Perceptions of Music Majors and Music Performance Students on the Use of Music as Torture in the War on Terror

by

John Paul

and

Stephanie K. Decker


 Washburn University

Introduction

    The American military's use of music and sound as a technique of interrogation and as a vehicle of forced compliance on prisoners in the "global war on terror" has been well documented by journalists and by select scholars of music (Cusick 2006 2008, Pieslak 2007). Specifically, it has been reported that music has been used to break prisoners' resistance to interrogation "through sleep deprivation, disorientation, and playing music that was culturally offensive to them" (BBC News 2003:1).

     Given these practices, and following Cusick's (2006) initial query wherein she asked the "blogosphere" (comprised of musicians and/or music educators) to reflect upon the idea of music as torture, we ask a very specific segment of the public (music students at a Midwestern American University) if they are aware of these practices and what they make of music being used in these ways. Pragmatically, we chose to query music majors and performers because we felt this topic would resonate with them in a personal way, as they are deeply intertwined in the realm of music consumption, study, and production. Further, as Bohlman (2007) notes, the student musician and the student ethnomusicologist should have a crucial presence in these debates about the role of music as torture. He states:

For [students of music], ethics does not inhabit only everyday practice. It shapes our identities, how we and others see us as citizens in communities that overlap and intersect, our own musical worlds... and the public sphere from which [students of music] should not distance [themselves] (2007:1).

The presumption that music is an invariably an uplifting and ennobling art form is well established and dates back to antiquity…[yet] despite the tendency to focus on music's benign and positive role, we are confronted today with clear disclosures of its role in torture and human rights violations. Recent revelations of music's use in the detention and interrogation centers of the so-called 'War on Terror' have underlined music's potential to wound and cause suffering... [Thus a]  key question [must be asked]: Can music be considered a form of torture? [This] difficult and contentious question [has] not gone unnoticed by [scholars], although it must be said that musicology as a discipline has mostly passed over them in silence...More documentation and debate on this subject is crucial...

     Heeding the call from these scholars, we offer this study as a small contribution to this emergent area of "music as torture." As noted, the student voice has been largely overlooked in these debates about the unconventional and controversial uses of music. By querying the student musician, we hope to gain insight into their depth of knowledge regarding this practice, and per Bohlman's (2007) and Papeti and Grant's (2013) request, we offer a collection of underrepresented voices to this debate.   

     Given that there is little previous sociological or ethno-musicological research on music students' reactions to music as torture, this research may also be described as an exploratory study. Thus, in part one of this paper we offer a history of music as weaponry and we detail the reality of music as torture. In part two, we turn to the exploratory portion and we offer a description of our methodology as well as the five core themes that emerged from our study with music students, namely: limited familiarity, questioning the idea of music as torture, assuming torture was only used on "bad guys", belief in the efficacy of torture, and altered relationships with music. Lastly a discussion including the limitations, implications, and directions for future research is provided.

Examples of Music as a Weapon

     While journalists and human rights organizations have documented the use of music in torture, few scholars (with exceptions: Cusick 2006 2008, Pieslak 2007, Papeti and Grant 2013) have examined the issue. The use of music as both weaponry and an instrument of torture by American authorities have been documented by journalists even before the "global war on terror" (for a detailed discussion of music as weaponry in non American settings, see Cloonan and Johnson 2002). Prior to the "war on terror" the most well known examples were the musical bombardment of Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega in 1990   to hasten his surrender to American soldiers (Potter 1998) and the "sound siege" of the Branch Davidian Compound in Waco Texas in 1993 to disorient cult members prior to its raid by federal agents  (Ammerman, 1993). Speaking first to the Noriega conflict, we reference the words of Potter (1998:37-8), who writes:

Music was used to inflict pain [as well as] annoy the papal staff of the Vatican embassy in Panama City were Noriega was seeking sanctuary. The goal was to apply pressure to the Vatican staff hoping it would compel the Monsignor to release Noriega… The music was selected to be repetitive and loud, although it included a number of topical pieces such as 'No Place to Run' and 'You're no Good.' In this case there was also the aesthetic dimension to the attack, as Noriega was an Opera lover. 

     In the end, however, this tactic backfired as U.S. Catholics and Vatican officials saw the practice as a "clumsy effort to harass Noriega and inflict needless stress upon the papal staff" (Rouse, 2000:1). As a result President George Herbert Walker Bush instructed military officials to silence the music.

