The Confession (2013)

[Shari Alvine]

Thisessay will explore the structuring logics of the politics of privilege. In particular, the logics of privilege rest on an individualized self that relies on the raw material of other beings to constitute itself. Although the confessing of privilege is understood to be an anti-racist practice, it is ultimately a project premised on white supremacy. Thus, organizing and intellectual projects that are questioning these politics of privilege are shifting the question from what privileges does a particular subject have to what is the nature of the subject that claims to have privilege in the first place.

But they suggested that these collectivities could not be formed without a radical change in what we perceived ourselves to be. That is, if we understand ourselves to be transparent, self-determining subjects, defining ourselves in opposition to who we are not, then the nations that will emerge from this sense of self will be exclusivist and insular. However, if we understand ourselves as being fundamentally constituted through our relations with other beings and the land, then the nations that emerge will also be inclusive and interconnected with each other.

Native peoples are not positioned as those who can engage in self-reflection; they can only judge the worth of the confession. Consequently, the presenters of these narratives often present very nervously. Did they speak to all their privileges? Did they properly confess? Or will someone in the audience notice a mistake and question whether they have in fact become a fully-developed anti-racist subject? In that case, the subject would have to then engage in further acts of self-reflection that require new confessions in the future.

Based on this analysis then, our project becomes less of one based on self-improvement or even collective self-improvement, and more about the creation of new worlds and futurities for which we currently have no language.

Many leftists will argue that nation-states are necessary to check the power of multi-national corporations or will argue that nation-states are no longer important units of analysis. These groups, by contrast, recognize the importance of creating alternative forms of governance outside of a nation-state model based on principles of horizontalism. In addition, these groups are taking on multinational corporations directly. An example would be the factory movement in Argentina where workers have appropriated factories and seized the means of production themselves. They have also developed cooperative relationships with other appropriated factories. In addition, in many factories all of the work is collectivized. For instance, a participant from a group I work with who recently had a child and was breastfeeding went to visit a factory. She tried to sign up for one of the collectively-organized tasks of the factory, and was told that breastfeeding was her task. The factory recognized breastfeeding as work on par with all the other work going on in the factory.

The site is secure.

The ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Innocent suspects may not adequately protect themselves during interrogation because they fail to fully appreciate the danger of the situation. This experiment tested whether innocent suspects experience less stress during interrogation than guilty suspects, and whether refusing to confess expends physiologic resources. After experimentally manipulating innocence and guilt, 132 participants were accused and interrogated for misconduct, and then pressured to confess. Systolic and diastolic blood pressure (SBP, DBP), heart rate (HR), respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), and preejection period (PEP) responses quantified stress reactions. As hypothesized, the innocent evidenced smaller stress responses to interrogation for SBP, DBP, HR, and RSA than did the guilty. Furthermore, innocents who refused to confess exhibited greater sympathetic nervous system activation, as evidenced by shorter PEPs, than did innocent or guilty confessors. These findings suggest that innocent suspects underestimate the threat of interrogation and that resisting pressures to confess can diminish suspects' physiologic resources and lead to false confessions.

The Alliance is a coalition of pastors, scholars, and churchmen who hold the historic creeds and confessions of the Reformed faith and who proclaim biblical doctrine in order to foster a Reformed awakening in today's Church.

Basically there is a murder and the murderer himself confesses his crime to an innocent priest. But all the evidence eventually leads (wrongly) to the priest. Since the priest is bound under the seal of the confessional not to disclose any information provided in a sacramental confession, he has to bite the bullet.

Police investigators at Maekelawi use coercive methods ondetainees amounting to torture or other ill-treatment to extract confessions, statements,and other information from detainees. Detainees are often denied access tolawyers and family members. Depending on their compliance with the demands of investigators,detainees are punished or rewarded with denial or access to water, food, light,and other basic needs.

