Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: researcher

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Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: resea... - 2/28/2008 10:22:38 PM

celticlord2112

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http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080229/wl_mideast_afp/scienceusiraqwarsocietymilitarytorture

Rather disturbing idea--that Abu Ghraib was not an accident.

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/28/2008 11:24:08 PM

TheHeretic

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It's hard to believe that people tasked with running a military prison wouldn't be familiar be Stanford. Using reservists was either the dumbest choice possible, or exactly the right one, depending on the goals.

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/28/2008 11:26:58 PM

Termyn8or

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"Zimbardo, 75, is renowned for the 1971 Stanford prison experiment in which students on summer break play roles as guards or prisoners in a mock prison in the basement of a building on the university's campus in Northern California.
The pretend guards grew so sadistic and the prisoners so cowed that the experiment was halted prematurely out of concern for the students."

What does that tell you about human nature ?

Just sat here for a couple minutes before sending this, HOLY SHIT what does that tell you about human nature ?

T

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/29/2008 3:38:07 AM

SugarMyChurro

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I still think people know what they are doing is wrong and they have to take responsibility for that.

But sure, we have utterly failed as a society to properly educate the young. We have raised generations of children as hopeless canon fodder. "Good" soldiers willing to die or to commit any atrocity in the name of freedom.

Yeah, go figure that one out...

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/29/2008 6:48:33 AM

TheHeretic

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Termyn8or

HOLY SHIT what does that tell you about human nature ?

Nothing new, Termy. Power corrupts. Wiki has a decent summary here .

A couple years back, HBO ran a movie called Ghosts of Abu Graib that would have been a lot better if it had explored this aspect.

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/29/2008 7:28:07 AM

thompsonx

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Termyn8or

"Zimbardo, 75, is renowned for the 1971 Stanford prison experiment in which students on summer break play roles as guards or prisoners in a mock prison in the basement of a building on the university's campus in Northern California.
The pretend guards grew so sadistic and the prisoners so cowed that the experiment was halted prematurely out of concern for the students."

What does that tell you about human nature ?

Just sat here for a couple minutes before sending this, HOLY SHIT what does that tell you about human nature ?

T

T:
You will note that it was the "human nature" of a low ranking enlisted man who brought this shameful case to the light of day.
thompson

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/29/2008 7:33:24 AM

pahunkboy

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ild bet pics during ww1 ww2, the civil war- any war- would have been shocking-any side of it. war is not pretty- thats why it is 'war".

im not sure why one would snap pics of that. why?   to stop it? to amuse over it?   it isnt clear.

the peril here is that what we do to foriegners will trickle down to our own. i truly beleive that.

with the world now a conservative one- I actually got in trouble over a pic seen around the world.    i had put it on the from page of a yahoo group. the young one who was naked and running from napalm in vietnam. national geogrphic had published it. surely that pic is in the public domain by now.

it is troubling that- pics today can be alterred. so much so that what you see is not what happened. [not the case OP] but never the less compelling.

a miser wont let you touch the gold. you may look- but only if you are lucky. be mad- be critical. but no touch. i recall doing office work- i thoufht- no program is ever good- as someone thinks they can do it better. then i worked construction- well they get to the point right way- time is money. ridecule another guys work- either shoddy or too slow. apply that to politics. everyone can do a better job. back to the gold miser.
"YE WILL NOT TOUCH the Gold!"   got it?

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/29/2008 7:38:12 AM

Sinergy

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quote:

ORIGINAL: SugarMyChurro

But sure, we have utterly failed as a society to properly educate the young. We have raised generations of children as hopeless canon fodder. "Good" soldiers willing to die or to commit any atrocity in the name of freedom.

Would a president so uninterested in the welfare of others and the value of education, who surrounds himself with a cabal of greedy corporate imperialists, want anything more in a soldier but those qualities the NAZIs or Al Qaeda or the Khmer Rouge or whoever exploited to inflict terror and genocide on helpless individuals.

Brutality runs a spectrum from yanking small children around by the hair and goes all the way to genocide. It is just a question of degree.

