#disabling torture

[scripttorture]

Hello! I'm not sure if this qualifies as torture, but I was wondering what the effects of having one's eyes pierced with a sewing needle would be—would this result in permanent blindness, or is it possible that the victim would still be able to retain some eyesight? Thank you! (Sorry if this is a weird question)

Huh. Well I know that in historical India something similar to this was used to blind people. However a heated needle was used and I don’t know how much the resulting blindness was due to the needle itself and how much it was due to the heat.

 Heat would cause more damage to the surrounding tissue, basically cooking most of the area around it. It would also sterilise the needle and make infection a little less likely.

 But straight up puncturing the eyeball is… OK so I am going to guess that most of my audience has not dissected an eyeball or seen one eaten. (Yes people eat sheep’s eyes in Saudi, you can get them in cans. No I have not actually eaten them myself, they’re a delicacy.)

 When you cut a raw eye (depending on how you do it, and if you get behind the lens which is doable) it deflates. The fluid that keeps the structure of the eye flows out, the whole thing collapses. This would not just lead to blindness but problems with the eye socket itself collapsing over time (this is why inserted glass eyes were a thing.) There’s also significant infection risk because you basically have dead tissue stuck inside the eye socket.

 I think (not a medic remember) that what the Indian method did was basically cook the cornea and this caused blindness.

 A needle could be used to cause enough damage to the cornea to blind someone. Theoretically.

 The brain is very good at filling in gaps when there’s small flaws in our vision. We see this with retinal damage and with several different eye diseases. With several different types of eye damage/disease there’s a period where the person won’t notice much change in their vision… and then it suddenly plummets.

 That was actually my own experience, my vision seemed ‘normal’ to me for at least a couple of days after the damage was done. Then one day I couldn’t see the blackboard at school.

 So where am I going with this? A single small puncture in the cornea specifically probably would not result in vision problems bad enough to be blind. Though they might still result in worse vision.

 Multiple punctures on the other hand would probably blind someone.

 Here’s the thing: blind usually doesn’t mean no vision. It rarely means complete blackness.

 In most places blindness is defined at a specific level of poor eyesight that can not be corrected. My vision can be corrected with glasses, but without glasses my vision is bad enough to classify as blind. Without glasses I can focus to about 2-3 inches in front of my face. I see colour and light. But I can’t see detail. I couldn’t read. I couldn’t drive. I couldn’t navigate by myself. I couldn’t recognise people I knew in the street. However I wouldn’t walk into walls.

 The damage in you scenario would be permanent. You’re talking about, at worst, destroying the eyeball and, at best, scarring the cornea. But blindness isn’t an all or nothing thing. There’s a spectrum to it. Vision can be poor enough to be disabling without someone losing their vision entirely.

 On a personal note while I’m glad my vision can be corrected (it makes life a lot easier) the world I see without my glasses is still beautiful. The play of light and shadow changes. Colour pops out in a way it doesn’t when I can focus. I can’t see the icelandic poppies in the garden as flowers, but I see these floating motes of vivid orange in a sea of green. I can’t see the rose bush against the wall, but I see these little balls of bright, bright green floating against the brick.

 So I’d suggest thinking about what changes to vision will mean for the character and story. Think about the variety within blindness. And choose where to go from there.

 I hope that helps. :)

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[scripttorture]

I've googled around and gone through this blog a bit looking for something that could help, but either I missed it or- I need to ask it myself :'D I understand most of the effects of sensory deprivation(complete deprivation, in this case, no sound, sight, feeling, ect), but what would the immediate effects be like after just being released from said deprivation? Would there be outbursts towards anyone trying to help/touch them, extreme sensitivity to sound or light, ect? Thank you in advance you're doing a great job with this blog <3

So I think part of the reason you’re struggling to find any information is a combination of academic paywalls and the dubious recording of results for some of these experiments.

 My understanding is that there are several data sets for sensory deprivation but the sources I have access to cover three: Hebb’s experiments with volunteers in a ‘Baldwin’s box’ set up, Cameron’s abuse of around 100 mental health patients using similar set up and Lilly’s experiments using volunteers in a tank. Cameron’s notes are only really ‘helpful’ for demonstrating that sensory deprivation quickly and thoroughly fucks up the human brain. They establish a timeframe where permanent damage is likely and show what that damage is likely to look like.

