I started this thread in relation to what Randi was saying on Monday about how thewar was not being covered and if those who promote war were to see the results of it, Americans who think they support the war would have a different outlook on it.
For the record I can not look at these pictures and never did try to look at the Daniel Pearl or other similar videos. I could never handle such a thing.
I can't even watch medical videos.............
Full Version: No War Pics Allowed
QUOTE (roborok @ Jul 8 2008, 12:23 PM) 
How do you know they don't? ...
As referenced earlier, the frequent reports of outraged calls, threatened boycotts, canceled subscriptions when even the tamest images are seen, and the absence of clamoring support from the other POV congratulating the outlet for finally meeting its obligation.
Please do NOT mistake these observations as advocating for the censorship of images. I am telling you, when they are published, the result has typically been, "I DON'T WANT MY KIDS TO SEE THIS CRAP AT THE BREAKFAST TABLE!" It has NOT been, "Thank you for finally letting Americans see what they should have been seeing all along."
I share your disgust with the former, and I actually HAVE congratulated the LA Times and others outlets on the rare occasion they've lifted the veil. The fact remains the LAT saw waves of subscriptions canceled when they finally put a flag-draped coffin on page one early this year or late last year, and there's no reason to believe they gained one subscriber. ABC and CBS have both been deluged with critical mail and threats of boycotts in response to "disturbing images," with now discernible movement from the opposite side.
So back to my original question: What do you do when the public refuses to look?
Or, of course, you can simply choose to pretend such people are rare or nonexistent, and that vast numbers do not respond to a brutal war story by switching over to "Wheel of Fortune."
QUOTE (bushwa @ Jul 9 2008, 11:11 AM)
As referenced earlier, the frequent reports of outraged calls, threatened boycotts, canceled subscriptions when even the tamest images are seen, and the absence of clamoring support from the other POV congratulating the outlet for finally meeting its obligation.
Please do NOT mistake these observations as advocating for the censorship of images. I am telling you, when they are published, the result has typically been, "I DON'T WANT MY KIDS TO SEE THIS CRAP AT THE BREAKFAST TABLE!" It has NOT been, "Thank you for finally letting Americans see what they should have been seeing all along."
I share your disgust with the former, and I actually HAVE congratulated the LA Times and others outlets on the rare occasion they've lifted the veil. The fact remains the LAT saw waves of subscriptions canceled when they finally put a flag-draped coffin on page one early this year or late last year, and there's no reason to believe they gained one subscriber. ABC and CBS have both been deluged with critical mail and threats of boycotts in response to "disturbing images," with now discernible movement from the opposite side.
So back to my original question: What do you do when the public refuses to look?
Or, of course, you can simply choose to pretend such people are rare or nonexistent, and that vast numbers do not respond to a brutal war story by switching over to "Wheel of Fortune."
Please do NOT mistake these observations as advocating for the censorship of images. I am telling you, when they are published, the result has typically been, "I DON'T WANT MY KIDS TO SEE THIS CRAP AT THE BREAKFAST TABLE!" It has NOT been, "Thank you for finally letting Americans see what they should have been seeing all along."
I share your disgust with the former, and I actually HAVE congratulated the LA Times and others outlets on the rare occasion they've lifted the veil. The fact remains the LAT saw waves of subscriptions canceled when they finally put a flag-draped coffin on page one early this year or late last year, and there's no reason to believe they gained one subscriber. ABC and CBS have both been deluged with critical mail and threats of boycotts in response to "disturbing images," with now discernible movement from the opposite side.
So back to my original question: What do you do when the public refuses to look?
Or, of course, you can simply choose to pretend such people are rare or nonexistent, and that vast numbers do not respond to a brutal war story by switching over to "Wheel of Fortune."
Well then wouldnt they be wise to follow society rules and not push the pics. if the story gets read by more without the pics, then all serve is exploiting the dead.
QUOTE (rowdyroddypiper @ Jul 9 2008, 09:18 AM)
Well then wouldnt they be wise to follow society rules and not push the pics. if the story gets read by more without the pics, then all serve is exploiting the dead.
Oh, the administration is/are CHAMPS at exploiting the dead and wounded! Hell, a current justification for continuing the war is supposedly so that the dead "have not died in vain!" GW awards medals of honor to soldiers, including posthumous awards, on the same day his general is giving congressional testimony, and the photos of the dead and injured are hidden away - not to hide from the citizens the reals costs of war - but to "respect the privacy" of those soldiers. (Apparently, dying in combat is the only way to get this administration even moderately interested in one's privacy rights.)
Bush jogs with a double amputee soldier/fan and a press gaggle follows along. The same soldier loses his legs, and a combat photographer on the battle field is the one "exploiting" the soldier?
And have you SEEN what goes on in DC with regard to most federal holidays of late, the solemn and sad salutes to soldiers - but God forbid anyone see them on the job.
Nah, the rap on "exploiting" soldiers isn't going to work as a device in censoring images. It's like Paris Hilton accusing Lindsay Lohan of being a slut.
How come we can watch documentary after documentary showing piles and piles of dead Jews in Concentration camps and be properly outraged but we can't handle looking at the horrors our President is responsible for in Iraq?
Don't you all realize the rest of the world is looking at these horrible images and judging us accordingly?
Why is it we refuse to be justifiably outraged? Oh, because then we'd have to DO something about it.
When our economy goes down the crapper, and it will, the rest of the world will be saying the Good-German-like Americans got exactly what they deserved.
I am sympathetic to those who just can't bring themselves to look, but to not make the images available here when the rest of the world IS looking at them and judging us accordingly is just wrong. Hitler was able to get a good running start because people were afraid to look into what he was doing, too. Stalin was able to get a good running start in Russia, too, because people were afraid to look into what he was doing and nipping his career in the bud when they realized his method of modernizing Russia was to enslave almost every Russian.
Have we been turned into a nation of appeasers of Bush because the majority refuse to handle the truth because they don't want to upset the children?
Or is it that a halocaust (sic) of Iraqi Muslims is just fine with Americans...just don't fill our beautiful minds with the gory day to day details.
Don't you all realize the rest of the world is looking at these horrible images and judging us accordingly?
Why is it we refuse to be justifiably outraged? Oh, because then we'd have to DO something about it.
When our economy goes down the crapper, and it will, the rest of the world will be saying the Good-German-like Americans got exactly what they deserved.
I am sympathetic to those who just can't bring themselves to look, but to not make the images available here when the rest of the world IS looking at them and judging us accordingly is just wrong. Hitler was able to get a good running start because people were afraid to look into what he was doing, too. Stalin was able to get a good running start in Russia, too, because people were afraid to look into what he was doing and nipping his career in the bud when they realized his method of modernizing Russia was to enslave almost every Russian.
Have we been turned into a nation of appeasers of Bush because the majority refuse to handle the truth because they don't want to upset the children?
Or is it that a halocaust (sic) of Iraqi Muslims is just fine with Americans...just don't fill our beautiful minds with the gory day to day details.
QUOTE (ChiffonBreath @ Jul 9 2008, 03:58 PM)
How come we can watch documentary after documentary showing piles and piles of dead Jews in Concentration camps and be properly outraged but we can't handle looking at the horrors our President is responsible for in Iraq?
Don't you all realize the rest of the world is looking at these horrible images and judging us accordingly?
Why is it we refuse to be justifiably outraged? Oh, because then we'd have to DO something about it.
When our economy goes down the crapper, and it will, the rest of the world will be saying the Good-German-like Americans got exactly what they deserved.
I am sympathetic to those who just can't bring themselves to look, but to not make the images available here when the rest of the world IS looking at them and judging us accordingly is just wrong. Hitler was able to get a good running start because people were afraid to look into what he was doing, too. Stalin was able to get a good running start in Russia, too, because people were afraid to look into what he was doing and nipping his career in the bud when they realized his method of modernizing Russia was to enslave almost every Russian.
Have we been turned into a nation of appeasers of Bush because the majority refuse to handle the truth because they don't want to upset the children?
Or is it that a halocaust (sic) of Iraqi Muslims is just fine with Americans...just don't fill our beautiful minds with the gory day to day details.
Don't you all realize the rest of the world is looking at these horrible images and judging us accordingly?
Why is it we refuse to be justifiably outraged? Oh, because then we'd have to DO something about it.
When our economy goes down the crapper, and it will, the rest of the world will be saying the Good-German-like Americans got exactly what they deserved.
I am sympathetic to those who just can't bring themselves to look, but to not make the images available here when the rest of the world IS looking at them and judging us accordingly is just wrong. Hitler was able to get a good running start because people were afraid to look into what he was doing, too. Stalin was able to get a good running start in Russia, too, because people were afraid to look into what he was doing and nipping his career in the bud when they realized his method of modernizing Russia was to enslave almost every Russian.
Have we been turned into a nation of appeasers of Bush because the majority refuse to handle the truth because they don't want to upset the children?
Or is it that a halocaust (sic) of Iraqi Muslims is just fine with Americans...just don't fill our beautiful minds with the gory day to day details.
