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Are you, your family, or your community at risk of turning to violent extremism? Now you can find out as The Intercept reports that a rating system devised by the National Counterterrorism Center titled "Countering Violent Extremism: A Guide for Practitioners and Analysts,” lets police, social workers and educators rate individuals on a scale of one to five in categories such as: “Expressions of Hopelessness, Futility,” “Talk of Harming Self or Others,” and “Connection to Group Identity (Race, Nationality, Religion, Ethnicity).” The ranking system is supposed to alert government officials to individuals at risk of turning to radical violence, and to families or communities at risk of incubating extremist ideologies. Families are judged on factors such as “Aware[ness] of Each Other’s Activities,” as well as levels of “Parent-Child Bonding,” (PDF) and communities are rated by access to health care and social services, in addition to “presence of ideologues or recruiters” as potential risk factors. A low score in any of these categories would indicate a high risk of “susceptibility to engage in violent extremism,” according to the document. Users of the guide are encouraged to plot the scores on a graph to determine what “interventions” could halt the process of radicalization before it happens.
Experts have suggested that intervention by law enforcement or other branches of the government in individuals’ lives, particularly young people, based solely based on the views they express, can potentially criminalize constitutionally protected behavior. “The idea that the federal government would encourage local police, teachers, medical and social service employees to rate the communities, individuals and families they serve for their potential to become terrorists is abhorrent on its face,” says former FBI agent Mike German calling the criteria used for the ratings “subjective and specious.” Arun Kundnani questions the science behind the rating system. “There’s no evidence to support the idea that terrorism can be substantively correlated with such factors to do with family, identity, and emotional well-being," says Kundnani. "“It is obvious that, in practice, [this] would mostly only be applied to Muslim communities."
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Subsentient on Saturday February 14 2015, @09:33PM
I'm speechless. Wow. Apparently I score high because:
*I've been suicidal
*I've had depression
*I'm a mama's boy
However, I score very low in "connection to group identity".
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." -Jiddu Krishnamurti
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 14 2015, @09:53PM
It seems like another item on my ever-growing list of reasons that I can't get treatment for clinical depression, anxiety, social phobia, etc from a psychiatrist here in the USA.
Say the wrong things (e.g. indicate that you are potentially suicidal) and your rights are basically revoked as if you were a felon. No guns, maybe even some forced monitoring at a mental facility which goes on a permanent record somewhere. Since there's so much stigma about mental illness in the USA, imagine if a potential employer sees that type of thing in a background check. There'll be questions. More depression and anxiety.
And with this type of thing, now there's the potential to be singled out as a terrorist at the whim of the psychiatrist (if not directly, they can just request a police officer to give an interrogation to "verify" their professional claim). I doubt they'd send you to Gitmo, but it'll definitely go on a LOT of records. You can't go back and undo background documents.
So, it comes to this...
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 14 2015, @10:56PM
Isn't it interesting that the mental disturbances which run rampant through people with high intelligence are singled out for persecution. It is a continuation of the historical trend to discredit, scapegoat, and marginalize the intellectually gifted by leaders that know they don't measure up.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 15 2015, @12:37AM
Despite systematic efforts by society to prevent intelligent people from breeding, isn't it amazing how intelligent children continue to be born to idiot parents? It's like they just can't stop intelligence from bubbling up out of the genome, for some reason.