Literature and Law Spring 2020

Truth Commission vs Eichmann

When reading the first chapter of Country of My Skull, I could not help but think about our class discussion about the first chapter of Eichmann in Jerusalem. In our discussion, we talked about how the courtroom in Eichmann in Jerusalem is set up like a theater which takes away from the complexity of the situation. This is seen when the prosecution tries to paint Eichmann as an evil mastermind who orchestrated the whole Holocaust in order to create a sense of sensationalism which is simply not correct and it undermines the whole legal process.

In the first chapter of Country of My Skull, the exact opposite atmosphere is set up.The Truth Commission is extremely complex and anything but simple. Justice Dullah Omar states the Truth Commission started because “a strong feeling that some mechanism must be found to deal with all violations in a way which would ensure that we put the country on a sound moral basis” (8). The commission acknowledges the complexity of the past political policy and understands that a magnitude of people were hurt by these policies. Most importantly they realize that not one person is responsible but that a long history of political policies and politicians are to be blamed. There is not one person to put the blame on because apartheid represents a whole political system, and it would be unfair to the victims for the process to be rushed. In Eichmann in Jerusalem, the court is less concerned with finding out the truth and more concerned about being the court that tires and finds guilty a member of the Nazi regime. Having this scapegoat takes away from the truth and the complexity of the Holocaust. Former commissioner of police, General Johan van der Merwe talks about how he was an enforcer of the law but never an advocate. He says that, “it is not the police who came up with apartheid but the politicians” (6).

Putting the “truth” in Truth Commission

Truth Commissions are weird in that their purpose is not to seek justice. While crimes were committed, they are prosecuting people for those crimes. Knowing that there are many paths to reconciliation in circumstances like these, I wonder why South Africa chose to use a Truth Commission. I think that Krog deals with the purpose and effectiveness in the book, focusing on different ideas. If justice isn’t the goal here, then what is? I see a few answers presented in the novel to explain what the goal is for truth commissions.

Narrative: The novel focuses on the importance of stories. One of the operations of the truth commission is to give the survivors a space to tell their stories. It also works to tell the stories of those who aren’t around to tell them. Krog gives herself this job saying, “I snatch you from the death of forgetfulness. I tell your story, complete your ending,” (Krog 38). She also focuses whole chapters like “Truth Is a Woman” on just relaying stories. The truth commission is a place for those affected by the crimes to be heard.

Truth: The most straight-forward and simple answer is that the truth commission is there to find out what actually happened without the threat of prosecution. Krog explains that there is no one version of the truth. The commission can’t define a truth of what happened, but instead it allows people to accept their own version of truth. It presents the stories and creates a system in which people can analyze and understand what they believe to be true.

Reconciliation: This last purpose is the strangest. While the definition, as explained by Krog, is supposed to be restored, that isn’t possible here. Krog says that “there is nothing to go back to, no previous state or relationship one would wish to restore,” (Krog 143). This is because the system has been a broken one. South Africa can’t restore a broken system and the truth commission allows it to move forward rather than reentering the cycle of violence of the system. Krog explains that reconciliation is actually a part of it and it is meant to be more of a transformation- a way to understand the past, not to accept it, and to move forward from that understanding so that this situation doesn’t happen again.

While I think that Krog is making these observations about the purpose, it is even more difficult to understand if this is what the victims want and are getting from the truth commission. For example, Krog talks about the people who are sitting there and listening to the atrocities about capital punishment yet still call for its use. It’s complicated and it’s hard, but South Africa specifically chose a truth commission over other forms of closing and Krog attempts to find out why.

To Forgive or Not

When watching a Long Night’s Journey Into Day it is very hard to believe these events actually happened for such a long time. The creation of the Truth & Reconciliation Commission was a strategy that had to be implemented. For the countless lives lost through the struggle, there needed to be accountability for those responsible. We see this similar commission in Death and The Maiden with Gerardo being one of the members of the commission overlooking the previous crimes. Now the question arises, do these commissions help those affected get over the atrocities or only reopen these deep wounds? For many of the mothers and family members in a Long Night’s Journey Into Day, reliving the crimes and meeting with the perpetrators helps with closure. With Amy Biehl’s parents, they go as far as meeting the family of one of their daughters murderers. They mention how now looking back at the whole set of events, and how Amy would have wanted them to continue her work. To continue to assist the movement against apartheid, and the injustice many faced in that period.

Reverend Desmond Tutu brings up a point that I believe carries the best way to look at this whole situation. For him, he mentions how this commission needs to do its due process and look back at these crimes to ensure that this will not happen in the future. This is a similar point brought up in a Death and The Maiden. Paulina tells Gerardo how she has difficulty reliving her past pain whereas Gerardo says this is necessary for her to be able to move on and “live free” as well as for such an administration not to arise in the future. Unfortunately, apartheid was around for over 40 years and there is no possibility of going back to fix what happened. The victims cannot be brought back. What can happen is that they can be remembered, honored, and their stories be told so like Tutu said, such a tragedy will not rise again.

Trauma Inflicted Upon Journalists in Country of my Skull

“We sleep between one and two hours a night. We live on chocolate and potato chips. After five years without cigarettes, I start smoking again” (Krog, 51).

This quote written by Krog is seen in chapter three of Country of my Skull as she explains the emotional conflict that journalists like her are forced to deal with throughout their careers reporting on the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

The film, Long Night’s Journey Into Day did not address the emotional burden brought upon the reporters. This was something I had thought about; how it must be extremely difficult to put one’s emotions aside while having to film and interview innocent people who are experiencing a very painful level of grief. I was so glad that Krog touched upon this in Country of my Skull because it was something that really interested me. I am a particularly sensitive and empathetic person, so I do not see myself as fit for the role that Krog is able to fulfil, although she does struggle.

There is a sense of strength that such journalists are required to possess in order to perform their jobs efficiently. Krog was affected by the stories in such an extreme way that she was drawn to return to a past addiction portrays the severe emotional trauma that comes with being a journalist. Krog shows that the amount of emotional strength it takes to quit an addiction like smoking cigarettes can be easily lost when an emotional trauma of equal or greater force interferes.

Krog continues to write, “we develop techniques to lessen the impact. We no longer go into the halls where the hearings take place, because of the accumulated grief. We watch on the monitors provided. The moment someone starts crying, we start writing/scribbling/doodling” (Krog, 51). She shows readers that they are forced to come up with ways to deal with the trauma inflicted upon them. I thought it was very interesting that she also wrote that the journalists are, in a way, each other’s therapists; as they are going through the same thing, they are there for each other to ease the intense emotional burden.

The emotional burden of being a journalist and having to report on such sensitive cases is something I have not thought about prior to watching Long Night’s Journey Into Day and reading Country of my Skull. Learning about this actually gave me a much better appreciation for the work that these journalists do. Their careers are not just reciting information about cases; they are often faced with hardships and are forced to find their own ways of putting their emotions aside to lessen their own agony.

The Role of the Journalist : Covering the TRC Hearings

William Tradd Stover

This focuses on a more subtle idea that the text presents: journalism. Since Krog had that position and was forced to deal with the realities that came with it, I wanted to explore this concept a bit in thinking about what a journalist would have gone through.

In Long ‘Night’s Journey Into Day’, the viewer is able to see the stories unfold in front of their own eyes. In some of the shots from the film, reporters are seen crowded around like in any other big case or event, avidly listening and almost misplaced in how they are dispersed. In this book, the reader is given the clear perpective of a journalist during this time, one that has real, complex emotions about what is going on.

As I think about this work being largely made up of a journalist’s viewpoint, I think first about what having that title entails. Usually, at least in America, people hope that reporting will be fair, balanced, and rather objective in most cases. In this case, it is hard to fathom what it must have been like for someone covering the cases and hearing testimonies to do their job ‘properly’ and objectively. There is a feeling of anger toward foreign news people that just want a story and do not have the same sort of passion for what is actually going on behind the camera lens and notepads. It is almost impossible to report on these hearings without some sort of emotion poking through in some form.

Krog is in a peculiar position given that she is an Afrikaner and is forced to deal with her nation’s history of injustice and gruesome behavior. The TRC’s hearings were obviously excruciating for the people involved, and having to report on such a thing is a really interesting and intimidating concept. I imagine that it was difficult for Krog to place herself into a group during this time of attempted reconciliation, being an Afrikaner woman. Was she responsible in some way for these spiteful acts? Was she different because of her womanhood? How could she do her part in giving victims the respect that they deserve?

