Gangstalking, and other forms of psychological attacks are, at their very core, a form of adversity. Therefore, like any adversity we may undergo, they ruthlessly reveal our emotional weaknesses. That is not necessarily a bad thing. That same adversity now offers us the opportunity to cultivate and strengthen emotional virtues that equip us to successfully face this and future challenges. The childish traits that cause us to react poorly can be replaced with a powerful and enduring strength-of-character. Today, was for me, a time to “put away childish things” . . . Let me explain.

I was in Papago Park, a scrub brush, sand and rock-filled desert preserve near my home in downtown Phoenix, Arizona. I often use this setting for improving my compositional skills as a photographer. As is my custom, I was in Papago Park today to capture some of the warm late-afternoon winter light that makes for great photos. Of course, the “gang-stalkers” engaged in my harassment follow me into this setting, like any other. One of their typical tactics is to pretend to be an amorous couple while keeping me under surveillance.

There was one such couple in Papago Park today, tracking my movements. As I setup my camera and tripod, they stood perhaps 60 feet behind me out of my line of sight. However, by using the reflection in the rear LCD of my digital camera like a mirror, I could see that they were watching me intently. When I turned around, now facing them, they quickly resumed their “cover” as an amorous couple. This sun-baked, shadeless, open desert setting is perhaps the least comfortable place in all of Phoenix for a couple to be necking and petting. Yet, there they were, glancing at me repeatedly as I photographed the landscape.

The human ego is a childish thing that must be put away. Especially when one is the target of repeated psychological attacks. One can go for years maintaining needed self-control and yet, in an unguarded moment, allow the childish ego to rear its ugly head. Normally, I ignore these gangstalkers. Yet, on this occasion, my foolish ego got the best of me. I proceeded to walk over to them.

If and when I choose to do so, by combining my physical bearing (over 6 feet tall and in reasonably good shape) with an authoritative tone, I can become an intimidating presence. Using that ill-chosen talent, I asked to take their picture, something they were loathe to allow. While my words were carefully chosen for their innocence, they were said in such a way that subtly acknowledged that I knew why they were there. The tenor of my speech was also mildly condescending. However, I did not use profanity or threaten. We had a few tension-filled words of conversation. They became very uncomfortable with the idea of having their photo taken and left the area.

For a quick moment I felt a sense of having won a small victory. That was quickly replaced with a deep sense of shame. What I had just done was immature and unacceptable. By that one childish act, I had given my persecutors a victory. For years they have tried to rob me of my dignity. In that one moment, I voluntarily handed over what they could not gain by torture and humiliation for over ten years. I had become no better than my persecutors. In a small way, I was now imitating their cruel thinking and behavior.

The person who takes an illicit pleasure in humiliating others is like a man who mutilates himself and then laughs at his wretched condition in the mirror. We are all part of the same human family. Humiliating others is an expression of the low regard we have for our ourselves.

Interestingly, as I observed today, many of those who are used as “gangstalkers” come from the same working class backgrounds as the people they victimize. This strategy by the covert government agencies that exploit them is not without precedent.

The Nazi’s used a similar strategy in the concentration camps to oppress prisoners. They would select certain prisoners to work inside Nazi concentration camps during World War II in various lower administrative positions. Called Kapos, they would receive more privileges than normal prisoners in exchange for their keeping their fellow prisoners in line. The Kapos, many of whom were Jewish, often proved to be more brutal and oppressive toward their fellow prisoners than the SS Guards. In fact, many who served as Kapos were so brutal in their treatment of fellow prisoners that they were tried along with Nazi officers for war crimes at the end of World War II. The word Kapos, which means “combat police” in German, has since come to mean a “self-loathing Jew’ because of the notorious behavior of Jewish Kapos toward their brethren in the concentration camps. This same cruelty is seen in the actions of modern day “gangstalkers.” Their psychological brutality is directed towards their own neighbors, persons much like themselves. In a real sense, they are modern-day Kapos.

Gangstalking is a “childish thing.” Those who employ it avoid the honest, open communication and interaction characteristic of mature individuals, using spite, hubris and cowardly mob violence to address disputes they have with fellowmen. Gangstalking and other psychological attacks are not tools of those who have “put away childish things.”

Knowing this, I am more determined than ever to avoid the cruel thinking of my persecutors. As that gangstalking couple walked away, I had to stand there for a few minutes pondering my own actions. I said a silent prayer, asking for God’s forgiveness. I was intent on apologizing if I saw those two individuals again. Irregardless of how I am treated, I must retain my dignity and humanity and reject injustice of any sort when dealing with my fellow man. That is the mark of a mature man who has “put away childish things.”

