Crehan, Joseph H.

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The Linacre QuarterlyVolume 31 | Number 4 Article 14November 1964The Ethics of BrainwashingJoseph H. CrehanFollow this and additional works at: http://epublications.marquette.edu/lnqRecommended CitationCrehan, Joseph H. (1964) "The Ethics of Brainwashing," The Linacre Quarterly: Vol. 31: No. 4, Article 14.Available at: http://epublications.marquette.edu/lnq/vol31/iss4/14The Ethics of Brainwashing JOSE PH H. CREHAN, S.]. IN ORDER to simplify this discus-sion, one may premise that leucot-omy and surgical treatment of the brain is excluded from the strict defi-nition of brainwashing, this being de-fined as the artificial removal of a man's settled principles of action and their replacement by others that are different and even opposite. The op-erative word in this definition is the adjective artificial, which implies that the means used whether chemical, elec-trical or sensitive (hypnosis or possibly telepathy), are somehow below the human level at which a human per-son has the right to conduct his af-fairs . Obviously there are many men who go into a Directors' meeting or a Governors' meeting with one idea quite firmly held and who come out having agreed to the opposite, and yet they cannot be said to have been brainwashed, since they have, as they say, "had it out" with their fellow Directors and have been convinced by a process of rational argument. T echniques of brainwashing vary, but a brief summary of the kind of process followed may be given as a background for discussion. The pris-oner, before questioning begins, is confined in various types of cell, in one of which the inmates have been beaten, in another of which they have confessed, while in a third they may have been waiting for months for something to happen. All this exposes the mind of the prisoner to strain and uncertainty about the future. After this he is removed to a tiny cell , scarcely big enough to contain him, there to await interrogation in silence and meditation. After some days he is surprised by the sudden opening of his door. A silent guard beckons him to follow, and he is escorted through NOVEMBER, 1964 si lent corridors on what seems an end-less journey. At each corner the guard stops to listen, looks in both direc-tions and then goes on. If he hears or sees any other person approaching, he pushes the prisoner round to face the wall until the others have passed . When the prisoner reaches the inter-rogation room the treatment varies very much. Questioning may be in-formal, as he sits in an arm-chair and is offered a cigarette. At another time he may be beaten until he loses con-sciousness, revived with cold water, and then beaten again. If his confes-sion is not satisfactory, he is removed back to the cells for further soften ing-up. Back in his cell he will be waked up at any time of the night, or called out fo r questioning just as he has begun to eat the food provided for him. He may be deprived of all pos-sibility of exercise or of sleep by a team of questioners who take over from the other until he is exhausted. Each questioner may begin all over again without reference to the answers given to his predecessors. If the pris-oner stays awake long enough during this process, he will begin to suffer hallucinations, thinking that there are insects crawling over him or rats run-ning about the floor. He will finally confess from sheer physical weakness. If in the course of his interrogations the prisoner, without giving away any vital matter, lets slip some clue or some slight admission, his questioners will stick at this point and use it to drag more out of him, taunting him with it as if it were the whole of the matter. When (and if) he has eventually confessed, there will set in a reaction of remorse and self-re-proach, and during this period the positive build-up will start. He will 201 be told that he is now on the side of his questioners and their revolution or whatever it may be. He will be encouraged to throw in his lot with them completely, as his former friends will now loath him and a new start will become necessary. A certain eas-ing of his conditions will go with th is, so that the returning sense of eu-phoria will brace him to make his choice effective and to reconcile him with what is being asked of him. This is the most delicate part of the whole job and only the most skilled inter-rogators will be used to put before him the ideals such as they may be of the new movement he is being asked to join and to outline for him his new path. They may say to him that they have been through a si mi-lar process themselves or may indi-cate that the whole world is coming over to their side, as an encourage-ment to him. The chemical and electrical aids may be interposed in the process of questioning at any point where a hold-up has occurred. It is obviously not required in the present context that the working of sod ium pentothal