When I think of all the media present at the hearings, I think of a certain picture that I looked up that really almost gives me chills. It is a photo of Jeff Benzien reenacting what he would have done to torture a black man during the apartheid rule. It is a really jarring sight, and I can not help but to think of all the people in the room that witnessed that. Something like that represents years of injustice and division, and it can be dwindled down to a click on a camera: fascinating.

This post is a little all over the place, but I was really intrigued by so many things. The ideas of journalism as a means of story telling, identity, self-placement, and ownership really struck me.

It’s not just black and white: Forgiveness in Long Night’s Journey into Day

Long Night’s journey into day is a story of truth, social justice, reconciliation, and undoubtedly forgiveness. For me, watching this documentary and seeing the awful things done and the pain the families faced was heartbreaking. I was angry watching the men put on trial for the things they did, as well as seeing the mothers wail and cry over their dead sons. I can’t even imagine what it would be like to have the person that killed one of your family members sitting right in front of you asking to be set free. Although this film made me angry and heartbroken, it also gave me the ability to rethink the wrongs of others and my thoughts on vengeance. The families in this film were able to face the truth, the people who hurt them, and heal from it.

In the books we’ve been reading (Eichmann In Jerusalem, Death and the Maiden, etc.), we were faced with the ideas of revenge and retributive justice, but none of them mentioned forgiveness or restoration. Where retributive justice can be effective, I think letting the past be the past and restoring justice can build a stronger community. We want those who hurt us to pay but this documentary shows that forgiveness is the first step for healing and moving on. At the end of the documentary, one of the mothers who was talking to her son’s killer said, “forgive those who have sinned against you,” something this film has highlighted and something everyone can take notes on.

Country of My Skull: The Personal insights of Krog and Their Impact on the Story She Tells

In the journalist’s approach to telling a story of the truth commission post-South Africa apartheid, we not only get the story of those affected via perpetrators and victims, but we also get an inside look into how these stories effected spectators as well. Krog provides accounts of both victims and perpetrators and provides her own account of how their stories affect her. With this, we get a perspective of someone who is not directly involved with crimes committed in a dark time for South Africans. Even Krog, an outsider to the apartheid, is heavily effected by the heinous ongoing of crimes that happened to so many innocent citizens. Krog writes,” No poetry should come forth from this. May my hand fall off if I write this. So I sit around. Naturally and unnaturally without words. Stunned by the knowledge of the price people have paid for their words. If I write this, I exploit and betray. If I don’t, I die,” (p.66). These lines give the reader a sense of what it was like for Krog to have been able to put these stories into a novel. It shows struggle within the mind of not knowing what to do with information that is not necessarily the business of Krog, but such a series of horrid injustices, that she wants the whole world to know about it. This internal struggle comes from how much Krog has involved herself with these stories and truly listened and felt sympathy for the citizens who have suffered so much loss. As a reader, one reads these stories that Krog tells of other people’s misfortunes and cannot help but to feel as if they have been punched in the gut. This novel is a telling of grievances written by someone who is doing their own grieving over the situation at a distance. Krog worries by writing what she does that she will exploit the pain of all of these people. By admitting this to the reader it is so clear that that is not at all the message she is giving when she writes of her own sorrows from listening to these people’s countless stories. Krog brings an emotional empathy for these people grieving. She writes, “It is not so much the deaths, and the names of the dead, but the web of infinite sorrow woven around them,” (p.45).

A Long Night’s Journey into Day: What does Restorative Justice Look Like?

A Long Night’s Journey into Day is one of the most emotionally-charged documentaries I have seen in a long time and really made me question my notions of justice and what that looks like in the aftermath of atrocity. Through the stories told to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, a picture of a broken nation is painted by a broken people. I acknowledged the importance in revealing the crimes of the perpetrators to the court of public opinion, but the pain it caused to the families of these victims made me wonder what it ultimately accomplished for them. What good could come from giving those who backed a racist system of oppression amnesty? It became clear to me when I heard Archbishop Tutu talk about his ideas on “restorative justice”

He mentioned that as a society, there is an emphasis on retributive justice for the victims, but that restorative could be just as impactful-if not more so. Going forward to the stories of the Gugulethu Seven was much more impactful to me after keeping the idea of restorative justice in mind. Watching the mothers of the boys as they painfully relived the experience of their sons’ deaths and came face to face with their killers. They went in unwilling to forgive, but by facing the pain and one of the men who caused it and allowing themselves to feel that horrific pain, they were able to forgive.

