The Raven

Friday, September 20, 2002

Not If, But When

In a very sharp piece for the LA Times, Will Arkin lays out the case for war with Iraq as being "inevitable". During the Iran-Iraq war, the U.S. supplied intelligence and weaponry to the Iraqis in order to keep Iran from gaining the upper hand. This program went under several names, including "Elephant Grass," "Druid Leader" and "Surf Fisher." The man in charge? Donald H. Rumsfeld.

What It's Going to Cost

Back to Donald again, he says that this won't be an air war in remarks before the House Armed Services Committee yesterday:

"Anyone who thinks it's easy or clean or antiseptic is wrong. It is a terribly difficult, dangerous business."

Unlike Desert Storm, though, this war doesn't have much of a feel-good factor. It is unlikely that there will be songs of the "Kick Ass USA" variety. The solemn mood one senses is far more appropriate as war should never be a cause for celebration. I overheard an analyst this morning on TV speaking about the possibility of the conflict starting in early December, just after Ramadan, and being over "before Christmas." Talk about deja vu.

The case for a quick war with low casualties is made primarily with an eye to Hussein's unpopularity. Even his notorious personal guard is expected to capitulate at the first sign of an invasion: nobody wants to die defending the Glorious Leader. It's a classic illustration of the aphorism that "he who rides the tiger fears to dismount." And the Iraqis weren't very tough the first time around, remember. They invented the military tactic of curling up into the fetal position and praying.

2:30:08 PM

No Safe Haven

In the metro Atlanta area, there are several Georgia State-owned and operated children's shelters that are designed for short-term emergency stays. Perhaps a runaway can not be returned home for some reason, and foster placement is going to take time. In such a case, the child might be taken to one of the shelters in Fulton and DeKalb counties.

According to a lawsuit filed by the New York-based Children's Rights organization, the problem is that these homes are also used to house severely disturbed youths who should be in juvenile detention or psychiatric care facilities. Enter the young runaway. Begin horror story.

The group cited children running away by the dozens, being raped near the shelters and being beaten by gang members inside the shelters and staff members being asleep on the job.

The shelters are located in extremely dangerous parts of the city. So our young runaway has a number of options, all bad. Stay in the shelter? The report cites "a particular style of beating: A gang throws a blanket over a victim before beating the child up." The same thing awaits the child who makes a desparate run for freedom outside. These children need help, and quickly.

The Art of Terrorism

British artist Damien Hirst apologized yesterday for some careless remarks he made about the September 11 terrorists. Namely, he said they deserved "congratulating." This didn't go over very well.

In a video essay for BBC News Online last week, Hirst said the attack on the Trade Center was "visually stunning" and "kind of like an artwork in its own right."

Before getting all upset about this, though, perhaps it's worth reflecting on what he meant by that. Art, after all, is about making a statement and some kinds of art—political art in particular—requires a strong expression to generate the required impact on the viewer. By this token, terrorism does seem in some cases to have artistic elements in its execution. That doesn't make killing or injuring people "art," of course, but the mind of the political artist and the terrorist may at times cover similar ground with overlapping objectives. It's the parts that don't overlap that got Hirst in trouble, especially his crack about how "you've got to hand it to them on some level," which shows the sort of poor taste that informs many of his artistic creations, like that cow he cut in half and suspended in formaldehyde.

Another artist, this one an American, approached the subject a little differently but seems to have crossed a line that should have been respected. Eric Fischl designed and installed a statue titled "Tumbling Woman" that seeks to memorialize those who jumped to their deaths from the burning World Trade Center.

Shown at right, the piece "was abruptly draped in cloth and surrounded by a curtain wall on Wednesday." This is much more difficult to evaluate. Do we need to remember the victims best as they were in life, and are their deaths somehow exploited by the artist who chooses to focus on the moment and manner of their destruction? The Raven thinks so. The sum value of a human life is more than its final microsecond. By focusing on that instant, Fischl allows the September 11 killers to define the meaning of their victims' lives as being nothing but a prelude to their murder. The passers-by who complained about the statue and are resposible for its removal are in the right here.

"I don't think that it's done in bad taste," Christine Defonces said before the statue was covered. "It's an artist's reaction to what happened."

That's a valid point, but at the same time we don't desecrate the tomb-like nature of the Titanic and Andrea Doria shipwrecks, either. The concensus here is that the wrecks should be left as undisturbed as possible in respect to the dead who perished aboard them. The same thinking creates a moral wall about the September 11 victims that precludes attempts to exploit their deaths for value—whether commerical, political, or artistic.
11:27:49 AM