 You can read about that in the masterpost here.

 It is worth stressing that consent and being able to stop something make a huge difference to our experience of it. It can, quite literally, change the amount of pain we feel. Experiments with sensory deprivation and solitary confinement both confirm that volunteering for something harmful increases the length of time we’re ‘comfortable’ subjecting ourselves to it.

 For Hebb’s volunteers the main side effect after around 24 hours was extreme disorientation. They struggled to walk down straight corridors. The sources I have don’t report distress in the volunteers. They also don’t report how long it took for the volunteers to re-orient themselves and recover.

 Based on what is reported I get the impression that the volunteers recovered relatively quickly. I can’t say with certainty whether they did struggle with things like light and noise in that initial period. That information just isn’t recorded in the sources I have. What is recorded is a pretty huge lack of coordination and confusion. There might also be some memory problems surrounding time spent in the ‘box’ (it was actually a small room but the term box seems to have stuck.)

 It’s difficult for me to be sure whether the descriptions from volunteers are memory problems or a result of the hallucinations and confusion sensory deprivation causes. Hell it could be all three.

 There aren’t any reports of aggression or violence in the volunteers. At least not that I could find.

 Volunteers from Lilly’s tank seem to have come out of 2-3 hours in the tank kind of… well high. They may have hallucinated but they generally seemed relaxed. Which might be why the tank was re-purposed as a spa treatment. (For those who wish to manipulate their brains I assume?)

 Volunteers from experiments using Baldwin’s Box do not seem to have experienced the same relaxed state. But there aren’t any reports of high anxiety that I could find.

 You do see reports of aggression and high levels of anxiety in some of the ‘experiments’ that were conducted without the consent of the subjects. For instance when Baldwin locked a soldier in one of these boxes and refused to let him out the man kicked his way out of the box and attempted to beat Baldwin. Baldwin’s notes describe the man crying, screaming and begging to be released.

 Cameron also recorded a high degree of distress in the people he was abusing.

 So some of the answer depends on whether we’re talking about a voluntary or abusive scenario. It’s also worth considering that an outburst may not be coherent or coordinated. Which means that it’s unlikely to be effective.

 I am struggling a little here because what you’re asking isn’t really something that’s covered by the dataset. I think it’s plausible. But I also think it’s worth taking a moment to consider the character.

 They’re going to be disorientated, confused and distressed. They’ve probably hallucinated. Their memory might not be trustworthy.

 Do outbursts fit with the character in this state? Does it make sense with the interaction these characters have had previously?

 Is this rescuer/helper someone the victim character has known for a long time and cares about or are they a relatively new acquaintance? What’s the level of trust here and does it come with expectations like ‘why didn’t you save me sooner’?

 Because without clear evidence to fall back on those are good narrative things to base the character’s response on.

 Sensitivity to light and sound would make logical sense. But based on the accounts I think this is more likely to feed in to the disorientation and look like disorientation rather then sensory overload. Less ‘light and sound hurt’ and more ‘I can not interpret this light and noise as things I recognise and speech’.

 I can’t be sure of that though. There’s a real lack of survivors accounts here. Most of what I’ve read is someone else’s impressions or observations of people who were in sensory deprivation (whether it was an abusive scenario or not.)

 That can be helpful. An outside perspective is useful when we’re talking about things that mess with memory and the brain. But there’s a limited amount outside perspectives can tell us about the lived experience. Survivors might have a very different take on this observed disorientation. They might have different ideas about sensitivity to sensory input too.

 I put a lot of emphasis on realism because I think it’s important to know when we’re breaking with reality and to consider what those breaks with reality imply. I think that we need to be more mindful and considerate of real survivors when we write about violence.

 I don’t think we should ignore the fact that most people get their information on torture from fiction rather then the increasing body of scientific studies. Especially when fiction usually falls back on tropes that are not only wrong but wrong in ways that tacitly support torture.

