> I think it's nonetheless truly > astonishing that the stories of mass rape over there have not led to more > public and media pressure. Is it just because the situation is too complex? > But when did that ever stop the media? Or is it because most of the raped > women are Muslims, hence don't "count" in terms of the narrative paradigm that > James talks about in connection w/ BoaN and the Gulf War? > > bitnet tbbyer01@ulkyvm; internet [log in to unmask] > Thomas B. Byers I seem to recall that within the last year (?), there *was* a brief period of concentrated media coverage of the systematic raping of Muslim women -- but it was relatively short-lived. There was a burst of public commentary and concern in the U.S., and then that, too, faded. Would it have faded *as* quickly if the women had been, say, Christian? I doubt it. But I think there's another (related) issue here (as others have pointed out in recent posts): even as some feminist historians and scholars sought to point out that mass rape was, indeed, a kind of political and military strategy, the American media tended to depoliticize it by representing it at the level of personal tragedy. As if it were an either/or proposition . . . Rape can be a powerful mobilizing metaphor (hence the success of Bush's incessant references to "the rape of Kuwait"), but when rape is *not* invoked symbolically -- that is, when it is all too literal -- it still tends to remain marginalized in the realm of the personal . . . which is, all too often, *not* considered the political! Alison McKee Department of Film and Television UCLA [log in to unmask]