June 3, 2004
Women at Abu Ghraib: Two perspectives
The Women at Abu Ghraib
by Stephanie Hiller
(published in AWe - Awakened Woman's e-newsletter - May 27, 2004)
So much has been written about Abu Ghraib that I hesitate to add to the pile, but I've received half a dozen copies of Barbara Ehrenreich's article, <http://www.alternet.org/print.html?StoryID=18740>What Abu Ghraib Taught Me&emdash;sometimes subtitled A Uterus is No Substitute for a Conscience&emdash;and I feel compelled to comment on the questions it raises.
On first take, Ehrenreich's shock at the involvement of women soldiers in the sickening abuse that occurred in the Iraqi prison reminds me of the response one so frequently hears to assertions that "women would do things differently." Where it used to be, What about Margaret Thatcher? it is now more often, What about Condi Rice? It's the kind of response I have termed, The Argument from the Exception. Yes, there are women who behave exactly like men have done, but they are rare. Countering generalities with the exception doesn't seem to me to make very good logic. Yes, women can do awful things&emdash;but mostly, we don't.
It is shocking that women were involved in the prison abuse of male prisoners, but it's no cause to throw out our conviction that women would construct a different way of being in the world, were we given the chance.
What's problematic is that even women who have achieved positions of power have had to conform to standards of behavior set by men.
The women soldiers at Abu Ghraib were in the military. We know how the military twists the minds of soldiers in training. It might be said that a woman brainwashed to kill-kill-kill is placed into so much contradiction with her own instincts that she loses the ability to know what she thinks.
Lynndie England, who is taking the brunt of these charges, and could be incarcerated for up to 15 years, has said that she was doing as she was told, and she believed it was the right thing to do. She wouldn't have joined the military in the first place if she didn't think war was a necessary and correct response to conflict. But even if she was felt this behavior was indecent, what could she have done?
As Lucinda Marshall points out <http://www.awakenedwoman.com/marshall_ghraib.htm>in her commentary the attention given to women's participation in this scandal is itself an reflection of the hatred of women that comes into play whenever women stray from the ladylike role that has been assigned to us.
It distracts from the real perpetrators of the crime, the officials who directed the treatment of prisoners. Under this administration, the treatment of detainees in Guantanamo has, like Abu Ghraib, been rightly criticised for breaking international agreements about treatment of prisoners.
Although comparisons are odious, particularly when it comes to torture, laughing at naked men made to masturbate may not be comparable to forcing a broom into any available orifice, or ripping the body from tip to toe with a bayonet. These kinds of things are routine in war situations, all over the world. Consider the treatment of women in Abu Ghraib. According to one article in the UK Guardian:
an Iraqi woman in her 70s had been harnessed and ridden like a donkey at Abu Ghraib and another coalition detention centre after being arrested last July. Labour MP Ann Clwyd, who investigated the case and found it to be true, said, "She was held for about six weeks without charge. During that time she was insulted and told she was a donkey."
and
According to Swadi, [one of seven female lawyers now representing women detainees in Abu Ghraib] who managed to visit Abu Ghraib in late March, the allegations against the women are "absurd". "One of them is supposed to be the mistress of the former director of the Mukhabarat. In fact, she's a widow who used to own a small shop. She also worked as a taxi driver, ferrying children to and from kindergarten. If she really had a relationship with the director of the Mukhabarat, she would scarcely be running a kiosk. These are baseless charges," she adds angrily. "She is the only person who can provide for her children."
The abuse of women at Abu Ghraib seems not to be so shocking&emdash;abuse of women is the norm. What shocked the world in Abu Ghraib was the humiliation of MEN.
For an administration eager to prove that women should be corralled into second place, the participation of women in this tawdry affair is so convenient it could almost have been planned for the very purpose, proving, as they do like to allege, that feminism is the root of all evil.
For Ehrenreich to be so affected is too bad. She is a brilliant feminist author of great reputation whose recent book, Nickel and Dimed, shows how women in working class jobs struggle. Her early book, For Her Own Good, is a classic work on how women in patriarchy have been stripped of their power to make choices and heal their own bodies, by the experts of the medical profession.
It's really a shame that she fell into the trap. But it may stimulate her to reformulate what women need to do. Ehrenreich is having to question her long held belief that by entering into the male arena, women will be able to change it. Now she realizes, "Women do not change institutions simply by assimilating into them." No, we don't&emdash;but that's not exactly news. We couldn't even change marriage, except by leaving it. How could we possibly think we could change the military!