 But I’m the first person to admit that we need more data about a lot of this stuff. There are some questions we honestly don’t know the answers to yet.

 I don’t think we can blame anyone for using the best information they had at the time and making a reasonable guess at the rest. Even if that guess turns out to be wrong.

 So take the information you have, look up some of the sources in the Sensory Deprivation masterpost if you can. Then try to build something that is a reasonable extrapolation based on what you’ve read and fits with the characters you’ve created.

 I hope this helps :)

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[scripttorture]

Going off what you said in that one ask, where a character being strung up by their wrists can cause nerve damage and pain throughout their arms, can it also cause damage to the shoulders?

Yes and after talking to a remedial massage therapist (they described it as ‘slightly below a physiotherapist in terms of qualifications) a few months back I realised that I’ve actually been underestimating the damage to shoulders in my answers.

 I think there’s a lot of focus on nerve damage in my sources because it’s irreparable. Whereas theoretically most of the muscular and tendon damage suspension causes can be treated and people can see significant improvement.

 However once you factor in the poverty of most torture survivors and the length of time it can take to see a doctor- Well the fact an injury is theoretically treatable becomes less relevant.

 There are also several different methods of suspension by the wrists, some of which cause more injuries.

 I’m guessing you’re referring to a scenario where the character’s hands are tied in front of them and they’re hoisted off the floor. That’s the scenario I write about most of the time.

 However historically it was also pretty common to tie the victim’s hands behind the back (which dislocates the shoulders). This was also sometimes modified by repeatedly raising and dropping the victim. Which did further damage to the shoulders and could also cause broken bones in the legs.

 There’s also a method that I’ve only seen referenced in historical Japan so far (which may be due to the fact I can’t read Chinese) which involved tying victims by their fingers. This resulted in the slow dislocation of every joint in the fingers.

 Going with the scenario where the hands are tied in front of the character this can lead to really reduced mobility in the shoulder. Partly due to chronic pain and partly due to damage to the soft tissues around the joint.

 The nerve damage can cause some interesting effects. Numbness and tingling sensations are common in people with ‘normal’ shoulder injuries, I haven’t seen reports of torture survivors discussing this but that might represent a lack of reporting rather then a lack of symptoms. It can also cause pain but interestingly the pain isn’t always at the site of the injury. It can be felt further down the nerve pathway. So a character might have a shoulder related nerve injury but feel pain further down their arm.

 Posture and mobility responses to this chronic pain can actually make the damage worse if an injury is untreated in the long term. A character that’s hunching over a lot to try and relieve pain in their shoulders might actually be putting more pressure on the site of the injury, increasing their pain in the long term (ie months to years). Or they might be creating a situation where some of their muscles become relatively overdeveloped and other underdeveloped, which would then feed into decreased mobility in the shoulder.

 My impression is that reduced shoulder mobility may not be as noticeable as reduced mobility in the hands. People seem to automatically adjust how they perform basic tasks in order to compensate for reduced mobility in the shoulders. This can cause the same kind of unusual muscle use I described above and that can lead to pain in different areas, like the neck.

 Taking a step back I think the best way to think about shoulder injuries is to consider the character’s general health, how long and often they were suspended in the story and their access to medical care afterwards.

 The impression I got from my conversation with the (extremely helpful, thank you) remedial massage therapist was that most of the shoulder injuries a suspension victim would get are treatable and there can be significant improvement. Both in terms of pain and mobility.

 But the extent of that improvement depends on early access to medical care after the injury.

 A character who is regularly suspended while they’re held, or suspended for a prolonged period (ie over 15 minutes) is going to have a more severe initial injury. An older character (50s onward) is also likely to have a more severe initial injury.

 And the longer a character goes without having that initial shoulder injury assessed and treated, the worse the damage is likely to get. The way the character compensates for their shoulder injury over a long period of time will also cause problems, ranging from pain to further reduction in movement.

 So a character who is suspended and also imprisoned for a year without treatment will be in a worse position then a character who is rescued after a week and taken straight to a doctor.

