Israel is a behaviourist who fits electrodes to the arms, legs and torsos of resistant autistic children — misbehaviour earns a painful electric shock. Typically, the Nine reporter was too witless to do enough research (and we’re talking Googling the guy’s name, for goodness sake) to discover that Israel’s practice isn’t “new” at all.

As Mother Jones reported this week in a story headed Why Can’t Massachusetts Shut Matthew Israel Down? , he has been shocking autistic, and more recently Asperger, children for at least 17 years.

In the same issue of the magazine he gave an occasionally disturbing interview to Jennifer Gonnerman.

Autism Diva had an extensive post on Israel earlier this year, and an Australian blogger with a child on the autistic spectrum responds to the Nine report.

Last year the Boston Globe covered a report by New York City education officials who visited Israel’s “school”:

The report, based in part on an inspection last month of the Judge Rotenberg Educational Center in Canton, portrayed a school in which most staff lack training to handle the students and seem more focused on punishing bad behavior than encouraging good acts.

The investigators said some forms of discipline, such as a device that delivers shocks at timed intervals, appear to violate federal safety regulations, and students live in an atmosphere of “pervasive fears and anxieties.” ….

There have been increasing allegations of abuse at the Rotenberg Center in recent months.

They include several assertions that students have been badly burned by the shock devices, known as graduated electronic decelerators. The Massachusetts Disabled Persons Protection Commission has received 22 allegations of abuse at the school since January, including 12 that involve injuries. Rotenberg officials have steadfastly denied the charges, but commission officials say that at least two have been substantiated.

The full report is here. Remarkably, the centre is taxpayer-funded.

The use of electric shocks as an “aversive” factor dates back to the 1960s, when one of the “fathers” of ABA therapy Ole Ivar Lovass (like Israel, a disciple of B.F. Skinner) used electrodes in therapy for autistic children. The practice was reported in a 1965 Life magazine article, Screams, Slaps & Love: A surprising, shocking treatment helps far-gone mental cripples.

It plays no part in the modern ABA therapy practiced in New Zealand.

And in case you wondering how strong these shocks are, here’s a video: