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  1. #1
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    Default Chelsea Manning -punishment or persecution?

    Most of you will know that Chelsea Manning was sentenced to 35 years in prison after being found guilty of espionage. She is serving her sentence in Fort Leavenworth Men's Military Prison. A report in The Independent today claims that she may be placed in solitary confinement for reasons quoted below, which contain a reference to an expired tube of toothpaste which makes you wonder what planet these prison officials live on.

    I am not condoning espionage, but the sentence is the punishment, to keep adding to it for trivial reasons to me smacks of persecution, and that surely is not part of the deal.


    Chelsea Manning ‘could be placed in solitary confinement indefinitely’ for having Caitlyn Jenner issue of Vanity Fair

    The US whistleblower Chelsea Manning could be placed in solitary confinement for allegedly being in possession of the Caitlyn Jenner issue of a Vanity Fair, her lawyer said on Wednesday.
    Manning is currently serving a 35-year prison sentence after being convicted of espionage for leaking over 700,000 classified documents to Wikileaks while working for the military in Iraq.
    Manning, who is transgender, is currently serving her prison sentence at the Fort Leavenworth men’s military prison, where her hearing in front of a panel of three people will take place in private, according to her lawyer Nancy Hollander.
    Manning was also allegedly found with other reading material, an expired tube of toothpaste and is accused of disorderly conduct for sweeping food onto the floor and of showing disrespect, according to the Associated Press.
    Her supporters have launched an online petition claiming she is being punished for “speaking out” and listed the four charges against her, which include ‘medicine misuse’ for the expired toothpaste.


    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/pe...-10453067.html



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    Question Re: Chelsea Manning -punishment or persecution?

    I Just HAVE to know....What he hell is up with the "EXPIRED" toothpaste.....What is so DIRE about an expired tube of toothpaste ?!?!?! That is has to be part of "Prison Rules"


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    Regulator Professional Poster JenniferParisHusband's Avatar
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    Default Re: Chelsea Manning -punishment or persecution?

    It's the military. For those who were in the US Armed Forces, this strangely makes sense. There are rules for everything. The more you screw up, the more restrictive things become. I have cleaned my barracks with a toothbrush, I've seen DI's go behind beds and foot lockers and even under your mattress with white gloves looking for the tiniest speck of dirt. As you progress in their world, things ease up. I lived off base for a while after basic, and no one came and checked on my apartment. But my duty station was required to be kept clean.

    So where she is in prison, there are going to be a lot more rules, more structure. She is going to have almost no say in the material that comes in and out. It will come from a controlled prison "library" and will have been approved by the people in charge, and provided, when allowed by her superiors, at their leisure and from an approved selection of items. I can't imagine they would let her have a book about Anonymous, or for that matter anything controversial. Her mail, anything sent from the outside, will be read. If that Vanity Fair and other material wasn't in the library, it's contraband. If it was supposed to be returned at a certain time and wasn't, it's contraband. If she was already on disciplinary restrictions and wasn't supposed to have it, it's contraband. See where this is going? Everything is controlled, and subject to approval by the people in command of the facility. But don't do the crime if you can't do the time.

    If she has an expired tube of toothpaste, it could be that she is not keeping up with her hygiene and this was extra, or there was another purpose for it which is against their code of conduct, which also made it contraband. Can you get high on toothpaste? Holy hell, that would make my trips to the dentist a lot better. It could simply be that it's the government at work, and they aren't permitted to allow expired "medicine" and are required to make sure things are un-expired. It doesn't make a lot of sense if you weren't in the military, but if you've been in, you can kind of see what they are doing.

    The sweeping food onto the floor, showing disrespect, yeah that's going to earn you persecution. I got persecuted by a Sgt. for not having my underwear folded a certain way. Extra miles and guard duty. It sucked, and that was just during BMT. One of the guys in my flight got caught with a Walkman. He failed basic, had to redo it, and the whole time they were gunning for him, and since he was in my flight, they were gunning for the rest of us by association. It is a different way of life. There will be punishment, but you have to respect the stripes, or your life is going to be miserable, even if you aren't in prison and in the working military. She isn't doing herself any favors by doing that. As for the tribunal, those are never public. So that's just SOP.

    For the next 35 years, Chelsea's life is going to be incredibly regimented to almost the last little detail. It's not persecution. You know all this is a possible outcome, or at least should know, when you go through your BMT. I actively tried to avoid that outcome while I was in, and thankfully succeeded.

    I don't really think any of this is persecution for speaking out, it just feels like this is the usual military thing. I've actually heard of worse. This is how they do punishment, and it could probably be much much worse. That's my opinion though.


