From The River To The Sea

The Government Of My Country Disgusts Me

Eagle Pass, Texas To Gaza

(Source: NY Times, 3/220/24)

(Source: Caitlin Johnstone, 3/20/24)

A reader comment on Caitlin Johnstone’s Substack today caught my eye. Commenting on the Gaza photo above, this reader wrote:

“Any news source that provides pictures of this atrocity will be banned if Israel can possibly do it.”

This reminded me of a personal episode, which prompted my reply as follows:

This reminds me of a personal story on the media coverage of the Abu Ghraib torture photos. Early on, they were not published in US media but were in Europe. At the time, I had a “citizen journalism” column at the Star Ledger, NJ’s largest newspaper. There was no editorial content control over what I wrote. Joe Lieberman (and/or with Obama support) sponsored a bill to amend the Freedom of Information Act to prohibit the release of these photos. Disgusted by that censorship, I wrote a column about the bill that provided a link to the European news photos. It was only a link (not the photos themselves) and I included a READER WARNING – GRAPHIC CONTENT.

But within 10 minutes of posting that column, I got an angry phone call by the Editor of the paper, screaming at me. He not only took the post down he terminated my column. Never forgot that episode. It’s also what started my blog.

The US media’s photo coverage of the Vietnam War contributed to the opposition and end of that war.

The Military and politicians learned that lesson, and instead of body bags on the TeeVee news and splashed across the front page of the newspapers, they “embedded” so called “journalists” and censored their coverage.

The internet and social media have smashed that censorship model, and we’re seeing a return to sanity, with growing opposition to the wars and genocide being conducted by Israel in Gaza.

And once again, the visual image is at the center of that phenomenon.

And the many parallels to Vietnam – including self immolation and the demise of LBJ and Biden – are downright spooky.

[End Note: for my photos of the Rio Grande River and border wall, see these posts: