Time to Talk about Torture Again

It happens to be a rainy day and my plans for a nice hike have been postponed, so what a better way to be productive than to catch up on some reading. Instead of some light reading, however, I picked up Torture and Democracy. Perusing once again Rejali’s detailed account of various torture devices invented and applied through human history and across nations, I started thinking about the distinction between torturers and the tortured.  

For most people, the roles of the torturers and the tortured are clearly defined: those who torture are the strong ones and those tortured are weak, victims, and under the control of the torturers. That is not always the case. Those who focus on exhibiting control over others by using torture are in my opinion weaker, both physically and psychologically, than the individuals they torture. While reading The Question by Henri Alleg, I could not help but think that while the so-called victim is no victim at all, those torturing him are not only victims of the act itself but in the event that the desired outcome is not obtained, they crack. They rely so much on the act of torture and count on the weakness of the tortured that if they do not encounter one, the other, or both, they become slaves to and limited by their anger and aggression. The louder they yell and the more enveloped by anger they become, the weaker they present themselves.

When I was growing up, for example, children were disciplined so that they learn the appropriate mode of conduct and turn into productive and well-behaved adults. I remember instances of hits on the palms, boys being stripped down to their underwear “to learn their lesson”, and many of us asked to stand up, facing the wall, hands up for ten minutes, all because we disrupted the class atmosphere by engaging in such “outrageous” acts such as laughing out loud. The actions on the side of teachers were done with the intention to punish the young students and teach them that misbehaving has consequences, usually negative ones. Well, I certainly learned that there are consequences for every action. The problem was that I never felt that the disciplining methods were proportionate to the alleged violation of conduct that was committed. Therefore, being disciplined only made me angry and more convinced that there is nothing wrong with me; rather, the problem was in the system. As I stood in the principal’s office, being disciplined and reprimanded, I refused to apologize, did not make a sound (as much as it hurt), and once even smiled back. Needless to say, my actions only aggravated the principal and teachers even more. Here was a nine-year-old kid who had the power to make her principal and teacher lose control and yell in desperation. Even then, I knew I was not the victim; they were. The victims to a system that sought control and total domination over everyone’s action and crumbled when it could not achieve these. 

According to many, the developed world has moved away from the methods referred to in the previous paragraph. This is why we denounce corporal punishment. This is why we want to kill humanely, whether animals or persons. What is humane, however, is not the act of killing, but the fact that it is not prolonged and painful. The end result in both situations is largely unfavorable for the person against whom the act is exercised, but for his killers, the notion that they did so humanely helps them preserve the belief that they are still law-abiding persons who love and respect fellow human-beings and will under any other circumstance not even hurt a fly. People are no longer barbarians who take a life as if it means nothing; instead, they have graduated to be civilized creatures who still take a life, but do so humanely, claiming to respect the person whose life is being taken. Even if we convince ourselves that the above is true, the presence and wide application of torture warns that we might not be that far off from our ancestors as we would like to think we are.

-      Krasi

Torture Part Deux

As I mentioned in a previous post, spring quarter 2012 is almost over (almost because I still have one last paper to polish and submit...) and I am quite ready for summer. Before that happens, however, I think I should add some reflections from the seminar on torture I completed. I can honestly say that I wish I had not seen some of the pictures and films presented during the seminar, but I understand why it is important that we do see them and acknowledge them.

 

Several years ago I watched a documentary on the Chernobyl nuclear plant disaster of 1986. The purpose of the documentary was to reveal a step by step description of what exactly went wrong. What made an impression on me was the fact that the disaster happened because everything went wrong. It was not simply a human error, it was not just one person’s error, it was not just one safety device failing. The breakdown of all the elements in the chain allowed the disaster to happen. Similarly, the practice of torture occurs not because one person has a particular taste for violence or because there is a failure in the system. Everyone must participate, either as a torturer, as a sanctioner, or as a bystander. 

As the Chilean novelist Ariel Dorfman points out, the type of regime has no relevance to the use of torture; rather, as long as those in charge are able to present a worthy goal of some ultimate freedom and security, the act of torture will be accepted and condoned by the majority. How the act is presented to the world highly relies on the point of view. Depending on whose side a person is on, torture can either be a great violation of human dignity or the ultimate expression of patriotism in the pursuit of security to the homeland. 

Orwell portrays the danger of such distinctions and in his work Animal Farm stresses that considering the behavior one engages in, the label of that behavior is irrelevant to the outside observer. If all nations, regardless of how democratic they are, choose to employ torture to ensure security, the line between us and them is erased and if a true outsider were to look through a hypothetical window, he would not be able to distinguish between enemy and friends because without the knowledge of who is “us” and who is “them”, all humans would look the same to him as far as the practice of torture is concerned. 

The fact that there is no difference between the so-called enemies and ourselves when it comes to disrespecting the law, each other, and humanity in general should be known to most people. However, we are used to pointing fingers at others and finding rationalizations for actions that would easily be regarded as despicable if committed by the enemy. A cultural shift is indeed in order if we are to stop ignoring what goes on in our own neighborhood before we start searching for criminals in the town across the river (or ocean). Until we realize that language is a means of controlling one’s thoughts and ideas, it will be hard to acknowledge that there is no difference between a dictatorial “enemy” torturing our combatants and our combatants “harshly interrogating” the enemy under the sanction of democracy. 

 - Krasi

Torture

As if the classes on genocide and human trafficking were not enough of a depressing topic to me, I decided to enroll in a class on torture this upcoming quarter. And no, the purpose of the class is not to educate us on how best to convince a roommate to not leave dirty dishes in the sink for days or how efficiently to respond to a malevolent act from someone we have established as an enemy to our peaceful existence. Rather, the class presents a platform on which to discuss the use of torture as an interrogation technique and provide an answer to the question: Is torture ever a viable method to extract information? 

I could argue that torture, physical or psychological, is a subjective experience and what constitutes suffering for one person might not be the same for another person. This, however, is not the purpose of this post. Rather, I choose to focus on certain actions that for anyone, under any circumstances, will constitute torture and will incur painful experiences. Most of us go through our daily lives referring to everyday experiences as torturous and unbearable and often, we do not even stop to consider what the true meaning of torture is. Even though dealing with an employee at the Department of Motor Vehicles office might seem as an intolerable experience that if survived, increases our pain tolerance threshold, no one would hopefully truly argue that this constitutes torture. Yet, these are the kinds of experiences we refer to as torture on a regular basis. 

The repeated use of and application of the word torture to a variety of ordinary experiences and events seem to have made many inured to the concept and consequently, they have lost their ability to critically judge a certain practice and to file it under the characterization of torture. An example would be the infamous practice of waterboarding suspected criminals to pull out information pertaining to national security. Personally, the moment I hear a description of what this notorious torture method entails, I have no intention of trying it out to confirm that it is indeed torture. Some, however, are not that smart or are simply very stubborn because they continue to insist that waterboarding does not sound too bad and that people should stop protesting against it. Some of you might then ask why don’t they just try it and prove their point. Well, lucky for you, and me, there are such individuals and personally, I file them under the category of people who serve as a warning to us all. For further illumination on the above point, please watch the video below.

And while we are on the subject of torture, why not include a video that clearly identifies that common people like you and me are the ones who can hurt other human beings, no hardened and conscience-lacking criminals needed. 

 - Krasi