After months of civil war, Muammar Gaddafi is dead. As the news spread and celebrations in Libya and elsewhere began, the picture began to take shape: Libya is free, the people can live in peace, another tyrant has fallen in the Arab Spring. In other words, Gaddafi’s death is nothing but good news, a cause for elation. But the news that has come since clouds that picture, makes those vibrant colors murky.
For this picture to be accepted, the rebels must be the glorious democratic heroes doing battle with the evil tyrant for justice. And they certainly were—at least to some extent. Gaddafi’s leadership in Libya was geared toward nothing but his own personal pride, towards waving the golden guns he had made for himself as a symbol of his brilliance. No one should need to be reminded that he ordered his troops to fire on civilians after they made it evident they would not be easily silenced.
But even in Gaddafi’s death we can see a dark shadow. He was killed in Sirte, his hometown, after he was found in a sewer. But elsewhere in the city, 53 bodies were found. While these men were Gaddafi’s supporters who had followed him through all of his crimes, they were found having been executed with hands bound and many having already been wounded. Ten of the bodies were dumped into a reservoir nearby.
Moreover, Gaddafi himself was killed in a most brutal fashion. He was beaten, dragged away to be stabbed (and possibly sodomized with a knife), thrown on the ground and shot multiple times, thrown into the back of a truck while still alive. Only later did he die from his wounds. The way the rebels attacked Gaddafi combines a sickening amount of violence and degradation.
Perhaps more important, however, is that the rebels originally claimed Gaddafi was killed in crossfire between themselves and loyalists. They also only agreed to investigate the bodies after pressure began to mount once the news stories began to spread. The National Transitional Council (NTC)—the rebels now ruling Libya—have already shown a willingness to play the same sort of power games that have marked regimes like Gaddafi’s. These news stories also show that the rebels looted and ransacked the civilians in Sirte in the name of the revolution. In doing so they are certainly more concerned with making the uprisings out to be more beautifully democratic, but they are using the same techniques Gaddafi used. They make claims of democracy while obscuring the information necessary for any true democratic life.
But Gaddafi was strikingly similar. He marked his regime with a massive lifestyle discrepancy between the people and his family, in which those close to him lived lavishly while the public suffered disgusting projects like the Great Manmade River which abused money for glory. And yet Gaddafi’s regime also raised literacy from ten to 90 percent and increased life expectancy by 20 years. The number of doctors and hospital beds increased drastically. Certainly many, if not most, of the policies he implemented were terrible. But he also did good, and, just as the rebels do now, claimed to represent the people. Gaddafi’s terror was not simple, nor was the picture of his regime clear. He was an evil man who abused civilians, but one must be clear on how. The way the NTC fights ostensibly for democratic principles mirrors the direct democracy Gaddafi named throughout his reign. His abuse of power showed itself in the way he worked towards his goals—favoring pride and glory over true democracy—in a way that, even before they have been able to put any programs in place, the rebels have hinted at mirroring.
To fight Gaddafi, then, one must change not only the end to be worked towards, but also the way the work is done. When he was killed, he was found with his golden pistol which was then shown off by his captors and brandished as a mark of pride and glory. But if there is one enduring symbol of the dead Colonel, it is violence made golden, death turned to wealth. To separate the NTV from Gaddafi, they must rid themselves of this concern with glory and its symbols. The only violence can be that which is necessary, and it must be made plainly. Difficult though it may be, the rebels must refuse to sacrifice the methods of democracy even in the midst of the battle for it. That means that they cannot kill for vengeance, they cannot worry themselves with glory, they cannot punish without trial, and they must respect the limits of their power as defined by democratic principles. Anything short of that and the democratic character of their revolt will die away.