     Moving next to the Davidian siege, we identify Albert and Bell's (2002) rather strange but intriguing article that examines the Waco tragedy within the language of music theory. We paraphrase and "translate" the authors' arguments below:

After bombarding the Davidians with deafening and disorienting sounds, only silence was returned…the negotiators grew uncomfortable with the level of silence deciding that "the orchestra piece" they and Davidians were conducting was now in the "final movement." Federal agents determined "to hit the last note" preceded their raid on the compound with tear gas, unintentionally sparking fires [or encouraging arson by the Davidians] that quickly engulfed the structure and the majority of the Branch Davidians within.

     Though the aforementioned article stops short of a critique of the Federal government's role in the Waco tragedy, it nonetheless implies a negative assessment of the use of music to penetrate the Davidians' compound. No longer was music simply a medium for entertainment or apolitical aesthetic pleasure. Instead, as Albert and Bell (2002) imply, it became a tool of disorientation and subjugation, a hymn to disguise cunning, and a marching tune of overconfidence.

     Music has also played a role in the torture of detainees in the "global war on terror." the use of music as a technique of interrogation was reported on as early as 2003 (with the US invasion and occupation of Iraq). Three months following the American invasion and occupation of Iraq, the BBC (2003) issued a report detailing the US Army's use of music (e.g. Metallica's "Enter Sandman" and Barney the Purple Dinosaur's "I Love You") in the interrogation of terror suspects. The songs were repeatedly played at high volume inside confined spaces with the goal of breaking prisoners' resistance to interrogation "through sleep deprivation, disorientation, and playing music that was culturally offensive to them" (BBC News 2003:1).

     This tactic was confirmed by Piore (2003), who notes that US interrogators used heavy metal and American's children's songs to "break the will" of uncooperative captives. Citing a US Psychological Operations specialist, he writes:

These people haven't heard heavy metal. They can't take it. If you play it for 24 hours, your brain and body function start to slide, your train of thought starts to slow down and your will is broken. That's when we come in and talk to them (Piore, 2003:13).

     Pieslak (2007:132) offers additional evidence of the use of music to inflict pain on detainees when, in transcribing the recorded words of a military interrogator, he writes "that songs were used to get on these people's nerves so that…their resistance was weakened…[in one such case] a tape of babies crying worked so well that detainees usually answered questions after half an hour of listening." 

     The use of music as a vehicle of compliance still exists despite the stated policy shift from the Obama Administration. Shortly after the inauguration of President Obama, the White House announced that the use of loud music was one of the techniques tossed away during a policy change on interrogations. Yet, as Cusick and Joseph (2011: 8-9) write, "the use of sound is now described as a condition of detention, not a tactic of interrogation."

When it's described as a condition of detention, it's removed from the usual legal definitions of torture, which are about getting information out of someone… Yet detainees were not asked questions while subjected to music… The use of music to manipulate prisoners' behavior has always been a "condition of detention," but subsuming acoustical violence at these levels of intensity under that rubric is [a] sleight of hand (Cusick and Joseph (2011: 8-9).

Defining Music As Torture

     While the above cases demonstrate the documented use of music as pain, scholarship on its direct application as torture is sparse. A key notable exception is the work by Cusick and her colleagues (Cusick 2008, Cusick and Joseph 2011). This research shows that music may be used as a medium of pain through forced listening, sensory overload, emotional collapse, and cultural offense. The continuous, involuntary listening to music at high volumes has the effect of torture simply because it is forced and inescapable (Cusick, 2008). In addition, she notes that for detainees the non-voluntary listening of music acts as a prison of experience that "forces a conscious state of sin that [individuals] are powerless to avoid" (Cusick, 2008:13-14). In this way, music can be used to "break" a prisoner's resistance to interrogation through sleep deprivation, disorientation, and psycho-cultural distress. 

     Further, though torture is often conceived as body on body contact that produces noticeable external damage, several scholars challenge the idea of music being "non-physical." For instance, as Branden Joseph writes, "torture [can be conceptualized as] "body on body" or "body on body mediated by something like the acoustical waves of music" (Cusick and Joseph 2001: 19). In this way, the effects of forced listening may produce anxiety, fatigue, lack of sleep, disturbances of mood, attitudes and behavior, and create ear and nerve damage (Physicians for Human Rights 2010; Isakson and Jurkovic 2013). Additionally, Cusick states:

[We] know that the simple bombardment of a human body with acoustical energy will change the body. It may feel like a beating, which is what one former detainee told me several times: when it's over, he stated, you feel as though you've been "beaten with a hammer." Yet, even if it doesn't feel like a beating, every bone in the body of the person being bombarded with sound has no choice but to vibrate sympathetically with the sound. The entire body is forced to make music (Cusick and Joseph 2011: 13).

