Guantanamo Bay... a tourist resort?

I saw this article over the weekend in the Irish Daily Mail. To sum it up, the US are trying to market Guantanamo as a tourist resort for Americans looking for a 'getaway' holiday at a knockdown price. Who in their right mind would holiday at the resort knowing prisoners, the majority of which who have not had a trial, are being tortured and subjected to inhumane treatment in the infamous Detention Center itself is only minutes away?

I don't know which is worse:
the people who would visit such a 'resort' or the US government for trying to market it in such an innocent 'there's nothing going on here' kinda manner.

However, there's worse to come. The most disturbing aspect of the article were the so-called 'souvenirs' on offer at the gift shop in the resort. Yes, you read correctly - souvenirs. In this shop everything from t-shirts to keyrings to mugs are on offer for those wanting to bring a little slice of Guantanamo back home. Naturally, Amnesty have issued a statement condemning the resort.




I can't even begin to comprehend how wrong this is. It's almost a glorification, an insulting mockery of the suffering that is endured in this camp. Frankly, it's shocking. I want to believe that it's a joke, a hoax but unfortunately it exists in our world right now. I want to meet the people behind this resort and those who are responsible for designing such sick souvenirs and ask them: how do they sleep at night?

It's stories like this that make me realize that even in the modern Western world, we still have a depressingly long way to go to ending injustice and inequality.