Like I said, a punishment should never amount to torture, in any way. And it should never be humiliating. Really, it should never be physical at all, most modern democracies agree. Because any physical abuse is wrong. And some physical forms of abuse are actually torture, though it seems they wouldn't be. Take waterboarding. Critics of waterboarding claimed it was not just physical abuse, but torture. Because it made you feel like you were drowning. Which any physician will tell you, is always very painful and very distressing. Some people were skeptical, claiming maybe it was physical. But it certainly wasn't torture, they claimed. Then in 2008 British journalist and author Christopher Hitchens allowed himself to be waterboarded, after Vanity Fair editor-in-chief Graydon Carter asked him to. And famously, people who saw the tape still remember, the person started slowing pouring water from a small cup onto a simple handkerchief that was over Hitchens' face. And immediately, after the first drops hit the handkerchief, Hitchens jumped up from the table gasping for air screaming in panic "It's torture! It's torture!" Because some things can seem harmless to the outside world but still be torture. That is why governments think they can get away with using those techniques. Denying someone access to the bathroom, holding them in some uncomfortable position for a very long time, or just shaking someone's shoulders violently, like the did once in Israel, have been used by governments in the past as forms of torture. Because to the public they seem so innocent. But believe it or not, as any physician will tell you, they are all forms of torture. Because they cause intense pain and panic. Like I said, we all agree, governments are not supposed to use any physical forms of restraint or punishment too.
