What was fiction in zero dark thirty

It belongs to a genre of entertainment that glorifies torture as an effective means to bring perpetrators to justice. It does this in an untruthful way that neglects the complex moral, legal and pragmatic issues that motivated our government to implement torture to achieve its military and diplomatic goals. As a country that cherishes and strives to uphold individual freedoms and inherent human dignity and worth, how can we justify torture as a defense of democracy?

This report is the result of an extensive, three-year investigation examining more than a million pages of documents detailing interrogations of detainees in CIA custody. It is time for the Senate Intelligence Committee to release its report to the public, which will shed light on the misconceptions about torture that fester in an atmosphere of secrecy.

People have the right to know if their government is or has tortured people on their behalf. Intelligence experts have repeatedly stated that torture is counterproductive. Interrogators have themselves admitted that non-coercive, traditional, rapport-based interviewing approaches provide the best possibility for obtaining accurate and complete intelligence.

Torture is also illegal under the U. Convention Against Torture, which the United States signed in It induces long-term suffering that leaves bodies and minds broken. Torture is usually low-tech. Beatings are one of the most common forms of torture. But clinicians treating torture survivors increasingly see sophisticated form of psychological torture that leave survivors suffering from emotional trauma for years. Waterboarding is a method of torture that goes beyond the fear of suffocation.

It is tantamount to a mock execution that can result in the survivor suffering psychological trauma for years. Mock executions leave survivors feeling they were already dead. Tragically, they often relive these near-death experiences in their nightmare or flashbacks.

Sexual humiliation has devastating mental-health consequences. These forms of abuse, as well as stress positions, isolation, sleep deprivation, and others also are frequently used in combination to increase the severity of the physical and psychological pain. The report is now going through a declassification process at the CIA. Only when the facts are known can we understand what went wrong and what must be done to prevent the use of torture again in the future.

Abusive interrogation methods used and once authorized as U. Curt Goering is the executive director of the Center for Victims of Torture , an international nongovernmental organization based in St.