[Prudence]

Prudence has an opinion!

I'll wait for you to get over your shock and surprise.

If the photos are on the internet, they will eventually be found by someone outside those participating in the posting. The internet is not a particularly good place to hide things. Whether found by our government, insurgent groups, AI, the press, or any other group, they will be found and it will look bad.

Why will it look bad? Because it's awfully hard to take the moral high ground when your actions aren't so moral. We already went through a whole hoo-haw over prisoner photos. I'll conceed that war is an experience that cannot be understood by those who aren't there. However, there is a significant distinction between taking a "war trophy" photo and posting that photo on the internet, just as there is a distinction treatment of live humans who pose a continuing threat or possess valuable information and treatment of an inanimate corpse. (This portion of the opinion was first run by my husband to make sure I didn't have a wholly unrealistic view of the military.) Not only that, but I believe there was a photo on the blog page of a woman injured in an attack (not an insurgent.) I may be wrong, as I didn't linger. If so, I don't even have words to describe that.

Now back the the "eventually found" portion of this argument: Best case scenario is that the military finds it first and shuts it down. Worst case scenario is that the enemy finds it first and immediately starts the propaganda against us. Middle ground is that another party finds it first, the government acts appropriately shocked, and involved parties are punished.

I agree that the existence of these photos puts our troops in danger. However, because I feel that the photos would have been eventually found by someone, whether or not press, I feel that the irresponsiblity lies with the participants for creating a situation that opens troops up to increased risk. The soldiers involved created the product and placed it on the 'net. Not only that, but they did this AFTER the Abu Whatsis prison episode. Have they no sense whatsoever? And do they regularly display this lack of sense in carrying out their assigned duties upon which the lives of others depend?