mental torture?

A Pakistani-born US resident detained at Guantanamo Bay has said he was "mentally tortured" there, according to a transcript released by the Pentagon.

however, here's a partial list of the things he considers to be "mental torture":

*taking away a picture of his daughter [mean, maybe, but torture? i think not]

*giving him new glasses with the wrong perscription [this one would qualify as mean if it were intentional, and rather stupid if it were unintentional (you'd think we'd be able to get that sort of thing right); again, i see no torture]

*shaving his beard off [if something as trivial as a beard is that important to you, it may be time to rethink your priorities; if allah is any kind of god worth the title, he'll love you anyways]

*forcibly feeding him when he went on a hunger strike [damn us for keeping him alive!]

*denying him the opportunity for recreation; and even worse, when we did let him recreate, there were "half-inflated balls in the recreation room that 'hardly bounce'" [so, you plan to blow stuff up, and we're supposed to give you recreation time? not on my watch. also, when i was in elementary school, students were occasionally kept in the classroom during recess as punishment for misbehaving. were they being "mentally tortured" as well?]

this, of course, was just too much for the poor man to take: "This led him to attempt to chew through his artery twice, Mr Khan said." i bet we gave him medical treatment after that as well, horrible bastards that we are.

my favorite instances of "psychological abuse" are in the last paragraph:

*cheap, branded, unscented soap [cleanliness may be next to godliness, but does your soap really need to smell good to get the job done?]

*noisy fans [suck it up and deal with it buddy]

*the prison newsletter [is the writing actually that bad? also, nobody is forcing you to read it]

honestly, the article looks like it would fit better in a scrappleface post than on the bbc website. i had a hard time not bursting out laughing when i read it.