Punk / Counterpunk

Should the Beatings Continue?

From the Office of the Protectorate

April 5, 2006
Re: The Question

My esteemed colleagues, as you are well aware, we are at war. A cabal of shadowy and unknown enemies is afoot. We know not their name, ranks, and serial number, but we know this: they are out to destroy us, with a tenacity and single-mindedness that we must be willing to match if we are to win. For rest assured, we are at war with an enemy that will destroy our way of life, and the gloves are now off. 

Freedom cannot march shackled by high ideals. We must be philosophically flexible in our pursuit of efficient information-gathering techniques. Some of you, the more squeamish junior members, have felt pangs of moral unease at our coercive interrogation techniques. I've read Voltaire, too; I understand your concerns.

However, they are groundless. The beatings continue as long as they must, for we are in the midst of an epic battle whose outcome is known only to History. Persevere. After all, continual appeals to the judgment of History mean never having to say you're sorry.

Also included are directions to this month's Liberty Mixer with Kappa Kappa Gamma, the theme of which is "20,000 Leagues Under The O.C." I hope you all bought your party hats, and that we won't have a repeat of last month's copier incident.

[Paragraph Redacted]

As we walk down that destined road, the future's so bright, gentlemen, that I have appropriated funds for adequate eye protection.

Yours in Freedom,

[First Name Redacted] Wyrmwood, [Title Redacted]
Senior Officer for Coercive Interrogation Techniques
Vice President, Party Planning Committee

From the Beaten

After several hours I no longer recognized the sound of my own screams. After several days of sleep deprivation, night and day blurred to perpetual gray.

On the first night I was led into a small, bare cell. I was stripped naked. My arms were handcuffed to opposite ends of a long metal bunk bed; I was bent over the top bunk. They pulled a pair of women's underwear over my face, whispering, "We have so many new things to teach you."

I remember a point about a year into my "stay" -- I was hauled out of my cell, hooded as usual, and one of the men grabbed me by my hair. I remember how quiet they were -- it was the first time they didn't shout obscenities at me. It was their silence that frightened me more than anything. Me, who'd withstood the electrical shocks and the "liberation" of my fingernails, and here I was remembering fear. I heard the sound of running water, and with a quick motion my hood was removed and my head plunged into icy water. I had no time to breathe. The water numbed my face. Then they pulled my head back out again. I choked and spluttered. Back into the water. This went on for almost an hour, until I blacked out. What I remember most is their silence.

They stripped me of all my clothes, even my underwear. They gave me woman's underwear that was rose color with flowers in it, and they put the bag over my face. One of them whispered in my ear, 'Today I am going to fuck you,' and he said this in Arabic. He cuffed my hands with irons behind my back to the metal of the window, to the point my feet were off the ground and I was hanging there for about 5 hours just because I asked about the time, because I wanted to pray. And then they took all my clothes and he took the female underwear and he put it over my head. After he released me from the window, he tied me to my bed until before dawn.

I was beaten with a broom. They broke a chemical light over my back, sodomized me with a police baton.

Then they laid me on a bench, flat on my stomach, head extending into the air, and tied my arms against my body with cords. Again the same question, which I refused to answer. By tilting the bench very slowly, they dipped my head into a basin filled with stinking liquid—dirty water and urine, probably. I was aware of the gurgling liquid reaching my mouth, then of a dull rumbling in my ears and a tingling sensation in my nose.

"Like a dog!"