A Few Bad Apples

[Patjade]

The news today and over the past year or so has been interesting...

We hear about abuse in Abu Ghraib prison, yet are assured it is the act of a "Few bad apples" that somehow got together to torture prisoners.

But then, today, I hear there were Rangers that threatened people who thought about reporting the abuses...

This has got me thinking. Just how did these "bad apples" meet and get together to do this? And how come they seem to be the ones who get the job of interrogating prisoners? What about the abuses that happened in Afghanistan? And in Guantanamo Bay? More isolated "bad apples"?

It sure sounds like more like the bushel basket to me. I mean, if it were one or two people, I might believe it, but you tell me there are a dozen people in one place, a few dozen in another, and yet another dozen someplace else, with groups of two or three here and there at other detention camps and prisons...

Are we recruiting bad apples for the job of guard and interrogators? Sure seems like it to me. Either that, or they all gravitate towards the job. or perhaps it's the job that is making these people into torturers and abusers. Looking at the face of someone who might be your enemy day in and day out, until those charged with their keep decide that they want payback for the comrades that have been injured or killed...

I also think that the word to torture and abuse is at a level far higher than the local field commanders (and definitely higher than the few NCO's and enlisted people who have been indicted). To have a problem this far-flung, widespread, and accepted among the ranks (until word gets out on the media networks) seems to indicate that the abuse was not only specified, but expected.

Anyone else find this so?

[Rishiy]

I guess the bad apples have what it takes to get into the sweeter sections of the apple sauce of life. (XD)

But seriously, I imagine that there is some kind of physical, or personality trait that they all share, that has helped them get into power.

[Patjade]

Is it that, or is the problem more systemic than what is being admitted to the public. In every situation there may be an isolated incident or two, but if one analyzes all the reports and and all the facts, the "Bad Apple" theory almost HAS to be discounted for a wider-reaching policy, since the methods are being duplicated in various degrees across Iraq, in Afghanistan, and even in Gitmo. I doubt these people belong to a special club that trades techniques with each other for next Sunday's torture meet on the Internet, don't you agree?

I suspect that there is someone higher on up and in common with the interrogators that has dictated what is expected and acceptable in the treatment of prisoners.

[Kiddo]

In sociology last year I read a study on something along these lines that's become rather famous. You might have heard of it.

Basically, they took a bunch of college students (all paid volunteers) and assigned them roles as prisoners and wardens. The experiment was to last a week but the researches ended it early because the situation was getting rather bad.

All the students fell into their expected roles. The wardens bullied and abused the prisoners, the prisoners acted like they were indeed prisoners. Altough the students could quit at any time, they didn't. They were locked into these roles they'd adopted.

Perhaps what you've touched on Pat is a symptom of this tendancy for humans to conform to the role that is expected of them. In that case, it'd be the position that's turning people into bad apples. Maybe a certain personality gravitates towards it and maybe the role is what makes them this way. Probably both. But either way, in that case, I think the main problem would be societal. Humans tend to treat other humans badly. Fact of life. And there must be some sort of mindset that states we're allowed to treat those below us even worse than usual.

[Tdyans]

Remember how the saying goes: one bad apple spoils the bunch. You can't have an isolated bad apple. Leave it around the other "good" apples and the rot will spread to them. Have one abusive soldier in a bunch and the other soldiers who mightn't be abusive on their own may follow suit for a number of reasons (fear, pressure, just not know how to handle the situation, misled comradery). Or, as Kiddo said, the situation itself, without any person being the "leader", could be the factor. If that's the case, are they all bad or is some excuse to be made? I really don't know. I'm just rambling without any point to make, to be honest. Just thinking it through myself....

[Patjade]

You would think that SOMEONE would have said something though. The lastes word to come out is that the Rangers guarding the area threatened those people who considered reporting the abuse, and confiscated letters, blocked email, and otherwise kept people from reporting the situation. Yet these rangers were not interrogators or prison guards.

I still maintain there is more going on than the public is fully aware of.

And yes, Kiddo, I remember that study. It still amazes me, thought that a bunch of NCO's and officers are following the lead of the E3's and E4's that are pointed out as the ringleaders. Having been around the military my entire life, this is 180 degrees out from what is established military training and behavior.

Furthermore, we ARE talking about the military here, not college students. These people are SUPPOSED to be highly trained professionals. We are all drilled with the Codes of Conduct, Articles of the Geneva Conventions, etc. from the day each person joins the service until they leave. They should all be held to higher standards.

Somebody needed to have stopped the activity before it got out of hand, yet it was hushed... All over, until those photographs surfaced on the internet.