and sodium amy tal should be described or the manner in which shock-treat-ment can alter the structure of mem-ory. Attack may be made on the sense-apparatus by music or rhythm of a sort. In Evelyn Waugh's horror novel he makes Pinfold say: "The three-eight rhythm. The Gestapo discovered it independently. They used to play it in the cells. It drove the prisoners mad. Yes: thirty-six hours did for anyone. Twelve was enough for most. They could stand any torture but that. It drove them mad, raving mad, stark staring mad. The Russians use it now. The Hungarians do it best. " In the coffee, drugs; in the air, sounds, but after all it is the psychological mech-anism of human choice that has to be altered at the last. The human will seems to operate 202 on two planes. These were distin-guished by medieval theologians as intentio and electio, and may be in-terpreted as the plane of ideals and the plane of choice. It is in the light of his ideals that a man makes his day-to-day choices. It is not quite a matter of the mind making up a moral syllogism with the major premise serving as ideal and the minor premise providing the factual information which will lead to the immediate making of a choice, but rather that the ideals are settled principles rest-ing in the mind which enter into ordi-nary choices, not perhaps singly but as a complex group. St. Thomas in-deed thought that it was the duty of a man on coming to the use of reason to make his fundamental decision, to seek God or to turn away from Him, thus making sure that all his subse-quent choices would be informed either by a principle of good or of evil. Some theologians sti ll hold this view but it is not by any means uni-versal. It may be that a moment comes to most people when they can say that they came to a realisation of what the existence of God should mean to them, but to say that this was at the moment of their com ing to an age when they could first make a rational choice would not seem true to experi-ence. The structure of the Spiritual Exer-cises of St. Ignatius is also on this pattern. A man is encouraged to de-velop an ideal of doing something for Christ, and is then brought up against the question : "What have I done for Christ? What am I doing for Christ?" , and the immediate choices are then to be made in the light of the ideal. In the discussion which followed the read-ing of this paper, the point was raised that to some minds the making of a retreat by a Catholic was more than submitt ing oneself to brainwash-ing. It is true that in going through the Spil·jtllal Exercises, one is trying LINACRE QUARTERLY <\ • to improve one's settled ideals so that subsequent choices may be more pleas-ing to God, but the means by which one effects that improvement bear no comparison with the technique of brainwashing. After their experience in Korea, when one-third of their sol-diers who were taken prisoner were suspected of having gone over to the Communists, the American Army evolved a technique of inculcating their men with the ideal : " I am an American fighting man," and hope that in future emergencies that will prevent similar breakdowns. Unless such an ideal is rationally presented to the mind and adequately motivated, it would not seem to have much efficacy. At this point one must advert to the concept of Original Sin. The fram-ing of an ideal has to be in accordance with human nature, but it has also to be able to correct the bias to which human nature is shown to the sub-ject. Thus in the Spiritual Exercises a man has to be encouraged to over-come himself in order to find the will of God, to fi nd what he can do for Christ. In the political sphere there may be a similar attempt to bring a man to overcome his self-interest in order to work for the good of the party or of a movement, but in the nature of things such appeals are not so firmly based in real ity. It is inter-esting to note that members of the Communist party are suspended for private immoralities that are notorious. It may be that this is a security meas-ure, to avoid having party-members who are open to blackmail, but it may also be an admission that if they are not somehow integrated characters-even if integrated on wrong lines-they are of no use. When a man has made it his chief end in li fe to get more strong drink, he does not need much manipulation to be perfectly brainwashed. If his drink supply is cut off, he will come to terms at once. The interrogators, as NOVEMBER, 1964 soon as they discover this intentio in the man, know what they have to do, and all is over. If, like the late Mac-kenzie King, in Canada, their great aim in life is to succeed in communi -cating with the dead by means of Spiritualism, the brainwashing tech-nique would have to be much more subtle. It might be risky to try to introduce in the man a belief that he was communicating with the dead and that they were telling him to join the Party and work for it, since his credulity might not