Discussion about the Participation of a Psychologist in a Forced Interrogation - Essay Example

? Psychologists should participate in coercive interrogations There have been several debates on whether psychologist should or should not participate in coercive interrogation. In this paper, I intend to encourage the participation of psychologist in coercive interrogations. I will also emphasize by the use of the time ticking bomb scenario the importance of coercive interrogation. The main reason that hinders psychologists from participating in coercive interrogation is that, it was considered immoral and psychologists were sworn professionals. In this paper am going to argue on whether the right of one person is more valuable than the rights of a thousand more. Most of the people that were interrogated are either criminals or suspected criminals, and so there should be room for the use of any possible methods to get valuable information from them. It is in exceptionally rare situations that criminals would just go ahead and give information voluntarily or when asked to do so. It is for this reasons that I believe psychologists should not abstain in coercive interrogations. Psychologists and coercive interrogations and why they should participate The biggest and most popular challenge to the psychologists was determining how narrowly or broadly a field should prescribe what is acceptable behaviour for professionals working with diverse populations for increasingly psychologists come from differing backgrounds and hold varying beliefs (Goldman, 2010). There are two types of coercive interrogations. Pain interrogation supposes that a person will give the required information so that he escapes pain. After succumbing to too much pain or the fear of going through pain, the victim gave up the information. In this case, a physician may be asked to advice on how to prevent a prisoner’s death or to ensure the prisoner remains conscious all through the questioning process. A physician may also be required to interfere with the medical report or even the death certificate of a prisoner and to erase traces of trauma. Another form of coercive interrogation is the psychiatric stress where the prisoners were forced to back down and psychologically depend on the interrogator (Goldman, 2010). They become submissive to the interrogator and in turn produce little or no resistance in answering the questions. The psychologist comes up with a plan to break down the prisoner without impairing their ability to say the truth. Both methods are psychologically stressful; some deprive a prisoner of basic needs. They caused pain and injury to the prisoner and were mostly used in the war on terror. I believe that the use of any means should be applied if it will help save lives. If a psychologist can get key information from a suspect, by coercive interrogation, let them use it, because if there is any chance a suspect is a bomber, rapist or a killer, their rights cannot be their shield (Bellamy, 2008). There are many people out there who are at risk of been harmed by them. Some people may argue that it is unethical but, at these changing times, there is no universal standard measure of ethics. This is because of several factors; someone from a hostile environment would find torture as a normal thing to them, where as someone from a country like the United States would see it as a crime because it is illegal there. So a psychologist from a hostile Middle East nation would not mind using coercive interrogation, so if a psychologist from Middle East can use it, why not a psychologist from the United States? After all, they are all psychologists who have taken an oath. A major point of argument is in the time ticking bomb scenario; in most cases, it entails someone with valuable information, and many lives at risk. The information with held is usually a life saver. In this case if any other method were used for interrogation it would take much longer and, the longer it takes the closer the lives of so many people is at risk of been lost. It is in such times that coercive interrogation comes in handy. If a psychologist can carry out the interrogation and get the needed information, and saves the lives of many citizens, is that not a heroic act that shows loyalty to the nation? Pressed by arguments emphasizing the coasts of the early Bush practices, the supporters of cruel practices turned quickly to the example of the ticking time bomb placed in a significant populated center. With other interrogation methods taking a lot of time, the brutal forces and harsh interrogation methods are less cruel considering the mass murder that would have been caused by the ticking time bomb (Blum and Heymann, 2010). Where is the ethics in letting a hundred people die just to protect the rights of a single criminal? There is an argument that prisoners should be treated well for them to give the needed information. In extremely few cases, this happens, and if it happens the information is either too late or false. A prisoner, who is heartless and his intentions are clearly to harm others would not be trusted to give voluntary information. It was said that those in the interrogation business, especially the coercive forms cannot be relied on to make impartial judgments (Bellamy, 2008). Even practitioners disagree as to whether they can maintain their personal integrity while working in a job that requires lies and deceptions, threatening and harming. Some people would argue that manipulation through humiliation, loneliness, and pride are more effective than physical pain but, it is evident that both methods can hurt the victim, and cause long lasting harm. If that is the case, than a person using non-coercive methods of interrogation is as wrong. People who are against psychologists participating in coercive interrogations advice that psychologists should be advocating for extra protections for the detainees who are from vulnerable populations such as minors, ethnic minorities or other groups that have limited access to socioeconomic or political resources or are potentially subjects to societal discrimination or prejudice, because such groups may receive coercive interrogations or excessive force or less likely to be sympathized by the general public (Ford 2009). This could be reasonable, but let us take a terrorist as an example, they might be from a different ethnic group, they might be a minority group, are their killing acts the same? In the unfortunate incident of 9/11, if anyone had thought of interrogating the Muslims or Arabs in the states, it would be considered wrong from many aspects. The same people, who are quick to rule psychologists out of use of coercive interrogations, then should come up with effective better ways of getting out information from trained hard core criminals; otherwise, many lives are going to be lost while protecting the life of one or two people. Very little of the recent studies has been directed towards understanding the psychological effects of interrogation on not only the detainees but also the people working within and outside the interrogation and detention system (Ford, 2009). Brum and Heymann (2010) suggest that, there are three principal contender structures to guide interrogations of terror suspects by U.S officials. First there is the one adopted by the Bush administration. It had almost unlimited discretion for the United States and, its president to use morally rejected and legally prohibited methods of interrogation whenever he saw it fit. This required secretly amending the agreement and statutory obligations in a way that largely left them without meaning or effect. The other alternative would be meticulously honoring their obligations not to engage in torture and under their reservation to the banning of cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment, not to engage in any form of interrogation that would shock the conscience and thus would go against the due process clause of the 5th amendment to the constitution. This applied wherever the United States placed or held detainees. The last option was to go beyond any narrow reading of the treaty commitment in order to establish the interrogation practices to the same level with considerable allies like U.K, France, Germany, Spain and Japan. This would mean that the U.S would have to adopt a stricter set of rules that were thorough and, not dependent on how strong their need was for information. All these set of rules aimed at abolishing the uses of coercive interrogation are not perfect. Having in mind that the ticking time bomb was considered as a different emergency, it will undoubtedly require the use of coercive interrogation to get the information at the needed time. The war on terrorism and crime is a battle for all citizens regardless of your status in the society. Sidelining a psychologist from practicing coercive interrogation, is like sidelining them from being citizens, just because they have taken an oath (Ford, 2009). Psychologist were considered acceptable people in the society, people who cannot harm anyone knowingly, people who put other people’s interest first, people who listen to other people’s problems. It would be so hypocritical, for anyone to judge a psychologist who uses coercive interrogation just because they believe they are causing harm to the victim. Looking at both sides, there is the interest of people to be considered, there is the public in danger and, there is the suspect who has their right to be considered. It would only be reasonable and, human if the psychologist would use any means to protect the lives of the many innocent citizens at the cost of harming the one suspected terrorist. Terrorist being interrogated would know it is unethical to intend to kill hundreds of people and would give the information needed voluntarily. Until that happens, the psychologist should go ahead and use any means to protect their countries and citizens from the selfish, heartless criminals. References Bellamy, A. J. (2008). Security and war on terror. New York: Routledge. Blum, G., and Heymann P. B. (2010). Laws, Outlaws and Terrorists: Lessons from the war on terrorism. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Ford J.D (2009). Posttraumatic stress disorder: scientific and professional dimension New York: Elsevier Inc. Goldman J (2010). Ethics of spying: A reader for the intelligence professional. Lanham: Scarecrow press. Read More