Colleen Graffy & Gitmo
Je reproduis ici la lettre ouverte d'un américain à Colleen Graffy, chargée de la diplomatie publique au département d'Etat et qui avait qualifié, dans la droite lignée des grands cyniques du pentagone, le suicide des 3 personnes à Guantanamo de "coup de pub pour attirer l'attention". Cette lettre avait atteri quelque part dans mes commentaires et j'ai tout de suite jugé qu'elle serait ici à sa place.
O: Colleen.Graffy@pepperdine.edu
Dear Ms. Graffy:
I am
writing to you to remark upon the incredibly ignorant statement you
made regarding the three recent suicides at Gitmo. The lack of
knowledge about the causes of suicide which you demonstrated in your
profoundly stupid remarks leaves me breathless for the sheer lack of
understanding of an issue which is the 11th leading cause of death
among Americans. (Anderson RN, Smith BL. Deaths: leading causes for
2001. National Vital Statistics Report 2003;52(9):1-86.), not to
mention what incarceration without hope of release for charges unknown
must do to a person. How would you like to be locked up without any
knowledge of charges against you, in a land not your own, without any
sense whether or not you would ever leave alive? Perhaps you should try
it.
Annual rates of suicide in this country are over 30,000 per
year, more than 650,000 Americans are hospitalized each year following
suicide attempts, and over 116,000 are treated in hospital emergency
departments for same. Among US males, suicide is the 8th leading cause
of death for all US men and males are four more times likely to die
from suicide than females. And this is not even beginning to quote
numbers related to female and teen deaths. But don't take it from me,
Ms. Graffy, check out the website of one of your fellow-governmental
agencies, the CDC--that's the Centers for Disease Control in case you
had failed to note its existence-- http://www.cdc.gov/ncipc/factsheets/suifacts.htm
. There you will see a tidy introduction to a subject in which you are
woefully ignorant and which all your degrees have obviously not
prepared you to understand or speak about.
I come from a family
which, in the last one hundred years, has experienced over a dozen
suicides in its ranks. So, yeh, I tend to be rather sensitive to the
issue. We are what you would call patriotic Americans, as a whole, and
have done more than our share to contribute to the life of the nation
in ways very big and small. To see you liken suicide as an act of
warfare against the US would be funny if it were not so cruel and
unfeeling. But then, cruel and unfeeling is probably how you have risen
to the position you presently enjoy at State.
Do us all a favor,
Ms. Graffy, and shut your mouth about subjects for which you are
woefully under-qualified and under-experienced to comment. Step outside
of your fishbowl of an office and limited circle of acquaintances, take
a drive sometime and see the world beyond the Beltway. Touch base with
reality. You are in many ways as imprisoned as the people you are
verbally abusing at Gitmo.
Very Truly Yours,
Robert Pell-deChame