CIA torture theorist working for KIPP charter schools

[Hannah Bell]

Among the blockbuster revelations in Jane Mayer’s new book, The Dark Side, is that world famous psychologist and former American Psychological Association (APA) President Martin Seligman actively aided the development of the CIA’s torture techniques, based as they were upon Seligman’s “learned helplessness” theory. Apparently Seligman aided CIA consultant torture psychologists James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, in the development of these techniques.

She traces the development of the torture techniques to the work of two contractors, Mitchell and Jessen, and disclosed the specific techniques they developed.

She notes that the techniques rely heavily on a theory called “Learned Helplessness” developed by a Penn psychologist Martin Seligman, who assisted them in the process. All of this was done under the thin pretext of being a part of the SERE program. Seligman is a former president of the American Psychological Association.

This helps explain why the APA alone among professional healthcare provider organizations failed to unequivocally condemn torture and mandate that its members not associate themselves with the Bush Administration techniques.

http://psychoanalystsopposewar.org/blog/2008/07/13/martin-seligman-second-former-apa-president-connected-to-cia-torturers/


In December 2006 I posted a piece on the inspirational role by Martin Seligman in the ongoing psychological sterilization of the KIPP Schools.

In the KIPP schools, children are routinely broken down into a state of learned helplessness through inescapable surveillance (by school and parents), academic drudgery, repeated testing, and isolation and labeling as "miscreants" for any infringement of rules.

From this broken, passive, and depressed state of affairs, the followers of Seligman at KIPP then apply his learned optimism techniques that aim to replace the previously-held pessimism of broken-down students with a grandiose optimism toward achievement that, simultaneously, turns blame inward at any hint of failure, thus redoubling the doubter's efforts to maintain the programmed regime of learned optimism....

http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2008/08/apa-cia-seligman-and-kipp.html


Test Was Designed by Psychologist Who Inspired CIA's Torture Program
An experimental, Army mental-health, fitness initiative designed by the same psychologist whose work heavily influenced the psychological aspects of the Bush administration's torture program is under fire by civil rights groups and hundreds of active-duty soldiers. They say it unconstitutionally requires enlistees to believe in God or a "higher power" in order to be deemed "spiritually fit" to serve in the Army...

CSF is based entirely on the work of Dr. Martin Seligman, a member of the Defense Health Board, a federal advisory committee to the secretary of defense, and chairman of the University of Pennsylvania's Positive Psychology Center, who the Army calls "Dr. Happy."

Seligman, who once told a colleague that psychologists can rise to the level of a "rock star" and "have fame and money," is the author of "Authentic Happiness: Using the New Positive Psychology to Realize Your Potential for Lasting Fulfillment."

The Penn Resiliency Program, upon which the Army's CSF is based, "teaches cognitive-behavioral and social problem-solving skills and is based in part on cognitive-behavioral theories of depression by Aaron Beck, Albert Ellis" and Seligman.

Despite his "happy" reputation, in some circles, Seligman is best known for developing the theory of "Learned Helplessness" at the University of Pennsylvania more than four decades ago. As psychologist and torture expert Dr. Jeffrey Kaye noted in a report published in Truthout last year, Seligman and psychologist Dr. Steven Maier developed the concept of Learned Helplessness after they "exposed dogs to a situation where they were faced with inescapable electrical shocks."

In May of 2002, the timeframe in which the CIA began to use brutal torture techniques against several high-value detainees, Seligman gave a three-hour lecture at the Navy's Survival Evasion Resistance Escape school in San Diego. Audience members included the two psychologists - Bruce Jessen and James Mitchell - who have been called the architects of the Bush administration's torture program.

Five months earlier, Seligman hosted a meeting at his house that was attended by Mitchell, along with the CIA's then-Director of Behavioral Science Research, Kirk Hubbard, and at least one "Israeli intelligence person."

Seligman claims he was totally unaware his theory on Learned Helplessness was being used against detainees after 9/11 and denied ever engaging in discussions about the torture program with Mitchell, Jessen, or any other Bush administration official.

http://www.truth-out.org/armys-fitness-test-designed-psychologist-who-inspired-cias-torture-program-under-fire66577

[Starry Messenger]

1. k&r

[salvorhardin]

2. Bright Sided

What Barbara Ehrenreich has to say about Seligman in her book _Bright Sided_ is not to be missed either.

He's a real sleaze ball.

[arikara]

8. That book looks good

I will have to order it.

[snot]

3. K&R'd; you go grrl, or whatever.

[Solly Mack]

4. k/r

[NNN0LHI]

5. Get these sick fucks away from our kids!

Recommended

Don

[Fumesucker]

6. Ve haff vays of Making You Learn..

[StarburstClock]

7. Amazing how we're told to just move on from things like this

as if that will ever work. War crimes never go away, they are dealt with whether it's now or 30 years from now.

[leveymg]

9. OMG - in 1982, I wrote that torture would become part of education in 2007

In the winter of 1982-83, I wrote a political fiction series for The Santa Cruz (CA) Express weekly newspaper entitled "Santa Cruz in the Years 2002-2010".

The use of psychological conditioning and torture boards as tools in corporate-run schools was the subject of one of the later installments.

At the time, even I thought it a bit too far-fetched to ever happen. Guess I was wrong about that.