Two perspectives on Lynndie England and women at Abu Ghraib from this week's village voice:



Richard Goldstein

Say what you will about sexism in this coverage. It's definitely true. But there's another reason why England's face is so ubiquitous in the press. Many acts depicted in those awful photos resonate with certain erotic fantasies. To admit that images of forced sodomy and pyramids of naked men are arousing is to understand why guards can do such things when ordered to, and then smile for the cameras. But because these fantasies clash with acceptable sexuality, they produce revulsion. The media show just enough flesh to rivet our attention, while blurring the holes in the prisoners' rectums as a signal of what we need to repress.



But offer an image of a woman grinning at the humiliation of men and you allay any homosexual anxiety while tapping into the permissible kitten-with-a-whip fantasy. You can blame her for being unnatural even as you project yourself into her gaze. By fostering this reverie, the press helps to transform a horrible story into a source of pleasure. That's where Lynndie England comes in. She's not just the face of Torturegate; she's the dominatrix of the American dream.

Ta-Nehisi Coates

Anti-Amazons are now emboldened by the conspicuous presence of women in the Abu Ghraib scandal. "While some advocates of women in the military have argued that women's presence would improve behavior, in fact there is much evidence to suggest it has had the opposite effect," conservative columnist Linda Chavez wrote last Thursday. "For years now, the military has ignored substantial evidence that the new sex-integrated military interferes with unit cohesion and results in less discipline."



But the abuse at Abu Ghraib raises more subtle questions about what happens when gender, violence, and the military collide. Our basic assumptions are upended. Were the prisoners victims of sexual assault? If the prisoners had been women, wouldn't the act of piling them, naked, into grotesque pyramids be considered a kind of gang rape? Are we saying that female guards, like England and specialists Sabrina D. Harman and Megan Ambuhl—who face charges ranging from dereliction of duty to indecent acts—can't commit rape? Should we be shocked that female soldiers were involved in the atrocities? If we are, what does that say about what we think of women?