I think the answer lies in the fact that the atrocities committed against people of Jewish faith during the Holocaust were done against a helpless civilian population and did not happen in open combat between rival armies. In war Soldiers will die. Understandably most US Generals/Admirals will do their utmost to avoid casualties. But that is part of warfare. The Holocaust was/is not a part of how one should fight wars. It was a shameful and massive atrocity.
Best Regards,
The case of a freelance photographer in Iraq who was barred from covering the Marines after he posted photos on the Internet of several of them dead has underscored what some journalists say is a growing effort by the American military to control graphic images from the war.
Zoriah Miller, the photographer who took images of marines killed in a June 26 suicide attack and posted them on his Web site, was subsequently forbidden to work in Marine Corps-controlled areas of the country. Maj. Gen. John Kelly, the Marine commander in Iraq, is now seeking to have Mr. Miller barred from all United States military facilities throughout the world. Mr. Miller has since left Iraq.
If the conflict in Vietnam was notable for open access given to journalists — too much, many critics said, as the war played out nightly in bloody newscasts — the Iraq war may mark an opposite extreme: after five years and more than 4,000 American combat deaths, searches and interviews turned up fewer than a half-dozen graphic photographs of dead American
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/26/world/mi...6censor.html?hp
Zoriah Miller, the photographer who took images of marines killed in a June 26 suicide attack and posted them on his Web site, was subsequently forbidden to work in Marine Corps-controlled areas of the country. Maj. Gen. John Kelly, the Marine commander in Iraq, is now seeking to have Mr. Miller barred from all United States military facilities throughout the world. Mr. Miller has since left Iraq.
If the conflict in Vietnam was notable for open access given to journalists — too much, many critics said, as the war played out nightly in bloody newscasts — the Iraq war may mark an opposite extreme: after five years and more than 4,000 American combat deaths, searches and interviews turned up fewer than a half-dozen graphic photographs of dead American
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/26/world/mi...6censor.html?hp
QUOTE (bushwa @ Jul 9 2008, 09:27 AM)
Please do NOT mistake these observations as advocating for the censorship of images. I am telling you, when they are published, the result has typically been, "I DON'T WANT MY KIDS TO SEE THIS CRAP AT THE BREAKFAST TABLE!" It has NOT been, "Thank you for finally letting Americans see what they should have been seeing all along."
Personally, I could give a flying fignewton about them and their rotten screaming milkbreath brats.
I am really tired of adults trying to censor what other adults can and can't see just because they are too lazy to tell their offspring that the world quite often isn't a very nice place.
i know KO has mentioned this on his newscast a few times, but isn't there a, dare I say, movement amongst parents of the deceased that WANT THE MEDIA TO COVER THEIR CHILD'S FUNERAL? But, unfortunately, the BCF has more or less told them that they cannot do that...
talk about fascism....
ETA: ok, here's one story... no doubt its here on the board somewhere:
talk about fascism....
ETA: ok, here's one story... no doubt its here on the board somewhere:
QUOTE
http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/07/23/18519194.php
Former Arlington National Cemetery Public Affairs Director Says She Was Fired for Refusing to Limit Press at Funerals
via Democracy Now
Wednesday Jul 23rd, 2008 6:47 PM
Wednesday, July 23, 2008 :The secretary of the Army has ordered an internal review to examine the Army's firing last month of the former public affairs director of Arlington National Cemetery. Gina Gray assumed the role of public affairs director of Arlington in April. She quickly discovered that cemetery officials were attempting to impose new limits on media coverage of funerals of the US soldiers killed in Iraq -- even after the families of the dead soldiers had agreed to let the press attend. After she pushed for greater media access, she says she was fired in a retaliatory move.
Former Arlington National Cemetery Public Affairs Director Says She Was Fired for Refusing to Limit Press at Funerals
via Democracy Now
Wednesday Jul 23rd, 2008 6:47 PM
Wednesday, July 23, 2008 :The secretary of the Army has ordered an internal review to examine the Army's firing last month of the former public affairs director of Arlington National Cemetery. Gina Gray assumed the role of public affairs director of Arlington in April. She quickly discovered that cemetery officials were attempting to impose new limits on media coverage of funerals of the US soldiers killed in Iraq -- even after the families of the dead soldiers had agreed to let the press attend. After she pushed for greater media access, she says she was fired in a retaliatory move.
then we have this 'organization', the Patriot Guard:
QUOTE
http://blogs.knoxnews.com/knx/editor/2008/...ts_funera.shtml
Patriot Guard obstructs funeral coverage
Covering military funerals has always been a sensitive matter. The newspaper wants to respect the needs of the families while also giving the soldiers the recognition they deserve. There's a delicate balance to be struck. We don't want to intrude into the family's privacy, but we do want the public to feel the emotional impact of the loss.
