Is Hazing a Form of Torture?
Here they go again.
As reported by Huffington Post and other media outlets, we now have two scandals in two days involving our security forces.
The first scandal involves guards at the U.S. Embassy Kabul who have engaged in extreme forms of violence. If you have the stomach for it, you can see photographs here.
According to the Project on Government Oversight, these episodes, which include simulated anal sex, are a form of "deviant hazing [that] has created a climate of fear and coercion, with those who declined to participate often ridiculed, humiliated, demoted, or even fired."
The second scandal is about a U.S. Navy unit in 5th Fleet in Bahrain where a gay sailor was brutalized for two years after he expressed disinterest in sleeping with a prostitute (a widespread practice at the base), and where female sailors were handcuffed to a bed and forced to simulate lesbian sex while on video. An official Navy report confirmed almost 100 different types of abuse. But, the Navy promoted the supervisor who oversaw the abuse even though Naval officials were well aware of what had happened. And the Admiral who was in charge of the 5thFleet at the time just received his fourth star this year, and now serves as Vice Chief of Naval Operations.
The participants in Kabul scandal were contractors, not service members. But in the wake of Tailhook, the rape scandal at the U.S. Air Force Academy, and a long-term pattern of violence among members of our armed forces, we should get a few things straight about the connection between the Kabul and Bahrain violence.
First, in no way do these incidents represent "bad apples" or isolated cases. One of my doctoral students just completed her dissertation on military training, a project for which she actually went through boot camp as a part of her research. I begged her not to go to boot camp to do her research because i believed she could get assaulted. Sure enough, every single woman in her training was sexually harassed, including one woman who was raped. The reason behind the pattern is that in order to train our troops for combat, we train them to brutalize one another.
Second, these cases are not hazing, they are torture. By referring to torture as "hazing," or "homosocial behavior" we make the violence seem like it is okay, just boys being boys. Hog-tying someone to a chair and then shoving him into a dog kennel full of feces, as was done to the gay sailor, is not boys being boys. In fact, the victims of such treatment often develop PTSD. One of the sailors implicated in the Bahrain scandal died from suicide, while another told me that he developed suicidal ideation as a result.
Third, the pattern of violence is not an accident, but reflects official policy, including the "don't ask, don't tell" law which makes it almost impossible for gay victims to report abuse. And even though the military does have policies in place to deter violence against women, these policies often produce contradictory results. For example, I am aware of a rape case that was not reported because the base commander had announced a "zero-tolerance" policy for assault, which the troops took to mean (accurately according to people I interviewed) that he did not want to hear about incidents.
This week's news should be a reminder that war is a violent business, and the people we train to conduct it often direct that violence at one another. Whether we're talking about private contractors or military service members, our collective national stereotypes what it means to serve in uniform leave a lot unspoken.
Keith Ferrazzi: Stop Waging Psychological Warfare - On Yourself
This exclusive excerpt from The Leap illustrates that it is our willingness to tackle head-on the forces that hold us in place that allows us to achieve our greatest potential.
Derrick Crowe: Afghanistan: Where This Is Going
If anti-government violence breaks out in Helmand and other Pashtun regions, there would be absolutely no room to argue against the conclusion that counterinsurgency has failed.
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Speaking as a former Navy sailor, hazing isn't torture. However, in the hands of sadistic, sociopathic people, it can be just as demeaning and demoralizing as torture. It depends entirely on the people inflicting the act. If the act isn't done in a meansprited way, then you won't hear it in the news.
What can you expect from thugs who are paid to kill (civilians mostly)
No wonder these kids are effed up in the head when they get home...you're all sick..
I cry fowl on the media (including this site).
When looking at the evidence, none of the men seem to be coerced, panic-stricken, or even simply uncomfortable.
Me thinks thou protests too much.
"Hazing"?
That's a minimizing frame.
The US embassy in Kabul is a very important place. We should not let political correctness damage security there. Hazing is a normal part of social relations. This is a place where esprit de corps is very important. Save your political correctness for places without national security ramifications.
Making subordinates hate you is good for security? Heard of fragging?
Putting abusive, culturally insensitive goons in contact with other cultures is a way to win hearts and minds?
Bringing prostitutes into a secure site has no national security ramifications? An opportunity for suicide bombers masquerading as prostitutes. Innocent people onsite suffer because developmentally backward bullies want to get their rocks off or want to force a reluctant colleague to be just like them.
Or how about the prostitutes/spies taking info or pictures back, saying, "These infidels are defiling our homeland with deviant sexual behavior and alcohol. These are the approximate coordinates"?
Tough physical and emotional hazing hurting, however temporarily, the well-being of someone Uncle Sam has paid a lot of money to train, food, house, and clothe? An uncle who was a vet once told me that getting a severe sunburn over the weekend got you a reprimand because you were abusing "Uncle Sam's" soldier/employee and his readiness to serve at a moment's notice.
"Sorry, honey, I got the STD from eating chips from my supervisor's rear end, or because I had to have sex with a prostitute to get the guys to leave me alone." Yup, that will encourage strong, family relationships to sustain you from home.
Hazing used to be a normal part of social relations in fraternities (which until recently produced at least one hazing death a year), but those are boys. Adults who haze? It's bullying by guys with sexual problems.
Come to think of it, I don't want my tax dollars paying for antibiotics for STDs acquired by military or civilian contractor personnel (unless,of course, they're a result of rape or hazing). You pick up an STD, you pay to treat it.
Exactly right.
Hazing is something people submit themselves to in order to be accepted by people they know absolutely nothing or little about. Acting in a servile manner to belong to something does not make them very bright in my book.
There's not always a choice about participating in hazing. Even the guys who barricaded themselves in their rooms faced the possibility that a bunch of drunks intent on hazing could break the door down. Apparently destruction of government property wasn't a big concern of the bullies in charge.
All the more reason to exit the wars, now. You can not participate in ongoing wars for decades and not take a moral toll on our military. We are destroying them by keeping them there. Get us out now.
It's torture. The techniques are the same. Wat happens to women in the military is a crime - and should be treated as such. I do NOT believe that all men are rapists. But there is something going terribly wrong with the male psyche nowadays where this kind of behaviour is considered acceptable. Would it be acceptable if it was their sister being attacked?
I despair. What message about the brutality and brutishness of the west are we giving those we are supposedly trying to 'free'? Free to be what?
We can always rely on HuffPuff to cover the important news in the world.
And here you are...
Is this cleverness or sarcasm or both?
You would prefer not to discuss another aspect of the destruction of the wars. Instead lets discuss Palin, birthers, Michelle's dresses, Fox news............ Thank heavens Huff is running more on the wars and the many dimensions of the destruction.
Yes. It's caleed situational violence--viz the Stanford Prison Experiment.
Exactly.
See this slide show (yup, a slide show for the reading impaired gorillas who haze) based on Philip Zimbardo's study of how those in power easily slip into being abusers.
"Our planned two-week investigation into the psychology of prison life had to be ended prematurely after only six days because of what the situation was doing to the college students who participated. In only a few days, our guards became sadistic and our prisoners became depressed and showed signs of extreme stress."
http://www.prisonexp.org/
What do you expect from people who will kill for money? Employers know what kind of people they are dealing with. It is in their interest to let them express themselves on each other. It helps the kind of bondage and discipline required between them. A broken soldier is a good soldier. He will obey orders without asking questions. Soldier as a hero is just a myth promoted by the nation states.
Too bad you know nothing about the military, or the people who dedicate their lives to the protection of the U.S.
Semper fi
I served in the military, and we didn't dream of doing anything remotely similar to this. We would have been ashamed to have it happen in our division, much less our battalion. That you see it and aren't ashamed tells me all I ever needed to know about the quality of the marines.
The nation states, be it the USA or any other, have lost their historical validity. They have mostly surrendered to the globalist corporations. The time of nationalism has passed. Capitalists use the nationalists just like they use the religious extremists. Politicians, preachers, soldiers and police are servants of the capitalists. It has become all about money. Most modern soldiers would not fight if it weren't for the financial incentives.
Repressed homosexuality results in distorted forms of violence such as these.
Don't ask, Don't Tell.
"Ya, Ya, I was drunk, buddy, last night. Shoot, I don't remember a thing. Do you?" How old and tired is this story?
How could it be torture ?
Nothing else the U.S. has done is torture. If it was there surely would be people brought to justice and held accountable for their actions.
If I recall, torture is illegal under International and U.S. law, therefore, as the U.S. is a nation of Laws .... well you all know the rest.
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