There's no such thing as simulated pain and suffering
The new editor of Commentary magazine, John Podhoretz, writes the following in a post on the magazine's website:
Moreover, even if this wasn't the definition, the entire point of water-boarding is to cause intense physical pain and suffering. Podhoretz describes waterboarding as "psychic game-playing," an elaborate "fake-out" where "the intent is not to drown or nearly to drown (a classic torture method) but to invoke the primal fear of drowning." But that's not at all accurate, as Evan Wallach makes clear in his recent piece in the Washington Post:
And how historically ignorant do you have to be to think that people invented techniques like waterboarding in order to skirt some hyper-technical definition of torture? The regimes that have used these techniques throughout the years weren't motivated by a desire to avoid domestic prosecution (that's a uniquely Cheneyian contribution to the history of torture); rather they chose these particular techniques because they leave no physical indicia of torture, no ironclad proof that torture occurred. A confession, whether extracted in a Spanish dungeon, a Soviet gulag, or a Japanese POW camp, was worthless for propaganda purposes if the confesser bore obvious signs of torture (like scars, bandages, missing fingers, etc.). Hence the motivation to use techniques like waterboarding that cause acute suffering but leave no evidence of torture on the body of the victims.
And finally, as a general conceptual matter, torture is not something that can be "simulated." It's not a flight on an airplane. There's no such thing as simulated pain and suffering. That this even needs to be explained to anyone old enough to read and write is absolutely astounding.
[T]he discussion of waterboarding and torture has taken a fascinating turn in the past few years, because it involves a redefinition of “torture.” As universally understood, torture is the infliction of physical injury through the application of physical force. It is the negation, the reverse image, of medical care. The monstrous intent of torture is, literally, to cause physical injury. That injury need not be permanently scarring or even temporarily bruising to be torture, as in the disgusting use of electric current, but it must be an actual injury in any case.This is wrong on so many different levels. First, Podhoretz' "universally understood" definition of torture is pulled directly out of his own arse. As Andrew Sullivan points out, the actual universal definition of torture is the infliction of "severe mental or physical pain or suffering." This has been the standard, universally-accepted legal definition of torture for a very long time.
Punishment techniques like waterboarding were invented precisely not to be acts of torture as commonly understood, but rather to simulate acts of torture. In the case of waterboarding, the intent is not to drown or nearly to drown (a classic torture method) but to invoke the primal fear of drowning.
Moreover, even if this wasn't the definition, the entire point of water-boarding is to cause intense physical pain and suffering. Podhoretz describes waterboarding as "psychic game-playing," an elaborate "fake-out" where "the intent is not to drown or nearly to drown (a classic torture method) but to invoke the primal fear of drowning." But that's not at all accurate, as Evan Wallach makes clear in his recent piece in the Washington Post:
The media usually characterize the practice as "simulated drowning." That's incorrect. To be effective, waterboarding is usually real drowning that simulates death. That is, the victim experiences the sensations of drowning: struggle, panic, breath-holding, swallowing, vomiting, taking water into the lungs and, eventually, the same feeling of not being able to breathe that one experiences after being punched in the gut.Podhortez claims that "[p]unishment techniques like waterboarding were invented precisely not to be acts of torture as commonly understood, but rather to simulate acts of torture." Oh really? Waterboarding dates back, at least, to the Spanish Inquisition. From the crime library:
The first level of torture employed by the Spanish Inquisition was the "water cure." Water was poured into the accused's open mouth. The linen cloth was washed into the opening of the throat, preventing the accused from spitting the water back out. The overwhelming sensation of drowning forced the accused to swallow the water. The rules of torture as written by Torquemada, a man whom historians have compared to Hitler, stipulated that no more than eight liters of water could be used in a single session.This technique was not invented to "simulate" an act of torture. It comes straight out of Torquemada's torture manual.
And how historically ignorant do you have to be to think that people invented techniques like waterboarding in order to skirt some hyper-technical definition of torture? The regimes that have used these techniques throughout the years weren't motivated by a desire to avoid domestic prosecution (that's a uniquely Cheneyian contribution to the history of torture); rather they chose these particular techniques because they leave no physical indicia of torture, no ironclad proof that torture occurred. A confession, whether extracted in a Spanish dungeon, a Soviet gulag, or a Japanese POW camp, was worthless for propaganda purposes if the confesser bore obvious signs of torture (like scars, bandages, missing fingers, etc.). Hence the motivation to use techniques like waterboarding that cause acute suffering but leave no evidence of torture on the body of the victims.
And finally, as a general conceptual matter, torture is not something that can be "simulated." It's not a flight on an airplane. There's no such thing as simulated pain and suffering. That this even needs to be explained to anyone old enough to read and write is absolutely astounding.
posted by A.L. at 5:13 PM
24 Comments:
Is this Podhoretz in any way related to N-Pod?
Because then you get the sense of some sort of right-wing...shadow organization.
Regardless, the neocon defense of torture is so ridiculous I am surprised they have not lost any (if any at all) credibility they had.
Move over Bill Kristol and David Horowitz. This nails it for John Podhoretz as being the Michael "Heckuva Job, Brownie" Brown of radical-right deep thinkers.
"As universally understood, torture is the infliction of physical injury through the application of physical force. It is the negation, the reverse image, of medical care. The monstrous intent of torture is, literally, to cause physical injury."
If Podhoretz's son or grandchild were (God forbid) to be kidnapped, raped and slowly dismembered by a fiend who sends him daily video updates, this dimbulb ideologue would learn the real meaning of the word "torture."
Commentary magazine would do better to turn the editor's chair over to whoever cleans its offices at night .
Is this Podhoretz in any way related to N-Pod?
Because then you get the sense of some sort of right-wing...shadow organization.
Indeed. J-Pod is N-Pod's son and has now taken over at Commentary, the magazine his dad started. There's a very limited pool of personnel to choose from on the right.
Sigh! Now they'll say that waterboarding was only the first level of torture used by the Spanish Inquisition and so long as we don't go to the second level it's okay.
"That this even needs to be explained to anyone old enough to read and write is absolutely astounding."
Of course, I don't believe that Mr. Podhoretz needs to have that explained to him...Hmmm. That's inaccurate. I think that he's fully aware that his arguement is utter BS, so in that sense he doesn't need it explained to him. OTOH, I'm currenly trying to stop myself from fantasizing him being restrained, naked, in a stress position for 72 hours while a constantly repeating recording plays explaning why his joke of a definition of torture is crap. Afterall, there's no phyical injury there, so by his definition...
I'm going to stop now before I inflict my mental scenario of educating J-Pod on why mental anguish is torture on any the readers here. It's been a frustrating day for reading about the Justice system, today. My apologies to your readers, A.L.
By going forward with the assumption that torture apologists like Podhoretz misunderstand the meaning of torture, you play their game of lies by their rules.
Of course they understand that waterboarding is torture. These kind of apologia are intended to play to the ignorant and unwary.
Mr. Podhoretz wants torture to be US policy. But just like "Dog The Bounty Hunter" he will pretend not to, for the benefit of the public.
Thank you once again for a clear-sighted analysis of the issue. As someone who has studied both law and psychology, I believe (and nothing will convince me otherwise) that psychological torture is still torture. The fear of drowning induced by waterboarding is every bit as real, and traumatic, as the fear of drowning induced by an actual attempted drowning. Arguing that the victim of the former technique was never in actual danger of drowning does not change his or her perception of the experience. The average reasonable person (that favored legal construct) subjected to the experience would perceive it as threatened drowning. Threatened death. To argue that it is anything but torture, simply because it does not leave visible, physical scars, is to engage in sophistry of the worst kind.
Perhaps that's why Mukasey doesn't know if waterboarding is torture. He doesn't know if more than eight liters of water are used in a single session, which is classified.
I agree about torture. Interestingly, Israel has been having this debate in a sort of more adult version. Most people understand that the techniques used on Palestinians are torture. The discourse then is, whether torture is justified. In that sense, people have become comfortable with being torturers--with all its attendant hypocrisies.
That being said, I can't help but feel that this is one of those issues that's thrown out there as red meat. I certainly don't want my country torturing me or anyone else, but I'm not sure banning just one technique THAT WE KNOW ABOUT is really worth doing. After all, how long did it take us to find out about extreme rendition?
"In the case of waterboarding, the intent is not to drown or nearly to drown (a classic torture method) but to invoke the primal fear of drowning."
Talk about a distinction without a difference. It doesn't matter if the purpose is to kill. When they rip your fingernails off they're not trying to kill you either.
And waterboarding IS near drowning in every relevant sense other than perhaps the probability of actually drowning. In terms of the character of the experience its exactly the same thing.
Also on the difference between mental and physical pain: there is very little difference. The latest affective and neurological science findings on pain find that it has two components: 1) a sensory component that identifies it as pain and 2) an affective (i.e mental) component which is the part that people actually don't like about pain.
