The Trauma Syndrome

Anyone who studies even elementary psychology knows that many times the bully had been bullied as a child. The sexual abuser had been sexually abused as a child. Remember the sordid tales of all those Catholic Priests ( read Jimmy Breslin’s fine book The Church That Forgot Christ ) who sexually abused young boys?

One wonders how many of those innocent victims later on became sexual abusers themselves. Trauma is a terrible thing to experience. As individuals have to deal with trauma, so do societies i.e.: cultures and even nations.

In 1963, JFK was assassinated. At first, it looked to be an open and shut case: one lone nut did all the damage. Yet, sometimes the truth can be felt , not by the rational mind , or through logic…. Rather through an intuitive process. The year after JFK’s murder, the United States murder rate increased dramatically! Why?

Did the mass consciousness of America reach some kind of resignation or hopelessness? If the employees of a company realize that their boss is skimming money, guess what happens? Some of them lose interest in  playing by the rules  , and they too skim and steal. We all are somehow spellbound by this trauma syndrome.

Remember the European Jews who were able to flee Hitler’s Nazi Holocaust to the safety of Palestine? These folks were deemed to be subhuman by the Third Reich, treated as not even 3rd class citizens… Brutalized in every way imaginable…. So those that could flee did so. Then, years later, many of these same people see the Palestinians as subhuman.

This writer recalls traveling on business to Phoenix in 1988. On the 747 Jumbo Jet we were able to walk around and stretch out. I engaged in conversation with a rather pleasant man, perhaps in his early 40s. He said he was an Israeli engineer, and had been actually born and raised in Israel. I asked him about the situation between the Israelis and the Palestinians. He was honest to a fault: ”

Listen, you have to understand that we Israelis realize that we treat these people harshly. Yet, we have no choice. They breed ( his words ) like rabbits, and if we do not do something about them, they will suffocate us in a few years. They are similar to the problem you have here with your black people. It is not nice… But we have no choice.” His brief explanation could have been right out of the mouth of some Nazi official in 1930s Germany… Or even more disturbing… Out of the mouth of some average German on the streets of 1930s Berlin! Trauma syndrome.

In America, we have experienced , these last couple of years, so many facts coming out about torture. Books and articles have exposed what horrific acts our government has committed in this ( so called )  War on Terror . These acts have been given the Orwellian phrase Enhanced interrogations. Torture, plain and simple. One wonders, with all the documentation coming to light, how many tortured detainees were not in the category of those terrorists who had committed heinous acts.

For every KSM, as they call him, there were perhaps hundreds of men who were ( and are ) absolutely innocent … Guilty in only being Muslim. We know that the Afghan warlords and their followers rounded up anyone they could grab in the early stages of post 9/11. They then sold these men to the Americans for a bounty! We know of the overreaction by the Bush/ Cheney crew to get information… And quickly! We know they circumvented the Geneva Accords by rewriting what was allowable in interrogations….

Or was it really always simply about punishment…. Payback time ? This is just not about one aspect of torture, or what Cheney still holds onto as enhanced interrogations AKA Water boarding. In a previous column, in one of my  Letters to Obama  series ( found on www.populistamerica.com ) , I asked the president to allow himself to be locked in the White House bathroom for 10 hours. I suggested that the AC be turned up to make the room freezing cold. Loud abrasive music should be piped into the bathroom… With him sitting there in total darkness….

Or better still , with bright bright lights on. He should be naked and periodically smacked around or shoved into the walls. Female guards should come in and play with his genitals… He should be called  Nigger  …. You get my drift. Perhaps in the adjoining bathroom Dick Cheney’s daughter ( the one who wails about how correct her dad was ) should be asked to experience the same regimen.

When our nation, as Cheney and co. are now attempting to do, begins a legitimizing of torture, we are in deep deep **** . When the rest of the world sees America as the hypocrite it now appears to be, credibility goes down the drain. Perhaps it is time for …… You who are reading this to begin speaking up and speaking out. Cheney has his popularity rising quickly in the polls.

The mainstream media, even those who have little use for Bush and co., they are beginning to rationalize that torture has kept us safe from more 9/11 styled attacks on our soil. What do you think? Before you answer that, be prepared to see the person you love the most have these procedures done upon his or her physical and mental self. What if… What if your loved one was friendly or worked with someone on some watch list? What if they were heard , or maybe misheard, saying something foolish? Are you prepared to see the Third Reich and its trauma continue to inculcate our system of government?

It already has, you know. It already has.