Chapter 4. Social Science
46 magazine / story / 2019 / 09 / 15 / cia - fort detrick-stephen-kinzer-228109/ (cited on page 45). [5]
4.5
Project MKULTRA. Project MKULTRA. URL: https : / / www . cs . mcgill . ca / ~rwest / wikispeedia/wpcd/wp/p/Project_MKULTRA. htm (cited on page 44).
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AP NEWS. After Learning of Whitey Bulger LSD Tests, Juror Has Regrets. Feb. 2020. URL : https : / / apnews . com / article / us - news - ap - top - news - whitey bulger - crime - weekend - reads - 8df % 20f185e1324cb7079b8a86c48c2ec56 (cited on page 44).
The Aversion Project: South Africa’s Attempt to Cure Homosexuality By Brian Salipante ’22 Apartheid lasted in South Africa from 1948-1994; nestled squarely inside this period was one of the most unethical tests of the nations history. In 1968, a man named Dr. Aubrey Levin claimed that he had a “cure” for homosexuality, and in 1969 he was given a chance to test his theory with immunity. Taking a step back to gain a broader understanding of the world, Dr. Levin conducted experiments in other countries that had already tried to “cure” homosexuality and found that neither the patients nor therapists found it helpful. Homosexuality was even removed as an illness from the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders in 1973.
by changing their genders that would turn them straight because they would be a woman attracted to men. After the surgery, the soldiers were issued fake IDs and told that they could not contact anyone from their old lives. During the surgeries, there was a large casualty rate, and the ones who survived often had medical issues afterwards. Even if the subjects survived these tests, the horrors were not over. Dr. Levin created a farm named Greefswald where he sent subjects who he deemed had not been cured. Although Greefswald was called a farm, it was more like a forced labor camp. Soldiers at the camp had to build barracks, march through brush for hours, hunt wildlife, and were deprived of food and sleep. Dr. Levin ended Universal forced conscription began in South Africa the tests in 1975 when he left the military and went on to in 1967. When the soldiers first joined, they were ex- become the Director of Mental Health in the Department amined by a doctor and chaplain to see if they were gay. of Health Services and Welfare in the Eastern Cape. The soldiers were threatened with harsh punishments and There are countless ethical issues with the Aversion imprisonment if the government learned that they lied project, and they all build on the foundation that is the about being heterosexual. Homosexual conscripts were basis of the tests. The Aversion project was billed as trysent to Ward 22 of a secret military hospital which was ing to cure homosexuality which is the first major issue led by Dr. Aubrey Levin starting in 1969 [2]. When because being gay is not an illness; therefore it cannot the soldiers arrived, they found themselves grouped in and does not need to be cured. The first ethical issue with life long drug addicts and people with severe men- that arises is that there was no informed consent: the subtal illness. The first test conscripts were forced into was jects were conscripted gay soldiers who had no choice in Dr. Levin’s main idea and what became known as the whether or not they would participate. These men were Aversion Project. Subjects would be strapped down into forced to endure torture, and they would be sent to an chairs and forced to view gay pornographic material. As even worse labor camp if they ever fought back. Conthe subjects viewed the images, Dr. Levin would electri- nected to the lack of consent, there’s also the issue of cally shock them over and over. These shocks were so subjects not being allowed to choose to stop the tests. The strong it was reported that one subject’s shoes went flying largest ethical issue is the fact that the tests were designed off during one. Dr. Levin’s hypothesis was that the sub- to harm the subjects. The subjects were gravely hurt in jects would begin to associate their homosexual thoughts every test, whether it was from the large electrical shocks with the pain from the electric shocks. In between these they endured or dying from a surgery gone wrong that tests, soldiers were also subjected to the horrors of Narco never should have happened in the first place. There are Analysis where they were pumped full of drugs so their so many ethical issues in these tests, but one of the more brain would be in a malleable state. Almost all of the egregious ones is the fact that even if the test had shown soldiers were chemically castrated by the time they left the results Dr. Levin was expecting, it wouldn’t have matWard 22, this resulted in many of them commiting suicide tered because it would be corrupt data. Sending subjects shortly after. The most horrific “cure” still had not been who were not cured to a labor camp incentivized them attempted though, Dr. Levin began to order forced gender to pretend that they had been “cured”. When you incenreassignment for some of his subjects. He believed that tivize subjects to give you the results you want, none of
