[Peace-discuss] Re: Peace-discuss Digest, Vol 38, Issue 17

[David Key]

Hi all,

Don't know if my last email went through so, I will send this again:

I AM SETTING UP A CARPOOL TO GO TO DC NEXT WEEKEND! I AM DRIVING AND
HAVE 3-4 SEATS AVAILABLE! I HOPE I GET SOME VOLUNTEERS!

My cell is 217-417-4688

Peace,

Dave


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>Today's Topics:
>
>    1. RE: Anybody going to Washington D.C? (Conrad Wetzel)
>    2. Re: The Politics of Naming: Genocide, Civil War,	Insurgency
>       (Robert Naiman )
>
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>Message: 1
>Date: Wed, 07 Mar 2007 15:19:49 +0000
>From: "Conrad Wetzel" <clwetzel at hotmail.com>
>Subject: RE: [Peace-discuss] Anybody going to Washington D.C?
>To: codybralts at gmail.com, Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
>Message-ID: <BAY144-F39970D81A3F811EC9D09E4D57A0 at phx.gbl>
>Content-Type: text/plain; format=flowed
>
>Hey, Cody and all,
>
>I would like to go to the protest in Washington next Saturday, but I have a 
>committment that I must keep. I would, however, like to help sponsor the 
>bus trip for some other over-18 person from AWARE who would like to go.
>
>Please contact me if interested.
>Conrad Wetzel
>clwetzel at hotmail.com
>217-352-8603
>__________________________________________________________
>On Tuesday, March 6, Cody wrote:
>
>From: "Cody Bralts-Steindl" <codybralts at gmail.com>
>To: Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net
>Subject: [Peace-discuss] Anybody going to Washington D.C?
>Date: Tue, 6 Mar 2007 22:41:12 -0600
>
>Hey all,
>
>I was wondering if any AWARE people will be going to the protest in 
>Washington next Saturday.
>
>The reason being that I cannot go unless someone over the age of 18 from 
>aware goes with me. Even though Shara E, and Jenny G will be going also. 
>I'm only 14 however.
>
>Just wondering!
>
>In solidarity,
>
>Cody Bralts
>
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>------------------------------
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>Message: 2
>Date: Wed, 7 Mar 2007 09:45:46 -0600
>From: "Robert Naiman " <naiman.uiuc at gmail.com>
>Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] The Politics of Naming: Genocide, Civil
>	War,	Insurgency
>To: "David Green" <davegreen84 at yahoo.com>
>Cc: Peace Discuss <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>
>Message-ID:
>	<bd75d63d0703070745u174b2529h9ff3ecba6789fe21 at mail.gmail.com>
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>
>I find this discussion a bit disturbingly glib.
>
>There is some contradiction, I think, between being outraged by the
>slowness of the University in getting rid of the Chief mascot and
>dismissing the campaign of Armenians for recognition of the Armenian
>genocide as "driven by cynical motives." The adversary plays the game
>of worthy and unworthy victims. We should not.
>
>I think that one can take the point to be wary of thought-stopping
>uses of the term "genocide" to soften up people for illegal and
>destructive military interventions without being dismissive of
>attempts of victimized groups to establish recognition for their
>victimization.
>
>If French politicians, say, raise concerns about human rights abuses
>in Turkey, and if part of their motivation for doing so is that they
>don't want Turkey to join the EU for other reasons, that is no
>evidence for the claim that concerns about human rights in Turkey are
>illegitimate. On the contrary: if I'm sitting in a Turkish prison, I'm
>delighted that French politicians are talking about me, regardless of
>their motivations for doing so.
>
>On 3/7/07, David Green <davegreen84 at yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>>Regarding the Armenian Genocide, it's important to note that it has not 
>>been
>>officially recognized as such due to the alliance between Turkey, the 
>>U.S.,
>>and Israel, at least at the federal level--many states have passed
>>resolution. Israel has specifically lobbied against recognition, perhaps
>>also because it would place the Armenian genocide in "competition" with 
>>the
>>Holocaust, but mostly for immediate political reasons. It sounds like now
>>there's more pressure to recognize it, but apparently for the wrong
>>reasons--political ones. So both the denial of the Armenian genocide and 
>>its
>>recognition are apparently driven by cynical motives.
>>
>>DG
>>
>>"C. G. Estabrook" <galliher at uiuc.edu> wrote:
>>
>>David Green wrote
>>
>>
>>>Mahmood Mamdani, author of the excellent Good
>>>Muslim, Bad Muslim
>>>http://www.lrb.co.uk/v29/n05/mamd01_.html
>>>[...]
>>>It seems that genocide has become a label to be
>>>stuck on your worst enemy, a perverse version of the
>>>Nobel Prize, part of a rhetorical arsenal that helps
>>>you vilify your adversaries while ensuring impunity
>>>for your allies ... Darfur can be neatly
>>>integrated into the War on Terror, for Darfur gives
>>>the Warriors on Terror a valuable asset with which
>>>to demonise an enemy: a genocide perpetrated by
>>>Arabs. This was the ... most valuable
>>>advantage that Save Darfur gained from
>>>depoliticising the conflict. The more thoroughly
>>>Darfur was integrated into the War on Terror, the
>>>more the depoliticised violence in Darfur acquired a
>>>racial description, as a genocide of 'Arabs'
>>>killing 'Africans'. Racial difference
>>>purportedly constituted the motive force behind the
>>>mass killings...
>>>
>>[From the British blog "Spiked," a discussion of the uses of genocide:
>>"...the French decision at the end of last year to make it a crime in 
>>France
>>to deny the Armenian genocide [is followed by a proposal to *make it a
>>crime* in the EU] to question whether Rwanda, Srebrenica and Darfur are
>>genocides, too." --CGE]
>>
>>Thursday 1 March 2007
>>Pimp My Genocide
>>The prostitution of the G-word for cynical political ends
>>has given rise to a grisly new international gameshow.
>>Brendan O'Neill
>>
>>Genocide, it seems, is everywhere. You cannot open a newspaper or switch 
>>on
>>the box these days without coming across the G-word.
>>
>>Accusations of genocide fly back and forth in international relations. 
>>This
>>week the International Court of Justice (ICJ) at The Hague cleared Serbia 
>>of
>>direct responsibility for genocide in the Bosnian civil war in the
>>mid-Nineties, though it chastised Belgrade for failing to prevent the
>>massacre of Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenica in 1995. The International
>>Criminal Court, also in The Hague, indicted two Sudanese officials for
>>'crimes against humanity' in relation to the conflict in Darfur.
>>
>>Last week, a United Nations official said the spread of the Darfurian
>>conflict into eastern Chad means that 'Chad faces genocide', too. 'We are
>>seeing elements that closely resemble what we saw in Rwanda in the 
>>genocide
>>in 1994', said the head of the UN refugee agency (1). Meanwhile, to the
>>concern and fury of Turkish officials, the US Congress is set to debate a
>>resolution that will recognise Turkey's killings of a million Armenians 
>>from
>>1915 to 1918 as an 'organised genocide' (2). This follows the French
>>decision at the end of last year to make it a crime in France to deny the
>>Armenian genocide.
>>
>>On the domestic front, too, genocide-talk is widespread. Germany, current
>>holder of the European Union's rotating presidency, is proposing a
>>Europe-wide ban on Holocaust denial and all other forms of genocide 
>>denial.
>>This would make a crime of 'publicly condoning, denying or grossly
>>trivialisingÂ…crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes 
>>[as
>>defined in the Statute of the International Criminal Court].' (3) In some
>>European countries it is already against the law to deny that the Nazis
>>sought to exterminate the Jews. Under the proposed new legislation it 
>>would
>>also be against the law to question whether Rwanda, Srebrenica and Darfur
>>are genocides, too.
>>
>>Why is genocide all the rage, whether it's uncovering new ones in Africa 
>>and
>>Eastern Europe, or rapping the knuckles of those who would dare to deny 
>>such
>>genocides here at home?
>>
>>Contrary to the shrill proclamations of international courts and Western
>>officials and journalists, new genocides are not occurring across the 
>>world.
>>Rather, today's genocide-mongering in international affairs – and its
>>flipside: the hunt for genocide-deniers at home – shows that accusations 
>>of
>>genocide have become a cynical political tool. Genocide-mongering is a new
>>mode of politics, and it's being used by some to draw a dividing line
>>between the West and the Third World and to enforce a new and censorious
>>moral consensus on the homefront. Anyone who cares about democracy and 
>>free
>>speech should deny the claims of the genocide-mongers.
>>
>>In international relations genocide has become a political weapon, an
>>all-purpose rallying cry used by various actors to gain moral authority 
>>and
>>boost their own standing. Anyone with a cursory understanding of history
>>should know that the bloody wars of the past 10 to 15 years – in Bosnia,
>>Rwanda, Kosovo, Darfur – are not unprecedented or exceptional. Certainly
>>none of them can be compared to the Nazi genocide against the Jews, which
>>involved the industrialised slaughter, often in factories built for the
>>purpose, of six million men, women and children. Rather, the labelling of
>>today's brutal civil wars as 'genocides' by Western observers, courts and
>>commentators is a desperate search for a new moral crusade, and it has 
>>given
>>rise to a new moral divide between the West and the rest, between the
>>civilised and enlightened governments of America and Europe and those dark
>>parts of the world where genocides occur.
>>
>>In some circles, 'genocide' has become code for Third World savagery. What
>>do the headline genocides (or 'celebrity genocides', perhaps) of the past
>>two weeks have in common? All of them – the Serbs' genocide in Bosnia, 
>>the
>>Sudanese genocide in Darfur, the Turks' genocide of Armenians – were
>>committed by apparently strange and exotic nations 'over there'. Strip 
>>away
>>the legal-speak about which conflicts can be defined as genocides and 
>>which
>>cannot, and it seems clear that genocide has become a PC codeword for wog
>>violence – whether the genocidal wogs are the blacks of Sudan, the
>>brown-skinned, not-quite-European people of Turkey, or the Serbs, white
>>niggers of the post-Cold War world.
>>
>>Consider how easily the genocide tag is attached to conflicts in Africa.
>>Virtually every recent major African war has been labelled a genocide by
>>outside observers. The Rwandan war of 1994 is now widely recognised as a
>>genocide; many refer to the ongoing violence in Uganda as a genocide. In
>>2004 then US secretary of state Colin Powell declared, on the basis of a
>>report by an American/British fact-finding expedition to Darfur: 'We
>>conclude that genocide has been committed in Darfur and that the 
>>government
>>of Sudan and the Janjaweed bear responsibility.' (4) (The UN, however, has
>>not described Darfur as genocide.) Even smaller-scale African wars are
>>discussed as potential genocides. So the spread of instability from Darfur
>>into eastern Chad has led to UN handwringing about 'genocide in Chad'.
>>During the conflict in Liberia in 2003, commentators warned that 'Liberia
>>could be plunged into a Rwanda-style genocide' (5).
>>
>>The discussion of every war in Africa as a genocide or potential genocide
>>shows that today's genocide-mongering bears little relation to what is
>>happening in conflict zones on the ground. There are great differences, 
>>not
>>least in scale, between the wars in Rwanda, Darfur and Liberia; each of
>>these conflicts has been driven by complex local grievances, very often
>>exacerbated by Western intervention. That Western declarations of
>>'genocide!' are most often made in relation to Africa suggests that behind
>>today's genocide-mongering there lurks some nasty chauvinistic sentiments.
>>At a time when it is unfashionable to talk about 'the dark continent' or
>>'savage Africans', the more acceptable 'genocide' tag gives the impression
>>that Africa is peculiarly and sickly violent, and that it needs to be 
>>saved
>>from itself by more enlightened forces from elsewhere. Importantly, if the
>>UN judges that a genocide is occurring, then that can be used to justify
>>military intervention into said genocide zone.
