Rebranding the Killing Machine: ’Zero Dark Thirty’ Selling Extra Judicial Killings
▻http://mondoweiss.net/2013/01/rebranding-promotion-judicial.html
While much of the air is being sucked up by this debate, scant attention has been paid to the larger, and in my view, more significant message of this film: that extra judicial killing is good. The film teaches us that brown men can and should be targeted and killed with impunity, in violation of international law, and that we should trust the CIA to act with all due diligence.
At a time when the key strategy in the “war on terror” has shifted from conventional warfare to extra judicial killing, here comes a film that normalizes and justifies this strategy. The controversy around this film will no doubt increase its box office success, but don’t expect mainstream debate on extra judicial killing. On this, there is bipartisan consent. Therefore the real scandal behind this Oscar nominated film—its shameless propaganda for extra judicial murder—will remain largely hidden.