 Now I don’t think I’m qualified to describe the kind of care a character would need for these shoulder injuries in detail. I know that they often involve extensive physiotherapy, lifestyle adjustments and sometimes surgery.

 If you want a more detailed breakdown of treatments I’d suggest looking up muscular tears. These come in three grades with 1 being the least severe and 3 the most.

 I hope that helps :)

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[scripttorture]

Hi! So I have a character who is beaten with a belt for refusing to hit another captive with it. He’s struck many times with the metal end, mostly on the back/sides but a few hits land on his head/face. How much physical damage would this cause? Could it be life threatening? Thanks for your help!

Potentially yes it could be life threatening but I think there’d still be a decent chance of survival.

 Any strong blow to the head has the potential to be fatal. At the same time plenty of people get hit over the head and survive without serious physical consequences.

 So long as it’s only one or two strikes to the head I think it’s still within the realm where you can decide you want the character to live. It’s also within the realm where you can decide you want them to live without brain damage.

 Attacks like this are uncontrolled, part of what that means is that there are a lot of possible injuries but not everyone attacked in this way would get all of those injuries.

 I don’t see anything wrong with deciding that a character in this sort of situation gets lucky. There isn’t anything wrong with saying ‘injury wise this could have been a lot worse’.

 The problem comes when we suggest that serious assaults are harmless, and do so in an environment where most people will believe this is true.

 Possible injuries from one or two blows to the head and face with a metal belt buckle include:

Traumatic brain injury

Skull fractures

Blinding

Broken eye socket (I may not be using the correct terminology here; the bones around the eye ball)

Broken nose

Fractured or broken jaw

Damage to the external part of the ear

Damage to the teeth

Lacerations of the skin

 To be clear, I would not expect all of these from two blows. The aim is to present you with possibilities and let you decide where you want this character to be hit/injured. With the scenario you’ve outlined (and the limit on blows to the head) blinding is more likely to be in one eye then both.

 Both the broken nose and jaw could be a lot more dangerous in this scenario then they appear. A broken nose left untreated could interfere with someone’s ability to breathe. A broken or fractures jaw could limit someone’s ability to eat. And these things are major problems when a character is unlikely to receive any medical care.

 Again this could be survivable but a certain amount of it is down to luck.

 Injuries from beating to the back and sides are less likely to cause death straight away, but some of them could still be deadly over days/weeks.

 Lacerations and bruising are pretty much inevitable. Multiple broken and fractured ribs are extremely likely and there’s a real possibility of a rib detaching and causing Problems. Like uh puncturing a lung or something.

 Kidney failure is also a potential, life threatening, problem. Both from direct injuries as you’d see in boxing, and from the accumulated damage of the beating itself. (This is often the ultimate cause of death when someone is beaten: kidney failure.)

 I think vertebra could also be cracked/fractured but that seems to be much rarer.

 If the character is mobile enough then defensive injuries are also likely. These are injuries to the arms and legs that happen when the victim tries to protect more vulnerable areas of the body.

 Again, lacerations and bruising. Fractured or broken arm is possible but I think a broken leg is unlikely. Broken fingers are quite likely, especially if the character is able to raise his hands to try and protect his face.

 I think the main thing here is to tailor the description of the attack to the kinds of injuries you want the character to have. For instance if it’s important later that he has full mobility in both hands then it makes sense for his arms to be restrained during the attack, so he can’t protect his head with them.

 If you’re going to mention a definite number of strikes I’d suggest keeping it well below 20 (below 12 if you don’t want the character half-dead). There aren’t definitive statistics for me to draw from but based on what I know about whipping- basically this scenario would do quite a bit of damage quickly and the more the character is hit the more likely one of those blows causes a life threatening injury.

 You have a lot of scope to decide what the exact injury pattern looks like here. It would include cuts, bruises and broken bones but where those are and what other injuries are present can vary widely.

 There is a lot of damage inherent in this scenario and it could be life threatening very easily. Don’t shy away from making that clear but don’t be afraid about making your character lucky either.

 One blow to the head can be fatal. But there are also people who’ve survived several strong blows to the head and made full recoveries.

 I hope that helps. :)

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