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You seem to think that glangdale is trying to play down Abu Ghraib. I think they're acknowledging the horror there while also trying to draw attention to other

You seem to think that glangdale is trying to play down Abu Ghraib. I think they're acknowledging the horror there while also trying to draw attention to other atrocities.

jancsika 8y ago
Again-- what are some links to investigative reports of these atrocities that were happening in prisons of the South around the early 2000s (or 1990s) in the U.S. which are "exactly the same sort of thing" as Abu Graib?
- PhasmaFelis 8y ago
  I don't have any links on hand, personally, but I'm sure you're as good at googling as I am, maybe better. Why are you so skeptical about the idea that serious abuse may have occurred in Southern prisons? Are you concerned about slandering innocent Southern prison workers? Do you think that it would diminish the importance of the Abu Ghraib atrocities? Or are you just nitpicking over whether they were really, literally exactly as bad, as opposed to merely very-bad-but-not-quite-as-bad?
- Kim_Bruning 8y ago
  Here's a memorandum opinion somewhere in the middle. https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp2/37/855/2415783/ https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp2/... If (like me) you're mostly interested in substantiation of the claim, the summary of the situation seems useful already. There are also plenty of references and keywords to be found in this document. For instance, many news reports and court documents seem to refer back to a quote from section XI-A; searching for "culture of sadistic and malicious violence" yielded a large number of relevant hits. Apparently this has been a well known issue, and all 3 branches have been working on improvement.
  - jancsika 8y ago
    Thanks, that is helpful and I'll have a look. Even so, I still don't understand the phrase "mainstreaming of behavior" and the connection to Abu Graib. If I take that phrase seriously, I would imagine it means some process similar the militarization of the U.S. police force after the Iraq war. There, dehumanizing types of "occupation" tactics came from a place hidden to most Americans (Iraq) to American towns and cities themselves. Combined with the anti-terrorism federal grant money, there is a clear cause and effect that I've seen reported in various mainstream investigative reports over the past decade. (I don't have footnotes atm but happy to provide them if anyone really hasn't heard about this connection.) So in my example, you have systems, tactics, defense contractors, and in some cases the soldiers themselves coming back to militarize the U.S. police force. So something hidden-- troop behavior abroad-- went mainstream-- local and regional police in U.S. What's the meaning of "mainstreaming of behavior" in the GP's example? How did guard's prisoner abuse in the U.S. South turn into broader atrocities like Abu Graib? I'm not saying there's not a connection there, and I'd certainly like to learn about it if it exists. But if I seem snide, it's because I don't think there is any good reason an educated American citizen should have any foreknowledge of the connection the GP seems to be making between Abu Graib and prisoner abuse in the U.S. South. Don't tell people they weren't "paying attention" when you can cite high quality investigative journalism. And if there's no high quality investigative journalism, don't make the remark.
    - Kim_Bruning 8y ago
      I realize not everyone gets the same google results back, so this is not deterministic, but the first most naive search I could come up with based on the information available to both of us was: culture of sadistic and malicious violence abu graib and my first hit was https://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0520/p02s01-usju.html https://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0520/p02s01-usju.html . Can you tell me what your first hit was? Where are you having trouble?
    - glangdale 8y ago
      > How did guard's prisoner abuse in the U.S. South turn into broader atrocities like Abu Graib? One extremely subtle connection that we could make here is the fact that some of the key perpetrators and leaders of the abuse were FORMER SOUTHERN PRISON GUARDS. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2004/05/10/torture-at-abu-ghraib https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2004/05/10/torture-at-abu... "Questioned further, the Army investigator said that Frederick and his colleagues had not been given any “training guidelines” that he was aware of. The M.P.s in the 372nd had been assigned to routine traffic and police duties upon their arrival in Iraq, in the spring of 2003. In October of 2003, the 372nd was ordered to prison-guard duty at Abu Ghraib. Frederick, at thirty-seven, was far older than his colleagues, and was a natural leader; he had also worked for six years as a guard for the Virginia Department of Corrections. Bobeck explained: 'What I got is that SSG Frederick and CPL Graner were road M.P.s and were put in charge because they were civilian prison guards and had knowledge of how things were supposed to be run.'" The guy that pulled the longest sentence for the abuse was a prison guard between stints in Iraq 1 and Iraq 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Graner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Graner Not really subtle, here. This stuff was all over the reportage of Abu Gharaib at the time and an 'educated American citizen' might well have actually noticed if they were inclined to notice things. I would suggest that being inclined to notice this sort of thing isn't that psychologically pleasant; making Abu Gharaib into a bizarre exception ("war is hell") is way more comforting than paying attention to all that investigative journalism about what prisons are like in the US. Just because the journalism exists certainly doesn't imply that people we 'paying attention'; your overly confident skepticism and lack of grasp on basic facts on Abu Gharaib is a fine illustrative example. I'm not going to drag out the links to stuff like this in US prisons but reading through stories about abuses in prisons in the US south is pretty gruesome reading and not hard to find. If you're actually interested, https://www.hrw.org/legacy/advocacy/prisons/u-s.htm https://www.hrw.org/legacy/advocacy/prisons/u-s.htm is a decent (if old) starting point. I will just simply assert that upon seeing the Abu Gharaib stuff, I was struck not by shock but by familiarity having read a fair bit of stuff about that in the 90s.

