August 18, 2008

Interrogation Debate Heats Up at Psychologists' Conclave

Roughly 100 anti-torture activists demonstrated outside the American Psychological Association’s convention this weekend, The Boston Globe reports.

As The Chronicle described last week, the association’s members are voting on a resolution that would toughen the group’s restrictions on psychologists’ participation in interrogations at the Guantánamo Bay detention center and similar sites. The vote is being conducted by mail; ballots are due September 15.

The resolution’s proponents argue that in “settings that fail to meet basic standards of international law, it is unrealistic to rely on psychologists to challenge their superiors, report on violations, and protect abused detainees.” Opponents say that the resolution is too ambiguous about which types of facilities would fall under the ban, and that the association’s existing anti-torture rules are sufficient.

Last week, a military psychologist who served at Guantánamo Bay invoked her right to remain silent and declined to testify at a military tribunal related to Mohammed Jawad, an Afghan citizen who has been held at the facility since 2003. That development, and the broader interrogation debate, were explored this weekend by The New York Times and The New York Sun. —David Glenn

Comments

1. Oh, this is just so cute.

   — snuggles    Aug 18, 01:45 PM    #

2. So the protestors will have no problems working for/by/of left-wing groups from anti-U.S. terrorist groups to the liberals of the world? How wonderful.

   — Michel    Aug 18, 03:24 PM    #

3. Obviously the feds must think there is something substantive to the psychology discipline. They are among the last.

   — llef    Aug 18, 03:44 PM    #

4. “…settings that fail to meet basic standards of international law, it is unrealistic to rely on psychologists to challenge their superiors, report on violations, and protect abused detainees.”

   Translation: I was only following orders. Remind anyone else of the Nuremberg Trials?

   Has the Bush/Cheney goosestep mentality penetrated THIS far into our society???

   — Al    Aug 18, 03:51 PM    #

5. Al,

   If you read comment #2 then the answer to your last question would be….yes….

   Questioning the status quo gets you smacked with the big bad dirty ‘liberal’ word.

   Would love to hear what pronouncement Samuel Johnson would have for us relative to the way in which modern day political figures mask their self interest under the guise of patriotism.

   — Lyn    Aug 18, 04:09 PM    #

6. Kudos Lyn for pointing this out…if I were an APA member, I’d be all for this – we are in a climate in which dissenters are viewed as anti-American rather than what they are – citizens engaging in the most truly American way – questioning the policies/actions of their government – THAT is what this country stands for! I am sick of people who attacked Clinton from all angles telling me that it is “my duty as an American to stand behind my president.” Where were they 8 years ago – certainly NOT standing behind Clinton.

   I want to see psychologists protect themselves from the kind of career-destroying attacks that this administration leveled against nearly a dozen federal prosecutors that did not do their bidding when it was immoral to do so.

   — rbuck    Aug 18, 08:25 PM    #

7. I’ve never thought of turning to the APA or any other group of people with a bunch of letters after their name for advice on how to fight a fight to win. I’ll have to reconsider my approach.

   — rec    Aug 19, 08:16 AM    #

8. Samuel Johnson called patriotism “the last refuge of a scoundrel.” In The Devil’s Dictionary, Ambrose Bierce wrote, “With all deference to this learned . . . lexicographer, I venture to suggest that it is the first.”

   It’s easy enough to make fun of academics passing resolutions, but real people are having to face up to real choices. It’s impressive that despite all the pressure, quite a few are making the hard but right choice. Remember “it can’t happen here”? It is happening, and it has been happening, far too long. And far too many people have been sacrificed, including many who have served out of the highest motives, including patriotism, while the cynical manipulators wrap themselves in the flag and let others do the suffering.

   — Dan Kirklin    Aug 19, 08:37 AM    #

9. I am a Liberal with a posting a bit crass,
   Question my patriotism and I’ll kick your a$$!!

   — anon    Aug 19, 11:11 AM    #

10. Sadly, comment #2 isn’t even interesting. There are nuanced and useful things to be said in favor of psychologists’ participation in interrogations, but Michel failed to produce any.

    On the topic: If a psychologist has to invoke his/her right not to self-incriminate in regard to an act officially undertaken at the behest of the government, then something is seriously wrong.

    — BobP    Aug 20, 02:52 AM    #

11. “It’s easy enough to make fun of academics passing resolutions, but real people are having to face up to real choices,” says #8. Well, true enough. But many of the “real people” having to face up to “real choices” are people working 24/7/365 to prevent academics and others from being victimized from people who don’t, shall we say, share the commonly accepted values of academic discourse. (Think, for example, bombs on school buses in Israel, beheadings in Holland, planes flying into skyscrapers, an old Jewish man in a wheelchair pushed off a cruise ship, etc.) Their work often involves a tremendous amount of personal risk, and they need all the support they can get to enable them to protect all of us in our—yes, indeed, Ivory Towers. For anthropologists—or any other professional group—to assume that they are, somehow, separate from the world in which they function strikes me as naive at best and smugly irresponsible at worst. The victims of terrorist attacks reflect many occupations, and all political inclinations and proclivities. Citizens of any country with a terrorism problem have a responsibility to assist their country in fighting it. That’s why it’s called “citizenship.” That’s why anthropologists need to grow up and get with the program.

    — Publius    Aug 22, 06:42 PM    #

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