Torture, sensory deprivation and the waiver game.

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I read this report today on the fate of an alleged KGB mole in the 1960s in America who was held in utter isolation for three years or so, because his handlers suspected him to be a triple agent.

The case shows some eerie parallels to the treatment of today's terrorists. My first thought was that when the stakes are perceived to be high enough, there will always and inevitably be people willing to go to extremes.

But to address the issue in a loosely structured way, three points:

• Sensory deprivation, confinement in isolation - is it torture? In my view it clearly is, which is strongly suggested by that treatment 'reducing humans to a state of docile animals'. This will be topic of the poll.
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• If it is ok to reduce them to the state of docile animals, drive people insane for all practical purposes, why not just pull their fingernails out, waterboard them?
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• Then there is the issue of waivers. As far as I understand them, they are conditon for the release. Now that makes for a great situation - they hold you unlawfully, probably tortured you, found nothing against you so they decided after a long deliberation process that they will set you free because you appear to pose no threat and never have, but make signing of a waiver conditional to your release (and in best case, to some form of compensation). What strikes me is that the whole thing is imposed, and I find it obscene to argue that these waivers, after all they are signed voluntarily, preclude lawsuits or later claims. The people don't have a choice, unlike in usual contracting. Who, after that treatment is still in his right mind, would refuse such an offer?

Discuss.

 

Waivers are so invalid on so many grounds. Immorality, duress, what have you. People will sign anything to leave and since their detention is unlawful, which the authorities know and the alternative to signing - i.e. prolonged unlawful imprisonment is illegal and in fact at that point probably criminal, it's extortion. It's not any more valid than a milion dollar payment to a kidnapper.

As for the kinds of torture you describe, they are... err... torture? Basically, intentionally inflicted suffering, which is an end unto itself in the shorter run and a result in the form of breaking the subject's will in the long run, is torture. Imprisonment for a crime, detention in order to prevent criminal activity, wartime detention to prevent rejoining with enemy troups, that's not torture. Some proportionate penalties for escape attempts or other infractions of prison discipline, are not torture. That's because the suffering either isn't directly intended for itself but rather a side-effect, or it has some purpose and some cause (a little bit, or perhaps a semblance of legitimacy). Softening the prisoner or detainee with suffering directly intended for itself and serving to break his will, is a whole different thing.

We may argue if it's ever justifiable, but we can't really argue whether it's torture. It clearly is.

 

I 'd like to point out that even if the detention itself is lawful, but the treatment is not, it's still extortion, and covering up for something they pretty obviously don't want to see exposed to broad daylight or discussed in court.

I find it remarkable that two, no, three voters thought it does not constitute torture. Why? What are the arguments for that? They could be interesting.

 

I didn't vote, because I'm not completely clear after reading the article exactly what the techniques you refer to entail.

Confinement in isolation seems pretty straight forward - you are held in a cell without contact with other prisoners. Presumably you see a guard every once and a while to give you food.

However, I'm not sure what sensory deprivation means. The only reference I saw in the article was a concrete cell with no windows, which to my knowledge doesn't make it that much different than a typical maximum security prison cell (they also are typically windowless). I'm sure that it's worse than that, but without a more detailed explanation, I can't say either way.

 

From Wiki:

From the article:

and as for the effects and purposes: