“The Invisible Leash”: The Patty Hearst Case and the Crazy Things Victims Do

In April 1974, roughly two months after they kidnapped bar Hearst, the Symbi whizse Liberation forces (SLA) released a mental picture of Hearst as evidence that she was no longer a kidnap victim provided a willing member of their group. In the ikon, Hearst is pictured alone (no other members of the Symbionese Liberation sol unwraprs ar evident). She stands finish up centered in the photo (to the left) in front of the Symbionese Liberation Armys symbol, a s regular-headed cobra (Symbionese Liberation Army).Her berth is aggressive her legs ar apart as if she is braced and ready to shoot her wedge is pointed ( non at the viewer, solely finish up to the viewers right) and her finger is on the trigger. The torpedo itself is a serious weapon, a carbine. And Hearsts attire is militaristic and basal she wears pants, tight, military-type clothing, and a beret of the same sort worn by revolutionary Che Guevera, in the famous photo of him snapped by Alberta Korda (Che Guevara). Mo reover, the background color in the photo of Hearst is red, a color that suggests violence and aggression.In the pass up right deferral of the photo, a nonher machine gun rests against the wall, only the upper portion of the gun is visible (its barrel), and its pointing upward, toward the top of the photo. While this photo is meant to depict Hearst as a willing member of the SLA, it isnt quite successful. That is, it suggests a to a greater extent than complex truth that people sometimes play qualitys that do not fully describe them and in which they argon not at home. A close look at the photo cave ins that Patty Hearst, though she assumes the stance of a guerrilla, is anything but that.Her gaze is not directed violently at the viewer instead, she looks to the side, transforming herself into the object of the gaze rather than being the gazer. This is in discriminating contrast to Kordas famous photo of Che Guevara, whose hat style Hearst has adopted. In his photo, Guevara fa ces the audience squarely and audaciously (Che Guevara). Hearsts posture may be audacious, but the direction of her gaze reveals submission. Other details in the photo also suggest that she is less than at home in her role as aggressive warrior.Her gun, for example, is pointed to the side just as is her gaze. Shes not threatening the viewer with the gun shes exposing herself to the viewer. Plus, though none of the SLA members are present in the photo with Hearst, the unmanned, projecting gun in the lower right corner of the photo draws the eye and reminds the viewer that just off stage lurks a threat. With her glance to the side, Hearst seems almost focused on this threat. Indeed, a quick look at her eyes reveals dark circles under them.Her express is pinched and drawn. These are indicators that she may be uncomfortable, even stressed in her peeled role. In fact, the photo, along with an audio communication from Hearst on which she called her don a corporate liar and explained t hat she was joining the SLA and taking a new name (SLA Tania), caused her groom-to-be and her parents to speculate that Hearst had been brainwashed or coerced. They did not believe that the Patty Hearst they were seeing and hearing was the real Patty Hearst (SLA Patty Hearst).And, indeed, Patty Hearst, granddaughter of paper tycoon William Randolph Hearst, seems to eat changed over the course of her kidnapping. Compare, for example, two of her communiques with her parents. The first was certain February 12, only 9 sidereal days after armed gunman kidnapped her from her fiances apartment on the night of February 4, 1974 (Radically). In this communique, she says Mom, Dad, Im OK. Im with a combat unit thats armed with automatic weapons. And these people arent just a chunk of nuts.Theyve been authentically honest with me but theyre perfectly willing to die for what theyre doing. And I want to get out of here but the only way Im going to is if we do it their way. And I just hope t hat youll do what they say Dad and just do it quickly. And I mean I hope that this puts you a little eccentric at ease and that you know that I really, really am alright. I just hope I can get back to everybody really soon. (The Patty Hearst Tapes) Here Hearst focuses almost entirely on her own situation, corpulent her parents who has taken her and what her parents need to do to free her.She mentions that her captors are serious but says very little about their political agenda. She sounds, in fact, very much like one might expect a kidnapped, 19-year-old to sound. By day 59 of Hearsts captivity, her communiques reveal that her focus has changed from herself to the SLAs cause. Mom, Dad. Tell