Loves and stratagems

apolesens-otheraccount asked: There is a Star Trek episode (Deep Space Nine, s3e21) where it is described how one character, who used to work for the secret police of a totalitarian government, "got a confession" out of a dissident. " You just sat there [- - -] And after four hours of watching you stare at him, he confessed.[- - -] Afterwards, he just kept saying, 'His eyes his eyes.'" (There is a one-minute clip of the scene on youtube entitled “DS9 3x21 - The Die is Cast - The Good Old Times”.) 1/3

scripttorture:

Considering other things we see of this culture, it seems likely the victim is restrained and he might well have been beaten or otherwise tortured before the staring described above. Furthermore, there are implications elsewhere that the torturer and the dissident knew each other, possibly very well, before these events. 2/3 I’d be interested to hear your take on this, its plausibility and anything that might ‘salvage’ it if it seems very unrealistic. How common is the use of intimidation tactics such as long stretches of silence? What is known of the difference between being tortured by a stranger and by someone you know and possibly trusted? P.S. Thank you for this excellent blog! 3/3

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You know I think I’ve seen part of this episode.

From what I can remember there’s a heavy implication throughout that the torturer-character is an unreliable narrator. Part of that seemed (to me at least) explicitly tied to his role as a torturer.

And well, that is realistic. Torturers are often incredibly unreliable sources when it comes to both the effectiveness of torture and what they actually did or why something they did was harmful.

What this reminds me of is the way American torturers described using heavy metal or other Western music against non-Western prisoners. They seemed to consistently put the distress down to the form of music that was being repeatedly played. Rather than the fact it was constant and at top volume, preventing the prisoners from sleeping.

Silence can encourage people to speak but it doesn’t necessarily encourage them towards confessing or speaking about anything relevant. And I don’t think staring at someone would have this effect. It’s the ‘HIS EYES!’ that underlines the disconnect from reality for me, it just seems so melodramatically implausible if staring was genuinely the only factor at play here.

It’s one of those strange depictions that can be read as either very realistic or hugely unrealistic depending on how much weight you give the torturer’s account.

Because this does seem like a realistic thing for a torturer to claim. But it isn’t a realistic thing to happen.

Which is another reason why nuance is so important in these stories. We’re dealing with unreliable narrators throughout. Torturers, survivors and even witnesses are all compromised at a neurological level; their memories are suspect.

And torturers are additionally heavily biased in their accounts. They take credit for things that are beyond their control, don’t mention things that go against their accounts (sometimes they don’t seem to even make the connection between them) and bend over backwards to justify their actions after the fact.

I can give you an idea of the kind of thing that a torturer might report in this way.

A prisoner is brought in. They’re restrained. They might be beaten. And then they’re ‘sweated’.

This is something that used to be common among police forces across quite a few countries. It basically means the victim was tied to a chair with a bright light shining in their eyes and interrogated for a prolonged period of time. Rooms were usually cramped, so the light would make the room unbearably hot. There’s an element of restraint torture, keeping the victim for a long time in one position. There’s sleep deprivation (because this often went on for over 12 hours). There’s dehydration, because the victim usually wasn’t given food or water. And they generally weren’t allowed to go to the bathroom either.

In Russia (and some other countries) they combined this with something Rejali calls ‘relay interrogation’. Which means they basically kept switching the torturers. This meant that the torturers would always be pretty well rested but the victim could be kept awake for literally days at a time.

I’d suggest that was what happened here.

Rather than the victim confessing after ‘four hours’, I’d suggest it was much more likely he’d been brought in 36-48 hours before and consistently deprived of water and sleep.

Over that time frame humans (we shall pretend that aliens work in the same way) become delirious and often start to hallucinate. Which could explain saying something like ‘THE EYES!!!’ It might also explain the ‘confession’ because in this state some victims are disconnected from reality to the point that they don’t really understand they’re confessing.

Torturers are competitive. In a situation like this, with relay interrogation, the first torturer gets absolutely no ‘credit’ for a forced confession that happens five torturers later. All of the ‘credit’, all of the praise, goes to the last person in the room.

Given that there is considerable encouragement for that last torturer to act as though the entire thing was down to them and their unique/unusual tactics.

And as torturers are prone to exactly the same memory problems as survivors, it’s also possible that a torturer in this situation could have genuinely forgotten that that particular prisoner was brought in several days before and had been tortured for that time.

I’ve not heard of the use of silence as a tactic by torturers. Intimidation, yes. But it generally seems to come in the form of threats.

However silence is commonly used as a tactic by people being interrogated. At the very least I know the IRA used this as a consistent organisation wide tactic that members were told to employ if arrested. They would turn their back on the interrogators and remain silent. It’s incredibly disquieting and does prompt some people to talk. I think there’s a link to a more detailed discussion of this in the Effective Investigation masterpost. I’m not sure if the Alisons have written any papers on it: their work tends to focus on tactics for interrogators rather than people who are being interrogated. They’d be a good place to check though.

