How brainwashing came to life and thrived - Jeff Stryker - 8/1/04 The term "brainwashing" was first popularized by Edward Hunter, in his 1951 book, "Brainwashing in Red China." Brainwashing was his translation for a Chinese term "hsi-nao," meaning, roughly, "cleansing of the mind." Lifton concluded that the Chinese interrogation techniques were merely time-honored methods of psychological coercion: isolation, humiliation and the repetition of propaganda.@ "Helen McGonigle, a Connecticut lawyer who represents victims of trauma and sexual abuse, knows she sounds like one of the nutters on the Internet when she talks about the history of military involvement in mind control. When asked if she thinks the government is still in the business of mind control, McGonigle responded without skipping a beat. "Absolutely," she said. "The history of the Bluebird, Artichoke and MKULTRA definitely raise the bar of suspicion," McGonigle said, ticking off a series of government experiments involving hypnosis, sleep deprivation and the use of psychotropic drugs. MKULTRA, underway from 1953 to 1966, involved research into mind-control agents at scores of prestigious institutions by prominent psychologists. MKULTRA scientists attempted to determine whether LSD could be aerosolized effectively; the CIA even hired a magician to teach field agents how to slip LSD into the drinks of unwitting subjects. Other experiments involved various forms of sleep deprivation and hypnosis. Consider a research question posed in CIA documents from the Bluebird experiments in the 1950s: "Could we seize a subject and in the space of an hour or two by post-H[ypnotic] control have him crash an airplane, wreck a train, etc.?"" _http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/08/01/INGRR7UIJ31.DTL_ (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/08/01/INGRR7UIJ31.DTL)
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