>>
>>Hardly anyone talks openly about a global divide between the savage Third
>>World and the enlightened West anymore. Yet today's genocide-mongering has
>>nurtured a new, apparently acceptable divide between the 
>>genocide-executers
>>over there, and the genocide-saviours at home. This new global faultline
>>over genocide is formalised in the international court system. In the
>>Nineties, setting up tribunals to try war criminals or genocidaires became
>>an important part of the West's attempts to rehabilitate its moral 
>>authority
>>around the globe. In 1993, the UN Security Council set up an international
>>tribunal to try those accused of war crimes in the Former Yugoslavia. In
>>1997 the international war crimes tribunal for Rwanda got under way; there
>>is also one for Sierra Leone. As Kirsten Sellars argues in The Rise and 
>>Rise
>>of Human Rights, for all the claims of 'international justice', these
>>tribunals are in reality 'political weapons' wielded by the West – 
>>attempts
>>to imbue the post-Cold War West with a sense of moral purpose by 
>>contrasting
>>it favourably with the barbarians in Eastern Europe and Africa (6).
>>
>>The opportunistic transformation of 'genocide' into a weapon on the
>>international stage can be seen most clearly in recent debates about 
>>Turkey.
>>The Turkish state's genocide against the Armenians in the First World War 
>>is
>>surely debated more today than at any other time in history. That is 
>>because
>>the Armenian genocide has been latched on to by certain governments that
>>want to lecture and harangue the current Turkish regime.
>>
>>Last year France passed its bizarre law outlawing denial of the Armenian
>>genocide. This was a deeply cynical move motivated by EU protectionism on
>>the part of the French. France is keen to keep Turkey at arm's length from
>>joining the EU, viewing the American ally in the East as a threat to its
>>authoritative position within Europe. And what better way to cast doubts 
>>on
>>Turkey's fitness to join the apparently modern EU than to turn its refusal
>>to accept that the massacre of Armenians 90 years ago was a genocide into 
>>a
>>big political issue? At the same time, Democrat members of US Congress are
>>attempting to dent the Bush administration's prestige and standing in the
>>Middle East by lending their support to a resolution that will label the
>>Turkish killings of Armenians a genocide. This has forced Bush to defend 
>>the
>>'deniers' of Turkey, and given rise to the bizarre spectacle of a 
>>six-person
>>Turkish parliamentary delegation arriving in Washington to try to convince
>>members of Congress that the Armenian massacres were not a genocide (7).
>>Again, movers and shakers play politics with genocide, using the G-word to
>>try to hit their opponents where it hurts.
>>
>>At a time when the West making claims to global moral authority on the 
>>basis
>>of enlightenment or democracy has become distinctly unfashionable, the new
>>fashion for genocide-mongering seems to have turned 'genocide' into the 
>>one
>>remaining moral absolute, which has allowed today's pretty visionless West
>>to assert at least some authority over the Third World.
>>
>>This reorientation of global affairs around the G-word has had a real and
>>disastrous impact on peace and politics. When 'genocide' becomes the
>>language of international relations, effectively a bargaining chip between
>>states, then it can lead to a grisly competition over who is the biggest
>>victim of genocide and who thus most deserves the pity and patronage of 
>>the
>>international community. The state of Bosnia brought the charges of 
>>genocide
>>against the state of Serbia at the ICJ, and is bitterly disappointed that
>>Serbia was cleared. Here it appears that Bosnia, every Western liberals'
>>favourite victim state, feels the need to continue playing the genocide
>>card, to prostrate itself before international courts, in order to store 
>>up
>>its legitimacy and win the continued backing of America and the EU. One
>>American commentator has written about 'strategic victimhood in Sudan',
>>where Darfurian rebel groups exploit the 'victims of genocide' status
>>awarded to them by Western observers in order to get a better deal: 'The
>>rebels, much weaker than the government, would logically have sued for 
>>peace
>>long ago. Because of the [Western] Save Darfur movement, however, the 
>>rebels
>>believe that the longer they provoke genocidal reaction, the more the West
>>will pressure Sudan to hand them control of the region.' (8)
>>
>>The logic of today's politics of genocide is that it suits certain states
>>and groups to play up to being victims of genocide. That is one sure way 
>>to
>>guarantee the sympathy and possibly even the backing of the West. This has
>>nurtured a grotesque new international gameshow – what we might call 
>>'Pimp
>>My Genocide' – where groups strategically play the genocide card in order 
>>to
>>attract the attentions of the genocide-obsessed international community. 
