8 ms·

American Psychological Association Bolstered C.I.A. Torture Program

118 points by mpnagle 11y ago

pnut 11y ago
The Bush years made me so ill, I had to stop following the news in order to maintain my health. A generational low point for western society.
- wavefunction 11y ago
  They made me ill too but I made a point to read about every ugly and evil little thing being done in my name. It's important to understand the costs being paid by innocent people in the misguided name of "freedom" at the direction of evil men and women. I cannot close my eyes to the suffering of my brothers and sisters.
- jcromartie 11y ago
  Um... when did it get better?
- atom-morgan 11y ago
  What makes me ill is people who think it was exclusive to Bush's term.
  - imglorp 11y ago
    I think Bush had the audacity to push through extraordinary measures initially. He was responsible for a number of Bill of Rights attacks: Habeas Corpus, search and seizure, 1A, Gitmo, and this whole rendition thing. The author of the Patriot act has since come forward and indicated he had no intention of having it abused in scope as we're seeing. PA was not intended to quash dissent nor pursue common criminals. Obama ran on a platform of repealing PA and restoring the Bill of Rights. Of course, he did a quiet 180 on the issue shortly after entering office and has since issued more secret executive orders than any other president. It makes one wonder what happens to Presidents after they're sworn in. Does someone read them in on the facts of life? Or are they simply always dirtbags whose principles are for sale?
    - atom-morgan 11y ago
      > It makes one wonder what happens to Presidents after they're sworn in. Does someone read them in on the facts of life? Or are they simply always dirtbags whose principles are for sale? This is precisely why I had someone recently tell me they'd like to see Ron Paul get elected. He's someone who has been relatively consistent on his views throughout his career as a politician - often to his detriment. They said if he got elected and also did the 180, it'd surely be the nail in the coffin on the "facts of life" reading you mentioned being a reality.
      - theorique 11y ago
        They said if he got elected and also did the 180, it'd surely be the nail in the coffin on the "facts of life" reading you mentioned being a reality. You mean that he would have been corrupted? Or that there were secret truths that Presidents have access to that change their actions from what they claim in advance that they would do 'as President'.
        atom-morgan 11y ago
        Neither. They were implying that in the case of a 180 the President is a puppet.
- vermontdevil 11y ago
  What are you gonna do if the government does this to you? I mean its entirely possible. First they came for < insert group > etc..
Someone1234 11y ago
People who were legally in the US, were literally picked up off of American streets, blindfolded, put into secret CIA aircraft, flown to Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, and Uzbekistan, and then tortured [0]. Yet not a single person has gone to jail over this. The CIA hasn't been reformed structurally, and no additional oversights have been added. In fact the only difference between then and now is we have a different administration in the White House who are just choosing not to continue it... Does this not disturb anyone? Isn't this exactly the type of stuff people used to joke about the USSR/KGB doing? Since when did the US constitution only apply to citizens and not residence? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_rendition#21st_century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_rendition#21st_c...
- hyperliner 11y ago
  This is relevant: "Are Foreign Nationals Entitled to the Same Constitutional Rights As Citizens?" http://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1302&context=facpub http://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?ar...
  - skwirl 11y ago
    The answer is "NO" because the Supreme Court has ruled that they are not. Unfortunately the Constitution grants judicial powers to the Supreme Court and not to David Cole, Law Professor.
    - hyperliner 11y ago
      Actually, the Supreme Court has not offered an absolute rule. If you read the article I offered, you would have learned about the nuances that the Supreme Court has provided in terms of areas of protection to non citizens and areas of no protection.
  - pdkl95 11y ago
    No, it's not. The fact that the person being tortured isn't a US citizen doesn't make torture any less of a contemptible, barbaric act that is unfit for civilized society. If basic human decency is not convincing, I suggest reading 18 U.S. Code § 2340A, which says (a) Offense.— Whoever outside the United States commits or attempts to commit torture shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both, and if death results to any person from conduct prohibited by this subsection, shall be punished by death or imprisoned for any term of years or for life. (b) Jurisdiction.— There is jurisdiction over the activity prohibited in subsection (a) if— (1) the alleged offender is a national of the United States; or (2) the alleged offender is present in the United States, irrespective of the nationality of the victim or alleged offender. The nationality of the victim doesn't matter.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
randomname2 11y ago
I guess this shows how deeply corrupt the leadership of the APA is? Realistically how would they say no to this?
- cryoshon 11y ago
  Easy: document saying no, then go public with the fact that the government tried to pervert its medical apparatus into supporting the torture programs. Boom, credibility of the USG's medical agencies goes to shit overnight, and you're inoculated from further manipulation.
sixQuarks 11y ago
There are so many of us that are sick and tired of reading this kind of stuff and knowing that no one will be held accountable. The general population is so apathetic, it's hard to gain any traction. What can we do? Seriously? Can we start a kickstarter to raise funds, to hire lawyers or whatever is needed to make sure people are sent to jail over this? What can we do that will make an impact, without relying on the ignorant mainstream public? There's got to be something
- cryoshon 11y ago
  You're not going to like this answer. We can strike. If we organize enough people in the tech sector or the general public and withhold work until conditions improve, this country will be brought to its knees nearly instantly and we can get some real change to happen. You think the people who run the country are going to tolerate reduced profits over some political mishaps committed by the last president? It'll be much cheaper to bribe their politicians to do some legal mumbo jumbo to put the proper people into hot water than to sustain a huge revenue loss.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - pdkl95 11y ago
