Torturing for Freedom

 

 

 

 The first thing I saw upon logging into LinkedIn was an old video of an ISIS operative gloating about the number of people he had killed and the women he had raped, followed by the usual chorus of comments about Muslims being terrorists and the inherent evil of Islam. As an atheist and no apologist for the faith—or any other—I acknowledge that this monster may be real, but could just as easily be another propaganda tool playing a role. What struck me, however, was how none of the commenters seemed remotely interested in digging deeper into the murky origins of ISIS—how it was propped up, armed, and financed as a counterweight to Iraqi Shia militias. No mention of the Western nation and its vassals responsible for the carnage and chaos in the Middle East, their infamous torture school (renamed but still operating), their illegal prison camp in Cuba, or the secret black sites scattered across the world. Moreover,  if we were to stack every Islamic terrorist atrocities against those committed by Christian white nations—their world wars, colonial slaughters, neo-colonial bloodbaths, South East Asian massacres, Middle Eastern invasions, brutal crackdowns on their own citizens—the so-called Islamic terrorists wouldn’t even rank-Babies.

I once knew a man who had his testicles electrocuted for a week—his only crime was being in the wrong place at the wrong time, a village wedding photographer mistaken for an insurgent because he looked "Mongoloid" enough for the army to pick him up. I met another who had cigarette burns covering his back, courtesy of his time in police custody. Then there was the time I got drunk with a Buddhist monk, only to later learn he had spent nearly seven years in solitary confinement in a Tibetan prison. I’ve heard senior police officers boast about how they battered people in custody, and I once drank chai with a BSF sub-inspector who casually used the word “torture” in place of “interrogation.” 

Already aware that most criminals don’t regret their actions in the least—at most, they fear human revenge or divine retribution—I once spent weeks scouring the web for scholarly and general articles on whether torturers employed by government agencies—police, military interrogators, intelligence spooks like those in the CIA or KGB—ever express genuine remorse. What I found was damning. The subject has been virtually untouched in academic research. And from the scarce evidence available—confessions of war criminals, testimonies from ex-operatives—the results were abysmal. The only ones who ever expressed regret—whether for torture, battery, or gang rape, all carried out in service of their nation and to protect our freedom—were those who had been publicly exposed or were hoping for a reduced sentence.
Most simply rationalize their actions, deny or defend them when confronted, and later shove it all into some dark, locked compartment at the back of their minds.

Coming back to the commenters on the ISIS video post—most aren't bothered about the 40,000 dead in Gaza, a million in Ukraine, or the over 1,000 Alawites massacred last week. Well, unless the mass or social media tells them to be. We humans have a way of keeping our biases intact and treating morality as nothing more than an arbitrary principle—weaponized or discarded as deemed convenient.

The Chinese Mask Torture

With age, a man sheds two things; the hair on his head and so-called friends! The ongoing ScamDemic has had me blocking a few Covidiots who were daily sending me a barrage of scaremongering messages. Likewise, I had to tell a couple of "Maskista" Karens to Fuck-off, also reminding them that I am not their hen-pecked husband to listen to that chiding tone. Which reminds me how fed up with their sermons and pretensions, I used to get rid of my female college mates exactly the same way, and they always angrily retorted back" No wonder you don't have a Girlfriend" as if my single hood and inability to take their Bullshit was interconnected. But, they probably had a valid point!

Without going deeply into the topic of masks, government flip-flops on the subject and over 50 medical (peer-reviewed) papers, which I collected that say that they mostly don't -  the main factor causing this current divisive rift is really about not their effectiveness but the subject of "Virtue Signalling!!"

Its Religious fanatics vs Atheists all over again. For religious whackos it's because their holy book/prophet/guru says so, here it's because governments and their bureaucracy who are always on a lookout for ways to increases taxes and curtail citizen's rights and promote autocracy, say so : “Honey, we have to trust them. This is our government. They’re on our side!!”

 All for public safety of course; protection from communism, terrorism, a venereal or some cooked up disease. This time they have hit jackpot by effectively combined fearmongering against an invisible enemy and people's inherent narcissistic need to display that they are better than the rest. 

