It sounds like a joke, so it was no surprise that when we first learned of music being used as an "enhanced interrogation technique" there were lots of jokes to be heard. But we're not talking about being in a store and feeling like the music being piped in is going to drive you crazy. We are talking about music deliberately being used in way that can drive you crazy. You can walk out of a store; prisoners cannot escape from the loud onslaught of the music they're subjected to.
I'd like to make the argument that using music this way diminishes a great and universal act of human spirit, but there's a much more practical argument to be made:
First, we should be putting the word music in quotes, because every instance I've read or heard about, no matter what style of music is used, focuses on volume. The recordings used are played back at painfully loud levels. Whether it's heavy metal or the Barney theme song, it's used as noise - as an aural bludgeon. There is nothing "musical" about it, and if the army had recordings of jackhammers and jet engines instead, they'd probably use them to the exact same effect.
So if we use "noise" instead of "music" then the problem becomes somewhat clearer. Music is something we love, something we have trouble imagining as "torture." But at the volumes we're talking about, noise is torture - and the idea that it doesn't leave permanent marks is just wrong. Noise at that volume, as we've already learned in our Friday "Sound Off" series, causes irreversible damage to the inner ear. If we were gradually blinding these prisoners, there'd be a lot more outrage. We Americans are supposed to believe there's no place for "cruel and unusual punishment," and destroying someone's sight would strike most of us as cruel and unusual. So why isn't destroying someone's hearing also considered cruel and unusual?
Tell us: Does using music at high volume qualify as torture? Is it justified?
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John Schaefer has hosted Soundcheck since the show’s inception in 2002. He has also hosted and produced WNYC’s radio series New Sounds since 1982 (“The No. 1 radio show for the Global Village” – Billboard) and the New Sounds Live concert series since 1986.
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