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| Iraq |
| Zeyad’s Confusion and Depression |
| 2003-12-20 |
| Fred this may be off-topic, but Zeyad’s post caught me by surprise. Here is an excerpt from Zeyad’s concerning Sadaam’s capture and inspection by the American medic. His reaction is simular to what Madeline Albright described as the Arab reaction, in general. I find her perceptiveness, in this case, very disconcerting. I still haven’t been able to get rid of this deep sadness that has overcome me the last two days. People have been emailing asking me to explain. I wish I could, but I simply can’t. After going through the comments today I had some more thoughts. If you had lived all your life ruled by a tough dictator elevated to the level of a god and then suddenly without warning watched that dictator displayed to the public on tv as a ’man’, you probably would have related with my position. The images were shocking. I couldn’t make myself believe this was the same Saddam that slaughtered hundreds of thousands and plundered my country’s wealth for decades. The humiliation I experienced was not out of nationalistic pride or Islamic notions of superiority or anything like that as some readers suggested. It was out of a feeling of impotence and helplessness. This was just one old disturbed man yet the whole country couldn’t dispose of him. We needed a superpower from the other side of the ocean to come here and ’get him’ for us. I was really confused that day I went out and almost got myself killed by those Fedayeen and angry teenagers in the Adhamiya district. Rachel and Ali explained the Stockholm Syndrome in the comments section. I haven’t heard about it before, but it did help me understand my contradicting feelings. I didn’t want to see him humiliated as much as I loathed him. And that is why I was dissapointed with myself. I want to see him sit in an Iraqi court and explain himself to Iraqis. I want to hear him apologize to Iraqis. It won’t help the dead, but I want to hear it anyway. He must be handed over to Iraqis. I don’t care about legitimacy. He must be tried publicly in an Iraqi civil court by Iraqi judges. The rest of the Arab dictators should see it and learn from it. And I’m still wondering why? Why did he have to put himself into this? Why did he have to destroy Iraq? What did he gain from all of this? Any comments by Dr. White, another physician or anyone with grief counceling/ desaster debriefing would be enlightening to me. |
| Posted by:Super Hose |
| #7 I wonder if the depression is isolated to the Sunni population, becuase there was little Sunni resistence to the regime. The Shiite and Kurds would rejoice because they fought and resisted to the extent that many of their family now reside in mass graves. POW's seem to suffer from depression to an extent that is inversely proportional to how much they resisted their captors. It's like a whole has been populated with the psychological equivalent of the crew of the Pueblo and residents of the Hanoi Hilton. I am surprised that Zeyad is this effected in that he has taken an active role in marches and other activities. A sense of participation in a movement and a sense of being in control of your own destiny should be good medicine against melancholy. |
| Posted by: Super Hose 2003-12-20 5:15:29 PM |
| #6 Actually, Zayed is being overloaded with the images of Hobo-Saddam. Hobo-Saddam is what the man was reduced to, it's not the man who was, in absence of real military opposition, the smiling mass-rapist of the opposition's mothers, sisters, and daughters... Zayed shouldn't ever feel bad because Iraq couldn't overcome the Hobo-Saddam. They were never given the chance. -Vic |
| Posted by: Vic 2003-12-20 2:28:07 PM |
| #5 This is going to take some time to undo the twisted sense of values that have evolved over a generation and a half in Iraq under Saddam. People develop systems of behavior to survive and cope under this corrupt and brutal dictatorship. Changing things that are ingrained for survival purposes is going to be long, difficult, and often painful. Remember that many people (millions of 'em) were heavily invested in the sytem and lived quite well under Saddam. Everything is not going to come up roses after Saddam's capture. Change will be quite painful at times. We have to have patience and understanding, and we have to listen. The Iraqis are not us. |
| Posted by: Alaska Paul 2003-12-20 2:21:20 PM |
| #4 Saddam was never alone. Other iraqis, other arabs, other muslims were doing the torturing, raping, and killing. None of those dictators are acting alone, and the muslims are still in denial about it. It's all America's fault, of course. |
| Posted by: 4thInfVet 2003-12-20 1:51:17 PM |
| #3 I think it's partly Stockholm Syndrom. Saddam held the whole country hostage all of Zeyad's life. Another part of it is what Lu Baihu said. I'd say that what Lu said is probably most of it. The shame/humiliation is more in the fact that they didn't do it themselves. Of course, he looks at Saddam and doesn't think about all his henchmen... He'll be ok. |
| Posted by: Kathy K 2003-12-20 1:28:26 PM |
| #2 Hey, Guyjean, give it some slack. As he makes it clear, it's more of shame towards himself than any Arab ideal, more of how the 24 million of Iraq could not overthrow one MERE "old disturbed man", some sort of overbearing yet invisible force forcing their oppression until overthrown by the equivalent of another (the US) ... |
| Posted by: Lu Baihu 2003-12-20 1:18:58 PM |
| #1 I'm getting really annoyed with the Arab world over their constant use of the term "humiliation" when it comes to how we captured Saddam. The short video that was released showed Saddam getting a medical checkup by a Doctor. He was NOT in handcuffs, he was NOT in leg irons, he had NOT been beaten or tortured. My god, if we had wanted to humiliate him, we would have beat the snot out of him and dragged him cuffed and in irons and left him on the floor whimpering for the world to see. But no, we gave him a medical checkup instead. So stop it already with the humiliation act. |
| Posted by: Guyjean 2003-12-20 12:07:52 PM |