Sodomized to Protect Our Freedoms

"Yasser tearfully described that when he reached the top of the steps 'the party began. … They started to put the [muzzle] of the rifle [and] the wood from the broom into [my anus]. They entered my privates from behind.' ... Yasser estimated that he was penetrated five or six times during this initial sodomy incident and saw blood 'all over my feet' through a small hole in the hood covering his eyes." – by Physicians for Human Rights' "Broken Laws, Broken Lives," a report containing firsthand accounts of men who endured torture by U.S. personnel in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantánamo Bay.

Waterboarding. It's all we seem to discuss when comes to American torture. Whenever you see people discussing "enhanced interrogation" on your TV, chances are they'll be throwing around the same tired arguments, all revolving around waterboarding.

Why, of all the things we've done to our suspected (and not-so-suspected) terrorist detainees, is waterboarding the issue? Why confine the rapidly dwindling debate to that single technique? We've engaged in a lot of other practices that qualify universally as torture. Are sleep deprivation or "Palestinian hanging" not controversial enough? Is solitary confinement too mundane?

How about sodomy? Is that something we consider unremarkable?

"This is highly consistent with the events Amir described, including a traumatic injury and subsequent scarring process. Examination of the perianal area showed signs of rectal tearing that are highly consistent with his report of having been sodomized with a broomstick."
-- "Broken Laws, Broken Lives"

That's right; sodomy. Forcible anal penetration. The documentation of this and other forms of sexual humiliation is too extensive to be denied or pawned off on a couple of redneck privates. And we know now that sexual humiliation techniques were among those discussed and approved by the National Security Principals Committee, a White House group including Dick Cheney, Condoleezza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, George Tenet and John "History will not judge this kindly" Ashcroft.

I don't want to come off as minimizing the horror of controlled drowning. It's just that there's something about anal rape that brings the torture issue into sharp focus.

Just once, I'd like to hear one of these American Enterprise Institute psychos, the ones that always trot out to defend the neocons' freakish obsessions, have to defend shoving a flashlight up a guy's ass. I want to hear Frank Gaffney or Jonah Goldberg tell me why I shouldn't be fucking mortified that raping prisoners was considered within tolerable interrogation practices by my country. I want Glenn Beck to justify butt-raping a suspect.

The next time I hear some idiot refer to Jack Bauer in defense of torture, I want to ask him what he thinks of Jack Bauer rogering terrorists with a broomstick. You've never seen that in the hours of not-so-subtle pro-torture TV drama we've seen since 2001, have you? Never saw Andy Sipowicz cornhole a skell on NYPD Blue? Or Michael Chiklis on The Shield making a suspect drink his pee? Me neither. Something tells me that might have hurt their ratings.

More from "Broken Laws, Broken Lives":

"He also recalled having been forced to wear soiled underwear, often for weeks or months at a time. 'I had diarrhea and I was in handcuffs. I was making my toilet in my underwear, and I was very dirty. That was very painful.' ... When he asked to see the doctor, he was told 'we brought a medicine to you.'

Laith explains that, in fact, 'They brought to me bottles [of] urine and [they] told me if you do not drink these now, we will bring your mother and sisters. Because I was hearing the voices of women and children, I [believed him and] drank it. I was in handcuffs, and they poured the urine [into my mouth], and sometimes I vomited from that, but when I vomited they kept on pouring [the urine] on my head … I died at that time.' He said that he was forced to drink urine from the soldiers on 11 different occasions." 

The key to winning the debate on torture is to eradicate any illusions about just what this was, which is sick, twisted and freakish beyond any usefulness in gathering information. And it becomes very clear in the light of a rectally inserted lightstick.