Day 67

A—

Sometimes we almost wanted to tell them that if they had a bit of consideration for us they’d speak out without forcing us to spend hours tearing information word by word out of them. But you might as well talk to the wall. To all the questions we asked them they’d only say ‘I don’t know’. ... So of course, we have to go through with it. But they scream too much. At the beginning that made me laugh. But afterwards I was a bit shaken. Nowadays as soon as I hear someone shouting I can tell you exactly at what stage of the questioning we’ve got to. The chap who’s had two blows of the fist and a belt of the baton behind his ear has a certain way of speaking, of shouting and of saying that he’s innocent. After he’s been left two hours strung up by the wrists he has another kind of voice. After the bath still another. And so on. But above all it’s after the electricity that it becomes really too much. You’d say that the chap was going to die any minute. Of course there are some that don’t scream; those are the tough ones. ... with those tough ones, the first thing we do is to make them squeal; and sooner or later we manage it. That’s already a victory. ... But they don’t make things easy for us. Now I’ve come so as I hear their screams even when I’m at home. ... Doctor, I’m fed up with this job. And if you manage to cure me, I’ll ask to be transferred back to France. If they refuse, I’ll resign.

Psychiatric case study of a French policeman in Algiers, reported by F. Fanon in The Wretched of the Earth (Penguin Books, 1963) p. 213—214.