Torture-as-Usual Monday, March 26, 2007

New York Times op-ed contributor Slavoj Zizek wrote a piece on the methods used to extract confessions from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. As I am sure you know, this man has admitted to planning a laundry list of terrorist acts including (this list taken from FOX News' "Fast Facts" on the story):

• The 9/11 attacks
• The "Shoe bomber" operation to bring down two American airplanes.
• An assassination attempt against President Clinton during his 1994 visit to the Philippines
• An assassination attempt againt Pope John Paul II (also in the Philippines)
• An assassination attempt against former President Jimmy Carter
• The bombing of a nightclub in Bali, Indonesia in 2002
• The destruction of U.S. embassies in Indonesia, Australia and Japan
• The bombing of hotel in Mombassa, Kenya that is frequented by Jewish travelers

Of course, not all of these plans were executed, but Mohammed admitted to planning all of them. But can we trust these grand admissions of guilt? After all, wouldn't he want to be remembered as a terrorist mastermind, even if he wasn't? Plus, while the information we gained from this man is shocking enough, even more shocking is the way in which we gained it: Americans tortured him for the information.

Let me pause so you can reflect on this a moment: the American government is admitting that it is torturing people for information in the name of national security. Of course he admitted to planning every major terrorist attack in the past ten years. He would have admitted to being the Gingerbread Man if you had asked.

But, based on the lack of popular outcry, the American people seem to be okay with that, because somehow, American society at large now accepts the idea that torture is an acceptable way of treating prisoners. Zizek writes

Yes, most of us can imagine a singular situation in which we might resort to torture – to save a loved one from immediate, unspeakable harm perhaps. I can. In such a case, however, it is crucial that I do not elevate this desperate choice into a universal principle. In the unavoidable brutal urgency of the moment, I should simply do it. But it cannot become an acceptable standard; I must retain the proper sense of the horror of what I did. And when torture becomes just another in the list of counterterrorism techniques, all sense of horror is lost.
—The New York Times, "Knight of the Living Dead"

This is the most horrifying aspect of the whole affair: not just that people are being tortured, but that people are okay with the idea of torture as an "interrogation technique".

Zizek goes on to compare the situation to Fox's show "24," saying that "Reality has now surpassed TV. What '24' still had the decency to present as Jack Bauer's disturbing and desperate choice is now rendered business as usual." Here, I think Zizek is missing the larger point: what happens on "24" and what happened at Gitmo are both the direct result of a corrupt leadership that is undermining the rule of law in favor of what can only be described as medieval standards for justice. As I wrote a few weeks ago, "24" has effectively desensitized the American people to the idea of torture. On "24" torture is business as usual, and is helping a very unpopular administration to get away with doing some very nasty things.

On the TV show, you can understand why Jack might resort to torture: he's always running out of time, knows who has the information he needs, and he's sure that if he does the distasteful act that he will be able to save thousands, maybe millions of lives. But the real world doesn't work that way: there is no ticking time bomb in this case, and there is no indication that these admissions will save any lives at all. This isn't an informant with a vital piece of information to avert an imminent terrorist attack. This isn't even Osama Bin Laden. This is some terrorist who is going to say anything you want him to say because you're dunking him like a witch at Salem. And ultimately, we are all going to suffer for it, because it is not only destroying our credibility, it is undermining the moral fabric of our nation.

... in the end, the greatest victims of torture-as-usual are the rest of us, the informed public. A precious part of our collective identity has been irretrievably lost. We are in the middle of a process of moral corruption: those in power are literally trying to break a part of our ethical backbone, to dampen and undo what is arguably our civilization’s greatest achievement, the growth of our spontaneous moral sensitivity.

—ibid.

With the help of a gagged media, the American people have chosen to look the other way as literally a thousand years of progress are being turned back. For what? A scapegoat named Khalid Sheikh Mohammed?

Why "24" Scares Me Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Have you been watching "24"? I'm not sure I can anymore. It's not just because it's written like a soap opera (I originally wrote "bad soap opera," but of course, that's redundant). It's not just because it's a one-trick pony (drink every time someone says "We're running out of time!"). And it's not even because it has a political agenda (after all, many stories do). It's because "24" is impacting real-world politics in a way that is unconscionable. I submit that "24"'s incessant reiteration of the "ticking time bomb" scenario is affecting the way America views the practice of torture by presenting it in a way that is eerily congruent with the Bush administration's position. It's presenting a practice that has been outlawed by both United States and international law.

How many torture scenes have there been in just the first few episodes of this season? Now consider the fact that one of the most brutal of them features the "hero" torturing his own brother. I'm not normally squeamish about violence in media, because I believe that violence in its myriad forms is a fact of life, even in our supposedly civilized modern society. But torture isn't just violence; it's "the deliberate, systematic, or wanton infliction of physical or mental suffering" (source). I think that any human being with feelings would agree that torture is virtually impossible to morally justify in any realistic circumstance. "24"'s producers serve up a steady stream of ludicrously contrived scenarios that make it seem that torture is not only useful but somehow patriotic. Jack would do anything for his country; even inject near-lethal doses of a torture chemical into a member of his own family. Is this the sort of psychopath we are supposed to be cheering for?

According to a study cited in The New Yorker, the show has set a disturbing precedent.

Before the [September 11th] attacks, fewer than four acts of torture appeared on prime-time television each year, according to Human Rights First, a nonprofit organization. Now there are more than a hundred, and, as David Danzig, a project director at Human Rights First, noted, "the torturers have changed. It used to be almost exclusively the villains who tortured. Today, torture is often perpetrated by the heroes." The Parents' Television Council, a nonpartisan watchdog group, has counted what it says are sixty-seven torture scenes during the first five seasons of "24"—more than one every other show. Melissa Caldwell, the council’s senior director of programs, said, "'24' is the worst offender on television: the most frequent, most graphic, and the leader in the trend of showing the protagonists using torture.”
—"Whatever It Takes: The politics of the man behind '24.'", The New Yorker, 2/12/2007

I'm not arguing that people cannot discern fantasy from reality. We all know that "24" is a television show, and I'm sure that the people responsible for interrogating bad guys aren't watching Kiefer Sutherland and getting new ideas. But some segments of the public have tacitly accepted the "ticking time bomb" argument as compelling, at least in part due to seeing such implausible situations play out in the show. Charles Petzold summarizes this problem and well:

It's becoming increasing obvious that "24" doesn't reflect reality about the nature of terrorism – but is molding reality about the response. The very popularity of the show sends a shameful message to the rest of the world that Americans believe torture to be a valid national policy.

I am the first to defend artistic expression. I'm also the sort of person who says that it's the viewer's responsibility to change the channel when there's something he doesn't want to see. But is it responsible to condone a calculated attempt to justify something so fundamentallty wrong?