Last week Jill Carroll was finally released from being held captive in Iraq for the past 82 days. It brought a sigh of relief to her family, friends, co-workers and fellow journalists.
Carroll’s life seemed to be doomed when she was not released soon after she was kidnapped and when her interpreter was killed. Most people assumed that since the demands were not met for her release that her kidnappers would take her life. Thankfully that did not happen.
She was forced to make a propaganda video in order to finally be released. It is shocking that some people actually believed that she did this on her own free will, speaking her own beliefs. In the video she criticized President Bush and what the United States was doing in Iraq. These obviously were not her thoughts and it is ridiculous that people are making her feel guilty about the video.
Carroll agreed to make the video in order to save her life; she should not have to explain her actions. Her life was on the line and all she wanted was to be able to go home. She did everything that was asked of her in order to regain her freedom. For all she knew, if she refused to be in that video she would have been killed.
I think a lot of people can agree that they would do everything possible to save their own life. Carroll already saw her interpreter murdered right in front of her eyes, so she knew that her captors were serious about killing her as well.
In a situation like that, she did the right thing, everyone at the Christian Science Monitor agrees. I feel bad that she did the right thing but now has to actually explain her actions to the public. All the poor girl probably wanted to do was see her family and friends when she was released, but no, she had to first make a statement explaining why she said those things in the video.
Let the girl rest! Who cares what she said, she obviously was not going to speak her own mind on television while being held captive by people who she thought were going to kill her at any moment.
The press was acting as though they were shocked that she lied to them and said that her captors treated her fairly, when in reality they did not. What did they expect her to say when she was still on their territory?
The people who criticized Carroll should offer her an apology. They should be grateful that we did not lose another journalist in Iraq. A lot of lives have been lost in the Iraq war, and when one person’s life is saved everyone should be grateful.
Posted to the web by Tim Hague