For years we've worked closely with funeral directors and family representatives to establish ground rules, such as where photographers should stand. Usually there are no problems, and the powerful images that emerge are among the most moviing we publish. Here, for instance is the reaction of one reader to photographer Kohl Threlkeld's picture from the funeral of Cpl. Jason Hovater yesterday:
"The front page photo today is one of the finest I have ever seen published in the local paper. He perfectly captured the moment, and the composition and foreground soft focus are remarkable, not to mention the evident fortitude of the subject. This image most definitely should be widely disseminated ..."
In recent years, however, newspapers have had to deal with a new factor, a group called the Patriot Guard, which believes it has a mission to protect veterans' families during funerals. During the Hovater funeral, for instance, the Patriot Guard used flags to try to obstruct media camera angles. Threlkeld had to work around the obstructions to come up with a strong photo.
I believe the Patriot Guard is well-meaning, but I don't believe its members really understand how a community pays respect to its war dead in this era of mass media. A gripping A1 photo, in my opinion, brings home the sacrifice of the soldier and his family like nothing else can, and thousands more join in the mourning as a result.
Think, for a moment, how disrespectful it would be for the hometown newspaper to ignore the funeral of someone whose life was sacrificed on behalf of the entire community.
Patriot Guard obstructs funeral coverage
Covering military funerals has always been a sensitive matter. The newspaper wants to respect the needs of the families while also giving the soldiers the recognition they deserve. There's a delicate balance to be struck. We don't want to intrude into the family's privacy, but we do want the public to feel the emotional impact of the loss.
For years we've worked closely with funeral directors and family representatives to establish ground rules, such as where photographers should stand. Usually there are no problems, and the powerful images that emerge are among the most moviing we publish. Here, for instance is the reaction of one reader to photographer Kohl Threlkeld's picture from the funeral of Cpl. Jason Hovater yesterday:
"The front page photo today is one of the finest I have ever seen published in the local paper. He perfectly captured the moment, and the composition and foreground soft focus are remarkable, not to mention the evident fortitude of the subject. This image most definitely should be widely disseminated ..."
In recent years, however, newspapers have had to deal with a new factor, a group called the Patriot Guard, which believes it has a mission to protect veterans' families during funerals. During the Hovater funeral, for instance, the Patriot Guard used flags to try to obstruct media camera angles. Threlkeld had to work around the obstructions to come up with a strong photo.
I believe the Patriot Guard is well-meaning, but I don't believe its members really understand how a community pays respect to its war dead in this era of mass media. A gripping A1 photo, in my opinion, brings home the sacrifice of the soldier and his family like nothing else can, and thousands more join in the mourning as a result.
Think, for a moment, how disrespectful it would be for the hometown newspaper to ignore the funeral of someone whose life was sacrificed on behalf of the entire community.
QUOTE
Arlington Cemetery Whistleblower Canned For Exposing Limits on Media Access to Soldiers' Funerals
from HuffPo
Gina Gray, until recently the public affairs director at Arlington National Cemetery, was fired for exposing the fact that cemetery officials attempted to limit media coverage of funerals of soldiers killed in the Iraq war, often despite the fact that fallen soldiers' families granted permission for the coverage. After Gray told The Washington Post in an April interview that the new limitations were contrary to Army regulations, she was demoted and ultimately fired.
"Had I not put my foot down, had I just gone along with it and not said regulations were being violated, I'm sure I'd still be there," Gray told the Post recently. Gray blew the whistle after observing that the cemetery's deputy superintendent, Thurman Higginbotham, had moved the media area 50 yards away from funeral sites, obstructing photography and making the service inaudible. Through at least 2005, reporters were stationed so that they could hear the prayers and the eulogies and film the handing of the folded flag to the next of kin. Gray says that cemetery officials began calling the families of the dead to encourage them not to allow media coverage at the funerals.
from HuffPo
Gina Gray, until recently the public affairs director at Arlington National Cemetery, was fired for exposing the fact that cemetery officials attempted to limit media coverage of funerals of soldiers killed in the Iraq war, often despite the fact that fallen soldiers' families granted permission for the coverage. After Gray told The Washington Post in an April interview that the new limitations were contrary to Army regulations, she was demoted and ultimately fired.
