Torture and the Politics of “24″
March 15, 2007
There is a very interesting (and long) article on 24, politics and torture on Truth Out; it looks like it was initially published in The New Yorker and is entitled “The Politics of the Man Behind ‘24.’”
As you probably know, I really like “24.” I like the somewhat improbable and cheesy plots (that are getting to be a little redundant by the 6th Season) - and I like Jack Bauer. But…yah, there are some problems with the show. Does it play off of and feed the terror-fixated culture we live in? Probably. Does it cause people to see, through the power of TV media, that torture can be “good” and should be used in some situations? Possibly. That’s why I found the above article so interesting, and revealing. Below are just some of the quotes that I found very interesting (and scary to some degree). It’s clear that the primary writer for the show, Howard Gordon, is perhaps a little too trusting in the American people:
Gordon, who is a “moderate Democrat,” said that it worries him when “critics say that we’ve enabled and reflected the public’s appetite for torture. Nobody wants to be the handmaid to a relaxed policy that accepts torture as a legitimate means of interrogation.” He went on, “But the premise of ‘24′ is the ticking time bomb. It takes an unusual situation and turns it into the meat and potatoes of the show.” He paused. “I think people can differentiate between a television show and reality.”
And here are some very interesting quotes concerning the use, and reliability, of torture:
But Navarro, who estimates that he has conducted some twelve thousand interrogations, replied that torture was not an effective response. “These are very determined people, and they won’t turn just because you pull a fingernail out,” he told me. And Finnegan argued that torturing fanatical Islamist terrorists is particularly pointless. “They almost welcome torture,” he said. “They expect it. They want to be martyred.” A ticking time bomb, he pointed out, would make a suspect only more unwilling to talk. “They know if they can simply hold out several hours, all the more glory - the ticking time bomb will go off!”
The notion that physical coercion in interrogations is unreliable, although widespread among military intelligence officers and F.B.I. agents, has been firmly rejected by the Bush Administration. Last September, President Bush defended the C.I.A.’s use of “an alternative set of procedures.” In order to “save innocent lives,” he said, the agency needed to be able to use “enhanced” measures to extract “vital information” from “dangerous” detainees who were aware of “terrorist plans we could not get anywhere else.”
And does the “24″ contribute to the use of torture by US Armed Forces? I suppose such a claim is somewhat dubious, but U.S. Army Brigadier General Patrick Finnegan, the dean of the United States Military Academy at West Point doesn’t think so. He and others flew out to meet with the creative team behind “24″ because they are concerned that “the show’s central political premise - that the letter of American law must be sacrificed for the country’s security - was having a toxic effect. In their view, the show promoted unethical and illegal behavior and had adversely affected the training and performance of real American soldiers.”
Although reports of abuses by U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, have angered much of the world, the response of Americans has been more tepid. Finnegan attributes the fact that “we are generally more comfortable and more accepting of this,” in part, to the popularity of “24,” which has a weekly audience of fifteen million viewers, and has reached millions more through DVD sales. The third expert at the meeting was Tony Lagouranis, a former Army interrogator in the war in Iraq. He told the show’s staff that DVDs of shows such as “24″ circulate widely among soldiers stationed in Iraq. Lagouranis said to me, “People watch the shows, and then walk into the interrogation booths and do the same things they’ve just seen.” He recalled that some men he had worked with in Iraq watched a television program in which a suspect was forced to hear tortured screams from a neighboring cell; the men later tried to persuade their Iraqi translator to act the part of a torture “victim,” in a similar intimidation ploy. Lagouranis intervened: such scenarios constitute psychological torture.
Zach, drummer from Jimmy Eat World, doesn’t like 24, as expressed here and here. What does everyone else think?
Tags: 24, Foreign-Policy, George-Bush, Jack-Bauer, Torture
Posted in 
Adam Walker Cleaveland: I am a 28 yr old 
March 15th, 2007 at 1:06 pm
I kind like “24″ as well. But I am disturbed at how it makes torture look acceptable. Given the context of the show, every situation Jack is in is a “ticking bomb” situation where our society has said it is okay to use torture as a last resort. The problem is that these 24 hours are played out on our screens for six months. We forget that is happening in a single time period and it looks like Jack is torturing someone every week and not as a last minute, last resort.
In shor, I think it does make torture look normal. And that is a bad thing.
Props to you Adam for reading the article and posting about it. Glad I sent it to ya. :-)
March 15th, 2007 at 5:57 pm
I think it definetely influences people to think torture is acceptable. Maybe not as something that most viewers would admit to, but everything we watch influences us in some manner - and if we see Jack Bauer repeatedly torturing people to get what he needs, it’s going to affect us in some manner (as small as it might be).
I do a lot with cultural studies, and while I don’t think people necessarily watch and then emulate exactly, everything we injest affects in some way. When you have a show such as “24,” with six seasons of repeated stereotypes and repeated torture-as-means, it will reinforce that idea that torture is acceptable. And while it may not influence you or I drastically or in ways that come out in our every day life, when you’re in a situtation where you have the ability to torture (such as a soldier or guard), it will make a difference.
My parents had this cheesy animated series to help my brother and sister and I learn good morals, and one of their lessons was “garbage in, garbage out.” Essentially, torture in, torture out.
March 15th, 2007 at 7:52 pm
Thanks for the interesting thoughts Adam. I’m a big fan of the show as well, but I’ve also been somewhat disturbed at times by the depth of torture or physical abuse that the writers seem to think is appropriate.
While the show’s premise (the “ticking time bomb” concept) is exciting and creative, the sense of urgency that it creates seems to make it very easy to gloss over the torture scenes, as we get wrapped up in the panic. Do I believe that Jack has the right to get information from a terrorist through any means? Or do I actually think people (yes, terrorists are people too) should have the right to a fair trail? Are human rights important enough to uphold even in the heat of a panic moment?
All these ideas are great to think about, but I’m still watching the show. I think this article was insightful and I’ll hopefully look at the plot a little more closely in terms of racial profiling (which is very clear) and what I see as condoning violations of human rights. It kind of lets the air out of the whole show at times, but maybe that’s appropriate.