I'm sure many were stunned at the images broadcast by Iranian TV of demonstrators "confessing" that they had been duped into demonstrating by American propaganda or were motivated purely by a desire to loot and destroy property. The "confessions" have been run in a loop by Iranian TV for days in an attempt to discredit the demonstrations and arouse popular opinion against the demonstrators. The alleged confessions were particularly chilling because they were coming from demonstrators who had been arrested and detained by Iranian authorities, strongly suggesting that the confessions had been obtained by torture or other abuse of the demonstrators.
I initially expected that the U.S. media would report that torture had indeed been used to coerce these "confessions", and found the absence of such reports, and the silence from our government regarding these chilling images, strangely discordant with the comprehensive coverage of the demonstrations generally.
Now The Guardian (a U.K. newspaper) has published reports that torture was indeed used to obtain these confessions, and Scott Horton has reported that demonstrators have been rounded up and tortured. Still, there is very little coverage of these allegations in the U.S. press.
There really isn't any mystery as to why the U.S. press and government, otherwise eager to condemn the violent suppression of the demonstrations, would be silent in the face of allegations of torture in Iran, is there? Having tortured ourselves, we have forfeited the ability to credibly condemn Iranian torture. As much as we would like to support the demonstrators and condemn the Iranian government's abuse of demonstrators, our media and government remains silent for fear of being called out for their brazen hypocrisy.
The consequences of our past torture are coming home to roost, and while the focus of our media and government might not have prevented the torture of demonstrators detained in Iran, it most certainly would have helped galvanize worldwide condemnation of the Iranian regime and perhaps deterred them. But our own record for torturing detainees renders us mute.
This is the clearest proof to date that the consequences of our own torture policy will be profound and felt not only here but around the world. Brave demonstrators in Tehran are now suffering the consequences of the U.S.'s policy of torture under the Bush regime, and it is certain that they will not be the last dissidents to suffer these consequences, in Iran and in countries with tyrannical regimes around the world.
The abuse of demonstrators in Tehran is another reminder of why the U.S. absolutely MUST unequivocally reject torture, indefinite detention and other denials of human and civil rights, and prosecute under our own laws those Americans guilty of torture, including most importantly those government officials who formulated, adopted and implemented a policy of torture.
Distressingly, however, while our government equivocates on prosecuting torturers and continues to espouse detention without due process, there are many who continue to insist that the U.S. can torture but others cannot; they insist, incredibly, that our torture is moral and theirs immoral. The execrable Jeffrey Goldfarb shamelessly made this argument just the other day, and received a righteous smackdown from Glenn Greenwald.
Goldfarb is of course a notorious neocon hack, but the apologists for torture are not restricted to the lunatic rightwing. There are apologists for torture in our major newspapers (for example, the Washington Post) and even on so-called "liberal" cable news networks like MSNBC (just watch Morning Joe to see Scarborough and Buchanan blithely dismissing U.S. torture). And they are even here at Kos, where frequent diarist Setrak posted a diary this morning condemning Iranian torture and citing it as a defect of its theocracy, but Setrak failed to acknowledge having opposed U.S. prosecution of our own criminal torturers and urged others at DKos to "back away" from demanding accountability.
I have a message for Setrak: when you post diaries entitled "Why I Am Happy That CIA Agents Won't Be Prosecuted" and "Please Take A Step Back from the Torture Debate", you have fatally undermined your credibility in condemning Iranian torture. And when our government and media join you in this hypocrisy, they fatally undermine our ability to speak with moral authority against torture and violent suppression of dissent, and they fail the brave dissidents in the streets of Tehran.
We have tortured. Damage has been done, to our own nation and to those in Iran who might otherwise look to the U.S. for support. We can't undo the damage that has been done, but we can stop further damage. We must clearly and unambiguously reject torture and indefinite detention and honor our obligation under our own laws to prosecute the torturers among us. Anything less is to lend aid and comfort to tyrants in Iran and around the world.