    While I support this idea and have believed for a long time now that a critical mass of the sysadmins, engineers, et al. that keep the world turning have more power than most politicians if they could just ignore the usual arguments for a while and organize. Look at the panic over Occupy; if the money stops flowing because nobody is there to keep the infrastructure working, I expect mass hysteria. This kind of plan is dangerous - in this political climate, there is a good chance such a strike would be labeled a terror plot, and the people with guns will be sent in to do what they usually do. Another consideration: similar to how "total information awareness" wasn't really canceled - it just got a new name and distributed into several departments - COINTELPRO wasn't really canceled either. Remember that any leader or central organizer is a target. Decentralize everything.
cryoshon 11y ago
This is a pretty sick example of institutions being corrupted by the power of the government. Where are the prosecutions of the APA? Where are the disbarments? Where are the war crimes trials for the Bush regime? This stuff is done in our names without our consent, and we have an ethical obligation to act out and speak out.
- olefoo 11y ago
  We may not be able to move the DOJ on prosecuting Addington, Wu and the other architects of the torture program. But the APA has an ethics committee http://www.apa.org/about/governance/bdcmte/ethics-committee.aspx http://www.apa.org/about/governance/bdcmte/ethics-committee.... If the notion of American doctors aiding and abetting torture strikes you as a matter that that the APA should discipline it's members over. Contact the ethics committee. The staff liaison's email is sbehnke@apa.org
dba7dba 11y ago
delete
- v64 11y ago
  Pearl Harbor was an attack by the Japanese military on orders from the Japanese government. The 9/11 attacks were not perpetrated by a government or nation. Most of the 9/11 terrorists were Saudi Arabian nationals. By your logic, why was there no military action against Saudi Arabia?
  - Spooky23 11y ago
    The grandparent shouldn't have deleted the comment. It highlights a nuance that isn't often explored while ruffling some feathers. So, why didn't we go nuke Saudi Arabia? A: It would not have accomplished anything. Morality is absent from the decision making process when it comes to warfare. If killing a million Saudis were the answer, they'd be dead. Technology has made it possible (or necessary) for non nation-state actors to levy something very similar to war against nation-states. In the case of a nation-state in the industrial and post-industrial age, the approach is straightforward -- you engage the enemy in the field AND destroy his ability to make war. The US Civil War was the dress-rehearsal for this, and WW1 explored the limits of what could be done before the innovations of the 20th century were fully baked. Today, you can't have total war, because tools exist to permanently execute a total war -- nuclear weapons. So we fight in the fringes by arming various individuals and engaging in an evolved form of guerrilla warfare. I think that history will conclude that the last decade and a half has been a process of the ultimate, seemingly omni-potent superpower figuring out how to scale down its war machine down as low as the individual actor.
Bud 11y ago
This headline should not have been edited to remove the words "Report Says", which make it clear that this story is not the contention of the NY Times itself and not based on their own investigating reporting, but is rather a contention from someone else's report.
hackuser 11y ago
Related: The head of a body that advises U.S. terrorism interrogators on ethics on Thursday called for a special prosecutor to probe how the abuse of captured militants during the Bush administration's "war on terror" was allowed to happen. http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/04/30/us-usa-torture-idUSKBN0NL2T720150430 http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/04/30/us-usa-torture-idU...
zeidrich 11y ago
There are statements about legality, about outrage, about who should be punished, about the corruption of organizations. That's not interesting to me. I'm not happy about it, but I'm actually more disappointed. The thing is, something like the APA should, more than anyone, know how ineffective torture would be for getting the kind of information that they were looking to find. The problem with torture, aside from the fact that it's hurtful, is that it is ineffective. We know this. We've studied it, we've already got a lot of data. The APA is supposed to be the professionals in this field that should be able to say that we shouldn't be torturing people. It's like you find out there was a group of doctors that are contracted to create a virus to wipe out a segment of the population, and the doctors deliver something that causes extreme itchiness and the inability to control your bowels. It doesn't kill anyone, it just makes your city smell like shit and causes these people targeted to be angry and uncomfortable. It's still heinous, and immoral. But not only that, it's ineffective and worthless. I mean, the torture argument comes up and there's always defenders that say "desperate times call for desperate measures". But the thing is, it doesn't matter how desperate you are, torture doesn't lead to good results, no matter how angry you are, no matter how bad you want it to. The thing is, I can understand if people in the military might not know this, or believe it. But the thing is, the APA is supposed to represent an organization that understands our minds. They SHOULD know this. So more than just "Oh they did a heinous thing" I am thinking "Oh, they did an idiotic thing, AND it was heinous!" I mean, if they were to do some horrific torturous mind control stuff, and because of that we got information that led to the safe return of troops abroad and a swift victory over the enemy, then I'd still be angry that they were willing to do horrible things to get that victory. But I'd respect their ability. In the same way that I think a nuclear bomb is a horrific weapon that should have never been used on a civilian population, but I think that the people who built it were really good at what they do. But it's like asking for a nuclear weapon, and getting something that detonates and makes the city and surrounding countryside stink for years but doesn't harm anyone. I mean, it's detestable that they'd be working to try to murder massive numbers of civilians. But even more than that, it's awful that they failed so badly at it, and obviously never really knew what they were doing to start with. They didn't accomplish their goals, and just made people angry.