Hence, the mantra "I am a better person than you, because I obediently wear a mask for your safety!!" 

Let's face it, Virtue Signalling is endemic everywhere, only in different guises. In India, it traditionally takes on a religious or cultural colour with a clock of drab orthodoxy. I am better than you because I am vegetarian,  more religious, maintain fasts and go on pilgrimages. Many a young Indian woman proudly states that she comes from an "orthodox conservative family" to denote that she is a virgin and sexually unavailable. So don't get any ideas Bozo unless you fulfil my long list of entitled expectations, those of my parents and the society too. Just like her same-age western counterpart would declare that she has a boyfriend  before even saying her name also meaning  "I am not available for you as well, Bozo!!"

Following the election of the Supreme Leader Modi and the masturbatory fervour with which people have been forwarding the ruling party's IT cell's (Fascist India/Indians/Army/Hinduism is great) messages to each other, Virtue Signalling in India now has got  a new nationalistic Hindu avatar. I am virtuous because I claim on Facebook that I worry about our poor soldiers dying on the borders or freezing their arses in the snow!! 

As organised religion is all but dead in the west, at least among the  white-skinned population, Virtue Signalling there has adopted  multiple new forms. Before the Covid masks, it was psalms to scowling Saint Greta of the Holy Church of Climate Change, the poor hungry polar bears, Asian Tsunami victims, suppressed and depressed women of India, Chinese torture victims and so on and so forth...

I remembered Chinese torture victims because that's what a very prim and proper Danish woman I met in Leh claimed she was doing: "Counselling Tibetan Monks who were victims of Chinese Torture." She spoke about it with such earnest sincerity that anyone listening was forced to nod solemnly in appreciation. Though almost 30 at that time, I was still very gullible in the ways of the world and my BS filters were not yet attuned to such western forms of VS. As I was  a journalist at that time, one who had  not yet discarded his "Free Tibet" grab, a month later I emailed her offering to connect her to some relevant people in the Tibetan Govt in exile at Dharamshala. She expressed her gratitude, but she was already in Bali at that time !! Never knew that Chinese torturers didn't even spare the island!!

 I could have guessed that she was just a poser when she kept extolling West African culture and music, all because her ex-boyfriend was from Mali. Now, interracial porn may not be my forte, but again who on earth gushes about a former partner's homeland's cultural wealth irrespective of whether he or she was black, purple or blue!!

Now, I don't need to pick up an African hooker, the kind who hang around the Pastry Palace on the Outer Ring road in Delhi on weekends For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge to appreciate  Youssou N' Dour!!

BTW, the face masks which the various governments, virtuous Karens and countless COVIDIOTS dictate, threaten  or scream at us to muzzle up with, can also be termed as Chinese torture, or even better China's revenge. After all, didn't this charade start when western powers led by the US used the excuse of a seasonal respiratory illness epidemic in China as a pretext to start hybrid economic warfare against the country?

Forcing a temporary economic embargo causing billions of dollars of losses for the Chinese by quarantining their ships, followed by dumping of share in Chinese companies. An assault bolstered by a 24x7 global  onslaught through media channels with theories of lab created chimeras and  recipes for bat soup thrown in for effect. But the Chinese quickly understood the game and gained the upper hand with an even better orchestrated media and PR campaign, while their domestic investors picked up the dumped shares for a song. 

Soon they were forgotten and every political opportunist around the globe starting using the ScamDemic and the lockdown tyranny to further their own domestic gains. The US elections, Brexit, a constitutional referendum, an excuse for demonising Muslims or to justify 6 years of misrule in India and in the process whether by accident or intent, making true the Rockefeller Foundation's prediction about possible future scenarios. One where countries impose an autocratic tyranny and curtail citizen's rights using the excuse of a pandemic: The Lockstep Protocol. 

So till it (Lockstep) is in place, be good and obedient citizens,  keep breathing in those cancer-causing and lungs blocking microscopic synthetic fibres and filaments from those Chinese made facemasks or material. 

But remember, you are undergoing the Chinese Torture in order to protect others!!

Who says I have anything against masks...