extreme apathy

Post to a sociology list...

I think I posted on this list sometime back an analysis I did, before the Iraq War, of how the reasoning for the war didn’t make any sense; it just didn’t add up according to what the CIA, FBI, and others were reporting (and the lack of finding any WMD’s by the UN). Now, of course we know that there were no WMD’s, thus invalidating the original stated reason for the invasion.

Turns out, the reason that it didn’t make sense was because of something that was not known to the public…the Administration had already decided to invade Iraq to remove Saddam by at least July of 2002. All that was needed was some reason for doing so; apparently, at least according to the memo that was released to the British press last week, terrorism and WMD’s were the reason(s). It all becomes clear when the facts are known.

See this article here.

Now, this memo has been made public, I don’t know to what extent, since I don’t watch TV, but I know that I have heard reports of it on the radio and on the internet. Curious, isn’t it? If the memo is indeed real, then the decision to invade Iraq was already made when statements about using diplomacy, giving Saddam one last chance, etc., were being promulgated on the airwaves. In other words, it seems pretty apparent to me that we intentionally were not being told the real reason for the invasion and this deceit/manipulation was deliberate. Sad, yes? Of course, we are jaded, we KNOW that the gov’t lies, it has done so for years.

I have a feeling that this memo will blow over (I guess it already has since it is NOT front page news anywhere, except maybe in the UK) and life will go on. IMO, this is evidence for something that is truly disconcerting about the American population. I know that some will say that we were mislead and we continue to be mislead by the media, the gov’t, etc., and that the population isn’t to blame. True, I suspect we are. This does not mean, however that we cannot find out things about what is happening if we really want to…obviously the release of this memo is tangible evidence of that.

I think our collective lack of response to this really quite devastating information is indicative of something even sadder than the fact that our gov’t wasn’t truthful with us about a war that has cost thousands of lives. We, as a nation, as a collective, don’t care. Sure, there are large numbers of people that do care. But, apparently, there aren’t enough because this is NOT front page news. We have tangible evidence that we were mislead, and there is no significant collective response. It is a blip on the news, nothing else. We just don’t care.

I say this not to provoke anything. I say it because it is an observation I am making about what in the future, I am sure, will be a critical point in history.

This is really interesting to me as a sociologist, and as a member of the collective that we know as America. The former because of the social dynamics that may be driving this indifference and the latter because this is not the America I was raised in.

Fascinating.