R.E.M. and Pearl Jam Call for Guantanamo Closure
- Posted on Oct 23rd 2009 10:37AM by Stephen Dowling
- Comments (431)
US President Barack Obama's call for the closure of the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba has got quite the chorus line of support from the music world, with R.E.M., Pearl Jam and Rage Against the Machine's Tom Morello all adding their weight to the campaign to close the facility.Launched on Tuesday, the Close Gitmo Now campaign unites activists, artists and retired generals in a coalition to close the controversial detention camp, used to house suspects captured in the War on Terror.
Other artists who have added their name to the cause include Nine Inch Nails, Billy Bragg, Roseanne Cash, Jackson Browne and Steve Earle.
Songs by a number of the acts -- including R.E.M., Nine Inch Nails and Pearl Jam -- were used to stress prisoners by being played at very high volume, a US Senate report said last year.
"At Guantanamo, the US government turned a jukebox into an instrument of torture," Thomas Blanton, executive director of the National Security Archive which backs the campaign, said.
"We have spent the last 30 years supporting causes related to peace and justice," R.E.M. said in a statement. "To now learn that some of our friends' music may have been used as part of the torture tactics, without their consent or knowledge, is horrific. It's anti-American, period."
AC/DC, Aerosmith, Bruce Springsteen and Metallica were among the 35 artists and songs that have been used against terror suspects, according to a list released Thursday.
The National Security Archive -- an independent research institute in Washington, D.C. that advocates "for the right to know" -- filed a request for the full list. The Archive's senior analyst Kate Doyle told CNN, "We do know that songs and band's work has been used to abuse detainees, we know that." The requests submitted under the Freedom of Information Act ask for documents "concerning the use of loud music during detention and/or as a technique to interrogate detainees at operated prison facilities used in its War on Terror at Guantanamo, and during 2002-the present."
Here is the full list of artists or songs used in the interrogations:
- AC/DC
- Aerosmith
- 'Barney the Dinosaur' theme song (By Bob Singleton)
- The Bee Gees
- Britney Spears
- Bruce Springsteen
- Christina Aguilera
- David Gray
- Deicide
- Don McLean
- Dope
- Dr. Dre
- Drowning Pool
- Eminem
- Hed P.E.
- James Taylor
- Limp Bizkit
- Marilyn Manson
- Matchbox Twenty
- Meatloaf
- Meow Mix Jingle
- Metallica
- Neil Diamond
- Nine Inch Nails
- Pink
- Prince
- Queen
- Rage Against the Machine
- Red Hot Chili Peppers
- Redman
- Saliva
- Sesame Street Theme Music (By Christopher Cerf)
- Stanley Brothers
- 'The Star Spangled Banner'
- Tupac Shakur
Reader Comments(1 of 22)
toby wrightat 10-23-2009
that's awesome!! Glad to know that the us government is torturing people with the music I love and make!! (sarcastic!!)
I was just wondering if I get royalties for them playing my music!!
thanks again for such an outrage against humanity, and leave it to the pigs of the governmental world to come up with such bullshit!!
OMG!at 10-23-2009
You'd rather they water-board or what? Another whiner, good gad! If it helps to get information that saves thousands or millions (or even one) life, I'm for it... I am so sick of whiners like you I could spit.
MaryLouat 10-23-2009
Exactly how stupid are you?
WTFDudeat 10-23-2009
You're torturing us with your pathetic dribble about how we need to be sensitive to terrorists and artists but we let you because it's a free country.
Terrorists + artists = Terrartists.
8-)
true americanat 10-23-2009
Just curious, did you lose a loved one on 9/11? If not, your opinion is not valid.
Mr.Politically Incorrectat 10-23-2009
Toby those detainee's think it's music of the devil that's how primative they are. In your eye's you are the devil do you still want to coddle and love those morphadites.We need to make them disappear like they made the twin towers disappear.Or did you seem to let is slip your mind there were 2 buildings in new york that are no longer there and innocent people died for no reason. It's because you bleeding heart's with no nad's is half the reason our country is in the $#it hole shape it's in. Trust me those detainee's as you call them are sub-human and don't deserve to beathe our oxygen. If they were innocent they would be free.
Lonat 10-23-2009
Quit crying
robat 10-23-2009
That's cool, I'm sure your "music" is torture to anyone who listens to your whiny garbage.