    Furthermore, Cusick (2008) notes the effects of using music as social, cultural, and religious indignation:

When interrogators confronted [the detainee] with a Qur'anic passage declaring [listening to music] a sin… he 'broke down crying and asking God for forgiveness and…stated that he could do nothing about the music that was played in his interrogation booth." (Cusick, 2008:13-14. Words in italics are our emphasis).   

     The scholarship arguing that the use of music in interrogation should be considered torture is supplemented by work from human rights organizations and accounts made by detainees.  Consider the case of Binyam Mohamed, a detainee held in Guantánamo Bay, who reports the following:

The CIA rendered him to Morocco, where his torturers repeatedly took a razor blade to his penis throughout an 18-month ordeal [but] psych-ops methods were worse than this. He could anticipate physical pain and know that it would eventually end. But the experience of slipping into madness as a result of torture by music was something quite different. Imagine you are given a choice…Lose your sight or lose your mind. While having your eyes gouged out would be horrendous, there is little doubt which option you would choose and what you would be willing to say for it to end (Smith 2008:1).

     Further, Binyam states:

There were loudspeakers in the cell, pumping out what felt like about 160 watts, a deafening volume, non-stop, 24 hours a day. They played the same CD for a month, "The Eminem Show." It's got about 20 songs on it, and when it was finished, it went back to the beginning and started again…I lost my head. It felt like it was never going to end and that I had ceased to exist. It was a miracle my brain is still intact (Mackey 2009, no page number).

    Former Guantánamo prisoners Ruhal Ahmed and Shafiq Rasul recount similar experiences. First the words of Ruhal:

The physical actions against me was less significant than the relentless, inescapable noise…I can bear being beaten up, it's not a problem. Once you accept that you're going to go into the interrogation room and be beaten up, it's fine. You can prepare yourself mentally. But when you're being psychologically tortured, you can't… [The music] makes you feel like you are going mad. You lose the plot and it's very scary to think that you might go crazy because of all the music, because of the loud noise, and because after a while you don't hear the lyrics at all, all you hear is heavy banging (Worthington, 2008: no page number).

    Lastly, the words of Shafiq Rasul:

It just starts playing with you… Even if you were shouting, the music was too loud -- nobody would be able to hear you. You're there for hours and hours, and they're constantly playing the same music. All that builds up. You start hallucinating (Peisner, 2006, no page number).

     U.S. agents initially accused Rasul of sitting in on an August 2000 meeting with Osama bin Laden and lead 9/11 hijacker Mohammed Atta. Though he initially denied the charge, Rasul eventually confessed – due exclusively, he said, to the torture he endured. However, investigators would soon confirm that in August 2000, Shafiq Rasul wasn't with bin Laden because he was attending university and working at an electronics store in England. In early 2004, Rasul Ahmed was released without charges (Peisner, 2006).

Methodology and Questions

     Given these documented causes, we wanted to know if music majors and music performance students were aware of such practices and whether or not they perceive music, when used in this way, as torture. To obtain this information we conducted conversational forums and focus group interviews (see Krueger and Casey 2009) with music majors and music performance students (n=264) enrolled in six separate ethnomusicology courses at a mid-western university across a six-year time span (2008-2013). These ethnomusicology courses were part of the required curriculum for all music students at this particular university. Here, it should be noted that the first author participated in these forums as a scholar in the sociology of music, while the second author participated in these forums as a scholar of war crimes and a sociology of deviance expert. Collectively, our scholarly expertise was employed to help direct and answer student questions as they emerged in these conservations. 
 
     In terms of direct procedure, we were allowed to conduct conservational forums with students during one allotted class period (a one hour and 15 minute period). We opened the class by exposing students to descriptive and documented vignettes on the US military's use of music on Iraqi and Afghani prisoners (see appendix for vignettes and guiding questions). After this, students were asked to reflect aloud on the vignettes and conceptualize their views on the idea of "music as a method of interrogation." On average, the forums lasted approximately an hour with the authors soliciting and analyzing students' views in these open discussions. In the conduction of forums, conversations would drift between contrasting views, not only on the conceptualization of "what music is for", but also on the facilitating power of music to "enable interrogation" and/or "perform torture." In responding to student commentary the authors would strive not to bias a particular point of view, but instead probe with questions like: "What do you think?" "What do you mean by that?" "Could you explain this a bit further?" "Why do you feel/think this way?" Lastly, conversations would normally turn to include discussions of the role and purpose of music in society, as well as the personal place of music in one's own life and elements of these discussions were included in the overall analysis.

     Consistent with a qualitative theme, data collection, analysis, and theory construction were done simultaneously (Glaser and Strauss, 1967, Strauss and Corbin, 1990). In the end, we grouped and analyzed music students' perspectives within broad themes guided by analytical signposts such as: collective/common agreement, outliers, turning points in conservations, recurring arguments, and intense and emotional reactions (see also Strauss and Corbin 1997).

     What is overwhelmingly clear from the focus groups is that the use of music as an interrogation technique is broadly unknown to students. The majority had not conceived of music as being used in this way and most were initially confused by the concept. The following statements are representative across all focus groups and demonstrate this lack of familiarity:

What? Are you serious? That sounds stupid (Student focus group member Spring 2008)
 
Is this made up? Why would music be used? What is the point? (Student focus group member Spring 2009)

Why and how? (Student focus group member Spring 2010)

    The why—or at least the theory behind it—as we explained, was to "break" a prisoner's resistance to interrogation through sleep deprivation, disorientation, and sensory overload. As, Alfred McCoy (2006a) a scholar who has written extensively about the interrogation methods, explains:

The idea [of sensory overload] … [with sound and light] …is that subjects become so starved for a break in this stimulation overload that they will crave interaction with their interrogator. The idea is that they break down and then they cling to the interrogator (cited in Benjamin, 2007 no page number). 

    Indeed, most persons (including the authors) were unaware of the use of music as a technique of interrogation until various academic and news reports became public. Though the use of music as a technique of interrogation was reported on as early as 2003 (with the US invasion and occupation of Iraq), the 2006 Human Rights Watch report was one of the first to critically examine its use and make the case for music existing as a mode of torture. Their report, "No blood, No foul" made the public aware of how music was being used to psychologically break detainees as part of the global "War on Terror." Please consider the following description by a former prison guard at the Forward Operating Base Tiger near al-Qaim, Iraq:

[A] typical first time interrogation consisted of some kind of heavy metal music really loud, strobe light, lot of yelled questions and stuff like that, until they finally would break down and cry and say "I don't know anything, I don't know anything!" ... He's on his knees, usually a rifle pointed at him, strobe light going, music going, whatever. Then the guys sitting at the desk asking him questions directly. [Everybody always had to yell] in order to hear [over the music] (Human Rights Watch, 2006, Soldiers' Accounts -no page number).

     As the student focus group discussions continued, and after vignettes such as the one above were offered, several students were able to express familiarity with the concept of "music as interrogation" and "music as torture" via their viewership of several popular American television shows.

I saw something like this on the show Homeland. They [the CIA] had a guy [terrorist suspect] in a room blaring heavy metal whenever he looked like he was about to fall asleep (student focus group member, Spring 2012) … Yeah, this was also on the TV show Leverage. [In the episode] former soldiers were being tortured with music… you know, sleep deprivation and using it to drive them crazy (Student focus group member, Spring 2012).

     Form here, the conservation typically shifted to the portrayal of torture in television shows and it was noted by many students that the media formed their opinions regarding the necessity for brutal interrogation tactics. Indeed, in recent years, the representation of interrogations in popular media has increased. The advocacy group, Human Rights First has noted that the number of military-like interrogations shown on television has grown from four times in a year before 2001 to more than 100 per year in the post-9/11 period (Human Rights First, no date). However, despite its growth of appearance in popular culture, and given the six year span that this research has been conducted, students seem no more cognizant that music has (and is) being used in this way. Further, the TV spectacle that depicts "music as interrogation" is often the sanitized presentation of real methods of abuse. Lastly these televised depictions never raise moral objections, nor engage in a serious dialogue on the subject. As one student said sarcastically,  "…it's not real, right? It's just a TV show." (Student group focus member, Spring 2013).

     Initially, the majority of our student musicians doubted the idea that forced listening could be harmful. In fact many found the idea humorous and dismissed the idea of music as nothing more than an irritating encounter:

Torture? I live in a place that only plays country music on the radio – now that's torture! (Student focus group member, Spring 2010)

My friend refuses to let me control [our listening choices] in the car… its nothing but hip-hop. I threatened to jump out of the car… (Student focus group member, Spring 2011)…
 
Emo music… that stuff is torture. Makes you want to kill yourself… we should be making the terrorists listen to that stuff. (Student focus group member, Spring 2008).

     The dismissive attitude toward music as pain is explained in part because many people routinely and humorously refer to the idea that being forced to listen to a certain song or music style apart from their own likes and tastes is "torture" – therefore, reports of the tactic of "music as interrogation" are often cast in a comic light. Even several prominent musicians whose music was used to "soften" detainees were skeptical. Consider that James Hetfield, co-founder of Metallica initially laughed off the idea of his music being torture. He joked, "We've been punishing our parents, our wives, our loved ones with this music for ever. Why should the Iraqis be any different?" (Smith, 2008:1). Similarly Steve Asheim, drummer for the death-metal band Deicide, (who's song Fuck Your God has been used by interrogators) questions whether music really counts as torture. He states, "If I was a prisoner at Guantánamo Bay and they blasted a load of music at me, I'd be like, 'Is this all you got? Come on.' I certainly don't believe in torturing people, but I don't believe that playing loud music is torture either" (Smith, 2008:1). In addition, a Christian metal band known as Demon Hunter apparently got in touch with the US Military and is reported to have offered their music as service, implying that the use of music in interrogations is not only acceptable, but honorable. They stated, "We're all about promoting what you do…We are honored, humbled and blessed that Demon Hunter was of any support or comfort to Seal Team 6 or anyone in the US military at any time" (Hogan 2013, no page number).

     Beyond these collective dismissals, many also rejected the idea of music as harmful because they didn't initially perceive it as being "physical":

It's just sound. It can't permanently hurt you… its not like you are being beaten up. If I were being "tortured," give me this any day (Student focus group member, Spring 2008).

Ted Nugent used to say, "if it's too loud you're too old"… I like loud music…I'd think of it like a free concert (Student focus group member, Spring 2009).

It's not like they're shooting you in the kneecaps or hitting you in the head with a phonebook… its music played over and over… I can see where this would be annoying, but at least you are coming out [physically intact] (Student focus group member, Spring 2010).

     Yet, as detailed earlier, the effects of forced listening may produce anxiety, fatigue, lack of sleep, disturbances of mood, attitudes and behavior, and create ear and nerve damage. According to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration there is no risk of permanent hearing loss from continuous 24-hour-per-day exposure to noise of up to 82 decibels. The CIA maintains that exposure to white noise/loud sounds is not to exceed 79 decibels during interrogations (Peisner, 2006).

     And to reiterate the words of Cuscik and Joseph (2011:13), "acoustical energy [applied to the body] feels like a beating, which is what one former detainee told me several times: when it's over, he stated, you feel as though you've been "beaten with a hammer." Once students were made aware of these perspectives and were offered additional vignettes by Binyam Mohamed, Ruhal Ahmed and Shafiq Rasul (as noted earlier in this paper), several students altered their initial reflections: 

A person who's confined and forced to listen to [noise] against their will –I believe that would cause unnatural distress on the mind (Student focus group member, Spring 2012).

Even after the music stops, it can stick with you. It can also make you feel a certain way (depressed, anxious) and it can be an emotion you can't escape (Student focus group member, Spring 2013).

I choose to listen to music that brings me pleasure. But if I were made to listen to something that offended me, I would be forced to participate in a music culture that I did not choose…that would violate my spirit (Student focus group member, Spring 2012).

     The majority of our student-interviewees did not conceptualize music primarily as a physical source of pain, and instead were most apt to be concerned with its potential as a source of mental and/or spiritual harm. Indeed, as our classroom conservations continued, many did conclude (or come to concede to fellow students) that they felt music, when used this way, was undeniably disruptive and possibly damaging to the mind and spirit. However, there was great disagreement as to whether it was morally right or wrong and whether it was a valid and purposive technique for gaining actionable intelligence from persons detained in the war on terror. Data reveal that students in each of the focus groups make broad assumptions on this point. Namely, students largely assume that persons being held for interrogation are "bad people" who would not be in detention centers if they weren't guilty of something. Take for example the following student remarks:

I admit that torture is evil, but so are these people… (Student focus group member, Spring 2008).

It does not bother me. It's only torture if its used on innocent people… but these are not innocent people. It doesn't bother me if they are using [music] to get information on people that they suspect has information (Student focus group member, Spring 2012).

     We speculate that these attitudes are due in part to the fact that this was the core narrative issued by the White House during the declaration of the global war on terror. For instance, the Former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld once declared that individuals captured by the US military in the aftermath of 9/11 represented the "worst of the worst… all were terrorists, trainers, bomb makers, and would-be suicide bombers…" (US Department of Defense, 2005 no page number).
We shared this with our student-interviewees and further reported that the vast majority of prisoners captured in the War on Terror were innocent and the administration delayed their freedom because of the political repercussions that would have ensued. Consider the words of Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to then Secretary of State Colin Powell:

I found that … the majority of detainees had never seen a US soldier in the process of their initial detention and their captivity had not been subjected to any meaningful review… further it became more and more clear many of the men were innocent, or at a minimum their guilt was impossible to determine let alone prove in any court of law, civilian or military… the primary issue was to gain more intelligence as quickly as possible on Al Qaeda… Sweeping up and detaining large numbers of people… even innocent people… was deemed acceptable if it led to a more complete and satisfactory intelligence picture with regard to Iraq, thus justifying the Administration's plans for war with that country (Cited in Leopold 2010, no page number).
 

     Further as McCoy (2006b) accounts: 

Most of those rounded up by military sweeps in Iraq and Afghanistan for imprisonment at Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo had nothing to do with terrorism. An analysis of the Pentagon listing of Guantánamo's 517 detainees reveals that 86 percent were arrested not by U.S. forces but by Northern Alliance and Pakistani warlords eager to collect a $5,000 bounty for every "terrorist" captured (no page number).

     In closing this portion of our focus group interviewees, we reiterated the reality that the vast majority of persons initially swept in the war on terror were not terrorists. Further, we provided evidence (Hope, Winnett, Watt and Blake, 2011) that suggested many were in fact innocent persons who were probably exposed to similar interrogation techniques described here. Student reactions were often mixed and many were skeptical regarding this information, but this questioning would always lead to a discussion about the perceived effectiveness of torture—and this is where we turn next.

Theme Four: Belief in the Efficacy of Music Torture

     In our debates about the utility of torture, the majority of our student-interviewees argued that its purpose was to extract crucial information that will save lives and avert future terrorist attacks. Even though the majority of students surveyed did not perceive music (when used in this way) as torture, they nonetheless had the impression that its application was a legitimate and effective way to gain information.

9/11 changed everything… this was unprecedented in human history…they changed the rules. So I it [music as a component of interrogation] is fair and legitimate … I think this can really make someone break and give up important info (Student focus group members, Spring 2008).

     It's a dangerous world and sometimes we need to [do this] stuff to protect us… if it gives us information to save lives then yes, we should be doing it (Student focus group members, Spring 2011).

I have no doubt it works. If I were being tortured I would talk. I'd tell them everything I know (Student focus group member, Spring 2012).

     While we where there primarily to query music students on their awareness of the implementation of music as a tool in the "war on terror," we nonetheless felt it necessary to engage such debate and offer a contrasting point of view when the efficacy of torture was professed. Specifically, we noted that despite claims of effectiveness, research often tells a different tale. Mayer (2008:134), for instance, argues:

Virtually every expert in and outside the government agrees…that torture and lesser forms of physical coercion will make people confess something- but the 'truth' is another matter.

     Indeed, in her work on the torture of detainees in the global war on terror, Mayer finds that nearly every individual whom experienced physical or psychological brutality lied and fabricated information to avoid torture. According to other research, intelligence officials, detainees who endured varying degrees of force did tell their interrogators some truths, but the majority told half-truths and outright lies (Alexander, Bruning, and Bowden 2011). Thus, the acceptance of torture as an intelligence gathering technique seems fundamentally flawed. Even if the detainee begins to talk under torture, interrogators have a hard time determining whether he is telling the truth or not. As Joe Navarro, a former FBI agent and author of Advanced Interviewing Techniques, writes "torture only guarantees pain; it never guarantees the truth" (cited in Pesca 2007 no page number).

     Invariability students would then ask something similar to the following: But if torture doesn't work, what does? Here we would offer commentary from experts in the field. Please consider for example, commentary from Navarro:

There is no professional interviewer that subscribes to torture or to advanced or enhanced interrogation techniques to obtain information. It just doesn't work…because the purpose of an interview is to get cooperation, not compliance. You know, the FBI has been interviewing terrorists since the anarchists back in the 1920s and '30s. We've never had to use any of these techniques. And, in fact, none of the intelligence services have really ever asked for this. 9/11 didn't change the human brain, and what we know is that people will say anything when they're being tortured… traditional techniques work just fine...techniques that use rapport-based techniques….that psychologically seduce individuals into cooperating and providing information (cited in Martin, 2013 no page number).

