Talk:Torture in fiction

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Torture in fiction article.
This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help.

Article policies

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

A fact from Torture in fiction appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 15 March 2022 (check views). The text of the entry was as follows:

Did you know... that efficient and professional torture is found only in fiction?

A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2022/March. The nomination discussion and review may be seen at Template:Did you know nominations/Torture in popular culture.

Wikipedia

Human rights Low‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Human rights, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Human rights on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.Human rightsWikipedia:WikiProject Human rightsTemplate:WikiProject Human rightsHuman rights
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Film

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Film. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see lists of open tasks and regional and topical task forces. To use this banner, please refer to the documentation. To improve this article, please refer to the guidelines.FilmWikipedia:WikiProject FilmTemplate:WikiProject Filmfilm

Literature Low‑importance

	Literature portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Literature, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Literature on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.LiteratureWikipedia:WikiProject LiteratureTemplate:WikiProject LiteratureLiterature
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Horror

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Horror, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to fictional horror in film, literature and other media on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can edit one of the articles mentioned below, or visit the project page, where you can join the project and contribute to the general Project discussion to talk over new ideas and suggestions.HorrorWikipedia:WikiProject HorrorTemplate:WikiProject Horrorhorror
???	This article has not yet received a rating on the project's importance scale.

Military history: Post-Cold War B‑class

This article is within the scope of the Military history WikiProject. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the project and see a list of open tasks. To use this banner, please see the full instructions.Military historyWikipedia:WikiProject Military historyTemplate:WikiProject Military historymilitary history

B

This article has been rated as B-class on the project's quality scale.

This article has been checked against the following criteria for B-class status:
Referencing and citation: criterion met Coverage and accuracy: criterion met Structure: criterion met Grammar and style: criterion met Supporting materials: criterion met

Associated task forces:
/
	Post-Cold War task force

Did you know nomination

The following is an archived discussion of the DYK nomination of the article below. Please do not modify this page. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as this nomination's talk page, the article's talk page or Wikipedia talk:Did you know), unless there is consensus to re-open the discussion at this page. No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was: promoted by Kavyansh.Singh (talk) 05:11, 9 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

(

Comment or view
Article history

)

... that inaccurate depictions of torture in fiction have been cited to justify torture and are imitated by real-life torturers? Source: various, see article
- ALT1: ... that efficient and professional torture is found only in fiction? Source: Rejali 2009, p. 547: "When I argued in chapter23that Trinquier’s model of efficient, selective,professional torture was fictional, I meant that literally. That is where you willfind it: in novels, television series, and movies"
- Reviewed: Template:Did you know nominations/Verein für germanisches Heidentum ‎

Created by Buidhe (talk). Self-nominated at 09:38, 22 February 2022 (UTC).[reply]

General: Article is new enough and long enough
New enough: Long enough:

Policy: Article is sourced, neutral, and free of copyright problems
Adequate sourcing: Neutral: Free of copyright violations, plagiarism, and close paraphrasing:

Hook: Hook has been verified by provided inline citation
Cited: Interesting:

QPQ: Done.

Overall: Another heavy nomination, but its long enough, cited to multiple reliable sources, and seems fairly neutral. It's not exhaustive but it doesn't need to be to cover the topic well. There's room for expansion but it's fine as is right now. The hooks are all cited to solid sources, and interesting (I feel weird describing them that way though). No copyvio detected, and qpq is done. BuySomeApples (talk) 01:17, 1 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Comment. I'm not sure this belongs on the main page in this state, as every reader will quickly think up contrary examples that this article does not present. For instance, the implication that the Star Trek franchise promotes torture as a useful device is just plain wrong; in particular, try watching the 1992 Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Chain of Command", in which Captain Picard is tortured at great length for what turns out to be no useful reason and eventually tells his antagonist, "Torture has never been a reliable means of extracting information. It is ultimately self-defeating as a means of control. One wonders it is still practiced."^[1] There are plenty of movies where torture is shown to be futile and degrading to those doing it, for example the prominent 1998 film The Siege. There are plenty of TV procedurals where law enforcement people are tempted to beat an answer out of a suspect but don't, and instead figure out how to get the information they need without it. And the article's idea that TV shows are helping to provide techniques and justifications for torturers is, unfortunately, not in alignment with any reading of history. People have figured out how to conduct torture, and to justify it to themselves, before TV, before radio, before novels, before the printing press, and, as archeological findings sometimes show, before writing itself. Most of this article is sourced to two authors; I would suspect there are some more balanced or nuanced views out there on this subject. Wasted Time R (talk) 01:43, 24 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
- Hi Wasted Time R, I'm not sure where you got the idea that the article says Star Trek in general promotes torture? The only Star Trek show mentioned is Star Trek: Enterprise where the protagonists indeed used torture. I agree the article could use expansion, but I think it meets DYK requirements. (t · c) buidhe 01:57, 24 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
- I also don't think the article is saying that media causes torture, just that (positive? effective?) portrayals of it in media can impact people's perceptions of it. It's kinda like how people might have drank milk forever, but media can influence whether people drink more or less milk. BuySomeApples (talk) 19:32, 25 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  - Exactly (t · c) buidhe 19:39, 25 February 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Promoting ALT1, the concise hook, to Prep 6. I read through the article; there is scope for expansion but this meets the DYK criteria. – Kavyansh.Singh (talk) 05:11, 9 March 2022 (UTC) [reply]

