I question Rolling Stone's motive for publishing this right now. This story is nothing new, in fact here is a Time article on the exact same events from October 12th of LAST YEAR.

 

My guess is new developments or something, again I'm not fully through the article, but from what I remember of the one last year they never had pictures

 

Your trolling skills are just pathetic. Seriously, I realize this is a runescape forum and all, but that's all you could come up with?

 

My posts were dripping with sarcasm, incase you couldn't tell.

 

No I couldn't because usually there is either at least one ultra-patriotic [wagon] who genuinely believes the stuff you said, or a troll who tries to get a rise. Good to know it was sarcasm

Soldiers are people. You cannot expect them to always act ethically.

Soldiers are people. You cannot expect them to always act ethically.

 

No one is saying all soldiers are perfect. But this is a pretty big mess

Soldiers are people. You cannot expect them to always act ethically.

^This

 

The Taliban are doing far worse than this. Not saying this is a good thing, but it appears to be an isolated incident.

But it is, and you know what? It's not going to stop.

Yeah. Terrible isn't it? This whole world is terrible.

I wholeheartedly disagree with you. This world is not terrible, but there are terrible people like the soldiers above.

 

I don't want to get in a huge argument over this, but I disagree that they're terrible people. If you haven't heard of it, look up Philip Zombardo's prison experiment.

 

tl;dr about the experiment: he chose law-abiding college students to either act as prisoners or guards, and watched how each person reacted. Most guards acted like real prison guards and were abusive, while most prisoners suffered mental stress and panic because of the abuse. These are normal people in a matter of days (the study only lasted 6 days). Most people will do messed up stuff if you give them authority without structure. I would say it's a problem with the army as a whole and how it is run, not a few bad soldiers.

 

 

The Taliban are doing far worse than this. Not saying this is a good thing, but it appears to be an isolated incident.

 

It's an isolated incident in that soldiers aren't going around killing people willy nilly, it was just these guys, but the article does say that there was another platoon possibly doing similar things (and that it likely will come under investigation). Then you have the issue of stuff like the Collateral Damage video pilots not being punished, or the UN helicopter that ripped some 13 year old boys to shreds with machine gun fire that they dismissed as an "accident".

 

 

I don't want to get in a huge argument over this, but I disagree that they're terrible people. If you haven't heard of it, look up Philip Zombardo's prison experiment.

 

 

I believe he called it the Lucifer Effect, I'm not sure how well it does or doesn't fit this case though...

But it is, and you know what? It's not going to stop.

Yeah. Terrible isn't it? This whole world is terrible.

I wholeheartedly disagree with you. This world is not terrible, but there are terrible people like the soldiers above.

 

I don't want to get in a huge argument over this, but I disagree that they're terrible people. If you haven't heard of it, look up Philip Zombardo's prison experiment.

 

tl;dr about the experiment: he chose law-abiding college students to either act as prisoners or guards, and watched how each person reacted. Most guards acted like real prison guards and were abusive, while most prisoners suffered mental stress and panic because of the abuse. These are normal people in a matter of days (the study only lasted 6 days). Most people will do messed up stuff if you give them authority without structure. I would say it's a problem with the army as a whole and how it is run, not a few bad soldiers.

 

Some of the experiment's critics argued that participants based their behavior on how they were expected to behave, or modelled it after stereotypes they already had about the behavior of prisoners and guards. In other words, the participants were merely engaging in role-playing. In response, Zimbardo claimed that even if there was role-playing initially, participants internalized these roles as the experiment continued.

 

More directly, though, it has been pointed out that, in contrast to Zimbardo's claim that participants were given no instructions about how to behave, his briefing of the guards gave them a clear sense that they should oppress the prisoners. In this sense the study was an exploration of the effects of tyrannical leadership. In line with this, certain guards, such as one known as "John Wayne", changed their behavior because of wanting to conform to the behavior that Zimbardo was trying to elicit.

 

Just from glancing through the Wikipedia article on it (yes, crucify me if you will for Wikipedia), the criticisms seem pretty reasonable. At the very least this experiment was done incorrectly and the results inconclusive.

Besides, hiding behind that experiment doesn't justify anything they did.

Besides, hiding behind that experiment doesn't justify anything they did.

 

Zimbardo's experiments aren't justifications, they're explanations

That article was actually horrifying. There's no way to describe what those soldiers did except as disgusting and wrong. Very wrong. I don't see how anyone can defend those actions... at all.

Soldiers are people. You cannot expect them to always act ethically.

^This

 

The Taliban are doing far worse than this. Not saying this is a good thing, but it appears to be an isolated incident.

 

I would say that the US and UK(I don't know much about others) have done/ are doing things that are just as bad as the taliban.

 

I'm sure this isn't an isolated incident, I've seen loads of videos of UK/US troops behaving like this in plenty of countries.

 

But I still think that drone attacks are worse, because noone seems to think of them as bad.

 

Anyway the taliban have a good few new images for recruting now. :S

 

(By the way I didn't read the article because it makes me sad :()

I remember when the barracks literally over the road to where I went to school became the focus of national media after photos apparently revealing torture by British troops on Iraqis were revealed to have been faked by soldiers stationed there. Baring in mind I was 14 at the time, against the Iraq war, and that a significant proportion of my school were Muslim, it wasn't nice to know such insensitivity had taken place only fifteen metres from our school playground: http://www.guardian....publishing.iraq

 

That was difficult enough to comprehend--Why would anyone want to 'act out' such barbarism?-- this is even worse. Truly shocking, and I for one won't accept any lenient excuses of, 'They're soldiers so it's OK.'

Same [cabbage] different day.

Every military in the world does this.

Just because every millitary does it doesnt justify it

Condemning this is pretty obvious, but I don't know how it can be stopped. When you put people in a position of power over others, and no likely or real threat of punishment for abuse, abuse happens to a brutal level. The only solution I can imagine is not giving soldiers the task of interacting with civilians who are mixed with a few hostile militants.

 

It's no wonder we're still in Iraq and Afghanistan.

 

 

I read the full article and watched the videos which I found pretty interesting, albeit horrible, but after the Abu Ghraib prison thing a few years back I'm surprised something like this hasn't come to light sooner.

But it is, and you know what? It's not going to stop.

Yeah. Terrible isn't it? This whole world is terrible.

I wholeheartedly disagree with you. This world is not terrible, but there are terrible people like the soldiers above.

 

I don't want to get in a huge argument over this, but I disagree that they're terrible people. If you haven't heard of it, look up Philip Zombardo's prison experiment.

 

tl;dr about the experiment: he chose law-abiding college students to either act as prisoners or guards, and watched how each person reacted. Most guards acted like real prison guards and were abusive, while most prisoners suffered mental stress and panic because of the abuse. These are normal people in a matter of days (the study only lasted 6 days). Most people will do messed up stuff if you give them authority without structure. I would say it's a problem with the army as a whole and how it is run, not a few bad soldiers.

 

Some of the experiment's critics argued that participants based their behavior on how they were expected to behave, or modelled it after stereotypes they already had about the behavior of prisoners and guards. In other words, the participants were merely engaging in role-playing. In response, Zimbardo claimed that even if there was role-playing initially, participants internalized these roles as the experiment continued.

 

More directly, though, it has been pointed out that, in contrast to Zimbardo's claim that participants were given no instructions about how to behave, his briefing of the guards gave them a clear sense that they should oppress the prisoners. In this sense the study was an exploration of the effects of tyrannical leadership. In line with this, certain guards, such as one known as "John Wayne", changed their behavior because of wanting to conform to the behavior that Zimbardo was trying to elicit.

 

Just from glancing through the Wikipedia article on it (yes, crucify me if you will for Wikipedia), the criticisms seem pretty reasonable. At the very least this experiment was done incorrectly and the results inconclusive.

 

There's also a video I saw of a study of people shocking random strangers because they thought they were on a game show, and of people shocking strangers who got questions wrong because they were told "shocking them will teach them better".

 

I'm not justifying these actions at all, nothing can justify doing that to another person, I just think it's nicer to think that it's not the people that are inherently bad, it's the military's structure that needs fixing. Giving people of power the position to choose how much a "prisoner" eats, what that "prisoner" does, etc. with no supervision is asking for trouble.

 

 

There's also a video I saw of a study of people shocking random strangers because they thought they were on a game show, and of people shocking strangers who got questions wrong because they were told "shocking them will teach them better".

 

I'm not justifying these actions at all, nothing can justify doing that to another person, I just think it's nicer to think that it's not the people that are inherently bad, it's the military's structure that needs fixing. Giving people of power the position to choose how much a "prisoner" eats, what that "prisoner" does, etc. with no supervision is asking for trouble.

 

The Milgram experiment was not a game show. It was an experiment in obedience.

 

Can we stop the arm chair psychology?

As a US service member, who has been over there, let me tell you all that the thought process may be the same, but the act carried out is a VERY VERY isolated thing. Don't throw us all under the bus because of a couple riders. I think its sick and disgusting what they did and inexcusable by them and their superiors for letting it happen.

I have to admit that's some pretty messed up stuff there. I have no clue how their commanding officers let them do that. I hope something will be done sooner rather than later.

As a US service member, who has been over there, let me tell you all that the thought process may be the same, but the act carried out is a VERY VERY isolated thing. Don't throw us all under the bus because of a couple riders. I think its sick and disgusting what they did and inexcusable by them and their superiors for letting it happen.

 

This. Not every US Soldier does it, in fact, most US Soldiers don't do it. There are a few bad eggs in the armed forces (I graduated basic training with a few that I would have preferred pushing over a cliff), but that's EVERY ARMED FORCES. Like I said, I'd rather those soldiers be pushed off a cliff, regardless of rank. Rank doesn't matter when you can't act like it.

update:

the brig commander got a slap on the wrist

http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/watercooler/2011/apr/5/kill-team-brigade-commander-given-wrist-slap/

"derp america sucks"

 

"derp america is best"

 

i am totally indifferent. yes, this article proves that in this world, there are some douchebags, and a few of them happen to be soldiers. this is utterly meaningless as far as any discussion of american politics goes (which is obviously the effect you were looking for based on your posts) and frankly everyone in the whole world knew this already.

 

1/10, this thread has been posted here 100 times with 100 names and the same posts including this one

 

Could you maybe read the thread next time? Or read it better next time?

 

Thanks in advance

oh jeez, that's my bad. i totally forgot about the whole "reading" thing.

 

oh wait, this is the same topic that gets posted every two weeks with a slightly different article.

 

Where are those other articles exactly? I'd like to read them.

oh jeez, that's my bad. i totally forgot about the whole "reading" thing.

 

oh wait, this is the same topic that gets posted every two weeks with a slightly different article.

 

Where are those other articles exactly? I'd like to read them.

Rocco is an overpartiotic American douche that likes to remind the world what exactly ignorance is. You should just ignore his posts because 90% of the time its him ass-kissing America like he's some ex-pat trying to earn citizenship in a foreign country.

can you link to some of this guys posts? he sounds like a real [bleep].

 

Who are you talking about/to?

Also have you had any time to find those other articles/topics that you mentioned?