The United States is quick to point out human rights abuses in other countries but could do with some self-examination. The UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment considers solitary confinement a form of torture, but it is practiced on political prisoners in the U.S. and among its own allies.

Solitary confinement drove U.S. Army Private Bradley Manning (now Chelsea Manning), who had the courage and conscience to expose the truth about war crimes, to suicide attempts. Today, Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, who published the “Iraq War Logs” which revealed soldiers killing civilians on the street in Baghdad, is held in solitary confinement in Britain’s Belmarsh prison; supporters are gravely concerned about his deteriorating health and mental condition. While believing they were doing the right thing, Assange and Manning did not choose to go to prison, and could have expected not to, if international and national law was observed.

One who chose to deliberately take the risk of prison was Philip Berrigan. On September 11, 2001, Philip Berrigan, age 77, an antiwar activist dedicated to nonviolence, was serving the last months of a 30-month prison sentence for an act of conscientious objection when police removed him from his cell, handcuffed and shackled him, and placed him in a solitary cell (“for his own protection”?). Why would the authorities feel that other prisoners would harm Berrigan because of these incidents outside the prison that he had nothing to do with? Did they think he might react by expressing an opinion of some kind? Or is it likely that they wanted to cast shade on him as a dissenter and punish him further?

In total, for objecting to war and nuclear disaster, Berrigan was rewarded with 11 years of life in prison. This is how people of conscience who dare to tell the truth and resist war are treated. However, locking people up doesn’t silence their messages – instead, it amplifies them, as people realize that exposing the truth is such a threat.

Berrigan continued to speak out against war until his death in 2002. His last statement: