I’m troubled.

First, Obama decided that those responsible for torture during the Bush administration should not be charged. I’m still not sure what to think of this, but I think that the safest choice — in terms of not wrongly punishing people — is to forgive those responsible for torture now that the movement to end the use of torture by the United States is in swing. To do otherwise would seem like retroactive law in practice, even though this may not be true technically.

However, I think that things have now gone too far. Obama seems to have decided that the public should be shielded from evidence of torture. The reason for this is that it would fuel “anti-Americanism” and lead to more violence. And it probably would, but is this enough of a reason?

I can deal with individuals not being punished for their wrong-doing, but this attempt to hide the truth is too much. Though it is true that it may well lead to more violence in the short-term — though I remember an Iraqi blogger (Riverbend?) saying that Abu Gharaib only put in pictures what Iraqis already “knew” was happening –, I believe it in the long-term health of the United States, and particularly, of the world as a whole for the public to be offered concrete evidence on crimes committed by what are after all public employees.

It has been easy for people to claim that the Abu Gharaib torture scandal was a good example of an isolated evident by a few individuals giving a whole organization, even a whole country a bad name.

To ward off feelings of collective guilt, people often rely on certain defense mechanisms so that they can “save face”. Concerning Abu Gharaib, some would try to contrast this with other events, such as the crimes of Saddam Hussein or genocides in other countries. Marques, Paez and Sera (1997) showed how individuals would view Portugal’s colonial past more favourably if it was compared to other colonial powers.

Another technique would be to legitimize the abuses. They might deny the collective or individual guilt of any participants involved. They may also claim that the victims deserved it (they were terrorists, they had probably killed people in the past, they didn’t end up there for no reason). Research shows that people may even stop perceiving people as “humans” if this helps them deal with feelings of guilt (Alexander, Brewer & Herrmann, 1999; Staub, 1989; Bar-Tal, 2003). They may even say that this was a necessary evil, an inevitable mistake that came out from the pursuit of the greater good.

But when mistakes are made, they have to be recognised. This is done by ensuring that no documentation on the mistakes is hidden from the public: it would have been much easier for people to pretend that the Holocaust never occurred were it not for all the evidence that we have, evidence that should rightfully have embarrassed the nations involved and even promoted feelings of prejudice (much World War II propaganda dehumanised the Germans and the Japanese)

The general argument behind Obama’s position is that, by releasing evidence of the military’s mistakes, “anti-Americanism” will be fuelled, putting the lives of US citizens at risk. Thus, the truth must be hidden. This argument is made more comfortable by the thought that new policies will ensure that this never occurs again.

I think that this kind of thinking will lead to more abuses and that Obama is being too optimistic if he truly believes that the United States has definitely moved beyond torture. “Everything will be taken care of, don’t worry” is the message that’s being sent here. This is a problem, because there’s a limit to what the government can do: laws that are created can also be removed and there will always be people who will rationalise the use of torture. It is only by properly documenting as much evidence as we have on torture that we will be able to make the best decisions dealing with the actions of our past and present, as well as our future present. Abu Gharaib will be harder to rationalise ten years from now in great part thanks to the pictures that were released, those very pictures that fuelled “anti-Americanism”.

Let’s see how this thinking applies to other issues. Imagine that a serial rapist/murderer/you-name-it had been caught, and that he was black. Should we, if possible, hide his ethnicity so as to ensure that it does not fuel racism? There are many people who are eager to blame all our problems, and particularly crime, on ethnic minorities, and blacks are their favourite target for this, since the crime rate is indeed higher amongst blacks.

I believe that, though it is a shame that such information is used to justify feelings and even actions that are to the detriment of society, we must still be aware of details such as the ethnicity and gender of criminals if we are to better understand the issue and thus improve our approach to it.

The truth can and will be used to cause harm, but it is all we have to improve our society and it must be pursued fiercely, if not recklessly.

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