You seem to think that glangdale is trying to play down Abu Ghraib. I think they're acknowledging the horror there while also trying to draw attention to other atrocities.

jancsika 8y ago

Again-- what are some links to investigative reports of these atrocities that were happening in prisons of the South around the early 2000s (or 1990s) in the U.S. which are "exactly the same sort of thing" as Abu Graib?

PhasmaFelis 8y ago
I don't have any links on hand, personally, but I'm sure you're as good at googling as I am, maybe better. Why are you so skeptical about the idea that serious abuse may have occurred in Southern prisons? Are you concerned about slandering innocent Southern prison workers? Do you think that it would diminish the importance of the Abu Ghraib atrocities? Or are you just nitpicking over whether they were really, literally exactly as bad, as opposed to merely very-bad-but-not-quite-as-bad?
Kim_Bruning 8y ago
Here's a memorandum opinion somewhere in the middle. https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp2/37/855/2415783/ https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp2/... If (like me) you're mostly interested in substantiation of the claim, the summary of the situation seems useful already. There are also plenty of references and keywords to be found in this document. For instance, many news reports and court documents seem to refer back to a quote from section XI-A; searching for "culture of sadistic and malicious violence" yielded a large number of relevant hits. Apparently this has been a well known issue, and all 3 branches have been working on improvement.
- jancsika 8y ago
  Thanks, that is helpful and I'll have a look. Even so, I still don't understand the phrase "mainstreaming of behavior" and the connection to Abu Graib. If I take that phrase seriously, I would imagine it means some process similar the militarization of the U.S. police force after the Iraq war. There, dehumanizing types of "occupation" tactics came from a place hidden to most Americans (Iraq) to American towns and cities themselves. Combined with the anti-terrorism federal grant money, there is a clear cause and effect that I've seen reported in various mainstream investigative reports over the past decade. (I don't have footnotes atm but happy to provide them if anyone really hasn't heard about this connection.) So in my example, you have systems, tactics, defense contractors, and in some cases the soldiers themselves coming back to militarize the U.S. police force. So something hidden-- troop behavior abroad-- went mainstream-- local and regional police in U.S. What's the meaning of "mainstreaming of behavior" in the GP's example? How did guard's prisoner abuse in the U.S. South turn into broader atrocities like Abu Graib? I'm not saying there's not a connection there, and I'd certainly like to learn about it if it exists. But if I seem snide, it's because I don't think there is any good reason an educated American citizen should have any foreknowledge of the connection the GP seems to be making between Abu Graib and prisoner abuse in the U.S. South. Don't tell people they weren't "paying attention" when you can cite high quality investigative journalism. And if there's no high quality investigative journalism, don't make the remark.
  - Kim_Bruning 8y ago
    I realize not everyone gets the same google results back, so this is not deterministic, but the first most naive search I could come up with based on the information available to both of us was: culture of sadistic and malicious violence abu graib and my first hit was https://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0520/p02s01-usju.html https://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0520/p02s01-usju.html . Can you tell me what your first hit was? Where are you having trouble?
  - glangdale 8y ago
    > How did guard's prisoner abuse in the U.S. South turn into broader atrocities like Abu Graib? One extremely subtle connection that we could make here is the fact that some of the key perpetrators and leaders of the abuse were FORMER SOUTHERN PRISON GUARDS. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2004/05/10/torture-at-abu-ghraib https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2004/05/10/torture-at-abu... "Questioned further, the Army investigator said that Frederick and his colleagues had not been given any “training guidelines” that he was aware of. The M.P.s in the 372nd had been assigned to routine traffic and police duties upon their arrival in Iraq, in the spring of 2003. In October of 2003, the 372nd was ordered to prison-guard duty at Abu Ghraib. Frederick, at thirty-seven, was far older than his colleagues, and was a natural leader; he had also worked for six years as a guard for the Virginia Department of Corrections. Bobeck explained: 'What I got is that SSG Frederick and CPL Graner were road M.P.s and were put in charge because they were civilian prison guards and had knowledge of how things were supposed to be run.'" The guy that pulled the longest sentence for the abuse was a prison guard between stints in Iraq 1 and Iraq 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Graner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Graner Not really subtle, here. This stuff was all over the reportage of Abu Gharaib at the time and an 'educated American citizen' might well have actually noticed if they were inclined to notice things. I would suggest that being inclined to notice this sort of thing isn't that psychologically pleasant; making Abu Gharaib into a bizarre exception ("war is hell") is way more comforting than paying attention to all that investigative journalism about what prisons are like in the US. Just because the journalism exists certainly doesn't imply that people we 'paying attention'; your overly confident skepticism and lack of grasp on basic facts on Abu Gharaib is a fine illustrative example. I'm not going to drag out the links to stuff like this in US prisons but reading through stories about abuses in prisons in the US south is pretty gruesome reading and not hard to find. If you're actually interested, https://www.hrw.org/legacy/advocacy/prisons/u-s.htm https://www.hrw.org/legacy/advocacy/prisons/u-s.htm is a decent (if old) starting point. I will just simply assert that upon seeing the Abu Gharaib stuff, I was struck not by shock but by familiarity having read a fair bit of stuff about that in the 90s.