Keywords

Hazing

Gender, Politics

At the end of my last post on the photos from Abu Ghraib, I quoted President Bush as saying:

That’s not the way we do things in America.”

And asserted that this was not true, linking to an article about rape in the Air Force Academy.

Well, I think the following makes my point even better:

On the April 30 broadcast of FOX News Channel’s Hannity & Colmes, former U.S. Army sergeant and former interrogation instructor Tony Robinson stated that frat hazing is worse” than what [was] happening in these pictures”

Indeed. I think the point of the above post is to imply that this is an inaccurate depiction of obvious torture; but, suppose he is right? This says something serious about the culture of masculinity in to which many of our nation’s students are indoctrinated.

In this vein it is also worth talking about the Skull and Bones Society at Yale. Both Bush and Kerry were members. We all know what the secret is in secret society,” don’t we?

UPDATE: The New York Times has a story on the Media Matters website.

UPDATE: PinkDreamPoppies has a look at how gender has played into the Abu Ghraib story.

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