has been done to people, once they/we are defined as 'unattackable' and 'uninjurable:' people to whom and about whom anything can be said without moral consequence.

Let me be blunt(er) in closing. When I saw Sallycat's diary Rhetoric of Hate, my first thoughts were essentially those of catnip who wrote

"Let's see if I've got this straight:
posting a diary that reflects the
opinion of much of the world about the attitudes of most Americans = being
hateful
telling said diarist that he is a "Republican troll" who writes
things that are "pathetically fucking stupid = not being hateful
What strange parallel universe have I dropped into here?"

I had the same reaction. It seemed to me bizarre that a group of people (Sallycat, NAG, militarytracy, Egerwaen, etc.), whom, based on their previous behaviour I expect as a routine matter of course to see attacking someone whom I respect (not least because of his steady, determined refusal to respond in kind in the face of considerable provocation) with misrepresentations, misreadings and virulent ad hominem attacks, then turned around and with no apparent sense of irony, posted and/or participated in a discussion purporting to be about peace and tolerance.

It struck me as utterly shameless behaviour.

But then I realised. They feel no shame because they don't think they've done anything wrong. As Sallycat puts it in her response to catnip, "I stand by my comments in that diary." And the reason they don't think they've done anything wrong (at least so far as I can tell, from their words) is because as a foreigner, as a presumed refugee and as a Muslim who says things that make USuns feel uncomfortable, DTF is among a class of people who cannot be wronged, cannot be maligned and are not part of that 'all' who are susceptible to injury. And because of this, a certain wide-eyed innocent eye-lash fluttering 'who me?' can be maintained throughout.

And like I said before, when I think of innocence, I think of Alex in her bloody party dress.

She needs you like she needs her pills
To tell her that the world's okay

Now, I'm not claiming innocence, Alex. I'm sure I've said some things that hurt to hear. And we both know that I resemble you all too often. But no matter how many pills you take, the world will still not be okay. And if you want those bloodstains out of your party dress, then you're just going to have to wash it clean.