655,000 People Dead In Iraq Who Cares?
[author:Jonathan Ledwidge Public time:Oct 25, 2006] |
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655,000 People Dead In Iraq Who Cares?
Many in the East routinely claim that the West is lacking in values. I always found this humorous given that all societies are capable of greatness and the banality in equal measure. Sadly, the past few weeks have led me to reconsider my position. Some of the worlds most renowned medical experts have told us that as much as 655,000 Iraqis have lost their lives since the 2003 invasion. Yet regrettably, the West has chosen to focus on Madonnas adoption of an African child, and whether or not Muslim women should wear the veil in public.
Let us put this in its true perspective. Ostensibly, America and Britain invaded Afghanistan and then Iraq because 3,000 people died on 9/11. It is perhaps beside the point that the majority of people in those two countries had nothing to do with 9/11. However, even if we do have some sympathy for the invasion of Afghanistan, seeing that is where Al Qaeda was based, Iraq is a different story altogether. Iraq had absolutely nothing to do with 9/11 and yet 655,000 of its people have died because of the Wests reaction to it.
We are also told that 200,000 people have died because of the war in Darfur. If we call that genocide, what does that make the situation in Iraq?
When several dozen people died in the London and Madrid bombings acres of newsprint was devoted to the tragedies and rightly so. I live in London I could have been a victim. So too could any member of my family, a friend, or a colleague.
The report of 655,000 dead in Iraq has come and gone as if it were a footnote.
For the life of me, I cannot understand why the adoption of a single child in Malawi by Madonna has absorbed so much media scrutiny, while the number of deaths in Iraq passes relatively unnoticed.
Frankly, I dont give a damn if Madonna broke the rules and used her money to accelerate the adoption. The rich will always be able to do that why get worked up about it? Whether you agree with me or not, what is certainly true is that it is not worth a fraction of the media coverage it has received.
The Madonna adoption story is a classic case of the power elites, the media, and the politicians diverting our attention away from reality. The governments in Washington and London must be exceedingly happy that the mass slaughter and mass deprivation brought about by their policies, has not been subject to a more critical assessment of their fitness to govern and the extent of the blood on their hands.
Before the war, the sanctions that the US and Britain maintained on Iraq, even when other members of the UN Security Council protested that they were unduly punitive and unnecessary, resulted in over a million dead most of them children. When asked about these sanctions on the CBS current affairs programme 60 Minutes, Madeleine Albright, the then US Secretary of State, stated that it was a price worth paying!
More than 1.6 million Iraqis have been killed either directly or indirectly by western action in the last decade and our collective response is nothing more than a capital Ho Hum!
As much as I hate and detest Al Qaeda, is it any wonder that they manage to foment so much hatred against the West? Is there any wonder that there are people living amongst us who are ready, willing, and able to blow up their fellow citizens?
There are a few simple truths that govern the relationship between all peoples if you care about my problem, I will care about yours. More fundamentally, if you care about my pain and my welfare, then I too will care about yours. And, even more critically, if you disregard my pain, do nothing to protect me, and cause me harm, then I will seek to inflict pain on you and cause you harm in return.
We might not like this, we might detest such attitudes, and we might even utter endless platitudes as to why violence and wanton recrimination never solved anything. Yet, these are the facts of life.
Not only have our political leaders completely disregarded and ignored the disastrous product of their handiwork, they have chosen to shoot the messengers. Both Blair and Bush have rejected the death toll of 655,000 without as much as offering a single shred of evidence to support their claim. Nor have they bothered to offer any statistics of their own.
The estimates were in fact compiled by scientists at John Hopkins University. They used an internationally recognised methodology; one that has been specifically approved by the US government. One this basis alone, the dismissive response by governments in Washington and London is worthy of contempt. Even if the true estimate is half that number, such a catastrophe demands far more reflection, contrition, and soul searching than it has received.
Not contenting themselves with adding gross insult to grotesque injury, politicians in the UK in particular decided that with such bad news on the Iraqi war dead, it was an opportune time to further obscure matters so they cleverly deployed the veil.
