If this doesn't make you shudder...

I linked this piece from the New York Times in the previous post because of its mention of civil lawsuits that either are currently or will soon be pending against the city of New York for its treatment of anti-GOP protesters last week. There is some discussion of the alleged filthy conditions of Pier 57, the primary detention space used by the NYPD. (I say alleged not because I don't believe the protesters who have lodged complaints, but rather because I don't personally have any first- or even second-hand evidence of the situation). Have a look at the last paragraph of the piece:

Norman Seabrook, president of the Correction Officers' Benevolent Association, said that he thought the pier was better than some jails he has seen, and that he would be the first to complain if his officers were working in a poorly maintained facility. "They would not be happy going through Rikers Island," he said, speaking of the protesters. "The rats, the roaches, the mice, the alleged rapes and sodomies. They should count their blessings. Many of the protesters were not from New York City, and they should just go on their way."

How many things are wrong with this statement? Depends how you count, I guess. I would start with the improbable notion that anyone who would utter those words could belong to any sort of "benevolent" association. But really, think about it. First of all is the small-minded and vulgar suggestion that an experience is necessarily benign when compared with the same experience augmented by the presence of vermin and the overt threat of sexual assault. Next is the disturbingly off-hand way in which the good president refers to the deplorable conditions of Rikers Island. And of course, polite society is just shocked, shocked by recidivism. One might be forgiven for thinking that disease and brutality are the quickest path to humane behavior, but it's funny how it doesn't seem to work that way. Then there's Seabrook's notion that prison rape, in Riker's or any similar institution, is only "alleged." If you had been wondering what kind of fucking scumbag could form a sentence like that and be able to sleep at night, I guess you found your answer. And beyond that, to use sexual brutality as a scare tactic to discourage nonviolent political demonstrators is unconscionable. Not that the quote requires further dissection at this point, but it's worth noting how Seabrook ends by implying that all the folks who travelled to New York to protest shouldn't have come in the first place. Unlike, I suppose, all those gun-toting Anglophones currently hanging out in Basra, Najaf, etc.