Sinergy

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/29/2008 7:46:12 AM

Marc2b

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I’ve read Zimbardo’s book and it is a fascinating study – I highly recommend it for everybody.

Zimbardo is quite correct that such extreme power differentials will almost always lead to abuse. It is all part and parcel of the process in which we dehumanize the other (it usually begins with name calling) and thus become free not only to ignore their pain but actually delight in it. There is no surer way to make ourselves feel important than by degrading others. Power is a narcotic.

I think it is important to point out the when Zimbardo talks about places like Abu Ghraib being designed to promote abuse he doesn’t mean that somebody necessarily set out to deliberately create an abusive situation but rather that by their very nature such uneven power situations will invariably lead to such abuse – so, if you create a grossly uneven power situation, you shouldn’t be surprised when things go bad.

Zimbardo also went to pains to point out that the situation doesn’t not absolve people from the moral duty to not only not participate but to blow the whistle on it although he concedes that it is not an easy thing to do.

None of us are immune from our own human nature. Given the right set of circumstances, anyone of us could be a guard at Abu Ghraib, or an overseer in a Southern slave plantation or a guard at a nazi concentration camp or...

The challenge is to use our intellect to overrule out emotions. To see the path were traveling down and turn back before we get to far.

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/29/2008 8:27:55 AM

Sinergy

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Marc2b

Zimbardo also went to pains to point out that the situation doesn’t not absolve people from the moral duty to not only not participate but to blow the whistle on it although he concedes that it is not an easy thing to do.

That was my favorite part of his work. While the subject was so dark he left a message of hope, so to speak.

Even if the message of hope relies on the individual being active, not passive, about their moral compass.

Sinergy

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/29/2008 12:05:23 PM

Marc2b

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quote:

That was my favorite part of his work. While the subject was so dark he left a message of hope, so to speak.

Even if the message of hope relies on the individual being active, not passive, about their moral compass.

One of my base philosophies of life is that it is easy to have high moral principles so long as the consequences don’t affect you. Thus I try not to judge too harshly those who keep silent in such situations since I’m not the one who faces possible retaliation from a pissed off command structure. On the other hand it makes those who do speak up all the more admirable. Ultimately, it comes down to the individual. Each of us, should we ever find ourselves in such a situation, must decide where to draw the line. Each of us must decide when it is time to step forward and say, "enough! This is wrong and must stop!"

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/29/2008 12:20:25 PM

Sinergy

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Marc2b

quote:

That was my favorite part of his work. While the subject was so dark he left a message of hope, so to speak.

Even if the message of hope relies on the individual being active, not passive, about their moral compass.

Ultimately, it comes down to the individual. Each of us, should we ever find ourselves in such a situation, must decide where to draw the line. Each of us must decide when it is time to step forward and say, "enough! This is wrong and must stop!"

It takes a community of such people.

http://www.rollingstone.com/special/8952417/mavericks_renegades_and_troublemakers_2005

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RE: Abu Ghraib prison turned soldiers evil by design: r... - 2/29/2008 2:43:43 PM

cyberdude611

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Termyn8or

"Zimbardo, 75, is renowned for the 1971 Stanford prison experiment in which students on summer break play roles as guards or prisoners in a mock prison in the basement of a building on the university's campus in Northern California.
The pretend guards grew so sadistic and the prisoners so cowed that the experiment was halted prematurely out of concern for the students."

What does that tell you about human nature ?

Just sat here for a couple minutes before sending this, HOLY SHIT what does that tell you about human nature ?

T

There was also the Milgram experiement that had ground-breaking results.... Stanley Milgram ran an experiement where participants were told to administer a test to another participant and for each wrong answer, an electric shock would be applied and each time the voltage would be higher. However the participant did not know the person recieving the shocks was a confederate (an actor hired by the experimenter) and no shocks were actually given. But the actor pretended to be shocked even to the point of yelling and screaming for the experiment to be ended.

The results were astounding. A vast majority of people, even though they did not want to continue the experiement, finished the experiment despite the cries of the person being shocked. It showed the effect of obedience when under pressure from an authority figure. It helps explain how something like the Holocaust was able to occur.

Check that out here...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcXb1aQruwI

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