go so far. These examples will, however, show that once a settled principle of action has been discovered, the man is open to manipulation in terms of that prin-ciple. If new principles have to be sup-plied to h im, then he wi ll need the whole treatment of breaking down and building up. The plain moral question involved in brainwashing is this : "How far is it right to use outside influences to change a man's inlentio? Can one ever rightly force an individual to be free) Can one use such a technique to im-prove a criminal during his imprison-ment ? In general one may answer that the State is there simply to provide the conditions that favour freedom and that help a man towards happiness and the greater knowledge of God; it has not the right to use human persons as if they were things. One may see this by the fearsome example of what was recently proposed by a correspondent in the Eugenics Review, that the State should admin ister to the whole population (by adulterating some staple food) the essential ele-ments of the steriliz ing pi ll and then allow some, for reasons and under license, the use of an antidote which would make them once again capable of bearing children and begetting them. The moral sense is revolted by such a proposal, but it is well to think out why this should be so. There has to be made a dist inction 203 between rational argument and what may for the want of a better word be called suasion . It is wrong for the State, or any of its organs, to act as a hidden persuader, and so to condi-tion the citizens that they produce an almost automatic reaction of consent to a State directive. Citizens are not to be equated with Pavlov's dogs. Ar-gument is fa ir ; conditioning is not. St. Thomas More put all this very clearly in his Utopia where he was sketching a pol icy which had the full use of reason but as yet no light of revelation to help it. His ideas may be paraphrased thus: King Utopus decreed that each one could follow what religion he pleased, and he might thus far try to persuade others to join him, that he should bring forward reasons to support his religion with peace and restraint, not striving to tear other religions to bits if he fa iled to persuade men to his own, not using any force at all and not stoop ing to abusive words. Any who offend in this particular the Utopians punish with exile or with enslavement. The intention of King Utopus was not only to preserve peace, but also he had in view the good of religion itself. He would make no hasty decision in such a matter ... One thing was clear to him, that to exact f rom others by force, or threat of force, adherence to what one beli eved oneself was quite stupid and arrogant. H e realised that the truth would make its own way and eventually come to the fore by its own power, if all was ruled by reason and moderation, but that if force and tumult prevailed the worst types of men, being always the most forward, would crush the most holy and the best religion under their own load of idle superstitions. He therefore left this matter an open question and left each man enti rely free to decide what to believe. He made only this provision, to be en-forced with great strictness, that no one should so far fall away from the dignity of human nature as to believe that the soul dies with the body or that the world is ruled by chance with-out any Providence from God. One who fai ls in this way they do not count in Utopia as a man . He is given no honours and is not admitted to any public office .. Still , they do not punish him nor compel him by force to conceal his opinion. H e is for-bidden to argue in favour of his opinion before the multitude, but in the presence of the pries ts and other grave men he is not only allowed but even encouraged to do so, for they trust that reason will f inally dispel that foolish prejudice. Others there are, and these are not a few, on whom there is no prohibition, and these are they who hold that the souls of ani-mals are likewise immortal, though not destined for the happiness that is ours nor to be compared with them in dignity. Utopia leaves us then with the re-sidual question : Granted that it is wrong to use suasion on a man in place of reason, when it is desired to change his course of action, does there ever come a time (as Utopia implies) when a man has so far sunk below the rational level and the dignity of man as to be exempt from this moral prohibition ? One may also be moved to wonder what, if anything, the mod-ern State is doing about fostering in its citizens a regard for the immortal-ity of the soul and the Providence of God, which are the two essential pre-suppositions of civic li fe? Repri n ted, with permission , from Catholic Medical Quarterly (London) 14:6-10 Jan . 1962 . 204 LIN ACRE QUARTERLY 

The Ethics of Brainwashing

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The Ethics of Brainwashing

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