Torture is a sadistic act designed to break its victims and instill terror in their communities. And long after the abuse has ended, its horrors haunt survivors long into their new lives in supposedly safe countries. For the most recent episode of VICE’s Informer series, we spoke to a clinician who works with torture victims who have escaped their tormentors and made it to the UK.
She told VICE that despite being illegal under international law, torture is still practiced in many countries . Advertisement “Torture is more prolific than people realize,” she said. “I think if people realize the extent of torture, they’d be absolutely horrified and shocked.
It can break people into a thousand pieces, so they can never rebuild themselves again.” Torture could take many forms—from physical to psychological and emotional abuse, she said. “There’s physical pain, which could be limb amputation, fingernails being pulled out, beatings, whippings, genitalia burning,” she said.
“There’s deprivation of food, water, sunlight, social isolation. People are often detained and then shown footage of their family or pictures of their children walking to school.” gaza I Made it Out of Gaza.
Now I'm Fighting for a Second Chance at Life. Bianca Ferrari 01.29.
24 Torture could be used for a number of reasons. Unlike in the movies, torture isn’t just used to extract secret information , she said, but could be used to punish people merely for exercising basic human rights, f.
