Alexandria Bergeron
Jeannina Perez
WST 3015
"Liar, Liar... Pants on Fire"
The Baghdad Burning (September 24,2004) blog entitled "Liar, Liar",took on the daunting task of taking on the "myth" of security and enrichment. The idea that with the American's presence in Iraq, life was getting better; that "we" were helping improve the world that the Iraqi people lived in. Her rant focuses on the lies about electricity and the misconception that there is a clearly defined example of security in this war torn world.
Of course what we don't see, in the news broadcast on CNN, or hear in the speeches given by political officials, is the world that Riverbend paints for us in her blog. A country of the limitedly oppressed, people who have lives and families, and who have a innocence and desire to become something without assimilating to this western culture. The anger that Riverbend expresses towards Bush during his speeches was understandable. From what she saw in the world around her, he was making bold and untrue statements, claiming that more electricity was available and that war efforts to improve daily life and to create a sense of security, were successful. Life was not improving, Families slept on roof tops just to make the heat bearable at night, since half of the day if not more was spent with out electricity. And with this decrease in service came the rise in the bill by over 100%.
Riverbend also makes clear her feelings towards the supposed new sense of security. This idea being, that security is the state a which time human beings should feel protected from harm that by all accounts is avoidable (Kirk pg. 510). The newly appointed political officials rarely could be found in Iraq, and most days were filled with bombings, kidnappings, and death. Her sense of security had vanished, but stories of a perfect new country were being painted in news broadcast to American's.
It is no wonder that her anger is boiling over into these ranting blogs. All the happy fairy tales stories that are being past along overseas sounded great, and that world seemed a lot more obtainable prior to the war, but the world's "police man" (Takazato pg. 523) ,the United States, had to step in. Suzuyo Takazato mirrored this thought in her article "Report from Okinawa". Like Riverbend, Takazato recognized that many of the "truths" American's were told in times of war, were far from the whole truth. For Takazato, it was the innocent people who were murdered, and raped in Okinawa (Takazato pg. 523), that American's never heard about, which was much like Rivebends feelings of anger for the lack of information about the Iraqi's that were being killed by American air strikes. In the end her true anger in this blog, is the lack of knowledge being shared with the public back home, and do to this fact, Bush, the man she hates more then anything, was up for (and eventually won) re-election.
I agree with you completely. Myths like these are dangerous and irresponsible. Americans start thinking that everything going on over in Iraq is working and serving a purpose that it really isn't. With these myths, people are able to stop thinking, and questioning, what is really going on in this war.
ReplyDeleteI always found it sad that people will believe everything they see and hear on the television or news. I had a friend from Pakistan who was always telling me he didn't understand why the media portrayed his country in certain ways; except he said it was better than what we were being shown. Whether or not the media is making these look better or worse people still cannot understand what is actually happening.
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