Real Lives, False Debates
Were committee staffers reluctant to open up a line of discussion that might lead to credible rationalizations for torture? Either way, by failing to talk to relevant CIA personnel, Carter wrote, the staff "weakened what was in most other respects a thorough and troubling examination of poorly conceived and poorly run program."
Carter called such omissions of opposing views, "a predictable and unhappy result of life in a swift and unreflective era." He may be right, but I don't think a predisposition to stick with one's preconceived notions is at all unique to this era. It only stands out as ironic in light of the endless flood of information that the digital age offers us to ignore.
Oversimplifying narratives creates false debates. Two opposing narratives are offered to the exclusion of other alternatives that may lead more quickly to a useful compromise, even if they fail to bring people to their feet or to the streets.
In this way we have seen the recent national uproar over alleged police brutality quickly polarize into hotly opposing camps with each side selecting versions of what happened that back their preconceived arguments.
In Ferguson, Missouri, for example, rage on the streets following the death of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teen, was barely dimmed by revelations that he may have ignited the whole ugly incident by resisting police officer Darren Wilson's lawful stop.
As a result, valuable attention may have been taken away from a case that ironically provided a more clear-cut argument for the protesters: the video-recorded chokehold death of unarmed Eric Garner in Staten Island, New York, after he tried to talk police out of arresting him for the petty crime of selling loose untaxed cigarettes.
It is not a contradiction to believe that police conduct is a serious problem, whether a particular victim turns out to be petty lawbreaker or not. Or that problems like campus rape are very real, even if some media narratives are not.
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E-mail Clarence Page at cpage@tribune.com.
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