“The United States government did something that was wrong — deeply, profoundly, morally wrong. It was an outrage to our commitment to integrity and equality for all our citizens . . . clearly racist.” - President Clinton’s apology for the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment to the eight remaining survivors, May 16, 1997

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 seriousness. Informed that they were being treated for “bad blood,” their doctors had no intention of curing them of syphilis at all. The data for the experiment was to be collected from autopsies of the men, and they were thus deliberately left to degenerate under the ravages of tertiary syphilis—which can include tumors, heart disease, paralysis, blindness, insanity, and death. “As I see it,” one of the doctors involved explained, “we have no further interest in these patients until they die.”

President Clinton, further commenting on the hubris of science gone wrong in the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, stated that “We must never go back to those awful days in modern disguise.”² Do you agree? What if you learned that the degenerative, premature death of your husband or brother was due to the deliberate, long-term denial of medical services by the same government agency? How would it affect you?

Hubris is an exaggerated sense of self-esteem; the distorted belief in ones own superiority (or that of ones’ group, race or class). However, the degree of arrogance that hubris describes makes one capable of cruelty against those viewed as inferior. It was clearly evident in the twentieth century genocides in Bosnia and Rwanda, the Holocaust in Germany, and the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment in the United States. I found the Tuskegee Experiment a particularly compelling example of hubris with a number of parallels to incidents of directed energy weapons torture and psychological abuse by covert federal agencies and local community policing groups.

1. We see evidence that an entire government agency can be characterized by hubris that leads to human rights abuses.

“Who could imagine the government, all the way up to the Surgeon General of the United States, deliberately allowing a group of its citizens to die from a terrible disease for the sake of an ill-conceived experiment?“ ⁴ asks Borgna Brunner of the Tuskegee Institute. “By the end of the experiment, 28 of the men had died directly of syphilis, 100 were dead of related complications, 40 of their wives had been infected, and 19 of their children had been born with congenital syphilis.”

The U.S. Public Health Service (now known as the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services) as an organization supported the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment. The Surgeon General of the United States participated in enticing the men to remain in the experiment, sending them certificates of appreciation after 25 years in the study. Keeping the experiment going for forty years required a well coordinated effort of deceit and manipulation by doctors, nurses, and health officials. “One of the most chilling aspects of the experiment was how zealously the PHS kept these men from receiving treatment. When several nationwide campaigns to eradicate venereal disease came to Macon County, the men were prevented from participating. Even when penicillin —the first real cure for syphilis— was discovered in the 1940s, the Tuskegee men were deliberately denied the medication.” ⁴

When a whistle-blower brought the story to public attention, the PHS remained unrepentant. An Alabama state health officer who had been involved claimed “somebody is trying to make a mountain out of a molehill.” “The PHS did not accept the media’s comparison of Tuskegee with the appalling experiments performed by Nazi doctors on their Jewish victims during World War II. Yet, in addition to the medical and racist parallels, the PHS offered the same morally bankrupt defense offered at the Nuremberg trials: they claimed they were just carrying out orders, mere cogs in the wheel of the PHS bureaucracy, exempt from personal responsibility.”

I see similar patterns in the abuses I have endured. This pattern of abuse cannot be carried out successfully without training, support, coordination and financing provided at an organizational level. It requires the coordination of several agencies, at the Federal and local level. This strongly suggests a wider campaign of abuses, I am only one of many victims. And, as with the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, there is a clear element of medical experimentation in the use of covert technologies. Additionally, the abuses are carried out in a way that denies the victim the ability to seek legal recourse.

A person (or organization) infected with hubris enjoys the denigration of others.He enjoys hurting someone in a cold, impersonal way and then gloats over the other person’s discomfort and ignominy. This is a noteworthy characteristic of many individuals who play a role in my abuse. I discern that the process of abuse provides them more satisfaction than any eventual goal the abuse is intended to reach.

2. Anyone Can be Induced by Hubris To Become A Human Rights Abuser.

It is too simplistic to explain The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment as a case of extreme white racism. “The experiment’s name comes from the Tuskegee Institute, the black university founded by Booker T. Washington. Its affiliated hospital lent the PHS its medical facilities for the study, and other predominantly black institutions as well as local black doctors also participated. A black nurse, Eunice Rivers, was a central figure in the experiment for most of its forty years.” ⁴ What induced these Black Americans, with the horrors of segregation and Jim Crow still a part of their life experience, to join in this crime against other Black Americans? What motivated Black educational institutions to become part of this crime? It was hubris. “The promise of recognition by a prestigious government agency may have obscured the troubling aspects of the study for some. A (Black American) Tuskegee doctor, for example, praised “the educational advantages offered our interns and nurses as well as the added standing it will give the hospital.” Nurse Rivers explained her role as one of passive obedience: “we were taught that we never diagnosed, we never prescribed; we followed the doctor’s instructions!” ⁴

Clearly, the Black doctors and nurses were seduced by the enhanced status and careers they would enjoy by participating in the Tuskegee Experiment. Gaining the praise and recognition of a prestigious government agency was part of the seduction. They too, felt superior to the common Black sharecroppers whose lives they condemned to a torturous death. It was not difficult for their feelings of superiority to attain the level of hubris: “mingled pride and cruelty . . . the arrogant contempt which makes [a man] trample on the hearts of his fellow men.” ²

Hubris perverts justice, cripples sound judgment, and weakens strength of character. From weakened character rises the remorseless intellect. This intellect gives license to barbaric abuses that insult all humanity. President Clinton, further commenting on the Tuskegee Experiment, stated that “the people who ran the study at Tuskegee diminished the stature of man by abandoning the most basic ethical precepts.” Indeed, we derogate all men by the continued acts of hubris in the form of directed energy weapons and psychological torture.

Do Not Envy the Remorseless

Some may be inclined to admire those who possess the authority and willingness to cruelly manipulate and control the lives of others. Do not envy them. They pay a high price for their excesses. Much like a man whose loses the ability to taste food, the remorseless become dulled as to what makes life most meaningful and satisfying. It is our striving to love and work for the better good of fellowmen that gives life meaning and purpose. When stripped of that capacity, life becomes tasteless, flat, joyless, and a meaningless quest for selfish pursuits. Eventually, the remorseless infect their family, friendships, and all social interactions with their merciless spirit. They begin to view everyone as exploitable, expendable, and cheap. I strongly suspect (based upon a decade of observing such individuals) that the dysfunctional results of remorselessness manifests itself in higher rates of divorce, mental illness, depression, suicide, alcohol and substance abuse. Do not envy them. Sooner or later, they will “reap what they sow.”

“Do not be misled: God is not one to be mocked. For whatever a man is sowing, this he will also reap . . .”—Galations 6:7

References:
1. President Clinton’s commencement address at Morgan State University, Baltimore, May 18, 1997.
2. New Testament Words, by William Barclay.
3. Theology for The Community of God, by Stanley J. Grenz.
4. The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment by Borgna Brunner

This past week I experienced two incidents which reminded me of the spirit and motives behind the gang-stalking and infrasonic / microwave weapons harassment I have undergone for the past few years. The first took place in my local library (Phoenix Library, Main Branch, Phoenix, Arizona). I observed a fellow in the business section poring over business journals and newspapers related to the stock market. Obviously he was a businessman of some sort, the intense look as he read revealing deep personal concern and interest. A much older, poorly dressed man approached him, evidently a poverty stricken Native American, quietly asking for a small handout. His approach was timid and apologetic, motivated by necessity. The businessman, quickly becoming irritated, began to loudly castigate the old man, demanding that he find a job rather than look for handouts. It was a humiliating display. And, judging by the businessman’s tone of voice, it was meant to be. The older Native American quietly walked away, uttering no response.

Feeling superior to others is a dangerous thing. When we are convinced that others are less worthy than ourselves, it can create a cruel and domineering spirit as that brief episode demonstrated. A simple, quiet reply by the businessman would have been a sufficient rejection, and, would have preserved the old man’s dignity as well. However, the businessman saw no need to treat someone he viewed condescendingly with even a modicum of respect.

It was with that observation fresh in my mind that a second incident occurred the following day. This time, I was personally involved. I was driving in the South Mountain Park / Preserve (Phoenix, Arizona) this past weekend to photograph the spring wildflowers that are in bloom. The part of the preserve best known for spring wildflower displays, is only open on the weekends from sunrise to sunset. At other times, a locked gate prevents entry. I drove into this area (the gate was open) about an hour before sunset this past Sunday. A Park Rangers’ vehicle was partially blocking one lane just past the entrance, having arrived just before I did. The Park Ranger had left the vehicle, and was walking in a forested area near the road. I stopped and asked him if the area was still open. I was not sure what to make of his vehicle partially blocking the road. The ranger said that they were closing the road. It was 4:38 in the afternoon, more than an hour before sunset. To my thinking, this was an odd decision. So I asked why they were closing it so early when the sign said “open sunrise to sunset.?”

Well, in less than a minute, a second Park Ranger appeared, approached my car and joined the conversation. I simply wanted to know why, just as I entered the area, that the decision was made to close it, and not at sunset as the posted sign indicates. As the conversation progressed, my manner of speaking began having a pronounced effect on these two Rangers. Let me explain why. I am the sort of person who grooms and dresses himself with dignity at all times. I have taught public speaking for over ten years, and spent many years in corporate environments. I know how to communicate respectfully yet emphatically without profanity or disrespect. Simply because of the way I spoke and conducted myself, the rangers began to think that perhaps I was a high-powered official with the Parks Department or City government who had caught them closing the gate too early. They became overly apologetic and extremely helpful as a result. I could see that they were in fear for their jobs, and were trying to find a way to know what office I held or represented. In that moment, I held a measure of power over those Park Rangers. It was the same power that businessman held as he was approached for a handout by the old man. How should I use that power? How did I use it?

I did not want to leave those Park Rangers with the wrong impression. It would be wrong to abuse the power I held at that moment. I thanked the Rangers for their work and assured them that I respected their authority. I also assured them that I was asking out of disappoint because of not being able to photograph the wildflowers (near sunset is one of the best times of the day for landscape photography) and would honor their decision. What fleeting power I held in that moment dissipated. I corrected any false impressions they held and left on good terms with both men.

However, I must admit to the brief temptation to use the power I held over those men in that moment as a tool of humiliation. After all, I have been repeatedly abused by those who hold an authority like these men. Shouldn’t I, in some way, take it out on these men, if only in speech? Never may that happen! I firmly reject the lure of power abused, sticking to the superior principles I have been taught since youth. Remember the “Golden Rule?” “Do unto others as you would have them do to you.” I strive to treat others the way I want others to treat me. Not the way I am treated. That “Golden Rule” did not govern the actions of the abusive businessman I had observed earlier. Nor does it govern the lives of persons employed in gang-stalking and psychological and physical torture. Offer ordinary people a chance to employ a cruel abusive power over others, and many will accept. It is an addictive thrill to abuse others, an alluring temptation to the imperfect mind and heart. Unless we make a concerted effort to adopt and stick to higher principles at all times (such as the “Golden Rule”), we will easily be lured by the abuse of power!