Oh, how I love Think Progress.
Eric Mancow wanted to get himself waterboarded for the purpose of proving that waterboarding isn't torture. The result?
"The average person can take this for 14 seconds," Marine Sergeant Clay South answered, adding, "He's going to wiggle, he's going to scream, he's going to wish he never did this."
With a Chicago Fire Department paramedic on hand, Mancow was placed on a 7-foot long table, his legs were elevated, and his feet were tied up.
Turns out the stunt wasn't so funny. Witnesses said Muller thrashed on the table, and even instantly threw the toy cow he was holding as his emergency tool to signify when he wanted the experiment to stop. He only lasted 6 or 7 seconds.
"It is way worse than I thought it would be, and that's no joke,"Mancow said, likening it to a time when he nearly drowned as a child. "It is such an odd feeling to have water poured down your nose with your head back...It was instantaneous...and I don't want to say this: absolutely torture."
An admission that wasn't without stubbornness, but I respect him for admitting that he was wrong. Still, the problem with a lot of conservative commentators is that they lack even a modicum of empathy on this issue. When one actually has it done to himself, my how that opinion changes!
The MSNBC article also references Christopher Hitchens's article, where he wrote about his own personal experience being waterboarded:
Last year, Vanity Fair writer Christopher Hitchens endured the same experiment -- and came to a similar conclusion. The conservative writer said he found the treatment terrifying, and was haunted by it for months afterward.
"Well, then, if waterboarding does not constitute torture, then there is no such thing as torture," Hitchens concluded in the article.
We're waiting, Mr. Hannity.
Edit 1: Oh wow. Major hat tip to KevinNYC for finding the video:
Edit 2: I just got home and I've begun reading some of the comments posted since I last checked. I saw one comment, which hinted that this would make good reality television. To anyone else who shares this sentiment, I've got to ask: what the fuck is wrong with you? We're taking something that has traumatized many people and planning on making it a spectacle on fucking ESPN?
When you watched the movie of Mancow getting waterboarded, what were you feeling? I was glad that Mancow confessed that his misconceptions on waterboarding (and torture in general) were indeed misconceptions.
However, I honestly wish that the pursuit of truth on this issue did not have to come to commentators using waterboarding for shock value. True story. I wish these people could do their research. I wish these people would read what SERE instructors have to say. I wish these people were much more inclined to show some empathy.
Make no mistake though, something constructive did come out of Mancow's stunt, hence why I think the net result of this stunt was positive. But I wish this wasn't the only way for these people to come to realization, and I damn well don't want to make the actual waterboarding a source of entertainment for people.
I don't want to see Hannity waterboarded for sadistic reasons and I hope I speak for the majority here. I want to see him waterboarded because in the seconds after it's over, he will have a chance to tell his audience that it is torture and help clear up the misconception that it isn't. Even if he manages to be a douche and try and tell us that it isn't after having gone through it, trust me, it will show.