This is Why You Get Mocked.

This week in the Chronicle of Higher Ed, there have been a lot of pixels expended on the role of anthropologists who work with the military in the "Human Terrain" project.  Ostensibly this project exists so that the military can figure out the cultural quirks in a given area before they go barging in there all willy-nilly and offend the hell out of everyone and explosions ensue, etc. etc.

I can see the value in this sort of approach--I've read about American soldiers having to adjust to Iraqi social mores while doing intelligence gathering, and how as small a thing as realizing that in Iraq you spend 2 hours socializing and eating before doing 'business" can affect success in dealing with the populace, leading to smoother relations and decreased violence.

So knowing who you're dealing with should be a good thing, right?  And the anthropologists should be pleased that they can help save lives by avoiding needless misunderstandings, right?

Well, apparently I have once again missed the point.  Because the point, you see, is that the military is EEEEVILLLEE, therefore any anthropologist working with them is in danger of becoming hopelessly morally contaminated and providing the military with psy-ops stuff so they can kill more people more effectively!

Don't believe me?  Here's the premise of an article written for the Chronicle Review - I'll quote the 1st paragraph in its entirety in case it's subscription only, but here's the link:

"Anthropology, long the handmaiden of empires, is once again being called upon to assist with warfare, this time in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere in the "war on terror." The U.S. military, the CIA, and some other government agencies and military contractors are recruiting a small but growing number of anthropologists and other social scientists to provide cultural knowledge and analysis, ethnographic research, and what the military calls "human-terrain mapping" to bolster counterinsurgency and other combat operations. Generally those involved wear military uniforms. Some are armed."

The piece is soothingly titled, "Enabling the Kill Chain."  Note scare quotes around "war on terror."  And the subtly veiled horror at the fact that folks in a war zone working for the military might a) wear a uniform, or b) have a gun.  Horrifying! I KNOW! Also, I was unaware that Genghis Khan, the the British and Hitler had relied so heavily on ANTHROPOLOGY when empire-building. 'Cause all my history profs were saying that mostly they'd relied on guns and money--or spears and fire, whichever came more readily to hand.  You learn something new every day, I guess.

Lest you think I am exaggerating this fellow's position, I'll direct you to this report in today's Chronicle which recounts a recent debate on the subject at their annual conference.  Again, I'll pull quotes, but here's the link.

"The report emphasizes two central principles: Anthropologists should be open and transparent in their work, and they should not harm the people they study. Unsurprisingly, no one at Thursday's sessions objected to such broadly stated principles--but there was plenty of disagreement about how to put them into practice.

Some of the discussion concerned the Human Terrain System, a year-old program in which social scientists embed within military units in Iraq and Afghanistan. No participants in that program, however, were present at either session."

So a bunch of academics will discuss something they have no first-hand experience with?  THIS will be fun!  You think there might be some sweeping judgments about people and institutions they've never bothered to actually learn about, even though they're ANTHROPOLOGISTS? Bring on the quotes!

"A few scholars suggested that the U.S. role in Iraq is so clearly immoral that the Human Terrain System should be plainly condemned. There is no need--at least in the case of that particular program--to have nuanced discussions of ethics, they said.

"I like the call for sharpening the do-no-harm clauses in our code of ethics," said David Vine, an assistant professor of anthropology at American University. "But I think there are some forms of harm where we don't need to talk anymore. The military--the U.S. military in particular--is an institution of violence, that kills and has killed. ... What do we do if we find anthropologists who are members of the association committing acts that lead to death or serious injury?" (Mr. Vine wrote about the human-terrain program in The Chronicle Review this week.)"

So even though there's no evidence that the worst case scenario is true, and no one involved in the program is there to tell you what it's like, there doesn't need to be any more debate on the subject. Okay!

Reality, please?

"Mr. Rubinstein studies international peacekeeping operations, and he often works as a consultant with military and intelligence agencies about how to improve such operations. Two of his former students, Kerry B. Fosher and Brian R. Selmeski, spoke about their recent experiences instructing military and intelligence officers. This week Mr. Selmeski joined the faculty of Air University, which trains officers in the U.S. Air Force. Ms. Fosher is a command social scientist at the Marine Corps Intelligence Activity, where she instructs case officers about anthropological concepts.

"I have complete academic freedom, I have tremendous autonomy, and I have fantastic students," Mr. Selmeski said.

The military is "not particularly interested in anthropology per se," he continued. "They are interested in what anthropology can do for them. Now, we can lament that, or we can see it as a window that's opening and try to force that window open a little further."...

For now, however, Ms. Fosher said that she has been surprised and pleased by her Marine Corps colleagues' openness to "uncomfortable" concepts about culture. "We were successful in getting a much more sophisticated and robust definition of culture" into her agency's curriculum, she said."

So the military wants to know about other cultures because it might help them not get their asses shot off, AND they're pretty open to the information?  Sounds like it:

As for whether their instruction will help the military target and kill individuals more effectively, the two scholars offered divergent thoughts. Mr. Selmeski said, "I have not found any individual student--I'm not talking about policy makers, but students--who has asked to learn about culture concepts in order to target. What I have heard is, 'We would like to minimize violence when possible.'"

But this is an academic conference, so the word of grad students who are actually working with the killbots must necessarily take a backseat to the bloviations of PhD's who Know Better and will invoke the Semiotics of Absence to Prove They Know Better:

Most members of the audience had apparently not had time to read the committee's report. But one scholar raised a criticism: Daniel A. Segal, a professor of anthropology at Pitzer College and the association's secretary, suggested that the report's authors were too quick to infer that no anthropologists were doing certain kinds of ethically dubious military activity, simply because the authors were unable to find any such anthropologists.

"I'm concerned about how you're interpreting these absences," said Mr. Segal, "given that we have an administration that never acknowledged prisons that it's running in other countries. ... It seems to me that when we don't find something in this context, to interpret it as not being there, as opposed to our not knowing whether it's there, is a mistake."

Haven't read report?  Check.  Ignoring actual evidence in favor of conspiracy theory based on the fact that you "know" the military is evil because of random factoid that has nothing to do with your discipline?  Check.

Irony offers you a six-pack and a salute, anthropologists!