118 points by mpnagle 11y ago

pnut 11y ago

The Bush years made me so ill, I had to stop following the news in order to maintain my health. A generational low point for western society.

wavefunction 11y ago
They made me ill too but I made a point to read about every ugly and evil little thing being done in my name. It's important to understand the costs being paid by innocent people in the misguided name of "freedom" at the direction of evil men and women. I cannot close my eyes to the suffering of my brothers and sisters.
jcromartie 11y ago
Um... when did it get better?
atom-morgan 11y ago
What makes me ill is people who think it was exclusive to Bush's term.
- imglorp 11y ago
  I think Bush had the audacity to push through extraordinary measures initially. He was responsible for a number of Bill of Rights attacks: Habeas Corpus, search and seizure, 1A, Gitmo, and this whole rendition thing. The author of the Patriot act has since come forward and indicated he had no intention of having it abused in scope as we're seeing. PA was not intended to quash dissent nor pursue common criminals. Obama ran on a platform of repealing PA and restoring the Bill of Rights. Of course, he did a quiet 180 on the issue shortly after entering office and has since issued more secret executive orders than any other president. It makes one wonder what happens to Presidents after they're sworn in. Does someone read them in on the facts of life? Or are they simply always dirtbags whose principles are for sale?
  - atom-morgan 11y ago
    > It makes one wonder what happens to Presidents after they're sworn in. Does someone read them in on the facts of life? Or are they simply always dirtbags whose principles are for sale? This is precisely why I had someone recently tell me they'd like to see Ron Paul get elected. He's someone who has been relatively consistent on his views throughout his career as a politician - often to his detriment. They said if he got elected and also did the 180, it'd surely be the nail in the coffin on the "facts of life" reading you mentioned being a reality.
    - theorique 11y ago
      They said if he got elected and also did the 180, it'd surely be the nail in the coffin on the "facts of life" reading you mentioned being a reality. You mean that he would have been corrupted? Or that there were secret truths that Presidents have access to that change their actions from what they claim in advance that they would do 'as President'.
      - atom-morgan 11y ago
        Neither. They were implying that in the case of a 180 the President is a puppet.
vermontdevil 11y ago
What are you gonna do if the government does this to you? I mean its entirely possible. First they came for < insert group > etc..

