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Behavior Modification

By VVAW

"The day has come when we can combine sensory deprivation with the use of drugs, hypnosis and the astute manipulation of reward and punishment to gain almost absolute control over an individual's behavior. We want to reshape our society drastically, so that all of us will be trained from birth to want to do what society wants us to do. Today's behavioral psychologists are the architects and engineers who are shaping the Brave New World of Tomorrow."
-- Professor James V. McConnell
Dept. of Mental Health Research

"There is presently for prisoners in prisons throughout the U.S., both state and federal, a new kind of warfare and dehumanization. For prisoners it is a present terror, for those on the outside it is a threat." These are the words of a federal prisoner speaking of the terrorist tactics of our prison officials as the practice of behavior modification in prisons becomes increasingly more common.

Since the early sixties, federal and state corrections departments have been investigating ways to modify the behavior or prisoners who present any sort of threat to the order of prison life. As prisoners have become increasingly politically aware and developed a history of resistance to the oppression which stifles them every day, prison authorities have found it "necessary" to provide facilities for "aggressive and manipulative prisoners who are resistive to authority." (The quotes are taken from the outline of Project START, a behavior modification project of the Springfield, Mo. Federal Prison).

The basic philosophy guiding these behavioral projects is well expressed by Dr. Edgar Schein (associate professor at MIT) and a behavior modification enthusiast. Schein explains: "My basic argument is this: in order to produce marked change of behavior and/or attitude, it is necessary to weaken, undermine, or remove the supports to the old patterns of behavior and the old attitudes." This may be done "either by removing the individual physically and preventing any communication with those whom he cares about, or by proving to him that those whom he respects are not worthy of it and, indeed, should be actively mistrusted."

Some of the techniques which Schein suggests for the prisons of this country include: "social disorganization and the creation of mutual mistrust" achieved by "spying on the men and reporting back private material"; "tricking the men into written statements" which are then shown to others with the object being "to convince most men they could trust no one"; "undermining ties to home by the systematic withholding of mail" plus the segregation of natural leaders, and the physical removal of prisoners to isolated areas so as to break of weaken close emotional ties.

The standard procedure previously used in prisons to break a prisoner's spirit has been physical brutality. However, this approach has recently been proven unsuccessful and prisoners have continued to resist this treatment as can be seen in the uprisings at Attica, Leavenworth, McAlester, etc. Since the technique of out-right physical brutality has failed to modify behavior, corrections departments have become much more sophisticated in their brutality and turned to psychology and psychiatry to solve the problems of the "non-cooperative" or "anti-social" prisoner.

Of the new, "sophisticated" techniques of dealing with "troublesome' prisoners, one of the most widely used methods of modifying behavior and breaking the prisoner's spirit has been "drug assaults." Prison officials, with the help of psychiatrists and drug companies (Updike, Squibb and Lederle Labs) have been experimenting for several years to find ways to modify behavior through the use of powerful and dangerous drugs. One such powerful drug is Prolixin, a drug which has been used in prisons such as Vacaville, Calif.; Patuxtent, Md.; and the Illinois Security Hospital for several years. Prolixin is a more powerful counterpart to thorazine and is a depressant which lingers in effect for two weeks. According to its manufacturer, E.R. Squibb, Prolixin is a "highly potent behavior modifier with a markedly extended duration of effect." Side effects include: "the induction of a ?catatonic-like state,' nausea, loss of appetite, headache, constipation, blurred vision, glaucoma, bladder paralysis, impotency, liver damage, hypotension severe enough to cause fatal cardiac arrest." It can also lead to a persistent palsy-like disorder. On top of this, "the symptoms persist after drug withdrawal, and in some patients appears to be irreversible."

An even more frightening drug is Anectine, a derivative of the South American arrow-tip poison, curare. When Anectine is injected into a person in a conscious state, it slows heartbeat, causes respiratory arrest and will make the subject feel as if he/she is dying. Dr. Arthur Nugent, chief psychiatrist at Vacaville prison, says that Anectine induces "sensations of suffocation and drowning." The subject experiences feelings of deep horror and terror, "as though he were on the brink of death." Nugent claims, "Even the toughest inmates have come to fear and hate the drug. I don't blame them, I wouldn't have one treatment for the world. I'm at a loss as to why everybody's upset over this."

That these drugs produce the ability to alter an individual's "behavior" is easily seen. Both of these drugs (examples of just two of many such drugs used in prison "experimentation") reduce the prisoner to a vegetable and make the prisoner unable to think clearly or react with emotion. Because of the vulnerable frame of mind that the prisoner is placed in while under such treatment, the prisoner is then scolded for his behavior and told to shape up or he/she will be given further doses of the drugs. The spirit of the prisoner is so drastically broken that the prison psychiatrist is then able to control a person who will be more readily amenable to behavior conditioning.

Another method of behavior conditioning which has been consistently used in prisons and mental hospitals is adversive conditioning. This method of conditioning gives negative reinforcement for behavior which is to be changed. Among the types of negative reinforcements which are used are electric shock and emetic drugs. By the use of electro-shock, prison psychiatrists have attempted to "cure" homosexuals by showing the individual "homosexual movies" while his penis is wired. When the prisoner becomes sexually excited, his penis is shocked. Emetics (drugs which induce nausea) are used in the same manner as shock treatment. A prisoner will be shown a movie of a bank robbery and injected with the drug which causes him/her to be violently sick. If this procedure is repeated often, the prisoner will become nauseous at the very thought of robbing banks.

Perhaps the most frightening method of "modifying behavior" is the use of lobotomy and electro-shock to the brain. Lobotomies are usually performed by removing portions of the frontal lobe of the brain (which controls many of our subtle functions such as emotion). Lobotomies leave people in a totally passive state -- a human robot -- who will perform tasks with no emotional response. Lobotomies may also be performed by implanting radioactive radium seeds in the brain. By using electrodes, a lobotomist can destroy the brain cells gradually and can stimulate areas of the brain in order to cause pleasure, pain and reflex actions in the prisoner. The purpose of psychosurgery is to stop "aggressive behavior" and characteristics which do not conform to prison life.

The above described techniques used in behavior modification are becoming increasingly common practices. Such techniques have been used in prisons in Morgantown and Alderson, W. Va.; Clinton, New York; Ft Worth and Seagoville, Texas; Terre Haute, Ind.; McNeil Island in Washington; Lompoc, Terminal Island and Vacaville, Calif.; Patuxtent, Md. etc. Thus far, the two most "far-reaching' behavior programs have existed in Springfield, Mo. and Marion, Ill. All of these programs have met with courageous resistance by those people who have been considered as "candidates" for the programs (those brothers and sisters who have refused to be molded into the submissive being that is demanded by prison officials). Resistance has taken the form of hunger-strikes, work stoppages, and court litigation on the part of the prisoners. This resistance has been successful to the extent that the START (Special Training and Rehabilitative Treatment) Program at Springfield has been cancelled. The administration at Springfield and the Dept. of Corrections have cited "economic reasons" as responsible for the termination of the START project, but in reality, the closing of this project was due to public pressure and the resistance of the brothers on the inside who were saying "NO" to the inhumanity of the program.

But even though START has been defeated, the largest fear in the field of behavior modification projects is still to come. Sometime this spring, a special $14,000,000 facility will be completed in Butner, North Carolina. The approximately 200-bed facility has stated its purpose of using its inmates for experimentation and research in behavior modification. The objective of the project is to set up a small microcosm of the outside world whereby the prisoners will be taught to "get along" in that world and to conform to everything in it. This objective is a complete denial of all human and legal rights of the people who will be selected to participate in this program. It completely avoids the right to resist oppression and injustice which is constantly growing in this country.

The prisoners to be housed at Butner include the "security risks, minority groups, management problems, etc." To translate these terms into normal language, those people most likely to be sent to Butner will be those brothers and sisters now being held in Segregation Units throughout the country. These are people who have participated in work stoppages, prison rebellions, and other forms of resistance to the oppression of prison life. Butner will consist of the political conscious brothers and sisters who have begun to fight back against repression in prisons, particularly black and third world prisoners.

There is unity growing in our prisons; there is an increase in organization to fight for human and legal rights: and there is a growing level of involvement in political struggles. This unity and movement of prisoners must be stopped if the prison system is to continue to exist as it now does -- as a hell-hole of brutality which tires to bring about the submission and complete denial of spirit among its inmates. Butner is the height of political repression as it now exists; it is the sign that the re-molding of minds is on the agenda for dealing with political dissent and resistance in the future.

Butner must be stopped, shut-down, dispensed with. Many prisoners who have been involved in resistance to previous behavior modification programs view the opening of Butner as the beginning of outright fascist tactics by the U.S. government. They believe that hey will be the guinea-pigs for the techniques of drug assaults, psychosurgery, etc. which will be conducted at Butner; but after these techniques have been perfected, the prisoners feel that these methods of controlling behavior will be introduced on the people of this country who are outside prison walls.

As political dissent against a corrupt, non-responsive and freedom-robbing government grows and continues, so will the country's rulers have to find more severe methods of quelling that dissent. It may not be long before the needles, the electrodes, and the scalpel will be used on many people who are now walking the streets. Everyone in this country must take on the responsibility of informing themselves as to the struggles that are now going on in our prisons, and of supporting the brothers and sisters who are leading the resistance against the oppression of prison life. These brothers and sisters are not only fighting for themselves, but they are struggling for everyone as they continue to resist the blatant repression which is facing them so that it will not be carried to the world outside. Their call for the cessation of behavior modification projects such as Butner must be heeded and pressure must be put on the government to see that these projects are stopped and that new projects do not begin. Letters in behalf of all the prisoners in the U.S. should be sent to; Norman A. Carlson, U.S. Bureau of Prisons, Washington, D.C. 20537, demanding an end to the terror tactics of behavior modification.