"Had I not put my foot down, had I just gone along with it and not said regulations were being violated, I'm sure I'd still be there," Gray told the Post recently. Gray blew the whistle after observing that the cemetery's deputy superintendent, Thurman Higginbotham, had moved the media area 50 yards away from funeral sites, obstructing photography and making the service inaudible. Through at least 2005, reporters were stationed so that they could hear the prayers and the eulogies and film the handing of the folded flag to the next of kin. Gray says that cemetery officials began calling the families of the dead to encourage them not to allow media coverage at the funerals.
QUOTE (carmenjonze @ Jul 26 2008, 06:53 AM)
Personally, I could give a flying fignewton about them and their rotten screaming milkbreath brats.
I am really tired of adults trying to censor what other adults can and can't see just because they are too lazy to tell their offspring that the world quite often isn't a very nice place.
I am really tired of adults trying to censor what other adults can and can't see just because they are too lazy to tell their offspring that the world quite often isn't a very nice place.
Yet they give the children toy guns and violent video games for christmas.
QUOTE (rowdyroddypiper @ Jul 8 2008, 10:43 AM)
what about the partents and the soldiers rights. Maybe if the parents would give the ok i would not have such an issue with it.
They have no rights in this case. The soldier signed up to fight and die for his country. (When enlisting, you cannot really 'opt-out' of any experimental immunizations that they want to try out on you. Even the soldier's parents cannot object on their child's behalf.) He is a government employee, and his death should be recorded in the history books. Instead, only the total number of faceless soldiers will be written down when all of this is over.
2,000 or 4,000 or 10,000. Those are just numbers of supposed people who are no longer alive because of this war. It's just a series of numbers that have little meaning until you see each face, know each family's heartbreak, and see the financial burden that this has on all sides.
To quote Il Duce from The Boondock Saints, You must watch, dear. It'll all be over soon.
QUOTE (bushwa)
"I DON'T WANT MY KIDS TO SEE THIS CRAP AT THE BREAKFAST TABLE!"
"Mommy, what's an erection lasting more than three hours?"
"Eat your cornflakes, honey. Mommy needs to watch FOX."
Maybe you guys know about this, as it is a couple of years old, but what the hell. Here's an opinion article from USA Today that I didn't know existed.
http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2006/08/a_war_with_flag.html
A war with flags but no faces
If death in Iraq is allowed to become a nameless statistic, it loses its meaning. That’s why — whether one supports the war or not — we can’t sit idly while the names of fallen soldiers are buried, too.
By Jonathan Turley
Dan Frazier seems an unlikely sort to spark a national firestorm. The soft-spoken former journalist runs a left-leaning website in Flagstaff, Ariz., offering political T-shirts and other items with such slogans as "Be Nice to America or We'll Bring Democracy to Your Country." It was one T-shirt, however, that made Frazier the Thomas Paine of the ready-to-wear rebel set. Last year, Frazier produced a T-shirt that read "Bush Lied ... They Died." He then listed the names of the fallen in Iraq: at the time 1,700 names (more than 800 short of the latest total).
One of those names belonged to Marine Cpl. Scott Vincent, who was killed in April 2004 by a suicide bomber. When his mother, Judy Vincent, saw her son's name on the T-shirt, she was outraged and demanded legislative action in her state of Oklahoma. Various state legislators promptly made it a crime to use a soldier's name or likeness for commercial gain without consent. Louisiana followed suit, and other states are considering such bills. Now, U.S. Rep. Dan Boren, D-Okla., has introduced a federal bill that would prohibit the use of the name or image of any current or former member of the military without permission.
The federal and state legislation raises serious constitutional questions.
In direct conflict with the First Amendment, the federal law would effectively prevent war critics from personalizing the true costs of the war. It is far more powerful for Frazier to say "Bush Lied ... They Died" than the more common "Bush Lied ... People Died." It is precisely the type of personalization that war advocates have tried to prevent.
Draping the reality
When Ted Koppel announced that he would read the names and show the pictures of the (then 700) dead on Nightline in 2004, conservatives denounced him for undermining public support for the war, and Sinclair Broadcast Group refused to air the program. When the news media tried to photograph the returning caskets from Iraq, the administration barred them and later barred photographers from funerals without consent.
Politicians know that a war — particularly an unpopular war — is far easier to maintain in the abstract. It is often the personal images of war that change minds. One such mind was Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C., who had voted for the war in 2002. Jones recently told me how he began to question the war after he attended the funeral of Marine Sgt. Michael Bitz, a 31-year-old amphibian assault vehicle driver killed in Iraq in March 2003 while trying to evacuate the wounded.
