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The Torture Chronicles — America’s long tradition and current shame

Writing It All Down So History Can Judge

by digby

Anyone who is following the “torture issue” (still hard for me to believe it’s an issue at all) must set a google alert for Jeffrey Kaye’s reports on the latest revelations, many of which are shocking even though the mainstream media doesn’t seem to notice or care. (I guess torture is so 2005.)

This one today, following the trail of evidence implicating the psychology profession and homing in on one in particular who is operating even today in the Obama administration is like something out of a dimestore novel:

As for psychologists, Dr. Soldz rightly notes, “Psychology as a profession is at a crossroads.” The same holds true for other professions involved with this abusive and criminal history, including the activities of anthropologists in the military’s Human Terrain System teams in Afghanistan, researchers in numerous academic departments across the country, and the many reports of doctors and other medical personnel involved in the monitoring of torture activities for the CIA and Defense Department. The use of torture has suborned U.S. civil society as a whole in activities that are dark and evil, and the society as a whole must make a tremendous effort if it is to extirpate such evil from its midst.

As far as I can tell, society as a whole really doesn’t give a damn and such evil is likely to spread rather than be extirpated. Most Americans like torture. They’re entertained by it. But at least someone is making a record. Sometimes that’s all you can do.

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