Someone1234 11y ago

People who were legally in the US, were literally picked up off of American streets, blindfolded, put into secret CIA aircraft, flown to Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, and Uzbekistan, and then tortured [0]. Yet not a single person has gone to jail over this. The CIA hasn't been reformed structurally, and no additional oversights have been added. In fact the only difference between then and now is we have a different administration in the White House who are just choosing not to continue it... Does this not disturb anyone? Isn't this exactly the type of stuff people used to joke about the USSR/KGB doing? Since when did the US constitution only apply to citizens and not residence? [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_rendition#21st_century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_rendition#21st_c...

hyperliner 11y ago
This is relevant: "Are Foreign Nationals Entitled to the Same Constitutional Rights As Citizens?" http://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1302&context=facpub http://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?ar...
- skwirl 11y ago
  The answer is "NO" because the Supreme Court has ruled that they are not. Unfortunately the Constitution grants judicial powers to the Supreme Court and not to David Cole, Law Professor.
  - hyperliner 11y ago
    Actually, the Supreme Court has not offered an absolute rule. If you read the article I offered, you would have learned about the nuances that the Supreme Court has provided in terms of areas of protection to non citizens and areas of no protection.
- pdkl95 11y ago
  No, it's not. The fact that the person being tortured isn't a US citizen doesn't make torture any less of a contemptible, barbaric act that is unfit for civilized society. If basic human decency is not convincing, I suggest reading 18 U.S. Code § 2340A, which says (a) Offense.— Whoever outside the United States commits or attempts to commit torture shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both, and if death results to any person from conduct prohibited by this subsection, shall be punished by death or imprisoned for any term of years or for life. (b) Jurisdiction.— There is jurisdiction over the activity prohibited in subsection (a) if— (1) the alleged offender is a national of the United States; or (2) the alleged offender is present in the United States, irrespective of the nationality of the victim or alleged offender. The nationality of the victim doesn't matter.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

randomname2 11y ago

I guess this shows how deeply corrupt the leadership of the APA is? Realistically how would they say no to this?

cryoshon 11y ago
Easy: document saying no, then go public with the fact that the government tried to pervert its medical apparatus into supporting the torture programs. Boom, credibility of the USG's medical agencies goes to shit overnight, and you're inoculated from further manipulation.

sixQuarks 11y ago

There are so many of us that are sick and tired of reading this kind of stuff and knowing that no one will be held accountable. The general population is so apathetic, it's hard to gain any traction. What can we do? Seriously? Can we start a kickstarter to raise funds, to hire lawyers or whatever is needed to make sure people are sent to jail over this? What can we do that will make an impact, without relying on the ignorant mainstream public? There's got to be something

cryoshon 11y ago
You're not going to like this answer. We can strike. If we organize enough people in the tech sector or the general public and withhold work until conditions improve, this country will be brought to its knees nearly instantly and we can get some real change to happen. You think the people who run the country are going to tolerate reduced profits over some political mishaps committed by the last president? It'll be much cheaper to bribe their politicians to do some legal mumbo jumbo to put the proper people into hot water than to sustain a huge revenue loss.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- pdkl95 11y ago
  While I support this idea and have believed for a long time now that a critical mass of the sysadmins, engineers, et al. that keep the world turning have more power than most politicians if they could just ignore the usual arguments for a while and organize. Look at the panic over Occupy; if the money stops flowing because nobody is there to keep the infrastructure working, I expect mass hysteria. This kind of plan is dangerous - in this political climate, there is a good chance such a strike would be labeled a terror plot, and the people with guns will be sent in to do what they usually do. Another consideration: similar to how "total information awareness" wasn't really canceled - it just got a new name and distributed into several departments - COINTELPRO wasn't really canceled either. Remember that any leader or central organizer is a target. Decentralize everything.

cryoshon 11y ago

This is a pretty sick example of institutions being corrupted by the power of the government. Where are the prosecutions of the APA? Where are the disbarments? Where are the war crimes trials for the Bush regime? This stuff is done in our names without our consent, and we have an ethical obligation to act out and speak out.

