{"id":58433,"date":"2015-05-25T12:00:09","date_gmt":"2015-05-25T11:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=58433"},"modified":"2015-05-19T20:49:39","modified_gmt":"2015-05-19T19:49:39","slug":"fugitive-facts-escape-from-american-psychological-association-headquarters-colluding-with-torturers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2015\/05\/fugitive-facts-escape-from-american-psychological-association-headquarters-colluding-with-torturers\/","title":{"rendered":"Fugitive Facts Escape from American Psychological Association Headquarters – Colluding with Torturers"},"content":{"rendered":"

Breaking News:<\/strong><\/p>\n

18 May 2015 – According to unconfirmed reports, the American Psychological Association is frantically searching for facts that have escaped from the Association\u2019s headquarters in Washington, DC. All of the fugitive facts apparently share one characteristic in common: they support claims that the APA colluded with the CIA and the White House in the Bush Administration\u2019s abusive detention and interrogation operations.<\/em><\/p>\n

A distraught APA spokesperson advised that such facts are extremely dangerous on the loose. She warned that no one should approach them until they have been captured, tranquilized, and defanged by the APA\u2019s public affairs office. \u201cWe need to turn them into mere allegations as quickly as possible,\u201d she was overheard telling an unidentified colleague. \u201cObviously, we can\u2019t refute facts!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

Despite repeated requests, members of the APA leadership have thus far declined to comment further. The total number of escaped facts is not yet known, but it appears that dozens of them had been tunneling their way out of APA headquarters for over a decade. Others reportedly still remain securely confined in APA and government custody.<\/em><\/p>\n

Although preliminary reports have now identified many of the fugitive facts, the APA continues to warn that extreme caution should be exercised until the Association has provided specific safety guidelines. Without adequate precautions, close contact has been linked to a variety of psychological symptoms, including denial, defensiveness, and despair.<\/em><\/p>\n

**********<\/p>\n

The \u201cbreaking news\u201d report above is, of course, satirical. But the facts presented below are quite real. And despite the dismissive attitude that has characterized the APA\u2019s actual public relations campaign<\/a>, none of the facts that follow has been refuted (which shouldn\u2019t really be surprising \u2013 after all, they\u2019re facts<\/em>).<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, APA leaders now insist that they will have no further comment<\/a> about collusion in the Bush Administration\u2019s \u201cenhanced interrogation program\u201d until they have received and reviewed the report from attorney David Hoffman\u2019s ongoing investigation<\/a>. Then, at some still unspecified time, both that report and the APA Board\u2019s response will be made public simultaneously.<\/p>\n

But the APA\u2019s silence-is-golden-we\u2019re waiting-for-the-facts rationale is misguided and self-serving. In particular, it disguises a simple truth: while Mr. Hoffman\u2019s report may well provide valuable new information, many critically important facts have already been established. Pretending otherwise is a disservice to APA members, to the profession as a whole, and to the public at large. Here are some of the facts we already know:<\/p>\n

Fugitive Facts<\/strong><\/p>\n

* Office of Legal Counsel and related government memos<\/a> from the Bush Administration required the presence of psychologists in order for various \u201cenhanced interrogation techniques,\u201d including waterboarding, to be used. Nevertheless, APA Ethics Office Director Stephen Behnke publicly insisted that psychologists played a valuable role in keeping interrogations \u201csafe, legal, ethical, and effective.\u201d<\/a> He also asserted that media reports of psychologist involvement in abuse were \u201clong on hearsay and innuendo, short on facts,\u201d<\/a> and, according to a New York Times <\/em>reporter, that psychologists \u201cknew not to participate in activities that harmed detainees.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

* James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, the recognized architects of the CIA torture program<\/a>, were invited participants at a 2003 APA-sponsored (and CIA-funded) invitation-only workshop<\/a> on the \u201cscience of deception.\u201d The workshop agenda included discussion of interrogation strategies<\/a>, including the use of \u201cpharmacological agents\u201d and \u201csensory overloads.\u201d When senior APA Science Directorate staff member Geoff Mumford sought feedback from participants after the workshop had concluded, the CIA\u2019s Kirk Hubbard told him that Mitchell and Jessen were unavailable because they were \u201cdoing special things to special people in special places.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

* James Mitchell was an APA member<\/a> during the period in which he designed the CIA\u2019s \u201cenhanced interrogation program\u201d and participated directly<\/a> in the torture of detainees at CIA black sites. Mitchell was also still an APA member when the first public report<\/a> suggesting his possible involvement in detainee abuse appeared in the press. The APA Ethics Committee has the authority to investigate<\/a> possible ethical violations on its own initiative at any time. In its immediate response last October to the publication of James Risen\u2019s book Pay Any Price<\/em>, the APA public affairs office, directed by Rhea Farberman, falsely claimed<\/a> that Mitchell was never an APA member.<\/p>\n

* APA Ethics Office Director Stephen Behnke hosted<\/a> a 2004 private meeting at APA headquarters for top-level APA staff, including<\/a> Deputy CEO Michael Honaker, and senior representatives of the intelligence community, including the CIA\u2019s Kirk Hubbard (who later went to work<\/a> for Mitchell and Jessen). In his invitation to the meeting, which focused on ethics in national security settings, Behnke assured the participants<\/a> that their names would never be made public and that \u201cin the meeting we will neither assess nor investigate the behavior of any specific individual or group.\u201d This meeting led to the creation<\/a> of the APA\u2019s 2005 Presidential Task Force on Psychological Ethics and National Security (PENS).<\/p>\n

* A clear majority<\/a> of the nine voting members of the APA\u2019s 2005 PENS Task Force were on the payroll of the Department of Defense or intelligence community at the time of their participation. Several of them served in chains of command where detainee abuses allegedly took place. After a single weekend meeting, the Task Force asserted<\/a> that it was ethical for psychologists to participate in national security detention and interrogation operations \u2013 a stance consistent with pre-existing Bush Administration policy<\/a>. At the time of the PENS meeting, there were already news reports<\/a> of psychologists\u2019 involvement in abusive interrogations at Guantanamo Bay.<\/p>\n

* After the PENS Report had been issued, APA\u2019s Geoff Mumford thanked<\/a> Kirk Hubbard for his role \u201cin getting this effort off the ground.\u201d He also assured<\/a> Hubbard that his views \u201cwere well represented by very carefully selected Task Force members.\u201d Hubbard was employed by the CIA at the time that the PENS members were selected. And when he extended his thanks to Hubbard, Mumford knew<\/a> that Hubbard was employed by the firm of CIA contract psychologists James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen.<\/p>\n

* Current APA president Barry Anton, an APA Board member in 2005, was the individual who recommended<\/a> that the APA Practice Directorate\u2019s top official, Russ Newman, participate in the PENS meeting. Even though Newman\u2019s wife \u2013 Debra Dunivin \u2013 was a BSCT psychologist stationed at Guantanamo<\/a>, where abuses had allegedly taken place, he nevertheless assumed a key role<\/a> in directing the meeting. Standard 3.06 (Conflict of Interest) of the APA Ethics Code<\/a> states: \u201cPsychologists refrain from taking on a professional role when personal, scientific, professional, legal, financial, or other interests or relationships could reasonably be expected to\u2026impair their objectivity, competence, or effectiveness in performing their functions as psychologists.\u201d<\/p>\n

* According to the Olivia Moorehead-Slaughter, the Chair of the PENS Task Force, current APA president Barry Anton and past president Gerry Koocher specifically approved<\/a> Susan Brandon as an undisclosed PENS observer, even though just a few weeks earlier she was a senior official<\/a> in the Bush Administration. According to APA\u2019s Geoff Mumford, Brandon also participated<\/a> in the actual drafting of the PENS Report, in particular the section on research. That section<\/a> included recommendations that psychologists should engage in interrogation research (e.g., \u201cresearch on cultural differences in the psychological impact of particular information-gathering methods and what constitutes cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment\u201d).<\/p>\n

* The APA Board approved<\/a> the PENS Report, authorizing psychologists\u2019 involvement in national security detention and interrogation operations, in an \u201cemergency\u201d session, without first bringing the matter to the Council of Representatives \u2013 APA\u2019s governing body \u2013 for discussion and a vote. The names of the Task Force members were never included<\/a> in the Report itself. These members were also required<\/a> to keep the meeting discussions confidential and not to discuss the Report publicly.<\/p>\n

* In 2013, after almost seven years, the APA Ethics Office closed an ethics complaint<\/a> filed against Guantanamo psychologist and APA member John Leso, asserting that there was \u201cno cause for action.\u201d<\/a> Ethics Office Director Stephen Behnke never referred<\/a> the case to the full ten-person Ethics Committee for review and resolution. The evidence that Dr. Leso played a role in the abuse and torture of detainees had been well established in authoritative reports<\/a>, and the operative threshold for referral to the full Ethics Committee required merely a preponderance of the evidence<\/a>. In closing the complaint, the APA did not refute any of the evidence of Dr. Leso\u2019s role in the interrogations.<\/p>\n

____________________________<\/p>\n

Roy Eidelson is a member of the TRANSCEND Network<\/a> and was a member of the American Psychological Association for over 25 years, prior to his resignation. He is a clinical psychologist and the president of Eidelson Consulting<\/a>, where he studies, writes about, and consults on the role of psychological issues in political, organizational, and group conflict settings. He is a past president of Psychologists for Social Responsibility<\/a>, associate director of the Solomon Asch Center for Study of Ethnopolitical Conflict at Bryn Mawr College, and a member of the Coalition for an Ethical Psychology<\/a>. Roy can be reached at reidelson@eidelsonconsulting.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Although preliminary reports have now identified many of the fugitive facts, the APA continues to warn that extreme caution should be exercised until the Association has provided specific safety guidelines. Without adequate precautions, close contact has been linked to a variety of psychological symptoms, including denial, defensiveness, and despair.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-58433","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-transcend-members"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58433","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58433"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58433\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58433"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58433"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58433"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}