Even years later, Jones fought back tears as he described sitting at the funeral with Bitz's wife, Janina, and their four sons (ages 7 and 2 as well as twin baby boys whom Bitz never met). As Jones gradually concluded that he had been misled on the evidence of weapons of mass destruction, the Bitz funeral continued to gnaw at him, and he began to question the real costs and purpose of this war — eventually going public with his opposition in June 2005.
When people such as Koppel or Jones or Frazier publish the names or likenesses of the fallen, they are trying to reveal the raw realities of this war as well as their sense of national grief over the loss of our best and our bravest citizens. After all, covering or overseeing or opposing this war is no abstract exercise. Too often, our national discourse becomes deadened to the real costs. It is too antiseptic, too clinical to have real meaning or relevance. Just as it is hard to imagine more than $300 billion spent on the war, it is hard to fully appreciate the meaning of nearly 2,600 dead and more than 19,000 wounded troops.
Frazier has learned something about the costs of personalizing war. He has received threatening calls and could be prosecuted. Yet, his message has resonated with many. Frazier told me that he has run out of the T-shirts but that he still sells magnetic vehicle signs with the design. Recently, a woman who lost a loved one in Iraq bought two dozen signs.
War as a weapon
When Congress starts to regulate the images that can be used to oppose the war, you know things are not going well on the home front. It wants to deny opponents of any face or name that would remind citizens of the true costs. Of course, members who support the war will continue to use men and women in Iraq as justifications for their re-election. Likewise, when President Bush turned an aircraft carrier and its personnel into a giant photo op to declare "Mission Accomplished" in 2003, there was not a whimper of opposition from these self-righteous members.
Whether it is caskets, funerals or even T-shirts, the politicians would prefer to keep the fallen out of sight and out of mind. If he doesn't want to go to jail, Dan Frazier will just have to speak for the fallen without mentioning any names; a war with all flags but no faces. Ironically, the administration might have succeeded on a practical, if not a political, level. There are now so many names, Frazier is not sure he can fit them on a T-shirt.
Jonathan Turley is a law professor at George Washington University and a member of USA TODAY's board of contributors.
---------------------------------
My own opinion on the matter was stated by one of the people who commented on the article:
I agree, and hope that no memorial or monument is erected to honor the 2,400 Americans killed in Iraq - after all, that would just provide an invitation for liberals to protest and dishonor their names.
Posted by: David Bender | Nov 5, 2006 7:28:07 PM
Sarcasm is wonderful.
Ghostwind
http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2006/08/a_war_with_flag.html
A war with flags but no faces
If death in Iraq is allowed to become a nameless statistic, it loses its meaning. That’s why — whether one supports the war or not — we can’t sit idly while the names of fallen soldiers are buried, too.
By Jonathan Turley
Dan Frazier seems an unlikely sort to spark a national firestorm. The soft-spoken former journalist runs a left-leaning website in Flagstaff, Ariz., offering political T-shirts and other items with such slogans as "Be Nice to America or We'll Bring Democracy to Your Country." It was one T-shirt, however, that made Frazier the Thomas Paine of the ready-to-wear rebel set. Last year, Frazier produced a T-shirt that read "Bush Lied ... They Died." He then listed the names of the fallen in Iraq: at the time 1,700 names (more than 800 short of the latest total).
One of those names belonged to Marine Cpl. Scott Vincent, who was killed in April 2004 by a suicide bomber. When his mother, Judy Vincent, saw her son's name on the T-shirt, she was outraged and demanded legislative action in her state of Oklahoma. Various state legislators promptly made it a crime to use a soldier's name or likeness for commercial gain without consent. Louisiana followed suit, and other states are considering such bills. Now, U.S. Rep. Dan Boren, D-Okla., has introduced a federal bill that would prohibit the use of the name or image of any current or former member of the military without permission.
The federal and state legislation raises serious constitutional questions.
In direct conflict with the First Amendment, the federal law would effectively prevent war critics from personalizing the true costs of the war. It is far more powerful for Frazier to say "Bush Lied ... They Died" than the more common "Bush Lied ... People Died." It is precisely the type of personalization that war advocates have tried to prevent.
Draping the reality
When Ted Koppel announced that he would read the names and show the pictures of the (then 700) dead on Nightline in 2004, conservatives denounced him for undermining public support for the war, and Sinclair Broadcast Group refused to air the program. When the news media tried to photograph the returning caskets from Iraq, the administration barred them and later barred photographers from funerals without consent.