That women soldiers conform to the oppressive ways of the military should come as no surprise. But then, I have never understood how joining the military could be a feminist choice. I am committed to seeing an end to war, and I look to women to lead in that direction. Now in the interests of gender equality, we are going to have a draft (spring, 2005) that will include women! Is this the kind of equality we had in mind?
The military is but the most extreme example of the resistance of patriarchal institutions to any deep change. The truth is that we haven't transformed any institution we have entered into&emdash;not medicine, nor the academy, the courts, or business.
So what are our options here?
It seems to me that we should figure out how to position ourselves so that we, the women, are a force to be reckoned with. While I don't think the solution lies in forming all-female communities&emdash;though they have their place&emdash;I do feel that women can meet together without men to recover what is innately and uniquely female, and act on it. And the best place for us to do that, in my experience, is in the women's circle.
It's not a utopian path. It's a difficult process. Dealing with each other&emdash;without having men as a buffer&emdash;is hard. We do have egos, we do react from our woundedness, we do get into unboundaried pits of swirling emotion. But if we can stay the course, if we can learn from the mirrors we hold up to one another, we emerge empowered.
Ehrenreich concludes that we need "a tough new kind of feminism with no illusions... We need a kind of feminism that aims not just to assimilate into the institutions that men have created over the centuries, but to infiltrate and subvert them."
I would go one step further. We need to establish our own authority and our own institutions. We need to remove all the props we have supplied to keep patriarchy in business. We need to demonstrate our way of doing things, by creating women-led organizations and institutions that operate differently, in significantly different ways, from the institutions of domination, oppression, and imperialistic order.
Then men can support us, if they choose, and together we can build a better world based on a much more appropriate balance of power: with women at the center.
How to do that is the big question, but maybe if we start asking the question, we'll find the answers.
Surely the global crisis demands that we try.
Response from a woman soldier
Dear Stephanie,
Your editorial in the May 26th AWe newsletter was troubling. I had written a heartfelt thank you to Barbara Ehrenrheich for her article on AlterNet "A Uterus is Not a Substitute for a Conscience". (She was even kind enough to respond and ask questions about feminism in the military) Mainly because I believe that quote from the article is a truism. Women are not better than men. This is a basic tenet of my feminist ideology, that men and women are equal in their graces and equal in their curses. Both can be self sacrificing, and both can be vile and dehumanizing. The uniqueness of the individual is the easiest and simplest way to see the power of the Creator, whatever name we give to the Divine.
Respectfully, I'd like to disagree with some of your thoughts. I am a pagan feminist in the military. While I agree to disagree with regards to much of our beliefs, I cannot help but suspect that your beliefs have been formed in ignorance, particularly of the military. When ideology, rather than idealism, takes part in crafting beliefs and ideas I fear we each run the risk of seeing only what we want to see. I make every effort to expose myself to ideas contrary to mine in an effort to prevent this.
Your comment about the inability of women to transform institutions like medicine, courts or business disturbed me. I was unaware that women had achieved equal numbers in any of these fields. How can women effect change if they are still vastly outnumbered, and not filling nearly equal number positions of power? If you look at early education and elementary education in the U.S. I'd say women have achieved much, and that is a field of study in which I am sure women make up the majority of professionals.
You and Barbara both mention that conforming and assimilating into male-dominated patriarchal institutions does not ensure change for the better and common (male&female) good. I agree. I think this brings up a very significant point for the Abu Ghreib prison scandal.
Conforming is merely meeting the requirements of the post as determined by the history of that post. To conform is one thing, and understandable when infiltrating a social structure based upon one particular methodology (patriarchy). But those that not only conform, but absorb, this way of thinking/feeling/acting/practicing are those that betray any hope for change.
These are the women that get to powerful positions, and do nothing to ensure that those they are in command of (whether it be business, military, family, social-organization) shift away from harmful practices. They not only betray themselves, but they betray others struggling as they struggled to get to where they are.
Maybe it's a small bit of mean-spiritedness where a grudge is held against others trying to follow in their footsteps to positions of power and esteem, and they determine that since they had to sweat, bleed and sacrifice to achieve their goals and they survived, those after them should do the same. It's a very destructive way of thinking. And, as we see in Abu Ghraib, can have profound consequences.
Regarding Abu Ghreib, you suggest that the world was more shocked at the humiliation of men than the abuse of women. I thought what shocked the world was that the abusers of prisoners, regardless of sex, were female. This rocked the foundations of the stereotype that women were kind ang good, and men were vile and evil. I fear that your interpretation does nothing but further antifeminism, and continues to prepetuate the notion that the abuse of 5 women should take precedence over the abuse of hundreds of men. As you mentioned comparing abuse and torture is distasteful, I should hope that neither shocks those of us that believe in equality more than the other.
