Reframing a pullout in Iraq -- Rape

I think equating the situation in Iraq with rape is really bad framing, because it makes the United States and our military out to be a sexual perpetrator raping Iraq.

In my opinion, the best metaphor is also the most realistic one, and that is: Iraq is in a state of CIVIL WAR. Once you talk of civil war, people begin to think of various groups vying for power, all of them engaging in various degrees of atrocities against one another. And the more people say "it isn't a civil war," the more it just reinforces that frame when people see Iraqis blowing each other up every night on TV.

And as the Democrats have been saying, there is no military solution to a civil war, only a political one. I can't think of a single instance in history where a civil war could be stopped by a foreign power using military means.

There are many victim analogies that might fit the bill and even though I do believe we are violating and assaulting Iraq, I think the rape metaphor does not work.

There are too many visuals that don't fit the frame (and are kinda uselessly gross on top of that). Is Iraq a woman? Do we want to withdraw(like it's birth control or something)? Visuals of sex power play jump to mind when you hear the word rape. The war we brought is a total power play, but in the global big picture it isn't sexual.

The worst part is that I believe from an Iraqi perspective, it would be extra insulting to just throw in sexual brutalization as part of our perceived identity for their country. What would you prefer to be seen as, an oppressed people or a rape victim?

Also, when you are thinking of solutions to the Iraq War problem, using the rape metaphor assumes all those that come up with a solution were also the perpetrator.

I don't think we should use victim analogies at all. People will then think, if Iraq is a victim, then we need to help them. And the best way to help them is to stay there indefinitely so that they don't end up killing each other.

There is an inherent problem with the way most people on the left and the right frame Iraq, which I was reminded of when you spoke of an "Iraqi perspective." There is not one Iraqi perspective but THREE. In fact, Iraq only exists as a country on paper. Here in America, there is an American identity, whether you are conservative or progressive. But there is no such equivalent identity in Iraq. Saddam created one, but that was based on Sunni Arab nationalism. So when those talk of how we are occupying Iraq and that they want us to leave, they are really talking about the Sunni Arabs. The Shia Arabs tolerate us (for now), because they need us there to buy time to build their armies populated with Shiites. And the Kurds love us. They are pro-U.S. all the way. Remember when we used to hear all those reports about how the Iraqis lov us and how we were helping them build schools and all that? Well, those were Kurds. (Did you know that the Iraqi national flag is BANNED in Iraqi Kurdistan? Yes, they have their own flag.)

The thing is people tend to pick whatever group in Iraq best justifies their views. But the truth is it is a CIVIL WAR with THREE different groups fighting for power.

but I would still maintain that none of the three groups of Iraqis want to be seen as a rape victim.

But I bet the Sunnis wouldn't mind frames that invoke images of us being the aggressor and them as the victim. It serves their world view that Iraq was peaceful and wonderful when they were in power, and is chaotic and violent when we pushed them out.

I agree, there are problems with this metaphor. The rape metaphor is very useful in some ways, but has problems in other ways. If I could think of a more appropriate metaphor; I'd use that.

Part of problem is that it's not an actual frame, but rather, it's more an analogy for certain aspects of the problem. Particularly, the distinction between wanted sexual advances, with all of the associated connotations, and an unwanted sexual advance, is useful. One carries a host of romantic associations

just as war does -- while the other casts those same associations in a wholly different light. Our insistence (or Bush's) in the noble nature of our intentions can be contrasted with Iraq's point of view, which would emphasize the unwanted nature of the war.

The most useful aspect of the analogy -- perhaps -- is the definition of the problem as one which isn't improved through a "more of the same" approach. The "war on terror" and "win v. lose" frames are rigid, that is, they are structured to imply that only a relatively confined set of solutions can solve the problem. In this sense, the term "functional fixedness" refers to our inability to conceive of the situation outside of the rigid frame, thus leading to tunnel vision approach to solving the problem.

Curiously, despite how effective the "winning" frame is, it clearly leads to a losing strategy. This implication has obviously occurred to the White House, since they recently found themselves attempting to steer away from the "stay the course" rhetoric, with all it's negative logical implications, and pushing their new "adapt and adjust" strategy, which floundered in a morass of logical and metaphorical contradictions. Defending the status quo was easy, in part because it relied on defending the administration's previous rationale, which many had heavily invested in. *Just an aside -- either cognitive dissonance or/and John Jost's System Justification theory could explain the attitude that embraces the status quo.

http://www.psych.nyu.edu/jost/

 

"Our insistence (or Bush's) in the noble nature of our intentions can be contrasted with Iraq's point of view, which would emphasize the unwanted nature of the war."

I don't mean to be anal, but you are implying that there is a single point of view coming out of Iraq, which is totally false. The Kurds WANTED this war, make no mistake about it. Go ask any Kurd. They want their own homeland. They believe this war paved the way towards them achieving independence.

It was mostly the Muslim world that was against this, who identified with the Sunni Arabs. The Shiites were glad that we got rid of Saddam, but they have their own ideas on what they want this new Iraq to look like (believe me, it won't look like America). Some of them even want their own region like the Kurds up North. But all of them are in agreement that they are the majority and will no longer be told what to do by anyone.

We on the left have to stop lumping all Iraqis together and thinking that this Iraqi view is synonymous with ours. All three groups have their own agenda.

Ours is different. We want to extricate ourselves from this mess. And this is not something we can clean up. You can't force people to live in peace if they don't want to.

Now for a final comment... I would suggest everyone to stop using the word Iraqis. It's a misnomer. Use Sunni, Shiite, and Kurds instead. It will emphasize that they are not a homogeneous group of people. I would only use the words Iraq and Iraqi in the context of talking about the land that it occupies, not about the people.

The more we speak of the Iraqis, the more we strengthen Bush's frame that they are all one people who will live happily ever after together if we just get rid of the terrorists. Wrong. There are no good guys in Iraq. All three groups, including the Kurds, discriminate or do worse in areas where they have the upper hand.