Politicians know that a war — particularly an unpopular war — is far easier to maintain in the abstract. It is often the personal images of war that change minds. One such mind was Rep. Walter Jones, R-N.C., who had voted for the war in 2002. Jones recently told me how he began to question the war after he attended the funeral of Marine Sgt. Michael Bitz, a 31-year-old amphibian assault vehicle driver killed in Iraq in March 2003 while trying to evacuate the wounded.
Even years later, Jones fought back tears as he described sitting at the funeral with Bitz's wife, Janina, and their four sons (ages 7 and 2 as well as twin baby boys whom Bitz never met). As Jones gradually concluded that he had been misled on the evidence of weapons of mass destruction, the Bitz funeral continued to gnaw at him, and he began to question the real costs and purpose of this war — eventually going public with his opposition in June 2005.
When people such as Koppel or Jones or Frazier publish the names or likenesses of the fallen, they are trying to reveal the raw realities of this war as well as their sense of national grief over the loss of our best and our bravest citizens. After all, covering or overseeing or opposing this war is no abstract exercise. Too often, our national discourse becomes deadened to the real costs. It is too antiseptic, too clinical to have real meaning or relevance. Just as it is hard to imagine more than $300 billion spent on the war, it is hard to fully appreciate the meaning of nearly 2,600 dead and more than 19,000 wounded troops.
Frazier has learned something about the costs of personalizing war. He has received threatening calls and could be prosecuted. Yet, his message has resonated with many. Frazier told me that he has run out of the T-shirts but that he still sells magnetic vehicle signs with the design. Recently, a woman who lost a loved one in Iraq bought two dozen signs.
War as a weapon
When Congress starts to regulate the images that can be used to oppose the war, you know things are not going well on the home front. It wants to deny opponents of any face or name that would remind citizens of the true costs. Of course, members who support the war will continue to use men and women in Iraq as justifications for their re-election. Likewise, when President Bush turned an aircraft carrier and its personnel into a giant photo op to declare "Mission Accomplished" in 2003, there was not a whimper of opposition from these self-righteous members.
Whether it is caskets, funerals or even T-shirts, the politicians would prefer to keep the fallen out of sight and out of mind. If he doesn't want to go to jail, Dan Frazier will just have to speak for the fallen without mentioning any names; a war with all flags but no faces. Ironically, the administration might have succeeded on a practical, if not a political, level. There are now so many names, Frazier is not sure he can fit them on a T-shirt.
Jonathan Turley is a law professor at George Washington University and a member of USA TODAY's board of contributors.
---------------------------------
My own opinion on the matter was stated by one of the people who commented on the article:
I agree, and hope that no memorial or monument is erected to honor the 2,400 Americans killed in Iraq - after all, that would just provide an invitation for liberals to protest and dishonor their names.
Posted by: David Bender | Nov 5, 2006 7:28:07 PM
Sarcasm is wonderful.
Ghostwind
QUOTE (ThaiVet68 @ Jul 8 2008, 06:12 AM)
There is a series of stories running on National Public Radio this week on "Section 60 Mothers." They are women who meet at section 60 of Arlington National Cemetery at the graves of their sons killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Their common loss creates friendships unlike any they've ever had.
So...Bush Jr. IS a 'uniter' after all.
QUOTE (KaydensMommy @ Jul 26 2008, 09:12 AM)
Yet they give the children toy guns and violent video games for christmas.
Oh I know. And send them to church to fantasize about dead people nailed to trees.
F'n weird.
QUOTE (carmenjonze @ Jul 28 2008, 01:51 AM)
Oh I know. And send them to church to fantasize about dead people nailed to trees.
F'n weird.
F'n weird.
And even weirder, to drink human blood and eat human meat. wtf?
QUOTE (RoyPDX @ Jul 28 2008, 02:11 AM)
And even weirder, to drink human blood and eat human meat. wtf?
God-eating/theophagy is totally weird.
QUOTE (plodder @ Jul 8 2008, 04:32 AM)
It's a disturbing picture. The dead Marine is lying on his back, his face damaged beyond recognition because of the blast.
But for photojournalist and blogger Zoriah Miller, 32, it was important to capture the daily toll of war in Iraq. "I just feel this war has become so sanitized that it was important to show," said Zoriah, who prefers to go by his first name. "My only discomfort is the idea that the family could accidentally stumble on it." ...
The Marine commanders who saw the photograph were not happy, saying it violated a "trust" between the military and journalists. Zoriah was immediately "disembedded" from a Marine unit and barred from working with the military in Anbar.
http://www.venturacountystar.com/news/2008...ovince-for-war/
But for photojournalist and blogger Zoriah Miller, 32, it was important to capture the daily toll of war in Iraq. "I just feel this war has become so sanitized that it was important to show," said Zoriah, who prefers to go by his first name. "My only discomfort is the idea that the family could accidentally stumble on it." ...
