In class on thursday and then thursday night Dr. Reiss talked about sleep. It got me thinking on how sleep can be used as a way to control people. There have been different methods by which people or groups could do this. One of the ways sleep could be used to get what you want is through the method of sleep depravation.
Some government agencies use sleep deprivation as a form of torture against suspected terriorist. There have been several cases of this being documented at the United States military base at Guantonimo Bay in Cuba. It has been used to extract information from suspected terroist for a number of years.
One of the reason this is such an effective form of torture is because of what it does to both the body and the mind. Sleep deprevation is lowers the bodies resistance to pain as well as breaking down the detaines will. Making other forms of tourtue more effective.
Is using sleep agains others morally wrong if it can have a positive outcome? What if it ends up saving thousands of lives? At the same time what if it leads to nothing but that person was still an enemy of the country? Isn't it better knowing that there isn't anything being planned against us?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/16/torture-memos-bush-administration
http://un-truth.com/human-rights/sleep-deprivation-is-torture
Have you ever heard of the game show Cram? It used to be on the Game Show Network years ago. Contestants had to stay up the whole night cramming for tests without sleep. Then, they had to complete physical tasks while answering questions they prepared for. The ways in which their bodies and minds reacted to the deprivation of sleep was astounding. Sleep is a vital bodily process and it's interesting to think that it's such a simple way to control another individual.
ReplyDeleteNow I realize that a lack of sleep or sleep torture can be an effective method because it is so detrimental to the human body, but I don't know if it's inhumane. Yes it's not really right, but when you think about it, that's the the worst possible way to torture someone. There are more gruesome and disgusting ways to torture a human being and to be honest, being sleep deprived certainly beats plenty of alternatives.
ReplyDeleteI agree that sleep deprivation does not seem like that serious of a crime as there are many more harmful and painful alternatives. I don't believe that sleep deprivation could have as much of an impact physically on the body as many other methods of "torture" can. Also sleep deprivation can most likely be easily curable or treatable simply with sleep.
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