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    Default Re: Chelsea Manning -punishment or persecution?

    Quote Originally Posted by JenniferParisHusband View Post
    It's the military. For those who were in the US Armed Forces, this strangely makes sense. There are rules for everything. The more you screw up, the more restrictive things become. I have cleaned my barracks with a toothbrush, I've seen DI's go behind beds and foot lockers and even under your mattress with white gloves looking for the tiniest speck of dirt. As you progress in their world, things ease up. I lived off base for a while after basic, and no one came and checked on my apartment. But my duty station was required to be kept clean.

    So where she is in prison, there are going to be a lot more rules, more structure. She is going to have almost no say in the material that comes in and out. It will come from a controlled prison "library" and will have been approved by the people in charge, and provided, when allowed by her superiors, at their leisure and from an approved selection of items. I can't imagine they would let her have a book about Anonymous, or for that matter anything controversial. Her mail, anything sent from the outside, will be read. If that Vanity Fair and other material wasn't in the library, it's contraband. If it was supposed to be returned at a certain time and wasn't, it's contraband. If she was already on disciplinary restrictions and wasn't supposed to have it, it's contraband. See where this is going? Everything is controlled, and subject to approval by the people in command of the facility. But don't do the crime if you can't do the time.

    If she has an expired tube of toothpaste, it could be that she is not keeping up with her hygiene and this was extra, or there was another purpose for it which is against their code of conduct, which also made it contraband. Can you get high on toothpaste? Holy hell, that would make my trips to the dentist a lot better. It could simply be that it's the government at work, and they aren't permitted to allow expired "medicine" and are required to make sure things are un-expired. It doesn't make a lot of sense if you weren't in the military, but if you've been in, you can kind of see what they are doing.

    The sweeping food onto the floor, showing disrespect, yeah that's going to earn you persecution. I got persecuted by a Sgt. for not having my underwear folded a certain way. Extra miles and guard duty. It sucked, and that was just during BMT. One of the guys in my flight got caught with a Walkman. He failed basic, had to redo it, and the whole time they were gunning for him, and since he was in my flight, they were gunning for the rest of us by association. It is a different way of life. There will be punishment, but you have to respect the stripes, or your life is going to be miserable, even if you aren't in prison and in the working military. She isn't doing herself any favors by doing that. As for the tribunal, those are never public. So that's just SOP.

    For the next 35 years, Chelsea's life is going to be incredibly regimented to almost the last little detail. It's not persecution. You know all this is a possible outcome, or at least should know, when you go through your BMT. I actively tried to avoid that outcome while I was in, and thankfully succeeded.

    I don't really think any of this is persecution for speaking out, it just feels like this is the usual military thing. I've actually heard of worse. This is how they do punishment, and it could probably be much much worse. That's my opinion though.
    What this well-informed post reveals is not so much the obsession with order in military institutions, but the practical futility of it in a prison.

    Basic training to turn a human being into a ruthless and efficient killing machine may have some logic to it, even if, in the case of the USA, there is no evidence on the battlefield that it works (the USA's ruthless killing machines have not won a war since 1945), but Chelsea Manning is not going to be released from prison back to the armed forces and fight for her country, her military career is over as I assume is also the case with most long-term prisoners at Leavenworth. If prisoners were going to be sent back into the field then maintaining them in peak physical and mental condition could at least be justified to a degree, but what purpose does it serve to impose combat readiness on someone who will never again be in combat?

    It enables Manning's guards to bring out the inner sadist, to practise tormenting the enemy captive in a cell when there is no enemy on the field, to find a human being and on the slightest pretext insult, abuse, intimidate and seek to destroy. In other words, there is no justification for it. The sentence and the prison are the punishment; the rest is coordinated torture. But hey, it's the USA, where torture as standard practice has been integrated into the military through the rule book. In a mature society, this sort of thing would not happen.

    The US military has changed before, it is now time to change again. Or move Manning into a Federal prison.



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    Default Re: Chelsea Manning -punishment or persecution?

    Quote Originally Posted by Stavros View Post
    What this well-informed post reveals is not so much the obsession with order in military institutions, but the practical futility of it in a prison.

    Basic training to turn a human being into a ruthless and efficient killing machine may have some logic to it, even if, in the case of the USA, there is no evidence on the battlefield that it works (the USA's ruthless killing machines have not won a war since 1945), but Chelsea Manning is not going to be released from prison back to the armed forces and fight for her country, her military career is over as I assume is also the case with most long-term prisoners at Leavenworth. If prisoners were going to be sent back into the field then maintaining them in peak physical and mental condition could at least be justified to a degree, but what purpose does it serve to impose combat readiness on someone who will never again be in combat?