the low and oppressed people of this nation what the corporate state is about to do. upbraid Black and poor people that they are about to be hit down to the last man, woman, and child.Tell the people that the energy crisis is nothing more than a means to get public approval for a monolithic program to build nuclear power plants all over the nation. The means goes on in this vein and culminates with the following I have chosen to stay and fight. I have been accustomed the name Tania after a comrade who fought alongside Che in Bolivia. It is in the spirit of Tania that I say, Patria o Muerte, Venceremos (The Patty Hearst Tapes). The Latin phrase means Fatherland or finish We shall overcome (Cox), and it suggests Hearsts variation from heiress to warrior.Clearly Hearst had changed, and after she was caught on video camera robbing a bank with the SLA only a fewer months after shed been kidnapped (Ramsland), Americans caught up in the story were left to meditate whether a person is always responsible for his or her own actions. In an article published in the National Review during Hearsts 1976 trial, one commentator gave circumstantial voice to the questions many people were asking themselves When given the opportunity, why didnt Hearst reassert her own individuali ty and try to escape? And, even more succinctly, the commentator asks Is Hearst guilty? (What Is Guilt? 258). Hearst was eventually sentenced to 7 historic period in prison for helping the SLA with their criminal activities (including bank robberies), but chair Carter had her released after only 22 months (Chua-Eoan), and, in 2001, President Clinton pardoned her (Radically), wiping her phonograph recording clean. President Clintons pardon suggests that Hearst was not responsible for what she did. It suggests that under specific conditions, a person can behave in ways for which she mustiness not be held responsible.In a nutshell, it suggests that those who have endured traumatic passs (victims) are not necessarily accountable for what they do. And, indeed, by most accounts, Hearsts experience was traumatic. During the first several(prenominal) weeks of her captivity (prior to her participation in the first of several bank robberies), she was (according to her own accounts) kep t in a dark closet. She was sexually assaulted (Truth 201). She was told that her parents were insects and that she was a member of a class of people that was drink blood from the commoners.When her father visited San Quentin (as part of a ransom demand make by the SLA), and he news reported that the conditions of the prisoners there was fine, Hearsts captors reportedly told her that her nourishment conditions (in the cramped, dark closet) were similar to those of the San Quentin prisoners. The take home message for Hearst was that her tiny cell, urinate air, and gloomy walls were considered by her father to be an acceptable environment for his daughter. Her captors led her to incur increasingly alienated from her old life and from her family (Tanias World). worst to severe trauma, a person may not behave rationally or in keeping with what might be expected. For example, in 2007, when law of nature found and liberated Shawn Hornbeck, a boy who had been abducted 4 years prima rily (when he was only 12), one of the questions that surfaced repeatedly was why didnt he run? During at least the last two or cardinal of his years of captivity, his captor (Michael Devlin) allowed Shawn a tremendous amount of freedom. Shawn went to school, rode his bike, and had multiple opportunities to report his situation to authorities, but he didnt (Tresniowski, Grout, and Finan).Shawns attorney speculates that an nonvisual leash kept Shawn from running (qtd. in Tresniowski, Grout, and Finan). And C. Robert Cloninger, a medical set at the Sanson Center for Well-Being in St. Louis, indicates that victims may bond with their abductors in companionship to feel safe Once youve begun to identify with your captor, you dont have to fear them anymore, because youre in harmony with themWe see this in guarantor situations, where the emotional brain short circuits the rational brain. (qtd. in Tresniowski, Grout, and Finan)It was this same camouflaged leash that made Hearst do the seemingly crazy things she did rob banks, spread over from the law, remain with the SLA. A close look at her history and a careful look at the now infamous SLA photo of Hearst reveal the truth she may have pretended to be Tania, but that was a temporary role, assumed under extreme circumstances to protect herself. Her transformation from an apolitical rich girl to a gun-toting radical (Radically) tells us more about the events that she was caught up in than about who she was.