Life is the art of drawing sufficient conclusions from insufficient premises.

- Samuel Butler
 

Everyone Is a Potential Torturer

by Gaia Vince

All humans are capable of committing torture and other "acts of great evil."  That is the unhappy conclusion drawn from an analysis of psychological studies.  Over 25,000 psychological studies involving eight million participants support this finding, say Susan Fiske and colleagues at Princeton University in New Jersey.  The researchers considered the circumstances surrounding how individuals committed seemingly inexplicable acts of abuse in the midst of the US military’s torture of Iraqi inmates at the Abu Ghraib prison in 2003 and 2004.  "Could any average 18-year-old have tortured these prisoners? I would have to answer: ‘Yes, just about anyone could have.’", Fiske says.

Many forms of behaviour, including acts of cruelty, are influenced as much by authority figures, peer pressure and other social interactions as by the psychology of the individual, she says.  "If we don’t understand the importance of social context and accept that almost anybody could commit acts of torture under certain circumstances, then we are setting ourselves up for situations where Abu Ghraib [atrocities] will occur again," Fiske warns.

The researchers identified situations where individuals feel provoked, stressed or taunted - such as during war - as conducive to causing aggressive acts.  And they say that the need to conform to their peer group and obey those in authority - or act in a way that they believe their superiors would approve of - could lead individuals to behave in a way that they would usually consider unacceptable.

"Certainly, acts of torture can be committed by almost everyone - not just psychopaths," says Ian Robbins, a clinical psychologist who has treated victims of torture and torturers themselves at the traumatic stress service in St George’s Hospital, London.  "A process of ‘grooming’ occurs, whereby the perpetrator is introduced to small acts of abuse - perhaps an occasional slap - and then over time these acts of abuse are built up to levels of extreme torture," he says.  "All this is carried out in a social context of acceptability, where the perpetrator is made to feel special for carrying out the abuse, and it is singled out as a special secret activity."

Fiske points out that the alienation and exclusion of certain groups renders them "contemptible, subhuman and disgusting" in the eyes of the torturer, making abuse of such dehumanised victims far easier to carry out.  And she points out that strongly cohesive social populations such as the military can either encourage prejudice - as in the case of the treatment of Iraqi prisoners - or actively discourage it.  For example, the US military offers the country’s best example of racially integrated cooperation between black and white Americans, she observes.  "Our national leadership could act to see everyone as equal and connected, or as foreigners who can be ignored and excluded.  If Iraqis fought alongside the US military, it would be harder for soldiers to dehumanise Iraqi prisoners," she says.

Robbins believes the general US prejudice against other nations is deeply ingrained.  "Calling Iraqi nationals 'insurgents', 'ragheads' or 'baddies' automatically dehumanises them and leads to a climate of disrespect," he says.

But, as the researchers note, there are always those few individuals who dissent from the group - "whistle-blowers" who alert authorities to abuse and prevent it continuing.  "People who opt out often have a strong sense of moral values or religious conviction that allows them to override their natural inclination to follow their superiors or fit in with their peer group," Robbins says.  But they are few, and because under certain circumstances almost anyone can commit torture, situations that could foster an atmosphere of abuse must be controlled, he believes.  "Any processes involving locking people up and interrogation need to be open to public scrutiny and not carried out by the military in secret, I find it extremely frightening that the American military in the Pentagon have been discussing which kinds of torture are acceptable and which are not,"

Journal reference: Science (vol 306)

Source: www.newscientist.com New Scientist news service 25 November 2004

See also:

	If We Knew for Sure, What Then? (the next page in this section) - "It didn't just take two and a half hours for a prisoner to die.  There was two-way communication in terms of audio," he said, adding this implied the scientists were also monitoring the degree of suffering during a slow death.  I don't think there is any question that such practices continue to take place."
	America's Gulag (further on in this section) - for several stories including the US deporting detainees to countries where torture is allowed, a review of the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment, the "productive" use of disgust and others...

They Speak for Themselves

Source: workingforchange.com

Pentagon Reveals Rejected Chemical Weapons

The Pentagon considered developing a host of non-lethal chemical weapons that would disrupt discipline and morale among enemy troops, newly declassified documents reveal.

	Most bizarre among the plans was one for the development of an "aphrodisiac" chemical weapon that would make enemy soldiers sexually irresistible to each other.  Provoking widespread homosexual behaviour among troops would cause a "distasteful but completely non-lethal" blow to morale, the proposal says.
	Other ideas included chemical weapons that attract swarms of enraged wasps or angry rats to troop positions, making them uninhabitable.
	Another was to develop a chemical that caused "severe and lasting halitosis," making it easy to identify guerrillas trying to blend in with civilians.
	There was also the idea of making troops' skin unbearably sensitive to sunlight.

The proposals, from the US Air Force Wright Laboratory in Dayton, Ohio, date from 1994.  The lab sought Pentagon funding for research into what it called "harassing, annoying and 'bad guy'-identifying chemicals".  The plans have been posted online by the Sunshine Project, an organisation that exposes research into chemical and biological weapons.  Spokesman Edward Hammond says it was not known if the proposed $7.5 million, six-year research plan was ever pursued.

Source: newscientist.com Friday 14 January 2005

For articles on bioterrorism, patriotism enforcers, airport security, children in war, McCarthyism, humanitarian killing, Voice of America, pipelines, truth, lessons, anthrax, hatred and pain click the "Up" button below to take you to the Index page for this War on Terrorism section.