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Housego (AP), September 18 2004

Text Source

Housego, Kim (Associated Press). "Wave of violence in Iraq leaves another 52 dead." Lawrence Journal-World (Lawrence, KS: Lawrence Journal-World; http://www.ljworld.com. September 18 2004): http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2004/sep/18/wave_of_violence/.

Let's talk about degrees of unreality. Suppose there has been a conquest of one country by another. Let's call the conqueror the conqueror country and call the conqueree the victim country. Suppose that, for some time prior to the conquest, the conqueror country had been attacking the victim country for years, and had been supporting terrorism inside the victim country, and the victim country hadn't been attacking the conqueror country or supporting terrorism inside the conqueror country. Now, suppose that, after the conquest and during the occupation, the newspapers started using a special definition of violence. They always portrayed the conqueror's project as nonviolent, and any attempts to fight against it as violence. That would be pretty unreal, because they would be defining defensive violence as violence, and offensive violence as nonviolence. So, basically, if someone comes into your house to take over your house, that's nonviolent (because he's just trying to do his project), and if you say he can't have it, so he shoots you in your own living room, that's nonviolent of him (because you weren't allowing him to do his project, so you deserve to die), but if you shoot him in your own living room, that's violent (because you are going against his project, and conforming to his project is the definition of nonviolence). Note that if you say he can have your house and he shoots you anyway, that's violent of him, because it's going beyond his project of taking your house. Well, that kind of unreality is standard in almost all texts about the US conquest of Iraq.

But this article takes the surrealism a step farther. The details shown in the article itself reveal that of the 47 dead people actually accounted for in detail in the article, every single one of them was killed during US-led attacks, and 44 of them were killed by US-led forces. Yet (and here's the impressive part) even as it shows these facts, the article still manages to create the impression that these people were killed by the "insurgents".

So, if the hypothetical surrealism described in the first paragraph above was presenting the aggressor's violent project as nonviolent and the defender's violence as violent, this article's surrealism is presenting the aggressor's violence as the defender's violence, even while showing facts that reveal that it isn't! Incredible. And remember to think about who is presenting this message: it isn't some government propaganda ministry; it's the "objective news,", the "adversarial media."

In terms of trying to build theory for understanding patriotism in texts, this is a very instructive example. I had for some time thought that all highly transparent patriotic changes were temporary redefinitions. Basically, I had thought that transparent change and definition-shifting were the same thing. But this example casts doubt upon that notion. Here we have the usual transparent redefinition of violence, but we also have this second example of an amazingly transparent shifting of who killed who, right in front of our very eyes. I wonder who would fall for this sort of thing.

Of much less interest in terms of theory, but still noteworthy in terms of thinking about sources of patriotism, note the rather blatant admissions throughout this article that the writer is on the US's side:

Message Unit 1 - an example of patriotized history

core myths: benevolence myth				unpatriotized history: The US project in Iraq is the violent one. The US rules Iraq and kills any Iraqi citizen who doesn't at least pretend to submit.
message (of patriotized history): The US project here is not violent.		patriotic change (of history): violence redefinition
technique: transparent redefinition
text: [headline:] Wave of violence in Iraq leaves another 52 dead

Message Unit 2 - an example of patriotized history

core myths: benevolence myth				unpatriotized history: The US was the violent one in this incident. This is revealed even by reading down in this very article. Although the article tries hard not to present the facts this way, reading down you can see that everyone who was killed was killed in US-led attacks. It's important to recognize that these were US-led attacks on Iraqi citizens in their own home.
message (of patriotized history): The US-led forces were not violent in this incident.		patriotic change (of history): violence redefinition
technique: transparent redefinition
text: [headline:] Wave of violence in Iraq leaves another 52 dead

Message Unit 3 - an example of patriotized history

core myths: benevolence myth				unpatriotized history: Of the 52 people that this article says were killed today, the article only accounts in detail for 47 of them, but even according to the article itself, 44 of those were killed by US-led forces, and only three were killed by anyone else. And even those three were only killed while they were actually in the act of attacking Iraqi citizens for the US!
message (of patriotized history): It wasn't the US that killed such a huge number of people here today.		patriotic change (of history): violence redefinition
technique: transparent redefinition
text: [headline:] Wave of violence in Iraq leaves another 52 dead

Message Unit 4 - an example of patriotized history

core myths: benevolence myth				unpatriotized history: It was the people that this text calls "Iraqi police" who were attacking, and they were were actually US-led forces carrying out an attack on Iraqi citizens at the time they were killed. You can see that they were actually helping the US to carry out an attack at the time just by reading the article itself. They weren't even working for the Iraqis; they were working for the Iraqis' worst enemy, and they were the ones doing the attacking.
message (of patriotized history): Some Iraqi policemen were just sitting there, not attacking Iraqi citizens for a foreign power or anything, when they were targeted (and beleaguered!).		patriotic change (of history): violence redefinition
technique: transparent redefinition
text: The car bombing, which killed three people and wounded 23, was the second this week targeting the capital's beleaguered police forces.

Message Unit 5 - an example of patriotized history

core myths: benevolence myth				unpatriotized history: These Iraqis are working for the foreign power that rules Iraq. They work for the US, which now controls the Iraqis directly by means of its own troops, and is trying to set up a system whereby it will control the Iraqis in the future as well. The US is trying to set up an "Iraqi" military force that will be US-led and will operate in Iraq with US air support. Its job will be the same as the current job of US troops: to kill any Iraqi who refuses to submit to US-led forces.
message (of patriotized history): "Working to restore stability in their country " is what these people are really doing; working for the foreign power that controls Iraq is just a false opinion that some people have about them.		patriotic change (of history): mastery/sovereignty shift
technique: transparent redefinition
text: ... Iraqis working to restore stability in their country but seen as collaborators because of their cooperation with U.S. forces.

Message Unit 6 - an example of patriotized history

core myths: benevolence myth				unpatriotized history: The US is trying to create permanent insecurity for Iraqis: it is trying to make the Iraqis be ruled by the US. And some Iraqis are trying to stop the US from doing this. Notice how in this text the "objective news" article itself claims to know that the "militants" are motivated by evil desires. Thus the news article itself is stating that the US government's claims about resistance motives are true and the resistance's own claims about its motives are false.
message (of patriotized history): What the US is trying to do is to create security for the Iraqis, and it is the goal of militants to stop this because militants don't want Iraqis to be secure.		patriotic change (of history): violence redefinition
technique: transparent redefinition
text: ... as militants try to thwart efforts to build a strong Iraqi police force capable of taking over security from American troops.

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