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End Medical Experimentation on Prisoners Now

Prisoners have no rights regarding the quality of their medical care or their participation in experiments.

By Silja J.A. Talvi

One of the most powerful movies ever to be made about the Holocaust was the 2003 made-for-TV movie, Out of the Ashes, which highlighted the sickening crucible faced by medical professionals held captive in the Third Reich’s torture-and-killing camps. Medical experimentation on Jewish and Roma (Gypsy) women was one of Dr. Josef Mengele’s favorite forms of entertainment. In the movie,… return to article

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    Similar to the Holocaust, the genocidal violence of prisons does not stop or begin with “medical testing.” Would the Holocaust have been “reformed” had Dr. Mengele not engaged in his horrible actions?  Like the victims of the Holocaust, prisoners are designated as beings who are not fully human.  Thus within this cultural logic, locking these people in cages, coercing experimentation, and utilizing SHUs are not aberrations from otherwise kind and just norms.  Horrible treatment of prisoners is the norm.  Just like extinguishing of human life during the Holocaust was the norm.  Methods shift and change, but genocide is genocide and prison is prison.  If one’s goal is to help curb the suffering of upwards of the 2.5 million in U.S. prisons, the goal is not simply fighting against these new tactics of symbolic death, but also against the old tactics--incarcertaion itself.  Any call for curing the ills of the prison regime must incorpoprate a call for abolition.

    United States Posted by dpstein on Sep 28, 2006 at 11:34 AM

    and might I add, illegal research is done not only in “secret prisons”, but within the general population. I know, I am a victim. For two years. The only difference in what I suffer and those in “cages” in cuba, are the physical scares. My cage is invisible, I can roam the streets but I have no privacy, none ... not for 1 second. They can wake me, control my moods, my heartrate,etc. they have even raped me, so much, I have lost count, whatever they want ... all with a “remote control”, next year I could be your daughter, your mother ... ,God only knows who is allowed to watch me as I bath, have other intimate moments, etc.
    I am prohibited any legal counsel, so I have fell prey to vaious predator types, over-zealous cops who like to beat woman, all the time knowing that I can’t seek any retribution ... that type of stuff. It’s as if the US government has “power of attorney” over me, I have no constitutional rights ... no freedom of association, I am denied proper medical care, I can no longer cast my vote privately. I have survived thus far, but the person I was is dead. I guess they just want to see how much a person can take before they end it all for themselves. I keep praying, hoping that my messages will get through to the right person, that someone will finally see through all the hoop-lah, before we are all victims. For this research is just a fore-runner for a much bigger plan, and no, there is no “innoculation” from it.

    United States Posted by eyesoftheworld on Oct 10, 2006 at 3:39 AM

    Where’s the proof?

    Those prisoners in Gitmo are living in luxury!  Get real. They are treated better than criminals in US prisons.

    Why not post some back up links to your claims.

    United States Posted by W Otis on Nov 13, 2006 at 6:01 AM

    It’s interesting, in this sense, listening to these calls for complete prison abolition. The remainder of this post has nothing to do with my strong position opposed to prison medical experimentation, which I am adamantly opposed to for the aforementioned reasons. It has more to do with my objection but with this call for “prison abolition.”

    I’ve walked the prison yards and had lengthy discussions with both repeat murderers and serial rapists. As a result, I cannot make the case--and I will not--that a simple abolition of prisons is the solution in this time and day.

    Having said that, I will freely and regularly argue that the vast majority of folks in prison simply are not benefitting--nor is society at large--from their lengthy periods of incarceration. The drug war, in this sense, is not only a farce, but a bad backfire of a legal and and social approach that we can’t seem to face up to.

    People are not coming out reformed, their coming out sicker, sadder, and more desperate. They’re coming out with fewer opportunites for housing, jobs, social services, and social acceptance. They come back to children who don’t know them, families that have grown estranged, and societies that have changed to the degree that they’re uncomfortable going to the grocery store. And then we’re surprised when roughly 2/3 of these former prisoners end up back in prison? Really, is that a surprise?

    I believe that most people who commit crimes can, in fact, be brought back into a healthy role in their respective societies, insofar as those societies themselves are remotely healthy.

    But not everyone can. Some people are, regrettably, damaged or disturbed beyond the prospect of real rehabilitation. Anyone who argues for complete prison abolition has not faced up to this reality. Whether or not it’s of our own making--and I would argue that the vast majority of people who are this ill have been shaped by their economic/familial/social circumstances--that does not remove the real danger that they present to the most vulnerable members of our society. I won’t deviate from that position because I simply have seen it from all sides: victim, survivor, woman, writer, researcher, person willing to talk to people on all sides. What I know is this: there are some folks who are truly so dangerous they can’t reasonably be in our midst any longer.

    In essence, this is my problem with the argument for full-on prison abolition. It’s simply not logical. It’s idealistic to a fault, and it undermines the real, worthwhile argument against over/mass incarceration of people to the ultimate detriment of our communities, families, and our society as a whole.

    United States Posted by Silja J.A. Talvi on Nov 15, 2006 at 4:34 AM
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