re: #52 Bob Levin

First I think we would have to untangle whether we are talking about Rachel Corrie the person or Rachel Corrie the symbol. I suspect that the topic is about Rachel Corrie the symbol. She is a symbol for several things. This would be one discussion, the nature of what she symbolizes.

Does she, as a person, deserve to be “demonized again and again with a fervor I usually see reserved only for the most notoriously brutal terrorists?”

No, but what about the almost universally acknowledged symbol of Rachel Corrie? The act of turning someone into a symbol is without question dehumanizing—but this has happened everywhere.

What is your interpretation of this symbol? You can’t ‘un-symbolize’ her anymore than you can un-ring a bell.

I have difficulty separating Rachel Corrie the person from Rachel Corrie the symbol. It’s not as if she was a Saddam Hussein, a Muammar Qaddafi, or an Osama bin Laden who had spent a lifetime terrorizing & brutalizing people.

If I had to choose the latter, then my interpretation would be that she symbolizes the dehumanization of Israelis & Palestinians that has resulted from a festering, dysfunctional, decades-long conflict. She symbolizes youth poisoned & twisted by a steady diet of hateful propaganda. She symbolizes the hope & bright potential of yet another generation snuffed out by the dark forces of “realpolitik”, corruption, cynicism, and third-party jockeying for national interests. Most of all, she symbolizes the futility of believing that continuing on the current path will lead to anything other than more death & suffering for everyone involved.