>>The
>>new genocide-mongering means that certain states are demonised as 'evil'
>>(Sudan, Serbia) while others must constantly play the pathetic victim
>>(Bosnia, Darfurian groups). This is unlikely to nurture anything like 
>>peace,
>>or a progressive, grown-up international politics.
>>
>>Rather than challenge the new politics of genocide, the critics of Western
>>military intervention play precisely the same game – sometimes in even 
>>more
>>shrill tones than their opponents. Anti-war activists claim that 'the real
>>genocide' – a 'Nazi-style genocide' – is being committed by American and
>>British forces in Iraq. Others counter the official presentation of the
>>Bosnian civil war as a Serb genocide against Muslims by arguing that the
>>Bosnian Serbs, especially those forcibly expelled from Krajina, were the
>>real 'victims of genocide' (9). Critics of Israel accuse it of carrying 
>>out
>>a genocide against Palestinians (while supporters of Israel describe 
>>Hamas's
>>and Hezbollah's occasional dustbin-lid bombs as 'genocidal violence') 
>>(10).
>>This does nothing to challenge the hysteria of today's genocide-mongering,
>>but rather indulges and further inflames it. Genocide-talk seems to have
>>become the only game in town.
>>
>>The flipside of genocide-mongering is the hunting of genocide-deniers. New
>>European proposals to clamp down on the denial of any genocide represent a
>>serious assault on free speech and historical debate. Will those who
>>challenge Western military interventions overseas to prevent a 'genocide' 
>>be
>>arrested as deniers? What about historians who question the idea that the
>>Turks' killings of Armenians were a genocide? Will their books be banned? 
>>On
>>the homefront, too, genocide is being turned into a moral absolute, 
>>through
>>which a new moral consensus, covering good and evil, right and wrong, what
>>you can and cannot say and think, might be enforced across society (11).
>>
>>If you don't accept the new global genocide divide, or the right of the EU
>>authorities to outline what is an acceptable and unacceptable opinion 
>>about
>>war and history, then step forth – and let us deny.
>>
>>Brendan O'Neill is editor of spiked. Visit his personal website here.
>>
>>(1) Chad violence could erupt into genocide, UN warns, ABC News, 16 
>>February
>>2007
>>
>>(2) Turkey Intensifies Counter-Attack Against Genocide Claims, Turkish
>>Weekly, 1 March 2007
>>
>>(3) See 'Genocide denial laws will shut down debate', by Brendan O'Neill
>>
>>(4) Powell declares genocide in Sudan, BBC News, 9 September 2004
>>
>>(5) Liberia: Fears of genocide, Mail and Guardian, July 2003
>>
>>(6) The Rise and Rise of Human Rights, Kirsten Sellars, Sutton Publishing,
>>2002
>>
>>(7) Turkey Intensifies Counter-Attack Against Genocide Claims, Turkish
>>Weekly, 1 March 2007
>>
>>(8) See Darfur: damned by pity, by Brendan O'Neill
>>
>>(9) Exploiting genocide, Brendan O'Neill, Spectator, 21 January 2006
>>
>>(10) Mr Bolton gets a UN flea in his ear, Melanie Phillips, 24 January 
>>2006
>>
>>(11) See 'Genocide denial laws will shut down debate', by Brendan O'Neill
>>
>>reprinted from:
>>http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/article/2907/
>>
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>End of Peace-discuss Digest, Vol 38, Issue 17
>*********************************************
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>