Phillat 10-23-2009
If you are saying that all of this music is torture to the prisoners held at Gitmo, then I would highly recommend that you ban it completely from the United States. If it is torture and not good for those held in Gitmo, it is then, by all means torture, so it surely can't be any good for those of us in America, I guess it is torture all the way around wouldn't you say? You play it loud here, they play it loud there, so you decide partner, is your music torture or not, you can't have it both ways, correct? One way or the other I say.
bat 10-23-2009
Everyone SHOULD watch the movie "Zeitgeist" its even on youtube.. Proof that the terrorist that were suppose to be on the airplanes that hit the twin towers ,most of them are still alive./ And all of the terrorist homes, cars, and expenses were paid by the CIa. They were ciA assets. This movie also has SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE THAT SHOWS THE TOWERS DID NOT FALL FROM THE PLANES. THEY FELL AT FREE FALL SPEED AS IF THEY WERE DEMOLITIONED. ALSO SHOWS HOW THE STEEL WAS FIRE TESTED TO WITHSTAND FIRES EVEN HOTTER THAN ON THAT DAY. This was a hoax to start a war not on terror but on any country that wont conform to the way of the USA.. dont you remember Operation Iraqi Liberation ...OIL
Kateat 10-23-2009
I am so happy that the suspected terrorists are now free and flew back on our jets.
It's prison people !!!!!!!!
Lieoushat 10-23-2009
Well, I guess I will have to learn to like someone elses music, as all yours that I find or have are going in the garbage! Take your self over there and see how long you last. But watch out you might "lose" your head.
Oh well, thats ok they are just misunderstood is all.
Chopper70at 10-23-2009
Here's a solution, Toby: Ditch any recording contracts you have, quit making music, then give ALL your money to the poor so they can get off welfare. But the problem with that is you'll have to quit your drug habits, start eating meat periodically and act like a normal American. The world has too many "artists" telling everyone else what to do, and nobody voted for any of them.
Wait- Hitler was an artist and he got voted in, so I guess I'm wrong on that one...
Mikeat 10-23-2009
Toby....thanks for being another out of touch moron like these chuckleheads in the story. You call that "torture"? You haven't a friggin' clue as to what real "toruture" is. I can send you some videos of our enemies beheading our soldiers. Not quickly with a guillotine, not with a sword, but slowly....with a knife. The video also shows them cutting tongues out of Americans....and these are the more "humane" acts they carry out.
See, it is because of self-righteous idiots like yourself that we've become such an easy target for terrorists. They laugh at your kind because it only solidifies their belief that we are a weak society that has no right to exist.
They shake their heads at a society that protects criminals and kills its own innocent children by the millions. They are willing to die for their god while we ban ours from school.
They view us as an immoral, Godless, spineless group of misfits who will only spread our decadent ways throughout the world.
Afraid of waterboarding? Are you serious? These people are afraid you'll bring mindless liberalism to their world.....that's why they're fighting. To keep people like you from ruining their chosen way of life.
tomat 10-23-2009
Give me a break. People are dying out there and you better believe they would kill Americans just because we are Americans.
nabilat 10-23-2009
what most people don't realize is that many of the captives have NOT been given a trial, thus our system considers all suspects innocent till proven guilty. These very suspects, many of them who've had NOTHING to do with terrorism, just got picked up by afghans getting paid 25k a head for "terrorists". So the very fact that we assume them guilty without trail and torture them in the process is UN-AMERICAN.
Jamesat 10-23-2009
Who gives a flying c@!@ !
Just another thing for theses artists to harp about and make more money on. If they want to be politicians then go for it. Tired of these lame excuses for humane causes. Hollywood and the Music industry are just too caught up in their own clouds, their fake -pathetic concerts that do nothing in the long run except put money in their pockets. Sad, tired examples of false concern!
mattat 10-23-2009
saliva is torture
reat 10-23-2009
your right, Id rather have tooth picks shoved under my finger nails than listen to your crap music.
timat 10-23-2009
You are probably one of the people who said that 9/11 was all G.W. Bush's fault and why didn't he do something to stop it. They do something to try to prevent it from happening again and all you can do is moan and cry about it. By the way, was YOUR name on the list of performers? NO!! When these people make and sell their music for profit, they lose all rights to say how their music is played after someone else buys it unless of course the purchaser is trying to make a profit off of it without paying royalties. These ARtiSt have gotten royalties from it, so have you, and so has every American. IT'S SAFETY FROM MORE TERRORIST ATTACK.