From what I know, silence could be an effective tactic in genuine interrogation but it would have to be part of a broader strategy. I don’t think it would be effective without the use of other tactics or if it was applied randomly.

It could help to get a person to start talking but it couldn’t replace building up a rapport or the ability to steer a conversation to the topic of interest.

As for the last question- I’m afraid I genuinely have no idea. There really aren’t enough studies on torturers and the studies I am aware of use a very small sample size. Studies with survivors tend to be a lot larger but I’ve never come across a study that talked about survivors and torturers having a prior relationship of any kind.

Anecdotal accounts aren’t much better on this front. I’m aware of cases where survivors and torturers came from the same village or small town. I’m aware of cases where they knew each other as acquaintances prior to the victim being tortured. But none of the cases I’m aware of showed any indication that the relationship was close. It’s- people who knew each others names, passed on the street, perhaps occasionally lent the other person a cup of flour. There’s no indication of anything as close as a working or colleague relationship in the accounts I’ve seen.

The account Fanon records of a torturer’s daughter who came to him for counselling does describe a closer relationship with victims. But that’s a torturer’s family member and victims, rather than the torturer himself.

Because it is, by definition, institutional torture doesn’t seem to involve those sorts of previously strong relationships often.

Now abuse definitely does and I suspect that if a prior strong relationship makes a difference then you could find that difference by comparing survivors of abuse with survivors of torture.  Which is a doctoral thesis I’d very much like to see funded but it’s rather beyond the scope of the blog.

In this case I don’t think I’d advise going through anecdotal accounts and trying to make the comparison yourself. In order for something like that to be significant you’ve got to control for a lot of factors, which might not be reported in anecdotal accounts and you need to go through a lot of accounts. I think it would be very easy to leap to an incorrect conclusion, especially when you don’t have direct access to the survivors themselves and can’t ask them.

For the purposes of the story I’d suggest assuming that there isn’t a symptomatic difference. Assume the symptoms would be the same whether the relationship with the torturer was close before or not.

But add to that particular issues around relationships and trust.

These can show up as a normal part of the mental illnesses torture causes but they don’t always. I think tying this kind of… element of self-isolation and difficulty around personal interaction to the character would add to a story with this kind of relationship.

Accounts from survivors of abuse (especially spousal or familial abuse) can give you an idea how these sorts of difficulties with trust and relationships manifest. I’d suggest asking @scripttraumasurvivors for a source recommendation there though, it’s outside of my area.

I hope that helps. :)

Disclaimer

(I am ourfinaldecember - this is the blog I actually use.) 

Thank you! This is very interesting and raises some interesting prospects. 

I should specify that the person recounting the story isn’t the torturer himself but his boss, but it seems like he is about as reliable as the torturer. I think it’s to this episode’s credit that even in this conversation where the boss describes the torturer as ‘having a gift’ and ‘relishing a good interrogation’, when he starts talking about the case above, the torturer gets a look of horror on his face. It’s pretty clear that he doesn’t really relish it, but finds it difficult to think about. 

What I think happens is that the torturer character is the last person in a relay interrogation situation, and that that particular ‘session’ went on for four hours (although it’s worth mentioning that the two characters can’t quite remember if it is three or four hours).  

You make an excellent point about the difference between reality and how people talk about these matters. I think the thing with ‘his eyes, his eyes’ is supposed to indicate that the victim is so mentally affected by the experience that it’s all he can think about, but I’ve never bought it as factually true. I don’t trust the speaker as far as I can throw him, and I doubt I’d manage to throw him at all. 

caancennau:

idea: kelas becoming super broody once they and elim are settled. kelas doesn’t mention it - they’re way to old to be able to produce viable eggs - but elim starts noticing weird little things like

• nesting behaviours - their bed has become a mound of pillows and duvets since it started
• tactility - kelas is much more touchy and tactile, and is definitely down for cuddling as often as possible
• sex drive - kelas’ sex drive goes through the roof, and garak loves every minute of it
• cuddling - kelas is much more insistent on being the big spoon, and wants something in their arms to sleep. on days elim can’t be the little spoon, they have a stuffed toy to cuddle instead
• danger sense - kelas is much more sensitive to danger, and is generally much more nervy in certain places. elim in response is much more protective of them, and will challenge anything that makes them nervous
• looks - the hormones the broodiness is encouraging also encourages kelas’ body to display in certain ways. kelas’ scales flush far easier, their hair and neckridges puff out, and phermones make their scent marginally stronger. elim is v appreciative of these changes

(via caancennau-deactivated20181229)

jimkerk:

jimkerk:

just saw somebody refer to garak as elim enabrovich…. power move

#garak in the wire referring to the sons of tain as ‘the brothers enabranov’ (via @coranum)

….. your mind