designing concentration camps

[Architorture]

[Richard Haut]

sadly that is the position that many have (and will continue) to find themselves in.

it happened in WWII when people did try to help in impossible circumstances (and often at great personal risk). Many died for it.

in Iraq, there have been the decent American soldiers who protested against the abuse - that is how we came to hear about it.

sadly such an excuse cannot be used by a firm like KBR - nor by your profession as a whole.

the problem is that if anyone does speak out against blatant dishonesty, illegality and barbarity, they are then subjected to a face full of abuse by Bush's equivalent of the Nazi Brownshirts (verbal and written at the moment, physical violence in the coming years).

as America tries to set up Syria for an attack, Americans had better realise that the 'we didn't know', 'we didn't support the extremist policies of Bush' excuses are drawing to a close.

there will be plenty of work for the American concentration camp designers in coming years - don't hold your breath waiting for anybody to object. Those who try to alleviate suffering will be in the minority - those who leer at suffering from torture to child abuse, like Donald, will bring your profession down to a level where the world will turn away in disgust at the idea of Americans designing hospitals or, God forbid, anything that involves children.

your profession had the chance to speak out - and failed.

[dgt]

Richard,
Many in the profession find it apalling that such atrocities are carried out. However, do not make naive generalities that the entire architecture profession has failed because they did not make some grand protest against this. In a perfect world this would occur and I would be extremely happy. The truth is no profession has made this statement because there are diffrent factions that think differently.

The profession does not speak with a singular voice.
As an architect myself, I would never be involved with a firm that I knew was responsible for helping to eliminate civil liberties granted in the Geneva Convention. I feel this is exactly what is happening. Just because this administration says they do not fall under this category does not mean this is so. Everyone should read the text here:
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/geneva03.htm
and decide for yourself.

How dare you lump my coleagues efforts in your view of failure. The fact that there is a part of the profession that does not agree with this policy give hope.

Please get off your moral high horse...it is rather sickening in this environment.

Regards,
dgt

[Richard Haut]

yes, I am indeed aware that many American lawyers are not only speaking out but trying to do something about the disgracing of their profession (in America and Britain). And more power to them for what they are seeking to do.

American architects do design concentration camps (and the re-emergence of this topic was because, having already designed the temporary camps, new permanent facilities are being built).

- and if it makes you uncomfortable, then I would just ask, if you don't deal with organisations who are involved in such things, do you deal with the US (or British) government ?

when the disgraceful lying that resulted in the attack in Iraq was going on, the RIBA in London and many of its prominent members did indeed speak out. I will admit that I was surprised - and very impressed. Did it have any real effect ? That I don't know, but the statement was clear, honest and decent.

conversely an architect from another British organisation stood up to crow that the attack on Iraq (which had not started at that point) would "show the world what British professionals can do". Not quite such a clear statement, and more ambiguous in intent.

you consider my views to be naive generalities ? I suggest that you wake up to the fact that - aside of the extremely minor significance of what I think as an individual - it is the clients that you should worry about. The discussion of the 'death of the American brand' some time ago is no joke.

the days of "not in our name" are over. It most emphatically is in your name.

Architects do not speak with a single voice, but have there been any voices of protest ?

now all we have to do is to wait and see if the lies about Iran will result in another murderous American attack - and more camps.

[Donald]

If you get the chance RH, send a link to any of the press the RIBA received for speaking out on behalf of the architects of the Royal Institute. I assume the RIBA is about the equivalent to the AIA here, so a little education about The American Institute of Architects:

Since 1857, the AIA has represented the professional interests of America's architects. As AIA members, nearly 72,000 licensed architects, emerging professionals and allied partners express their commitment to excellence in design and livability in our nation's buildings and communities. Members adhere to a code of ethics and professional conduct that assures the client, the public, and colleagues of an AIA-member architect's dedication to the highest standards in professional practice.

For more information, please visit www.aia.org ...and express any concerns you may have with regard to the design standards of the prison camps and facilities that the military has been constructing for over 200 years (using their developing building standards).

IF anyone out there has a problem with the Operations of any of our military prison installations, please contact the Department of Justice or the Department of Defense..... I suspect that there would be no complaints of this sort, due to the fact that military prison Operations are solely the responsibility of the military and they are not required to adhere to the code of ethics of the AIA, the RIBA or any other outside entity as it applies to such prison operations.

[JWmHarmon]

The term "Concentration camp" according to my old (1960's) dictionary is "a camp... where persons... are detained ... and sometimes subjected to physical and mental abuse and indignity." In the United States and I would assume in European countries, and everywhere where people have studied the history of the 20th century, the term concentration camp generates mental images of Auschwitz, Buchenwald, and other Nazi death camps, Dr. Josef Mengele and his cruel and inhuman medical experiments, and other such atrocities. As any student of history has read, the purpose of the Nazi concentration camps was genocide. The Nazis were intent on murdering Jews, Gypsies, mentally challenged people, and anyone perceived as an enemy of the Nazi regime. This was nation-state sponsered torture and genocide.

I believe, and the people who signed the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights, believed that "Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person." (see Article 3) http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html

What should be the response of civilized people in the face of persistent and unrelenting attacks on defenseless children and adults? Should we lock up the murderers or should we allow them to go free to murder even more defenseless people. Should we stand together to do everything we can to prevent ruthless people from committing the same kinds of atrocities committed by the Nazi murderers, even if on a lesser scale?

Should we kill these murderers or would it be sufficient to lock them up in a prison somewhere? If your answer is that it would be sufficient to lock them up, what kind of facility would you build for them?

Consider that the weapons available to those who would use them for genocide are far more potent than anything available to Adolph Hitler. Should we allow any "inhuman being" to have access to such weapons, or should responsible citizens try to prevent such weapons from falling into the hands of those who would deliberately attack defenseless citizens of half the countries of the world. (The attack on the World Trade Center was an attack on the citizens of at least 80 separate countries and was a declaration of war against humanity.)

If you built a prison to confine Adloph Hitler, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Joseph Mengele, Saddam Hussein and his two sons, or any of the other perpetrators of genocide or wanton killing of those who have a right to disagree with them, what should that prison look like? If you have a thousand killers who supported a mass murderer locked up in a prison, do you call that prison a concentration camp?

How long should civilized people sit around in their architect designed skyscrapers and office buildings while murderers take over the powers of government and use those powers against their own people or the citizens of other countries? How long should we tolerate corrupt people remaining in power while they covertly support such killers?

The history of governments is such that we must always be on guard against abuses of governmental powers. The history of human behavior shows that some people must be locked up to preserve the rights of others. Do you know of any other way to prevent murderers from killing their victims other than killing the murderer or locking that person up?

I ask again, what kind of prison would you build to detain a criminal determined to kill Richard Haut or Donald or you, just because you are an American, or a Jew, or a dark-skinned person, or of a particular religion, or any other reason that criminals use to feebly try to justify murder?

If all the murderers in the world were confined to one prison, would you call it a concentration camp? Or does the term concentration camp imply something else?

Would I put in my portfolio the design of a prison that locked up Hitler or Hussein, or any other murderer, before, or after, they had committed their crimes? What do you think?

If I had the power to lock up a murderer and did not, would you consider me a good citizen? If I had the power to lock up a murderer and did just that, would it be the right thing to do?

[Donald]

JMH, that is far too many questions to answer at one sitting, but let me give it some thought...especially the one about how to design a prison for the killer of RH, the others and I?....and I do prefer to call them Prisons.

As for our nation, our prison population continues to rise at record levels.


However, we know that Criminals commit crimes, and


When criminals are caught committing crimes they are prosecuted.


If the criminals are successfully prosecuted they will be sent to prison.


If the criminals are sent to prison the prison population will increase.


The more criminals you have in prison the fewer criminals you have on the street.


The fewer criminals you have on the street the fewer crimes will be committed.


If fewer crimes are committed the crime rate will fall.

Now, I wonder how one would feel if we change the above word "criminal" to Islamic Terorist? .. if some of you would clip these bullet points and send them to the brain surgeons out there who are against putting the criminal away, perhaps they will stop worrying about there being so many people in prisons. Me? I LIKE them there.

[Richard Haut]

"If the criminals are successfully prosecuted they will be sent to prison."

those sent to prison are sent after they have been convicted by the legal processes.

those in concentration camps are simply locked up because of a Kafka-style guilt-by-accusation.

after all, the reasons given for attacking Iraq were falsehoods - and had no known link to the attacks of 9.11.

what is the difference between the evil people who planned 9.11 and the evil people who planned the deceptions for the attack on Iraq ? None whatsoever.

- but in both cases, if caught, they should be properly tried and sentenced.

the extension of the line of argument used is that applying to the death penalty. The death penalty may be something that a government uses, but only after due process.

Otherwise those carrying it out against people because they don't like the look of them, or the colour of their skin, or their religion, are themselves merely murderers.

To use 9.11 as the excuse for the barbarity in Fallujah is identical to the line of reasoning of a bin Laden.

As for the killers of "Richard Haut", the members of my family who were murdered in such camps did not, as far as I know, include any with the same first name as myself.

However, they were taken to those camps by people who believed that they were a threat purely on the basis of their religious origins - but those bigots were German and Austrian, not - as today - American.

And for architects to pretend that they do not know the difference between a legally constituted and established prison, and a concentration camp for illegally detaining and abusing those that they do not like is open dishonesty.

It seems that the protests that American architects object to designing concentration camps was premature.

[Architorture]

the american culture is a culture of law.... what the law says is what is right or okay...not what ethics or morality says... its a country ruled by laws to a 't'

[Richard Haut]

'Never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal.'

- Martin Luther King Jr.

[Architorture]

well that is what i am saying.... law is considered the standard to which things are judged...

when in reality law is just the lowest form of discourse before violence

[Richard Haut]

"she draws that lawyer like a gun"

- Marshal Reuben J. 'Rooster' Cogburn
John Wayne, "True Grit"

[Martin]

I just quickly read through this topic and it brought to mind an issue that two architects in israel, Eyal Weizman and Rafi Segal raised. This basically being the moral responsibility of architecture or the politics of architecture which i feel the whole topic is generally about. Not sure if i can post links but here is some more information on the subject if you are interested,

http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/comment/0%2C10551%2C762659%2C00.html