This report documents human rights abuses, unlawfulinvestigation tactics, and detention conditions in Maekelawi between 2010 and 2013.For the report Human Rights Watch interviewed more than 35 former detainees ofMaekelawi and their family members. Although Human Rights Watch was not able tovisit Maekelawi, preventing first-hand observation of conditions and interviewswith current detainees, researchers cross-checked information provided byformer detainees, who were identified through various channels and interviewed individually.

Allegations of arbitrary detention, torture, and other ill-treatmentat the hands of Ethiopian police and other security forces are not new. But sincethe disputed 2005 elections, the Ethiopian government has intensifiedrestrictions on freedom of expression, association, and assembly, deploying arange of measures to clamp down on dissent. These include arresting anddetaining political opposition figures, journalists, and other independentvoices, and implementing laws that severely restrict independent human rightsmonitoring and press freedom.

Detainees also described dire conditions of detention,including inadequate food, severe restrictions on access to daylight, poorsanitary conditions, and limited medical treatment. Conditions are particularlyharsh during initial investigations.

Former detainees and their relatives told Human Rights Watchthat they were routinely denied access to legal counsel and family membersduring the initial weeks of their custody. Some were held incommunicadothroughout months of detention. The absence of a lawyer during interrogations increasesthe likelihood of abuse, hinders any documentation of ill-treatment and tortureby investigators, and limits chances of obtaining redress before the courts. Inthis way police investigators at Maekelawi obstruct basic national andinternational legal safeguards protecting persons in custody such as thoseregulating arrest and detention and protection from the use of forcedconfessions as evidence at trial.

Human rights monitoring of all detention locations inEthiopia, including Maekelawi, by government agencies is limited andindependent monitoring of any kind is insufficient. Representatives from thegovernment-affiliated Ethiopian Human Rights Commission and other officials havevisited Maekelawi and have raised some concerns about detention conditions inprivate and public communications. However, former detainees told Human RightsWatch that commission representatives were accompanied by Maekelawi officials,and the visits have not resulted in concrete improvements in their situation.

Over the past decade Human Rights Watch and other domesticand international human rights organizations have documented patterns ofserious human rights violations, including arbitrary arrest and detention,ill-treatment, and torture in many official and unofficial detention facilitiesthroughout Ethiopia. The government has invariably dismissed these findings or conductedinvestigations that lack credibility.

However, the Ethiopian government has taken some positive stepsin recent years to comply with its international human rights treaty reportingrequirements and develop human rights policies on paper. In 2010 Ethiopiasubmitted its first report to the United Nations Committee against Torture, theexpert reporting body of the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel,Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.

The government has also drafted a national human rightsaction plan for 2013-2015. The draft seen by Human Rights Watch contains some measuresthat could help improve detention conditions and treatment of pre-trial detaineesand convicted prisoners. The plan rightly identifies insufficient access tolegal counsel during pre-charge detention, insufficient complaint mechanisms,and inadequate access to food, medical care, and other services as challenges thatneed to be addressed.

The Ethiopian authorities, particularly the federal police, shouldurgently adopt concrete measures to address these persistent concerns inMaekelawi and other facilities. Ensuring that suspects enjoy the protections ofdue process, including the right to understand the reason for their arrest, andaccess to legal counsel and relatives from the outset of their detention wouldhelp reduce abuses.

Prosecutors and judges should also proactively monitor thetreatment of persons in custody and investigate allegations of torture and ill-treatmentwithout official interference or obstruction. At the same time, they shouldalso ensure protection for detainees who dare to speak out about theirtreatment.

The authorities should also allow unfettered and unannouncedaccess to Maekelawi and other detention centers throughout the country to independentEthiopian and international monitors, including human rights and humanitarianorganizations, members of the diplomatic community, and United Nations (UN) andAfrican Union (AU) human rights mechanisms such as the Special Rapporteur ontorture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment and the WorkingGroup on Arbitrary Detention.

3a8082e126