Drugs like morphine and certain brain lesions can lead to a phenomenon known as reactive disassociation in which the subject continues to feel the pain but its totally an intellectual exercise and they don't mind it any more even though they say they still feel it.
These apologists for torture are an ongoing disgrace to our country.
Actually, the intent of waterboarding is to gather intelligence. Lawyers and Senators are not good at gathering intelligence, but are extremely long on hot air.
Waterboarding, like abortion, should be safe, legal, and rare.
And from time to time, rest assured, it will be done, regardless of what the congress says and regardless of who is president.
Neutral, I previously thought you were just an ideologue. I now find myself at a loss for words for any descriptor that expresses my contempt for you. This will be last post I ever address to you or concerning you.
Actually, the intent of waterboarding is to gather intelligence.
No, like all torture, the intent of waterboarding is to mentally break the victim. This is done further any of a variety of goals. That goal could be gathering intelligence, eliciting a confession to some crime, forcing cooperation in some policy or participation in some propaganda, or force conversion the "true" religion. None of these goals changes the moral repugnance or this or any other such process.
Lawyers and Senators are not good at gathering intelligence, but are extremely long on hot air. Waterboarding, like abortion, should be safe, legal, and rare.
... I'm not even going to justify that with a response.
And from time to time, rest assured, it will be done, regardless of what the congress says and regardless of who is president.
This does not and never should justify it. The fact that something occasionally happens over time is no excuse saying it should be legal. Based the rest of this comment, I'm actually going to credit you with the intelligence or realizing how morally and intellectually bankrupt that argument is and not bother refuting it. I'm not going to be in any further dialogue with you, anyway.
As of the moment I hit the "post" button, you are Shrouded to me. That meaning, you're invisible. I will not acknowledge your presence in any way. You are entirely beneath my notice. I was tempted to encourage other readers here to do the same, but that could be seen as a usurpation of A.L's authority over his own blog. I wouldn't want to do that.
Good bye and good riddance.
David Hunt, you can, at your leisure, posture and preen about your moral superiority over those who have to do the dirty work to save the lives of their comrades, countrymen and allies.
It is only the most effete and uninvolved among us who can engage in the sort of tomfoolery that characterizes your recent post. Rather than come to grips with any of the moral issues posed, you forcefully assert your unwillingness to do so. But regardless of your puffery, men will continue to be faced with extraordinarily difficult choices about what to do with vile fiends who have information which, if disclosed, could avert catastrophes both large and small. And, as they have throughout history, they will wrestle with their decisions, and agonize over them for the remainder of their lives, without once giving the slightest thought to what fools like you have to say about the matter.
On this one, I'm with Chuck Schumer. Here's what he had to say:
"So it's easy to sit back in the armchair and say that torture can never be used. But when you're in the foxhole, it's a very different deal.
"And I respect -- I think we all respect the fact that the president's in the foxhole every day. So he can hardly be blamed for asking you or his White House counsel or the Department of Defense to figure out when it comes to torture, what the law allows and when the law allows it and what there is permission to do."
Hard jobs require hard people. Chuck understands this. If you got a problem, Mr. Hunt, take it up with Schumer.
And now I discover that not only does the fascist hyena Schumer agree with me, so does his fellow fascist hyena Bill Clinton. Here is Mr. Clinton, being quoted approvingly by Prof. Alan Dershowitz:
"'You picked up someone you know is the No. 2 aide to Osama bin Laden. And you know they have an operation planned for the United States or some European capital in the next three days. And you know this guy knows it. Right, that's the clearest example. And you think you can only get it out of this guy by shooting him full of some drugs or waterboarding him or otherwise working him over.'
"He said Congress should draw a narrow statute 'which would permit the president to make a finding in a case like I just outlined, and then that finding could be submitted even if after the fact to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.' The president would have to 'take personal responsibility' for authorizing torture in such an extreme situation. Sen. John McCain has also said that as president he would take responsibility for authorizing torture in that 'one in a million' situation."
Safe, legal and rare--that's the ticket!
David,
It is pointless to discuss anything with a person whose only interest is in making snide comments and whose argument consists of repeating the same basic garbage over and over.
There's barely enough intellect in the average torture advocate to type coherent statements, which is why they usually simply copy and paste other's comments. If they had more intellect, they'd understand the logic of an absolute ban on torture. Hint: if a person resorts to torture, there can never be a certainty that the information obtained is correct -- or that it could not have been obtained through other means. That is inescapable logic, but is apparently beyond the understanding of some.