Before Tutu even introduces the idea it is illustrated by the Biehls and their willingness to forgive the men who killed their daughter. When confronted by the reality of her death they were able to heal and make sure that those who killed her and their families would not suffer. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was an entity dedicated to this restorative justice for not only the healing of those personally affected by the damages of an oppressive regime, but to the nation of South Africa itself. By confronting the pain caused in the past and through the acts of confession and forgiveness the hope is to absolve and to prevent the horrors of Apartheid from happening again.

The Tragedy of the TRC

Within the movie, Long Night’s Journey Into Day, we are taken through personal stories and actions during the Apartheid’s rule in South Africa which lasted from 1948-1994. This film is startling yet beautiful in the way it recounts the experience of real people with real emotions. This movie is raw and explicit, but then again, so was the Apartheid. This film follows the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the court-like body assembled in order to distribute justice after the end of the Apartheid.

As many people were put on “trial” for crimes they committed against the South African people, it was explained that it almost had seemed like the TRC was similar to the reenactment of an ancient tragic play. This was especially interesting as this association is unique when you look at the other traits of the film. “The audience actually plays the role of a chorus in [this] ancient tragic play (Long Night’s). The purpose of the chorus within ancient plays is to connect the audience deeper to the characters and play itself. As they reenact and retell the horrid stories of what happened to many innocent people, when the audience “squirms” naturally, so does the audience. Although the chorus of the TRC is a sensible and composed group of people, they are still people fighting for their freedom and justice.

In this presentation of justice you notice the audience, or the chorus, as one cohesive unit, fighting for what is right. One protester during this time is recorded saying that “when you kill [him] you create more enemies […] my family is becoming your enemy and my friends become your enemy” (Long Night’s). This reference of one united force, fighting for justice, this “tragedy”, to me, becomes a lot more of a battle cry for the citizens of South Africa.

When I first watched this movie and they brought up the connection of the play, I actually restarted the film in order to do my best to understand how they would display the trial and chorus. Although just a glance into the issues of the Apartheid, we get a close comparison of how the innocent people of this area were affected by such an actual real tragedy.

The ethical grey area of Robert McBride

The film, Long Night’s Journey into Day, and the first part of Antjie Krog’s novel Country of My Skull, have moved me profoundly. Both have made me cry, and both have forced me to think about things in ways I never have before. Trying to decipher out right from wrong in the world of post-apartheid South Africa is messy, but I generally have been able to keep my own moral compass straight. There have been lots of different kinds of villains presented, and numerous types of victims. I have wondered what evil truly is, and pondered the question of how guilt disperses between organizations and people. Right from wrong, though, I have not had to question–until Robert McBride.

McBride is the one figure in the movie that I still cannot come to terms with. It is hard to consider him good, but hard to consider him bad. He seems genuinely remorseful for killing, but he is blatantly unrepentant for his acts of violence. From his point of view, he was a soldier fighting a war, and civilians were caught in the crossfire. Thus, he can be sorry for such sad outcomes, and wish the deaths had never happened, but he cannot be held responsible for them. In his view, the deaths had to happen, because they sent a message to his opposing army. He even compared his having to take the stand and confess for the Truth Commission to an Ally soldier being judged on the same terms as a Nazi soldier. At first, I was taken aback by the gall of that, and I thought the two were completely uncomparable–then I started thinking, how far apart are they really? The Holocaust and apartheid were two completely different systems of oppression, obviously, but can one way of holding down an entire people be better or worse than another? And if we look at apartheid as a cruel and violent system which solely did harm for purposes of oppressing people based on racial lines-which we should-can we blame a young person for joining a fight to end it, no matter what lives were unintentionally lost in the crossfire? War is not pretty. I also think it is important to note his point that he has still never received an apology for what apartheid did to him. I think it is interesting that most of the people we saw apologize in the film were black, and I think it says something about the intended audience.