     Ultimately, experts say that diligent intelligence sleuthing and traditional interrogation techniques are more effective in gaining information than torture. This said, why are students so adamant in their belief of the efficacy of torture? As noted in earlier sections, the portrayal of torture in television and pop culture, as well as in statements issued by governmental officials may have contributed to the belief that brutal interrogations are necessary and effective.

     Lastly, despite several students' claims that the brutality of 9/11 was unprecedented in human history (thus making the torture of "our enemies" legitimate and effective in extracting useful information quickly), we often closed this portion of the discussion with the following quotes for continued reflection. Eighteen hundred years ago, the Roman jurist named Ulpian, who critiqued of the use of torture in the Roman legal system, stated: "Torture is a difficult and deceptive thing for the strong will resist and the weak will say anything to end the pain." Even a senior American psych-ops instructor joked that "if he were made to listen to [repetitive music] he would confess to being a member of al-Quaeda [after] an hour [and] after ten hours he'd confess to being Osama bin Laden" (Pieslak, 2007:133).

Finally, as music is unquestionably a powerful form of human expression, we asked students to describe their personal relationship to music and their feelings while playing or creating music. Many responded in ways similar to those expressed below:

I love it [making music]… I wish I could do it all the time. It's an escape from the bad things that happen in life  (Student focus group member, Spring 2008).

If I didn't have music in my life, I think I'd go crazy (Student focus group member, Spring 2011).

Music is my life. It brings me such joy and whenever I create a new work it's like I am creating life… (Student focus group member, Spring 2013).

     Following this discussion, and as a way to bring the discussion back to potential role of music as torture, we asked music students how they would feel if the music they had created was used to inflict pain on another person. While some comments were snarky  (one student for example said: "As long as I get paid, I don't care what they do with my music), most were introspective and seemed emotively moved by this question.

     Students made the following statements:

Ahhh… well I think this would be particularly perverted because it takes something that's meant to be enjoyable and turns it into an instrument of pain… this would strip the prisoners of the future joy in music – how can one enjoy it after that (Student focus group member, Spring 2013).

I suppose this would make one "allergic" to music. I couldn't imagine anything more terrible… to be robbed of the joy (Student focus group member, Spring 2013).

Up till now this whole conservation was a joke to me, but I would hate to think that my music was [hurting] someone  (Student focus group member, Spring 2011).

I write music with God in my heart. The idea that my music would be viewed by [the detainee] as evil… I know I couldn't do anything about it, but I would feel complicit (Student focus group member, Spring 2012).

Ouch, I'd never thought of this before. I suppose I'd be angry that something I created with joy in my heart was used in a way I didn't approve (Student focus group member, Spring 2013).

     Cumulatively, these phenomenological expressions suggest a change in the thought processes associated with the potential experience of music. Previously, music students were quick to highlight their vision of music as a purely joyful enterprise. Now however, music was also to be conceived as an activity that could produce a negative experience for the creator – namely that the producer might be complicit in negating the joy of music for another. Imagining music and the musician in this light was the first time many viewed the potential harm of forced listening. At the end of these particular discussions, the researchers often noted how students made their first notable empathetic connections to persons subjected to "music torture"—and if nothing else, we saw how a critical debate on music, war, and its effects might be engaged.

Discussion and Conclusion

     So what exactly, have we gained from this research? Ultimately this paper had a two-fold purpose. The first was to identify and review the use of music as a technique of interrogation and as a vehicle of forced compliance on prisoners in the "global war on terror." We find that music defies easy (legal) classification as ''torture," even though prolonged exposure to noise can produce extreme psychological distress as it deprives prisoners of rest and sleep. In terms of physical harm, loudness damages hearing with prolonged exposure and may reduce bodily functions, alter intellectual capacities, and produce disorientation, anxiety, and fear. Truly, the pulses of music and noise when used in this manner blur the threshold between physical and psychological effects—and this use and effect of "music as torture" should continue to be identified and studied. For authorities that subscribe to the use of torture, but want to avoid criticism from the public, music may provide a convenient loophole. While the use of music in interrogation practices certainly feels like torture to detainees, the public may merely shrug off such practices as an annoyance—which takes us to the second part of our work.

     The second part of this paper was a replication and extension of earlier research by Cusick (2006). Whereas Cusick initially queried and recorded music bloggers' perceptions of the idea of music as torture, we asked a very specific segment of the public (music students at a Midwestern American University) if they are aware of these practices and what they make of music being used in these ways. In general, the music students surveyed were not overwhelmingly aware of the use and role of music as a tool of interrogation. This suggests, per the concern of music scholars and teachers (as noted by Bohlman, 2007 and Papeti and Grant, 2013), that students may be lacking in critical ethical education about the unconventional and controversial uses of music—and if nothing else, should be considered for additional inclusion in their curriculum. 

