Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
It might not be appropriate to ask for sympathy in my position, but torturing really sucks. No wonder they blamed the water drop torture on the Chinese (the truth is the Italians came up with it). The procedure is classic. The head of the the torturee is fixed so he can't move it the slightest bit and then water keeps dropping on his forehead. Felix wasn't much help, lying in the corner feeling sorry himself after the hanging part, so I had to construct this on my own. The mean thing about this is not the water, it's waiting for the next drop. And the next. That's what drives you crazy. In the beginning I didn't see much of that though. Felix looked all peaches and cream in the face. Felix: Ever kissed a girl in the rain and thought this moment is perfect and then she kicked you into the balls? After all this shit I thought this must be the honeymoon of torture methods. In the beginning I relaxed and watched the drops that were about to drop on my forehead. Then I started getting really impatient. Very, very impatient. Strangely impatient. About as impatient as you get waiting in front of the train card machine and you hear your train's doors just closing and you really have to pee and you realize you have lost your wallet and this was the last train that could have possibly brought you home to your family for Christmas just before you piss yourself. I was pretty close to that actually.
Advertisement
The expert advised us to stay clear from Felix's head with the taser because that could cause epileptic attacks. That's why I decided to go for his leg. In Germany any idiot can walk into a store or go on the internet to buy a 700,000-volt taser without even showing his ID. So that's how we reached the climax of our little experiment. I put the taser against his leg and shocked him. He shuddered and screamed. I kept going until he was lying on the floor and didn't move any more. Felix: The pain wasn't the problem, even though I must say that I ended up squirming on the floor after just the second shock. The pain goes away. What stays though is the echo in your nerves. I think everybody who had an experience with electro shocks before knows what I'm talking about here. But that's not really the point. This part of the torture was where I truly looked into the core evil of all this crap: man and his degenerated soul in action. A couple 100,000 volts melt away any constraints—and suddenly you find your appreciated colleague turning into the asshole who'd shoot you into the back in a rundown prison. When torture was banned in Europe in 1820 that didn't happen due to its inhumanity but its impracticable character. In times where torture is gaining more and more acceptance behind the scenes there's a little Kang Kek Iew in all of us. I know that I was a privileged victim assuming something like this exists. Compared to the poor guys who're suffering in random cellar holes around the world I could have aborted this shit any minute and could have stormed out the door after screaming "fuck off" into my colleague's face. That's why I can't say that I was tortured for real. The pain isn't what it's all about; it's just a side effect of the concept. You learn to put up with it and get used to it while your body is drugging up itself with its own chemicals. The human body can put up with a lot of crap, that's for sure. However, losing your personal freedom, the option to say "No!", being delivered to complete unprotection…that is truly hell on earth. I'm sure for Juliane this was merely another job, but I still cringe when she starts talking to me. JULIANE LIEBERT AND FELIX NICKLASPhotos by Christoph Voy