The ideal behind the military is the same as that of a militia: to defend in times of crisis. Regardless of how corrupt politicans and generals use the military for their own agenda, the ideal remains the same. I am a feminist in the military. I joined because I wanted to be a part of peacekeeping missions the U.S. was involved in with the U.N. I joined because I felt that if ever my country faced warfare brought to these lands, every citizen, male or female, would be needed to fight them off. I believe each and every individual has equal rights and equal responsibilities for those rights. That is how being in the military is and can be a feminist undertaking. Equality is blind, like justice. For a feminist, equality must be universal. And if that means the equal right to die in warfare, then so be it. Those that seek 'equality' only some of the time are only looking out for their self interests, and need to give up the belief that they work for the 'common' good rather than the 'selfish' good.
I made it through my basic training and so far 4 years of service without conforming to oppressive practices that you proclaim are inherent to the military. Is there a militant bloodlust in the military? I'm sure. I've listened to soldiers give enthusiastic descriptions of the brutalities of a warzone. But I've also witnessed special forces soldiers' haunted looks at the mere mention of what they saw in the carnage of Afghanistan. Again, I feel I need to stress to you and the readers of AWe the blessed individuality of soldiers. Change has been slowly happening in the military. And the old-dogs are not happy with it. Searching the web you are able to find plenty that supports this, that the 'new soft' military is unwelcome. But those old-dogs will retire and die out, and each year the 'new' look at the military gets stronger and more widespread. Patience is a virtue, and I have high hopes for the direction the U.S. military is taking.
Maybe for some it is true that the military twists and brainwashes the minds of its soldiers, to the point where the need to follow orders supersedes ethics and instinct. But I consider it only true for the weak willed, those that could not tell right from wrong walking down a neighborhood street, let alone in a foreign country faced with overwhelming stress. Maybe we need to have higher standards that individuals must meet before they can join the military. Or maybe only those soldiers with strong ethical convictions should be allowed to be placed in situations involving occupation and power over those that were considered 'enemies'. Or maybe we need more oversight on the Drill Sergeants. I went to a co-ed basic training, and my Drill Sergeants were beyond decent. I respect them greatly. I never witnessed them commit abuse, and everything they did was for a reason that involved training us with what we needed to know.
The abuses pereptuated by females in Abu Ghreib outrages me for three main reasons. These females disgrace MY sex, MY uniform, and MY rank. I am appalled that I share these three labels with them. Every time I read the backlash against military-females in the warzone, I get angry because my military conduct is now in question thanks to the immoral and unethical choices three pathetic excuses for female soldiers made. When I read the excuses that these soldiers were not as responsible as the media is making them out to be because of their low rank, my own rank's duties and responsibilities are tarnished. When deragotory comments are made about Army Reservists in Iraq facing unbelievable stress with little to no support from the Pentagon despite policies (or with new 'addendums' added to previous policies which tries to make excuses for the lack of foresight and planning by the Pentagon on the occupation of Iraq) my good name and good service as an Army Reservist suffers. I used to proudly sign my name, and my rank, and my military affiliation, because I had achieved what few others did. I do not put my rank or my military affiliation anymore.
I do not offer excuses to any of the soldiers that took part in or condoned the abuse in Abu Ghreib. Whether they are privates or generals, I am a vocal advocate that they face military justice and public villification. I want them to serve as examples for the rest of the military, and hope that they spur a move to make ethics a part of military training, perhaps much the way that sexual harrassment is now a part of military training. Lynndie England, had she felt her behavior was immoral, unethical or indecent, could have refused the order she was given. That simple and that easy. She would have faced consequences, yes. But that's the problem with morals and ethics, isn't it? One is willing to stick to those ethics in the face of conflict. Ms. England had none, or not enough. Nothing in the military excuses or gives license to what she did. The oath of enlistment, the Soldier Code of Conduct, the Soldier's Creed, and the 7 Army Values all list explicitly that she should have refused the order, gone to her superior, and demanded the abuse be stopped. If no satisfaction was found there, she should have continued up her chain of command. And, she could have worked with SPC Darby who ensured the pictures made it to the media and used the public's interest to stop the abuse.
In short, I respect Darby. I hold nothing but contempt for England. One is a good soldier. One is not. Conformity does not hamper change, an individual's refusal to effect changed practices in military, business or organizational practices does so. A woman's right to live, die, and defend peace makes the military a profoundly feminist undertaking. And equality is blind, and finds no difference in worth between a man's suffering and a woman's suffering. Abu Ghreib simply had more male victims that female.
Roxanne Korpal
SPC, U.S. Army Reserves
A liberally progressive pagan feminist in the military.