     When students were made aware of such modes of interrogation, most were not inclined to define it as torture because it is unlikely to produce outwardly visible marks of bodily damage. Additionally, the idea of music as torture was initially trivialized and viewed with humor—it was difficult for students to view the application of music as little more than a nuisance when used on detainees. Beyond this, music students envisioned harsh or aggressive interrogation tactics as justifiable because they conceived the detainees as legitimate perpetrators of terrorism. Many of our students also believe in the effectiveness of torture and defended it because they say it is needed in a world as dangerous as this one—and while this is beyond the scope of our paper, these findings also point towards a general public passivity regarding revelations of torture and acceptance of potential war crimes. Indeed, though these apathetic orientations have been studied elsewhere (Berinsky 2007, Steuter and Wills 2008, Leitz 2011), the perceptions of our music students, suggest that additional study into the influence of media, xenophobia, and social power on war trivialization is warranted. 

     However, when we asked music students how they would feel if the music they had created was used to inflict pain on another person, attitudes changed dramatically. For most of the students, the creation of music is a powerful form of expression and an emotion akin to deep joy. With the thought of their music being used in ways alien to them and without their permission, many spoke in descriptors citing anger, sadness, and sickness. The idea that music as torture might make people "allergic" to ever enjoying music again was something the majority had never conceived —and this reality was the most dismaying and disturbing aspect of this practice for our students.

     As the "war on terror" has turned music into a potentially repulsive experience for those engaged in its application as interrogation and torture, and we must now conceive of song and sound as a physical, psychological, and sociopolitical tool for pain and terror—and as such, we are also forced to consider new subfields within musicology and the sociology of music. These being potentially: soundscapes of pain and the socio-musicology of violence.

     Further, while we held conversational forums with music students to identify patterns of thought across a particular student population, future research should obviously continue to collect narratives from "music torture survivors." Future research should also assemble the impressions of musicians whose songs were used in such controversial ways. We imagine that the insights collected from both survivors and musicians would offer a "thick description" (Geertz, 1973) that goes beyond the first reflections of music students who were initially disconnected from this reality. Moreover, investigators should also gather the experiences, opinions, and beliefs of those soldiers and political/military officials who were directly involved in the organization and application of music as a tool in the "war on terror." Certainly the absence of these voices marks a limitation of this paper. Yet, these limitations also sketch a direction for future research and we hope that our paper, if nothing else, helps illuminate an important aspect of this is often overlooked reality of music, violence, and conflict. In the end, the physical and psychological damage caused by music torture must be recognized as a destructive force and we scholars and critics should work to broaden the understanding how noise assaults bodies and may be used as a tool of submission and compliance.  As Grant (2013:13) writes:

If we are to build a convincing case for taking this issue seriously we need to gather more information and we need to make public the scale of the problem. This is where we are so dependent on [scholars], readers, and the wider community of all engaged in the fight against torture and ill treatment.

References

Appendix: Opening Vignettes and Guiding Questions

*It's been reported that the US Army has used music on Iraqi and Afghani prisoners to break their resistance to interrogation, "through sleep deprivation, disorientation, and playing music that is culturally offensive to them" (Source: BBC News. 2003. "Sesame Street breaks Iraqi POWs" Tuesday, 20 May).

*In some cases prisoners have been held in garage-sized, windowless spaces where songs like Metallica's "Enter Sandman," Barney the Purple Dinosaur's "I Love You," and Decide's "Fuck Your God" have been played over a loudspeaker for days on end. In one particular case detainees were made to listen to a daily repeated loop of crying babies mixed with the Meow Mix cat food commercial (Source: Pieslak, Jonathan R. 2007. "Sound Targets: Music and the War in Iraq." Journal of Musicological Research, 26: 123 – 149).

Guiding Questions:

What are your general reactions to this?

Does it upset you to learn that music is used this way? Why or Why not?

What would be your reaction if you learned that a song "you loved" was used in ways similar to those described in the opening vignette? Would it change the emotional experience you have with the song?

What would be your reaction if you learned that an artist or band "you loved" endorsed (gave approval) to their music being used to "soften" detainees prior to interrogation?

What would be your reaction if you learned that music you had created was being used in ways similar to those described in the opening vignette?

Do you perceive music, when used in this way, as torture? In what ways do you consider it to be torture—In what ways is it not?

Finally, in your opinion what is the role or purpose of music in society?