Suzanne Cusick asserts "acoustical violence" used on prisoners induces negative psychological effects

by Michael Koester '13
NEWS WRITER

Being held in an uncomfortable position and forced to listen to music for three days non-stop is reminiscent of torture techniques used in Stanley Kubrick’s futuristic A Clockwork Orange— not commonly perceived as a method used by a modern Western government.

Yet Suzanne Cusick, professor of music on the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at New York University, has found examples of this “acoustical violence” in many of the infamous cases of torture that plague the reputation of the United States. In her lecture last Monday afternoon, part of the Levitt Center series on “Diversity and Social Justice,” Cusick denounced the “acoustical torture” policies of the US government, citing the psychological effects that can last well beyond imprisonment.

Both the CIA and the government repeatedly exposed prisoners in Iraq and Guantanamo to loud Western music, including hard rock, country, and rap in their cells for as many as 16 hours a day. In the isolation of their cells, the prisoners only heard loud and intrusive sounds, preventing them from hearing other sounds and relating to their environment. After undergoing physical torture, Cusick explained, “You still have your thought process... You still have yourself.” But after experiencing “acoustical torture, you’re gone.”

Cusick explained that constant exposure to these Western sounds forced the torturees to “vibrate” to the sounds of their enemy—a “vibration” or feeling that the prisoners were not used to, which caused psychological despair.

The most scarring example of “acoustical torture” was the interrogation of “prisoner X” at Guantanamo Bay. Suspected of helping to plot the 9/11 terrorist attacks, X was taken to a dark room for solitary confinement and shackled to the floor in an awkward squatting position. The room was lit with strobe lights and X was forced to listen to the sounds of American hard rock. The music and the lights were the only means of sensual perception for X, who was additionally strained in his uncomfortable position. The prisoner claimed that he was kept in the room in these conditions for as little as two hours and sometimes up to three days—while interrogators watched him from behind a two-way mirror.

Many of the torturees who lived in these prisons and underwent interrogation are currently suffering from paranoia and are afraid to leave their homes. Many cannot listen to the TV and radio like they used to without being reminded of the torture they suffered.

But the biggest terror from their ordeals was the prisoners’ frustration with the United States justice system. A prisoner, who grew up under Saddam Hussein’s rule in Iraq, explained his disappointment to Cusick: “We thought [the US] was the place we could look to [for justice].”