References
References ^ Lapidos, Juliet (May 7, 2009). "There Are Four Lights!". Slate.

Misreading of name

I first read the title as "Culture in popular torture".

Now that would be a really interesting article to read, if it were possible. Daniel Case (talk) 20:39, 9 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

@Daniel Case: Popular culture is commonly used as a form of torture. For example, see Musicians tell US to ban using songs as torture. So, the article we need is popular culture in torture, eh? See also Vogon poetry... Andrew🐉(talk) 08:37, 15 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

"Only in fiction"?

The appearance at DYK provoked some discussion at WP:ERRORS. It was not resolved but has scrolled off there now so, for the record, here's the issues.. Andrew🐉(talk) 17:39, 15 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

... that efficient and professional torture is found only in fiction? two hooks about torture (this one and torture) ran relatively close together. Therapyisgood (talk) 01:57, 15 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

From what I understand, this isn't an error if it's not in the same set. This applies to any topic such as the common radio stations, German musicians, etc. SL93 (talk) 01:59, 15 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Pull The current hook is as false as a forced confession.

The article in question is torture in popular culture. Studies of fictional torture are obviously of little use in telling us what happens in the real world. And the article doesn't actually make this absolute and extreme claim – it uses the word "often" rather than "only".

If you read our article on interrogational torture, it tells quite a different story. Firstly, note that it distinguishes torture used to extract information from other cases where torture is used for other reasons such as punishment, deterrent or sadism. The fictional article fails to make this point even though there are plenty of examples in fiction. And then our article about the real thing has a section about effectiveness which provides examples showing that "research on the history of torture suggests that torture has, at times, proven quite effective". As for professionalism, the book Torture and the Military Profession indicates that real torturers often adopt professional attitudes as a form of self-justification and self-righteousness.

So, as this is an IPC article, it should stick to fiction rather than making unlikely claims about what actually happened throughout history.

Andrew🐉(talk) 08:22, 15 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Pinging nominator Buidhe, reviewer BuySomeApples, and promoter Kavyansh.Singh. SL93 (talk) 08:31, 15 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Darius Rejali is one of the top scholars of torture in the real world, who has also written about fictional torture. It's true that torturers often pretend to adopt "professional" or "scientific" attitudes, but most sources agree that this does not reflect the reality, in which torture is a pseudoscience that leads to erosion of professional skills (see the last paragraph of Torture#Effects). If you read the article, interrogation is not the main reason for torture anyway and claims about effectiveness compared to other means of obtaining information are impossible to test and highly disputed. (t · c) buidhe 08:49, 15 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

If such claims are "impossible to test" and "highly disputed" then we should not be making absolute and sweeping statements about them. Andrew🐉(talk) 09:16, 15 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

All sources agree that in real life, torture is never effective in the same way as depicted in popular culture and the drawbacks are rarely portrayed. As the popular culture article states, "Torture can be a convenient plot device to extract information, and when the hero is the torturer, it almost always works, usually quickly." In real life, torture is certainly not convenient in obtaining accurate information, often takes a long time to work if at all, and does not produce accurate information in most cases (if that's even the goal). (t · c) buidhe 09:19, 15 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

These are massive generalisations which reek of WP:RGW. Are these sweeping statements true throughout all of history? Consider the Gunpowder Plot, for example, which is a featured article. Torture was used against the conspirators and this seems to have been both effective and professional. There are countless examples throughout history and it seems to absurd to claim that they have never, ever been effective. Andrew🐉(talk) 10:01, 15 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The words "effective" and "professional" do not appear in the article. I think we should go with what the RS says rather than rely on original research. (t · c) buidhe 10:06, 15 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

The words "found only in fiction" do not appear in the article in question and so the hook is not supported. It's a basic breach of DYK rules which require "The hook should include a definite fact that is mentioned in the article ". Andrew🐉(talk) 10:18, 15 March 2022 (UTC)}}[reply]

[1] Lapidos, Juliet (May 7, 2009). "There Are Four Lights!". Slate.

[1]