“When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.” - 1 Corinthians 13:11  King James Version

Few people today know the name Peter Buxtun. However, to a special group of illiterate Black sharecroppers in Macon County, Georgia, his name will always be associated with outstanding courage and conscience that speaks up when systemic injustice occurs. For forty years between 1932 and 1972, the U.S. Public Health Service (PHS) conducted an experiment on 399 black men in the late stages of syphilis. These men, for the most part illiterate sharecroppers from one of the poorest counties in Alabama, were never told what disease they were suffering from or of its consequences. Their value lay only in the autopsies that would be conducted on their corpses after the disease was allowed to rob them of life. This cruel experiment was entitled The Tuskegee Study.

In 1966, Peter Buxtun, waiting to be admitted to Hastings Law School, got a job doing venereal disease interviews at the Public Health Department’s Hunt Street Clinic in San Francisco. He was horrified when he overheard several of his co-workers discussing the Tuskegee Study, and learned they’d been told not to treat the participants. He wrote the CDC (Center for Disease Control) in Atlanta and requested additional information. “In early November 1966, Buxtun sent Dr. William J. Brown, the director of the Division of Venereal Diseases, a letter . . . expressing grave moral concerns about the experiment. He asked whether the purpose of the experiment was to obtain information ‘on the syphilitic damage which these men were being allowed to endure.’ He also inquired if any of the men had been treated properly and whether any had been told the nature of the study. And finally, he asked, ‘are untreated syphilitics still being followed for autopsy?’”

When Dr. Brown received Peter’s letter, he was furious. He invited Peter to come to Atlanta to attend a scientific meeting at the government’s expense. When Peter arrived at the CDC, Dr. Brown escorted him into “an executive conference room with a big mahogany table surrounded by a dozen or so chairs.” Two men were waiting for him. One of them was: “. . . Dr. John Cutler, a health officer with intimate knowledge of the study.”

According to Buxtun, Dr. Cutler began to harangue him the moment they were seated. ‘He was infuriated,’ stated Buxtun. ‘He had obviously read my material, thought of me as some form of a lunatic who needed immediate chastisement and he proceeded to administer it.’ Dr. Cutler then launched an impassioned defense of the experiment, stressing, in particular, how it would benefit physicians who were treating syphilitic blacks.”

James Jones, author of “Bad Blood: The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment,”  described what happened next: “Buxtun was neither intimidated nor impressed.” He told the officials they were using blacks as “human substitutes for guinea pigs,” and warned them that the Public Health Service would be discredited if the public learned what they were doing.

Peter resigned from the PHS in 1967, and he wrote Dr. Brown another letter in November 1968. This time he warned him: “The group is 100 percent Negro. . . . This in itself is political dynamite and subject to wild journalistic misinterpretation.”

Dr. Brown showed the letter to Dr. David Sencer, the director of the CDC. Neither official thought they were doing anything wrong, but they decided to convene a “blue-ribbon panel” to evaluate the study. Dr. Gene Stollerman was chairman of the Department of Medicine at the University of Tennessee at the time, and the only member of the blue-ribbon panel who: “. . . did not have previous knowledge of the Tuskegee Study before being asked to review it.” He was . . . “the only panelist who saw the subjects as patients, and thought that they had a right to be treated.”

Everyone at the CDC supported the program and thought it should continue until the last participant was autopsied. Buxtun’s moral indignation was attributed to his youth and “generation.” Peter realized something had to be done, so he contacted a reporter and told her about the study.

She contacted her editor; he assigned another woman to the story. On July 25, 1972, the Washington Star published her article. The American people were outraged when they read about the racist project. Public health officials tried to justify the program because it was done for “science,” but no one believed them. The Tuskegee Study ended that year, forty years after it began. Every survivor received $10,000.

Recently, a group of students at Yale University and the United States Air Force Academy (USAFA) were asked to define ‘courage.’ As part of their response, they described acts of courage, including (one who)  “stands up to unjust social practices because of what one thinks right.”  Would you not agree that this definition fits the actions of Peter Buxtun? Are such men of courage and conscience still needed today?

Ongoing systemic injustice by government organizations that includes psychological attacks such as ‘gang-stalking’ and the use of covert remote methods of torture on American citizens is every bit as shocking and abhorrent as the Tuskegee Study. My story and that of many other victims speaks of a systemic injustice that has been practiced for years by covert federal and local agencies. Injustice festers, spreads and weakens all strata of human society in the absence of conscience and courage.

It is our hope that men and women  of exemplary conscience and courage like Peter Buxtun still exist in our government today.

References:
The Radio Liberty Newsletter