Even many animals have the proven ability to feel other's pain and suffering, but a significant portion of the human race lacks this ability.
So a torture advocate lacks the ability to formulate and solve simple logical problems and is lacking in the ability to feel sympathy for other humans.
I would suggest that revulsion mixed with a little pity is the appropriate feeling when confronted with such a pathetic individual. I certainly wouldn't want to talk to them. Let them babble their twisted opinions into the emptiness, I say.
c3h50h,
I am well aware of the foolishness inherent in relying on the accuracy of information obtained via torture. I was considering putting together such a response to the Shrouded One's snarky comment when I realized that he was either:
a) simply acting as deliverer of a prepackaged talking-point and that any substantive discussion was impossible and further engagement was entirely pointless. or
b) was simply morally bankrupt enough that he was A-okay with making pithy comments about the systematic degradation and breaking of another human being. And therefore any substantive discussion was impossible and further engagement was entirely pointless.
In retrospect, my whole showy comment about "Shrouding" Neutral was a mistake. I still believe that it is pointless to attempt to engage him and will continue to ignore him. However, regardless of what I said, I have realized that upon reflection it's a grand-standing move that is actually an attempt to usurp a portion of A.L's authority here. Regardless of what I wrote, I was actually trying to organize a group shunning of Neutral by all the readers of this blog. I'm not sure what A.L would think about that, so he has my apologies.
I offer as an explanation (but not an excuse) that is was the revelations about the abuses at Abu Graib (sp?) that originally turned by opinions of the Bush Administration from “Well, I wish the other guys had won and I really didn’t want us invading Iraq, but we’re all still Americans and we’ve got to stand together against our enemies in the world” to “Oh my God, they’re defaming everything about America that has made us and our system of laws and justice the envy of the rest of the world for decades.” In specific, I remember hearing right-wing commentators making light of what was going on in Abu G and maybe using the word “abuse” to describe what had happened. I knew that if what was made public had happened to American soldiers, there would have been no hesitation or disagreement that the word “torture” was the proper word to describe it. It would have been a cause for war.
We are still seeing the fallout of this debacle and its cousins today and will for decades to come. Just recently a major under-secretary of State could not denounce even the waterboarding of American soldiers as torture because of its policy implications on our own practices. Even worse, our moral authority in the field of human rights, once one of our greatest assets in world diplomacy has been devastated for decades at least, perhaps irrevocably. Despotic regimes now can now simply laugh at human rights complaints from us unless there’s an air-strike behind the complaint. Vast amounts of our soft power in the world has been simply cast into the void and most of our hard military power is tied up in Iraq and Afghanistan, and every tin-pot dictator in the world know it.
In make a long story short (too late), I take this subject somewhat personally and let that get the better of me in my earlier post.
Addendum,
As anyone reading the above post can see, I am also terrible at editing my own messages prior to posting. The above is actually a better example of longer posts by me (in terms of spelling/grammar). I seem to have an odd block that prevents me from seeing certain types of errors before the post is actually sitting on some guy's website. As there is no way of editing posts in this forum, the mistakes stay there. Still, I think that the above is perfectly understandable, if a little clunky in places, and I didn't leave out anything as important as a critical "not."
As I final note, c2h50h has my personal apologies for misspelling his name.
David,
No need to apologize. I'm pretty tired of neutral's shtick as well. Anyone who doesn't naturally feel embarrassed and ashamed at the thought of their country torturing detainees is not someone who's going to be convinced by argument.
David,
I'm not sensitive about my handle. Heck, you promoted me 12 in molecular weight, how could I complain?
My earlier comment was meant in the spirit of commiseration rather than criticism.
c2,
Glad to hear about the lack on any offense about the name. I didn’t really expect there to be a problem. The bit with the name is a matter of pride on my part. I work in accounting and client relations are important. My boss is the guy with the incredible people skills and all the clients are ultimately his, but if I’ve learned anything about client relations, it’s that no one likes having there name mangled. If it’s a common name you look like an idiot, because who can mess up a name like (e.g.) Hunt? On the other hand, if a name’s unusual, then you should have checked to make sure that you had it right. I’ll take that comment as license to shorten it as above in the future, which is segues into…
After working in this field for eleven years, I’ve turned certain rules for myself into habits and one is that I typically refer to people I correspond with more formally. It comes from a workplace rule I have for myself of never referring to a client by their first name (only) unless they have invited me to some point. I occasionally post at Glenn Greenwald’s site and always refer to him as Mr. Greenwald when addressing him directly. Most everyone calls him “Glenn” and I’m sure that he’d never even notice a lack of formality from me, but it’s gone beyond even a habit and become something a personal affectation of mine on the internet. Of course, handles can throw all that out the window. Can you imagine calling A.L. “Mr. Liberal?” I actually (almost seriously) thought about that for about two seconds the first time I referenced him directly on this site. I got a grin out the idea, but I decided that was taking a personal affectation way too far into the realm of tongue-in-cheek snarkiness. He’s a reasonable and friendly fellow, but he’d have every excuse to taking being referred in such an odd fashion as off-putting and discounting anything that came out the weirdo who did it.