    It enables Manning's guards to bring out the inner sadist, to practise tormenting the enemy captive in a cell when there is no enemy on the field, to find a human being and on the slightest pretext insult, abuse, intimidate and seek to destroy. In other words, there is no justification for it. The sentence and the prison are the punishment; the rest is coordinated torture. But hey, it's the USA, where torture as standard practice has been integrated into the military through the rule book. In a mature society, this sort of thing would not happen.

    The US military has changed before, it is now time to change again. Or move Manning into a Federal prison.
    Part of the problem is that when you enlist, you're signing a contract with the government whereby you volunteer to suspend a lot of your rights. One of those is that you are subject to the Military's Uniform Code of Military Justice. There's no draft, no one is forcing you to join. You are choosing of your own free will to do this. You know, or should know, that the laws you are used to in the normal world are no longer the laws you have in the military world. In some ways, the UCMJ is better than what you have in the real world, in a lot of ways, worse. One of the ways it is worse, is that the Military has exclusive jurisdiction over you. You can't move to a Federal Court, because the Federal Court has no jurisdiction over a member of the military, who committed a crime against the service, or on a military base. If you go to a VA Medical Center, even as a civilian, and get a speeding ticket, that's not a local court, or a Federal Court, it is a special magistrate under the US Armed Forces Command. (at least as of 2002 it still was, that might have changed.) The Military Justice System is a completely different entity from a Federal Court. That's the first thing to understand.

    Second thing you have to understand. When you commit a crime in the military, you don't automatically get a discharge for bad conduct. If you go to jail, you are still considered active service, only you are on duty restrictions, which means whatever hitch you signed on for, it paused. If you signed on for 3 years, and you have 6 months to go, and you go to jail for 10 years, you are considered to have 6 months left of your required service time to fulfill. Now they may give you the boot the moment you walk out of prison, but you are still active duty, and you still may be called upon in a time of war. So yeah, they are going to keep Chelsea Manning in a state of preparedness, in case there is an event where she would be drafted back into service. It would be an incredibly desperate measure on the part of the Armed Forces though, and she would most likely get one of the crappiest duties ever. But, if she has a skill that is needed, they could offer her reduced time in exchange for her service in a time of emergency. So for her sake, it's best that she is kept in shape, and military discipline in case the need arises.

    The average sentence (as of 1991, when I went through basic) was 21 years.

    I think you misunderstood me when I was saying they could make her life hell. And, again, I'm basing all this off what the one guy in my flight told me about military prison. Like I said, a military prison is still military. You still run, albeit in a circle, or confined area, you still do your morning PT, you are still required to maintain appearance, conduct drills and maintain a general state of readiness. But, unlike say Riker's Island, she will also be learning a trade, and have assigned duties within in the prison. The one I always remember them saying you could become was a barber. But I know they do other work there as well. Some of my uniforms had pieces made in the Leavenworth prison. But the quality of those jobs and duties is based on your ability to follow orders. So Chelsea may be learning a trade that is highly sought after, and may earn her slightly more money than another trade (they do still earn income, but I think it's like a max of 20 cents per day or something. and they can spend it from what I remember being told, up to like $40 per year, and only on approved items.) So if they want to make her life hell for disobeying orders, they prevent her from working a good job, and making her work a more labor intensive one. If they want to make her life hell for throwing her food on the floor, she has to do her morning PT, her job, and her normal duties, plus maybe clean latrines, scrub the floors of common areas and other work. It's not sadism, but it is punishment. Combine that with the order, and restrictions of normal military life, it can be overwhelming. If they want to make her life rough, she could be out of her cell and working 19 hours a day, no access to any reading materials, no access to spending whatever income she has earned, solitary, or some other form of restriction or change of duties.

    If you want to talk about Sadism, talk to anyone who served in the Air Force about their BMT. There is a place in the mess called "The Snake Pit." Every new airman has to walk by a bunch of DI's who verbally abuse, humiliate and denigrate them, on a daily basis. You get assigned to guard your barracks and ordered not to let anyone in who isn't part of your flight, or a C.O. and then someone of equal rank to the person who gave you that order comes by at 3 am and orders you to let them in. When you don't, the verbal abuse starts, as do the orders to do things like push ups, which you can't do since you are not allowed to end your guard duty, then you get threats for not following orders. I've seen people have nervous breakdowns over these kinds of things, and that's pretty much from day 1. That's sadism, but you know you are going to get it from day 1, because that's what you agreed to when you signed on.

    Again, having served, I don't see any of what they are doing to be sadist or torture. I don't think its cruel or unusual, I do think it is just the normal military standard operating procedure. If I were her, I'd much rather be in Leavenworth than be Sylvia Boots in gen-pop at Vacaville or wherever she is currently serving. Chelsea has it way easier than Sylvia, and I guarantee there is much less sadism in Leavenworth. If what she is going through is torture, pretty much every American who wore the uniform should be suing the government. But then again, I knew what I was getting into when I signed up and made that choice. So did Chelsea.

    As for the USA, if you want to make torture allegations and talk of "mature societies" people tend to forget that we weren't alone in all that. There's a country with whom we have a "special relationship" to, that seemed to be willing to let us do their dirty work on their prisoners, and were happy to have that iformation; and on occasion got their hands dirty too. You could Google Cpl. Donald Payne, and Baha Mousa, just as two of MANY examples. And we won't even go into tactics used in Northern Ireland as recently as 2014. So let's back off the high and mighty train a bit. That is just going to devolve this conversation into a flame war. There's enough evil being spread around by all parties that I don't think there are any innocents out there, and certainly no "Mature Societies."


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    Default Re: Chelsea Manning -punishment or persecution?

    I have no interest in sparking 'flames' of any sort, and you skilfully describe the military as a 'state within a state' with its own rules and justice and education system, but you could at least admit that Chelsea Manning is not suited to that military life and should be removed from the military state completely. It is not about making comparisons with the British armed forces, because the US military has shown a greater capacity for change than its British counterpart, which is why I have suggested change is still an option although one notes that it is the military that is opposed to the closure of Guantanamo Bay, and that Jeb Bush according to the headline in the newspaper 'refuses to rule out use of torture if he becomes President'.

    In Manning's specific case she ought not to be, and realistically is unlikely to be part of any future military operations. The extent to which the US military runs its own affairs, and to the extent that it is exempt from the Constitution is a matter of debate which you can have in the USA, in the meantime the mature thing to do is to accept that in Manning's case this system simply does not work and it is better for both if she is taken out of it.


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    Regulator Professional Poster JenniferParisHusband's Avatar
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    Default Re: Chelsea Manning -punishment or persecution?

    Oh on that I completely agree. She was never cut out for life in the service. She never should have gone in, and I think they would have to be incredibly desperate to need her, even in a state of emergency now. Yep, we totally agree on that.

    But she did sign up voluntarily. She knew what she was getting into, but didn't know herself well enough to know if she could handle it. It's a little late for that now. Hindsight is always a wonderful thing, but it never changes the past. She volunteered knowing this was an outcome, now she has to live with it. Suited for it or not, it's her life for the next 35 years. If I rob a bank tomorrow, or murder someone (which I won't, because I don't want to ever go to prison), no one is going to take pity on me and move me to a lesser prison because I couldn't hack it. It's like pacifists who sign up to get a "free education" and then refuse to fight. They know what they are in for, its hard to justify the end result when they decide not to follow the rules. There's nothing special about her case, other than she's transgender. As I said, I'd rather be Chelsea in Leavenworth than Sylvia Boots in Vacaville, even with all the military BS.

    Don't get me started on Jeb. Another chicken-hawk who never served and has no clue. I feel bad for the US soldier who is tortured now, because every other country looks at us and says "If it's ok for the USA to do it, it is fine for us too." If Bush gets elected, it will definitely be time for me to try to get my UK citizenship back.


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    I <3 Boobs + Blowjobs Platinum Poster RallyCola's Avatar
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    Default Re: Chelsea Manning -punishment or persecution?

    i'll be honest...prison sucks but if you are in there, you probably did something to deserve it. the guilty far out weigh the innocent and i don't believe that prison should be for rehabilitation, it should be for punishment and punishment alone. ABA doesn't work on felons...you are never going to teach a hardened criminal replacement behaviors therefore, i'm somewhat indifferent to what happens to someone when they go in to a max security prison. it is cold and i realize that our system of justice is unjust, but post conviction, life should be so horrible on the inside that it is the ultimate deterrent do breaking the law in the first place.


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    Default Re: Chelsea Manning -punishment or persecution?

    The guards will probably use both of her holes for pleasure as she can't get pregnant.


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    Eurotrash! Platinum Poster Jericho's Avatar
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    Default Re: Chelsea Manning -punishment or persecution?

    Quote Originally Posted by gugaxamot View Post
    The guards will...
    Get back to the kiddies table...The adults are talking!


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