A part of us we have to watch
While I was still living in Ireland in 2008 I took part in
an Amnesty Ireland stunt aimed at getting people in O’Connell Street to sign a petition against
Guantanamo Bay. Overall the reception was very positive and nearly everyone we
approached agreed willingly to sign. I recall, though, that one man, strutting
by with his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket, stopped in front of the
petition and said “What’s this?” – as if, somehow, we didn’t have any right to
be there. When I explained to him what it was and, tongue in cheek, invited him
to sign, he refused. Then, as an afterthought, he exclaimed: “You do-gooders –
ye make me sick!” and strutted off.
I had to remember that I was representing Amnesty and that
it was not my role to exchange insults with this oaf. However, while I still
don’t have any sympathy with his attitude, even at this distance in time, I am
not naive enough to think that it is unusual – or even that it is not shared by
others who are, to all intents and purposes, decent men and women.
Actually, I suspect that most of them are men. I recall that
once, on Ireland’s stalwart chat show, The
Late Late Show, an interview was held with a woman who was the victim of an
abduction and a savage attack that necessitated facial surgery. At one point
she remarked that, whereas her female friends were full of solicitous questions
about how she was feeling and how she was coping, the almost universal reaction
of her male friends was “Oh, if I could only get my hands on that ****er!”.
That would probably have been my reaction too.
I recall
similar feelings the Dunblane massacre, (in 1996, when unemployed shopkeeper
Thomas Hamilton murdered 16 schoolchildren and one teacher before killing
himself). The next day an office colleague echoed my own thoughts when he remarked
that the worst aspect was the fact that the perpetrator had killed himself,
thus forestalling any punishment (by which he – and I – meant retaliation or
revenge). In fact, I heard afterwards that even an ambulance worker at the
scene said that he had great difficulty in resisting the urge to do violence to
Hamilton’s corpse.
These vengeful emotions remind me of a quip in the
1980s detective series, Micky Spillane’s Mike Hammer, in which Stacy Keach
played a highly sexed, macho private eye. On one of the (rare) occasions when
he refused an invitation from a pretty
woman to stay the night, he remarked in the voice-over “Part of me wanted to
stay but that part of me had got me into trouble before”. Similarly, the part
of me that responds to violent tragedy by wanting to see people suffer can get
me into trouble too.
A lot of the support for Guantanamo – or the reluctance to
condemn it – springs from justifiable anger at the atrocities of 9/11. That
anger leads to a desire to see people suffer in retaliation. Some people feel they would not be showing due respect to the
victims of the atrocities if they were to stop to think about some fundamental questions,
such as: whether or not it is only the right people are suffering in Guantanamo; whether indiscriminate
round-up and torture of suspects is the best way to find the real perpetrators;
whether this approach will prevent a repetition of the incident; or even whether
it will bring real solace and succour to the families of the victims. The answer in all cases
is an emphatic “no”.
None of this is intended to imply any compassion on my part
for the real perpetrators. While I have grave reservations about the summary
execution of Osama Bin Laden, I have no sympathy for him. Nor do I mourn the
passing of Saddam Hussein or Muammar Gaddafi, but that does not detract from
the fact that huge questions still surround the manner of their killing (yes I
know Hussein was tried and, even if the procedure was unsatisfactory, any
credible trial would have found him guilty – what I question is the Americans’
role in the whole affair and their failure to account for their previous and long-standing role
as his friend and ally).
So, by all means get angry when you learn of acts of injustice
and violence and by all means wish the perpetrators harm but please pause to put these
emotions into a wider context.
I’m saying that primarily to myself.
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