Now, I would be the first to admit that wearing a veil and exposing nothing more than your eyes in public is somewhat extreme. Yet, we live in a democracy. This supposedly means that people have a right to wear what they want, whenever they want to.
It is also true that those who choose to express their freedom in an extreme form should also realise that if their dress code does not conform to the requirements of a particular job or profession, then that freedom obviously comes at a price that is personal to them. This very point was made very clear to one veiled young woman last week.
What is more, it requires neither ministerial edict nor government legislation. In fact, this has nothing to do with religion they are the norms that govern society. They hold true for the veiled Muslim woman who wants to enter the classroom, much in the same way they hold true for those who dress far too provocatively and suggestively for the office.
If we really think about it, much of the argument about the veil is superfluous in the grand scheme of things.
First, I find it uniquely bizarre that those who see the veil as a subjugation of womanhood in male dominated Muslim countries and for sure, that is too often the case have taken it upon themselves to suggest that Muslim women should not be at liberty to wear the said veil, even if it is their personal choice.
Second, when we consider the primary source of protest, the British government, the rationale for some of these arguments appear even more ludicrous.
The British government has touted its very own unique brand of multiculturalism a separate development of the faiths. It has been encouraging religious apartheid by overseeing a significant expansion in religious schools.
To top it all, governments in both London and Washington were warned, by their very own intelligence services, that invading Iraq would greatly offend Muslim sensibilities and add to Muslim alienation, agitation, and extremism in our societies.
Thus, for the UK government to blame anyone but themselves and their US allies and for promoting separation between the religions is an act of astounding hypocrisy. It is tantamount to Judas blaming Christ for having offered himself for betrayal.
Ingenious it may be, but righteous it is not.
Of course, the sections of the mass media that take great delight in pandering to the least tolerant and most primal of our instincts have been in their element through all of this. Notwithstanding this sad if not wholly unexpected fact, I still marvel at the gullibility of the masses.
You may have guessed by now that I am of the firm opinion that much of the debate on the veil lacks merit.
So why is it happening now?
Allow me to offer my own considered interpretation of events.
The British Labour Party has now reconciled itself to the fact that they are stuck with Tony Blair as a leader until at least the middle of 2007. As such, there is no longer any mileage in Blair bashing irrespective of how many Iraqis are paying for his deception and duplicity with their lives. Instead, the Labour Party is focused on two things. The first is how to rehabilitate itself in the eyes of the electorate. The second is more personal to people like Jack Straw, Ruth Kelly, and John Reid, who are all positioning themselves for key positions when Blair does eventually depart the scene.
This is what the current kerfuffle is all about political posturing for the masses.
If and when the controversy over Iraq dies down, they will simply switch to something else that is why they are already making noises about Romanian and Bulgarian immigrants.
Iraq? Who cares?
655,000 dead, who cares?
I will tell you who cares the terrorists do. The terrorists who seek to inflict as much destruction as possible in order to further their own agenda.
While they are now as guilty and as responsible as the governments in Washington for the murder and mayhem in Iraq, Al Qaeda will take great delight in pointing out to their more moderate brethren, that the West is more concerned with a few inches of cloth than the lives of innocent Iraqis.
Donald Rumsfeld once claimed that the terrorists were winning because they had better PR. The terrorists would respond by saying that every PR victory they had was handed to them on a golden platter.
This is precisely what our callous disregard for Iraqi lives is doing.
We should be ashamed twice over. In the first instance because of our failure to express our outrage and make our governments more accountable for their actions, and in the second because we have allowed ourselves to be suckered into inanity.
Jonathan Ledwidge is the author of the book A Mannequin for President.
Otherinfo:jonathanledwidge@hotmail.com
+44 (0) 7795 035 229
Website:http://www.jonled.com
Printed From:http://www.free-press-release.com/news/200610/1161790833.html
Source:Free Press Release
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655,000 People Dead In Iraq Who Cares? [Oct 25, 2006]
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