The Inconspicuous Corpse

The recent death of Osama Bin Laden was a historic moment in our country’s history and the War on Terror. The question has been stirring whether Obama will release photos of Osama’s corpse to the general American public. President Obama announced on May 4^th to CBS’s Steve Kroft that “he decided against releasing any of the pictures showing the al Qaeda leader’s corpse” (Stone). Many people still believe that no matter how gory the pictures are the photos should be released to the public because it is a critical moment in our country’s history and his death needs to be documented. Obama took his time to make his decision in order to get all the opinions and thoughts he could. Sarah Palin was vocal in her opposition of Obama’s decision and in a “widely circulated tweet, Sarah Palin accused Obama of ‘pussy-footing’ and said releasing the photos were ‘part of the mission’ (Stone).  Obama knew that people would be against his and think he was doing an injustice to the country not releasing the photos, but Obama set up a hypothetical situation asking “how Americans would react is al Qaeda members killed a U.S. soldier and published photos of his or her body” (Stone).  Obama said releasing the photos is not who we are and “we don’t trot out this stuff as trophies” (Stone). Although, images of past dictors and terroists like Hitler and Saddam Hussain, Obama’s decsion is something that he believes is ethical for our country in the place that we are in now.

  White House spokesman Jay Carney stated his argument in what I thought was one of the best responses to this controversy.  He simply stated through a moral argument that “the United States would not stoop to the same level as bin Laden and his terrorist network” (Stone). This is something that people should take into account, no matter how bad people want the photos to be released it is not a necessity and it is not civil. Carney said “the respect that was shown to his body was far greater than the respect he showed to Americans on 9/11…Because that’s who we are” (Carney).  Many innocent people lost their lives in the attacks but the fact of the matter is we killed Osama and we do not need pictures to further establish that justice that was done.