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Chelsea Manning Ends Hunger Strike, Faces Solitary |
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By
Stephen Lendman |
| Solitary confinement isolation is torture by any standard - a flagrant
international law, constitutional violation, its 8th Amendment prohibiting
“cruel and unusual punishment” - standard practice in America, rendering
rule of law governance null and void. Longterm isolation crushes the human spirit, causing panic attacks, nightmares, dizziness, irrational anger, confusion, social withdrawal, memory and appetite loss, delusions and hallucinations, profound despair and hopelessness, suicidal thoughts, and paranoia, among other symptoms. It’s like being buried alive, at times causing irreversible trauma, turning otherwise normal human beings into mush - zombies. The whole world knows Chelsea was wrongfully imprisoned for doing the right thing - exposing US war crimes, accountability entirely absent. On September 9, she began hunger striking, protesting outrageous mistreatment, including “constant, deliberate and overzealous administrative scrutiny by prison and military officials,” she said - along with refusing vital gender dysphoria care she needs, involving gender-reassignment surgery. On September 13, she again began ingesting food, five days after she stopped, after military authorities agreed to treat her dysphoric condition - while keeping her isolated in punishing solitary confinement. Issuing a statement through her attorneys, she said she’s “unendingly relieved that the military is finally doing the right thing…This is all that I wanted - for them to let me be me.” “But it is hard not to wonder why it has taken so long…(W)hy were such drastic measures needed” - exacerbating her suffering. She still faces indefinite isolation on charges of attempted suicide, a desperate unsuccessful attempt to end her pain and suffering. She faces disciplinary action later this month, prison authorities unlikely to mitigate her ordeal. Her deplorable mistreatment since arrested in May 2010 reveals the true character of state-sponsored gangsterism - viciousness, lawlessness, along with indifference to human needs and suffering its defining characteristics. Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. His new book as editor and contributor is titled "Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III." http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com. Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network. |
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