Word to the Wise | Sojourners

Word to the Wise

Letter to the Editors

I liked David Gushee’s article Mr. Obama, Close Down This Jail! (August 2013) about the travesty of justice that is Guantanamo. I must ask, however, that no one refer to the men who have been imprisoned there for years as “detainees.” Do not let the U.S. government sugarcoat the fact that these men are prisoners. If the police stop me briefly for something, they detain me. They do not imprison me for years. Words do matter.

 Robert L. Boyce III
Lincoln, Nebraska

This appears in the November 2013 issue of Sojourners
for more info