olefoo 11y ago
We may not be able to move the DOJ on prosecuting Addington, Wu and the other architects of the torture program. But the APA has an ethics committee http://www.apa.org/about/governance/bdcmte/ethics-committee.aspx http://www.apa.org/about/governance/bdcmte/ethics-committee.... If the notion of American doctors aiding and abetting torture strikes you as a matter that that the APA should discipline it's members over. Contact the ethics committee. The staff liaison's email is sbehnke@apa.org

dba7dba 11y ago

delete

v64 11y ago
Pearl Harbor was an attack by the Japanese military on orders from the Japanese government. The 9/11 attacks were not perpetrated by a government or nation. Most of the 9/11 terrorists were Saudi Arabian nationals. By your logic, why was there no military action against Saudi Arabia?
- Spooky23 11y ago
  The grandparent shouldn't have deleted the comment. It highlights a nuance that isn't often explored while ruffling some feathers. So, why didn't we go nuke Saudi Arabia? A: It would not have accomplished anything. Morality is absent from the decision making process when it comes to warfare. If killing a million Saudis were the answer, they'd be dead. Technology has made it possible (or necessary) for non nation-state actors to levy something very similar to war against nation-states. In the case of a nation-state in the industrial and post-industrial age, the approach is straightforward -- you engage the enemy in the field AND destroy his ability to make war. The US Civil War was the dress-rehearsal for this, and WW1 explored the limits of what could be done before the innovations of the 20th century were fully baked. Today, you can't have total war, because tools exist to permanently execute a total war -- nuclear weapons. So we fight in the fringes by arming various individuals and engaging in an evolved form of guerrilla warfare. I think that history will conclude that the last decade and a half has been a process of the ultimate, seemingly omni-potent superpower figuring out how to scale down its war machine down as low as the individual actor.

Bud 11y ago

This headline should not have been edited to remove the words "Report Says", which make it clear that this story is not the contention of the NY Times itself and not based on their own investigating reporting, but is rather a contention from someone else's report.

hackuser 11y ago

Related: The head of a body that advises U.S. terrorism interrogators on ethics on Thursday called for a special prosecutor to probe how the abuse of captured militants during the Bush administration's "war on terror" was allowed to happen. http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/04/30/us-usa-torture-idUSKBN0NL2T720150430 http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/04/30/us-usa-torture-idU...

zeidrich 11y ago

There are statements about legality, about outrage, about who should be punished, about the corruption of organizations. That's not interesting to me. I'm not happy about it, but I'm actually more disappointed. The thing is, something like the APA should, more than anyone, know how ineffective torture would be for getting the kind of information that they were looking to find. The problem with torture, aside from the fact that it's hurtful, is that it is ineffective. We know this. We've studied it, we've already got a lot of data. The APA is supposed to be the professionals in this field that should be able to say that we shouldn't be torturing people. It's like you find out there was a group of doctors that are contracted to create a virus to wipe out a segment of the population, and the doctors deliver something that causes extreme itchiness and the inability to control your bowels. It doesn't kill anyone, it just makes your city smell like shit and causes these people targeted to be angry and uncomfortable. It's still heinous, and immoral. But not only that, it's ineffective and worthless. I mean, the torture argument comes up and there's always defenders that say "desperate times call for desperate measures". But the thing is, it doesn't matter how desperate you are, torture doesn't lead to good results, no matter how angry you are, no matter how bad you want it to. The thing is, I can understand if people in the military might not know this, or believe it. But the thing is, the APA is supposed to represent an organization that understands our minds. They SHOULD know this. So more than just "Oh they did a heinous thing" I am thinking "Oh, they did an idiotic thing, AND it was heinous!" I mean, if they were to do some horrific torturous mind control stuff, and because of that we got information that led to the safe return of troops abroad and a swift victory over the enemy, then I'd still be angry that they were willing to do horrible things to get that victory. But I'd respect their ability. In the same way that I think a nuclear bomb is a horrific weapon that should have never been used on a civilian population, but I think that the people who built it were really good at what they do. But it's like asking for a nuclear weapon, and getting something that detonates and makes the city and surrounding countryside stink for years but doesn't harm anyone. I mean, it's detestable that they'd be working to try to murder massive numbers of civilians. But even more than that, it's awful that they failed so badly at it, and obviously never really knew what they were doing to start with. They didn't accomplish their goals, and just made people angry.