A Simple Case for Torture, OR How to Sleep at Night Length: 62:00 Format: U-Matic, 1983

Martha Rosler identifies the totalitarian implications of an argument for torture, under certain circumstances, as it appears as a guest editorial in Newsweek magazine in 1982. Her critique is presented as a voiceover and a dizzying assemblage of radio and print media--articles on subjects ranging from human rights to unemployment and global economics. Implicating the U.S. government and American businesses for supporting regimes that systematically use torture, she indicts the American press for its role as an agent of disinformation through selective coverage and its use of language, and for implicitly legitimizing points of view that support torture.