Resisting Torture/Interrogation

==Torture==

'''Why'''

It is done out of sadism and is not a legitimate means of extracting information. It is counterproductive to intelligence aims. It creates a traumatized individual (or a dead corpse or cripple when taken too far).

'''Quick Methods'''

Targeting the hands, fingers, feet, toes, stomach, teeth, (all places with high concentrations of nerves) is an easy way to inflict lots of pain very quickly. Hyper-extending the joints also is a good way to produce sharp, strong pains, but with the ability to release the pressure and let them talk. Good for situation where you to try using pain to get someone to talk fast and don't have time, set-up, equipment, etc. for anything more elaborate. Fucking with the teeth is not advised as the pain won't stop after you damage their teeth, it'll keep going for hours or days.

'''Mutilation'''

Concerning mutilation it is extremely demoralizing and makes the target a useless burden in many cases. Removing fingers, genitals, eyes, etc. or even the reasonable threat of it can strike very intense fear into someone. Poking out an eye and then threatening to take out the other and thus taking their sight away might be an example of a way to use the terror of mutilation effectively. Counterproductive to propaganda and makes people really hate your organization.

'''Most Effective Method'''

Sleep deprivation. There's a lot of ways to torture people and sleep deprivation might not have the shock factor of the more BDSM-like torture but it's actually devastating to a target. It breaks down their judgement, undermines their morals, can break even ideologically motivated targets, makes them careless, makes them forget what they are fighting and resisting for, makes them give up. To the extent that torture is effective at all this particular method is your best chance to break your target and make them give into your demands.

'''Desensitization'''

Humiliation or the threat thereof really only has a chance to work once and only on someone who hasn't been badly embarrassed already. After you've already degraded and humiliated them their sense of self-worth is gone and they don't really care what more you do to them. Most torture methods can all be resisted simply through familiarity, they are scariest the first time if you aren't prepared and don't know what to expect, once you've been through it already it's easier to go through it again.

'''Ineffective Methods'''

Waterboarding is completely ineffective. It makes the target high because they suffocate and have oxygen cut off for a bit. Maybe if the target has a specific phobia of drowning this might make sense to use on them but you might just cure their phobia and get them high. Starvation also only hurts for like one day and then after you get over that little part where it sucks you feel perfectly fine even though you aren't eating. Actually feeding your prisoner a little every day will help them feel hungerpains all the time and intentionally starving yourself is a method to resist this.

'''Resisting Torture'''

1. Know from the start they're going to do the worst to you so you don't waste time hoping they won't.
2. They're going to make your fears come alive, have no hope, do not bargain.
3. Sanity is not your friend when being tortured. Try to go crazy, hallucinate, disassociate, and become a raving lunatic who they can't exact reliable information from and who isn't aware what is even happening to him. Makes everything they do ineffective.
4. Don't try to understand them. Don't identify with them. Don't try to figure out why they are doing it, don't let it matter to you at all. Just sate yourself with this answer if you need one; they are doing it out of sadism.
5. Don't hope for or think about escape or freedom. Feel the pain but don't identify with it, observe the body but don't hope to save it, enter a zen state of mind. (If option 3 doesn't work then this will)
6. Embrace it. Don't thank your torture for anything, don't expect any rest or leniency, don't care if they are treating you better than someone else. Defy them and tempt them to keep going until you're dead. It doesn't matter to you.
7. Don't play their mindgames. Don't reason with them, don't think about their arguments, just disregard everything they say.
8. Using the imagination to vividly go through possible torture, dismemberment, etc. scenarios beforehand can desensitize you when they actually do happen to you are unable to really give a shit.

'''Information Extraction'''

It is usually better to give people the VIP treatment and to gain their trust or spy on them or use trance techniques to get information out of them. Creating a psychological profile of a target by observing them beforehand will help you identify their vulnerabilities and weaknesses to come up with an appropriate strategy to make them submit to your demands. Torture is not effective at getting information out of people. Torture just fulfills people's sadism.