Q: Is talking about and/or seeing torture difficult for you? Is it too extreme like me or are you interested as well as disturbed?
The sad reality of American today is that torture has become a norm in our society. As a result, I have become somewhat immune to the entire topic of torture, especially today's form of it. Somehow it is a lot easier to discuss waterboarding then forms of medieval torture such as impalement and coffin torture (If anyone is interested in medieval torture here's a cool website that discusses the different types of torture devices used in the Middle Ages: Torture).
I can remember when I first saw the photos taken at Abu Ghraib. I felt a sense of disconnect between the images and what I should have been feeling. In my head, I knew what I was seeing was appalling and heinous but I felt absolutely nothing. On the other end, when I read 1984 and Winston was tortured in room 101, I had a hard time stomaching through the chapter. I guess that some of the reason I felt more for Winston was that I had formed a connection with him through reading the novel, and I instinctively wanted him to beat Big Brother. The victims of Abu Ghraib on the other hand were nameless faceless individuals. I had no emotional investment in them. Later on, when I watched a documentary of Abu Ghraib during my senior year in high school, I cried when I saw the same photos I had seen six years prior. This was because the documentary had given the nameless faceless individuals identities; the documentary portrayed them as human beings.
Q: Why do you think so many Americans still support the use of torture, especially after incidents such as Abu Ghraib have been made public?
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