On Wednesday evening, we had a difficult yet thoughtful discussion with Nick Cheesman and an activist Pornpen Khongkachonkiet about torture in Southeast Asia. We talked about a lawyer being kidnapped and tortured for his work defending insurgents, the effectiveness of torture (and why this question is entrenched in assumptions), and how torture can be a performative aspect of the state.

In thinking about the ways in which torture is portrayed in film, in television, and more generally in media it is always portrayed as a means to an end and a success. When I think of portrayals, I think there is a ubiquitous assumption that the person subjected to brutality is always guilty of something, that the pursuit of this person is for the purpose of some grander purpose, and that people will be saved in an impactful way that justifies the use of extrajudicial force. In pondering such a difficult topic, I wondered about the assertion that torture is used in identity construction of the state and as a way to impose and perform political power. People often forget that corporeal violence, especially from the state, is a controlling mechanism. If we agree with this analysis, it follows then that the reproduction of this imagery has the purpose of communicating a very particular message.

I wonder how this analysis of torture relates to the carceral state that we live in. How are we reproducing messages that people in prison deserve horrific treatment with proven lasting debilitating and traumatic effects like solitary confinement? How do we distance ourselves from individuals deemed criminals? How do we pathologize criminal acts and ignore the broader societal processes that may encourage these things? Lastly, how does the carceral setting factor into the building of the identity of the state. After all, we do know that people of color are disproportionately locked up and thus their status as “citizens” is diminished.