9/22/2014
Shock Doctrine
After reading the introduction and Part I of Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine, I was shocked by her theory and the accompanying evidence. I noted that Part I was really crucial for me in further understanding Klein's theory due to the horrifying personal experiences mentioned about the shock victims. It was refreshing to read evidence that was researched from afar but also from a first hand experience such as Klein's interview with Gail Kastner. It was horrific to hear of what Kastner and other victims went through under the eye of doctor Ewen Cameron. Kastner's personal experience with erasing and remaking was eerily similar to the events following catastrophes like the tsunami that hit Sri Lanka. Whether it was an event that followed a publicized catastrophe or an event that affected the life of a college student, the idea of erasing and reshaping is a theory so dark that it's hard to imagine that it exists.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Indeed, I found the personal accounts from Gail Kastner to be very tough to read. Simply knowing that innocent volunteers for a study were taken advantage of to the greatest degree by "doctor" Ewen Cameron is tough to handle. The CIA needs to take full responsibility of their actions and prevent such atrocities from ever happening in the future. This book certainly tells us to watch who we trust because we may be unaware of peoples' true motives behind their actions.
ReplyDeleteKastner's story to me sounded like something out of a horror film. Ideas become so much more real when you put a name and a face to a story, and that's what Klein did with Kastner's story. Hearing those stories is gut wrenching and realizing that they are true is even worse. It continues to put the United States Government's actions in doubt as we continue to find flaws with what they do and their rationale behind those actions.
ReplyDeleteI agree, it's terrifying to hear stories like that of Gail Kastner. Her life was ruined, all for the benefit of one man's experiments, and she most certainly was not the only one.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I feel that Cameron's idea of erasing and rebuilding a human personality is completely misguided (among other things, such as immoral, inhumane, disturbed, insane, but I digress). When you consider the concept of instinct and notice how certain traits are ingrained deeply in an individual with seemingly no outside influence, it seems silly that one could delude themselves enough to believe they could erase the human psyche and start over.
ReplyDeleteTry as he might, Cameron could never completely erase someone. I think this is a testament to the power of the human being, and the essence of human being, in resisting negative influence. Not only that, but it is entirely evident that these tactics create more problems than they solve both in the case of the individual and on a larger scale: Gail Kastner will probably never be the same after what was done to her, and the same can be said for places like New Orleans and Sri Lanka, In the case of larger societies, however, it is not the initial shocks that really cause the turn for the worse, but the ways in which the government powers in the world take advantage of the state of vulnerability induced by shock.