US Media and Post-9/11 Human Rights Violations in the Name of Counterterrorism

Abstract

This article adds to earlier research revealing that the American news media did not discharge their responsibility as a watchdog press in the post-9/11 years by failing to scrutinize extreme and unlawful government policies and actions, most of all the decision to invade Iraq based on false information about Saddam Hussein’s alleged weapons of mass destruction arsenal. The content analyses presented here demonstrate that leading US news organizations, both television and print, did not expressly refer to human rights violations when they reported on the torturing of foreign detainees during “enhanced interrogations” in US-run prison facilities abroad and the killing of civilians, including children, in US drone strikes overseas and outside theaters of war. Moreover, by framing torture and the “collateral damage” caused by drone-launched missile attacks episodically rather than in the context of human rights, the news media failed to alert the American public to the grave humanitarian violations in the so-called war on terrorism during the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations.

Full text

US Media and Post-9/11 Human Rights Violations
in the Name of Counterterrorism
Brigitte L. Nacos
1
&Yaeli Bloch-Elkon
1
Published online: 17 February 2018
#Springer Science+Business Media B.V., part of Springer Nature 2018
Abstract This article adds to earlier research revealing that the American news media
did not discharge their responsibility as a watchdog press in the post-9/11 years by
failing to scrutinize extreme and unlawful government policies and actions, most of
all the decision to invade Iraq based on false information about Saddam Hussein’s
alleged weapons of mass destruction arsenal. The content analyses presented here
demonstrate that leading US news organizations, both television and print, did not
expressly refer to human rights violations when they reported on the torturing of
foreign detainees during Benhanced interrogations^in US-run prison facilities abroad
and the killing of civilians, including children, in US drone strikes overseas and
outside theaters of war. Moreover, by framing torture and the Bcollateral damage^
caused by drone-launched missile attacks episodically rather than in the context of
human rights, the news media failed to alert the American public to the grave
humanitarian violations in the so-called war on terrorism during the George W. Bush
and Barack Obama administrations.
Keywords Tort ure .War fare .Collateraldamage .Civilian victims .Media responsibility.
Public opinion .Episodic and thematic framing patterns
BGovernments who fight terror often become guilty of human-rights abuses
themselves.^
William F. Schulz, Executive Director Amnesty International 1994–2006
Hum Rights Rev (2018) 19:193–210
https://doi.org/10.1007/s12142-018-0498-2
*Brigitte L. Nacos
bn1@columbia.edu
1
Columbia University, 420 West 118th Street, 736 IAB, New York, NY 10027, USA
Content courtesy of Springer Nature, terms of use apply. Rights reserved.