Okay, I’ve been engaging in one of my less productive habits of rambling, but I’ve decided to leave the whole thing as is in the hopes that A.L gets a chuckle out being called “Mr. Liberal.”
Cheers all.
I'm not sure what a "torture advocate" is. I don't know of any of them, other than among the criminally insane. I do know of those who advocate agressive methods of interrogation (if you want to call it "torture," go right ahead) in very limited circumstances where the potential savings in innocent life greatly outweighs the sheer awfulness of that which must be done.
Rather than despairing of any possibility of rational discussion with those who say, "it doesn't yield reliable information," I would instead urge them to consider for a moment that such an assertion is simply incorrect. In the very rare instances in which aggressive interrogation should be used, it yields information whose reliability can be readily verified: "Please stop! I'll tell you! The briefcase is in Room 1009 at the Holiday Inn!" We then go to Room 1009 and look for the briefcase. If we do not find it, we reluctantly resume the procedure. Mr. Clinton's director of national intelligence, Mr. Tenet, attests that this is so. Against his evidence is arrayed--well, what, exactly?
I am no more a "torture advocate" than Messrs. Schumer, Dershowitz and Clinton--indeed, I can draw no distinction between their position and mine on the issue at hand. If my critics here are honest and straightforward, they will vilify those three gentlemen with the same impotent rage they have sought to direct at me. But I will not hold my breath waiting for them to do so.
If anyone should construe anything I have said as defending what took place at Abu Ghraib, I would urge him to pay closer attention. Those depredations (not actually much worse than pledge week at Alpha Tau Delta) were criminal acts committed by a sadistic reservist and his very pliant crew. He and they were court-martialed and punished. Nothing that they did was done for any purpose other than their own amusement. None of them contmeplated obtaining actionable intelligence or saving innocent life. They have been properly shamed and punished.
We will always have with us those who can't distinguish between the mindless sadists of Abu Ghraib and the professionals who saved lives by making life very unpleasant for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Those who cannot make that distinction seem to congregate right here, though their numbers are happily few.
While fuzzy-cheeked lawyers and corpulent Senators parse words and bloviate, responsible men will get on with the unpleasant task at hand. Safe, legal and rare!
Causing the brain to be restructured so that the individual suffers from a lifetime of fears, nightmares, etc, is physical damage. End of story.
If there are psychiatric interventions that can reliably undo this damage, I haven't heard of them.
Frankly, Mr. Arnold, most people couldn't care less whether the brains of the three people who are known to have been waterboarded have been restructured in the fanciful manner you suggest. If that restructuring was undertaken with even a remote possibility that it could save the lives of innumerable innocents, it would require a strange sensibility indeed to contend that it should not have been done. And if there are no "psychiatric interventions" that can undo this damage, I am quite sure that for the right price one will soon be offered.
"A lifetime of fears, nightmares, etc.?" Goodness gracious! Heaven forbid that we should inflict such a fate on someone like Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Oh, the humanity!
You've been watching too much 24, Neutral. KSM's confessions weren't worth the paper they were written on. Several aspects were demonstrably false. You could have thrown in the Lindberg kidnapping and he would have confessed to that too. More importantly, you could have got the real confessions without the torture. You seem fixated on the highly unlikely paradigm that a mass terrorist attack might be averted by the use of torture. We could have saved a million Iraqi deaths by water boarding Bush into admitting there were no WMDs. What say you? No? You want to reserve torture for State-designated terrorists like Jose Padilla or Ali al-Marri. Now that we've designated as terrorists the 400,000 members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard we could torture them I suppose. Are you up for it? We're going to need a lot of hoses and face cloths. Seriously, your views are morally repugnant and intellectually bankrupt. Civilized society has made a decision quite some time ago that torture is neither socially necessary nor morally desirable.
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