Blog #11: Article One

The article I choose to read first was called “Promoting Aggression and Violence at Abu Ghraib: The U.S. Military’s Transformation of Ordinary People into Torturers” written by Adam Lankford. This article discussed how the U.S. military transformed typical soldiers into cruel guards at the prison of Abu Ghraib in Iraq. It talks about how the soldiers were taught through their training and their built up anger to dehumanize the prisoners, or terrorists being held at this prison. It says that these soldiers were screened before entering the military and they were all found to be ordinary people with no psychological disorders or early life traumas that would explain their reasoning behind their cruel behaviors. They have recently found research that recruits who are young and male with shared respect for authority and shared values are the ones who are most likely to follow the violent orders given to them by their commanders (389). These soldiers are basically desensitized and are taught to act out violently. They teach them that they are not supposed to be soft and cuddly, but are supposed to be tough.

            This ties into my paper because it will provide a lot of research to answer my question as to whether authority positions or powerful positions are the reason for the loss of humanity. This article within the first paragraph presented a lot of information that backs up my point that authority positions are one cause for the loss of humanity, which is often related to kindness and goodwill. These soldiers are only one example of how they go from ordinary people to violent torturers. This is also proves that they are closer to being more like vampires than vampires themselves.  Vampires even though they kill, at least they are not dehumanizing the people they are eating. In fact the vampires, must kill in order to survive, but these soldiers are only doing this just because they can without fear of retaliation.

Lankford, Adam. "Promoting Aggression and Violence at Abu Ghraib: the U.S. Military's

            Transformation of Ordinary People Into Torturers." Aggression & Violent

            Behavior 14.5 (2009): 388-395. Academic Search Complete. ebsco. web. 7 Apr.

            2011.