The Marine commanders who saw the photograph were not happy, saying it violated a "trust" between the military and journalists. Zoriah was immediately "disembedded" from a Marine unit and barred from working with the military in Anbar.
http://www.venturacountystar.com/news/2008...ovince-for-war/
i just don't understand why a free press would not show pictures. even pictures like these so you remember you are in war.
and remember bush sr and iraq ~ we got 24/7 news coverage. a birds eye view of bombs being dropped etc.
QUOTE (captainkona @ Jul 8 2008, 01:58 PM)
Stopping this war is more important than what any soldier and their families think or feel.
Deal with it.
Deal with it.
Well said.
QUOTE (lucytalk @ Jul 28 2008, 03:16 AM)
i just don't understand why a free press would not show pictures. even pictures like these so you remember you are in war.
and remember bush sr and iraq ~ we got 24/7 news coverage. a birds eye view of bombs being dropped etc.
and remember bush sr and iraq ~ we got 24/7 news coverage. a birds eye view of bombs being dropped etc.
Simple answer,lucy! You're in Canada & have a free press & we don't!!
Bill Would End Ban on Photos of Returning Military Dead:
"The legislation is significant because it would, for the first time since Vietnam, let photojournalists capture the powerful images of flag-draped caskets arriving on American soil during wartime."
read it here -
http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/newswire/arti...t_id=1003839279
American Censors strike again.
Pastor Ag tried to purchase "War Surgery in Afghanistan and Iraq: A Series of Cases, 2003-2007 (Textbook of Military Medicine)" through its publisher, through Amazon, through Borders, and by ordering it through my fave local bookstore. All purchases seemed to be successful at first, and I planned to give out extra copies to interested friends.
This book is a large, photo-heavy, report on injuries, deaths, and types of surgeries necessary to save the lives of thousands of US soldiers injured in IraqNam and Afghanistan. It is also graphic, disgusting, painful, and a testament to just how badly served America has been by Team Bush.
Apparently, the US government has bought up every copy in an effort to keep it out of the hands of civilians like thee and me. Each effort to buy this book has resulted in:
Though we had expected to be able to send this item to you, we've since found that it is not available from any of our sources at this time. We realize this is disappointing news to hear, and we apologize for the inconvenience we have caused you.
(Source - Amazon.com. similar responses received from other sellers)
If anyone thinks this is but a mere coincidence, please contact me about this great bridge I am selling in NY, NY. My quite elderly, fave bookseller advised me she has never had such a response nor such difficulty in ordering any printed material. Reminds her of Lolita and the attacks by government to keep that work of art out of Americans' hands. I suspect that the same assholes who prevent publishing photos of American corpses are doing all the buying, and keeping the public free of graphic, painful facts. On the theory that it offends the privacy of the dead soldiers, allegedly.
Damn this country. Damn this administration. Damn George Bush.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/8/17/17240/5756/97/569417
Pastor Ag tried to purchase "War Surgery in Afghanistan and Iraq: A Series of Cases, 2003-2007 (Textbook of Military Medicine)" through its publisher, through Amazon, through Borders, and by ordering it through my fave local bookstore. All purchases seemed to be successful at first, and I planned to give out extra copies to interested friends.
This book is a large, photo-heavy, report on injuries, deaths, and types of surgeries necessary to save the lives of thousands of US soldiers injured in IraqNam and Afghanistan. It is also graphic, disgusting, painful, and a testament to just how badly served America has been by Team Bush.
Apparently, the US government has bought up every copy in an effort to keep it out of the hands of civilians like thee and me. Each effort to buy this book has resulted in:
Though we had expected to be able to send this item to you, we've since found that it is not available from any of our sources at this time. We realize this is disappointing news to hear, and we apologize for the inconvenience we have caused you.
(Source - Amazon.com. similar responses received from other sellers)
If anyone thinks this is but a mere coincidence, please contact me about this great bridge I am selling in NY, NY. My quite elderly, fave bookseller advised me she has never had such a response nor such difficulty in ordering any printed material. Reminds her of Lolita and the attacks by government to keep that work of art out of Americans' hands. I suspect that the same assholes who prevent publishing photos of American corpses are doing all the buying, and keeping the public free of graphic, painful facts. On the theory that it offends the privacy of the dead soldiers, allegedly.
Damn this country. Damn this administration. Damn George Bush.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/8/17/17240/5756/97/569417
Why is this illegal?
There will be no public demonstrations till the draft is reinstated.
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