Eighteen Mental Emotions Deployed within
The Hunchback of Bel Air
1. Why were the victims taken away? A. They bullied someone.
2. Why the cages? A. So victims feel like trapped animals.
3. Why the four feet high cages? A. So victims would have to bend over.
4. Why chains and shackles? A. To lead victims around the arena for display.
5. Why did the chains only reach the cage door? A. To warn, “don’t cross the line.”
6. Why were the cage doors left open? A. To tease of a possible escape.
7. Why dog bowl feedings? A. To make the victims feel less human.
8. Why was the clock on the wall unplugged at 12? A. To only show the stroke of Midnight.
9. Why numbers on the cages? A. To let everyone know ahead of time when it’s their turn to die.
10. Why were the cage numbers rotated? A. To show when victims will be taken to the butcher shop.
11. Why were family members projected on the flat screens? A. No worse fear than losing a loved one.
12. What was the chamber used for? A. Brainwashing and mental cleansing.
13. Why were the flat screens used above the arena? A. To interrupt peaceful moments.
14. Why were voice activated cameras used in the arena? A. To limit privacy and record conversations.
15. Why was a plaque defining a dungeon read to the new captives? A. To let you know you are in a dungeon.
16. Why was there a “Don’t talk, whisper only” flashing light? A. To insure guilt and set off the chain of events.
17. Why parade a German Shepherd dog around the arena? A. To exploit Knuckles fear of dogs.
18. Why were the POST ITS left on the arena floor? A. They show # of victims taken away.
The Chamber: Nazi’s in WW2 used circular sound chambers to torture victims with eardrum piercing sound waves while watching their reactions. Constant experimental brainwashing was practiced inside the chamber to change victims personalities and values.
SONIC TORTURE AT DACHAU
From the outset, Nazi camp commanders made deliberate use of music to mentally break the prisoners and to rob them of their dignity and cultural identity. They also used it to achieve ideological ends. By using the camp’s loudspeaker system, present in some of the earliest camps, they aimed to manipulate, intimidate and indoctrinate the prisoners. During the first generation of concentration camps, Dachau formally integrated music into daily life more than any other camp.
SONIC TORTURE WITH “NATIONAL” MUSIC
Dachau opened on March 22, 1933 in a closed-down munitions factory. Its barracks could hold a maximum of 5,000 prisoners. According to the former inmate Walter Hornung, the camp commander, Theodor Eicke, 'tried with all the means available to him to teach the prisoners nationalist principles and to drive the internationalist ones out'. In addition to such 'patriotic music', there was marching music, such as the famous march 'Fridericus Rex,' as well as recordings of the workers’ song 'Brüder, zur sonne, zur freiheit!' (Brothers, towards the sun, towards freedom!), a song that had been co-opted by the Nazi movement.
POLITICAL RE-EDUCATION OF THE PRISONERS
Apart from such sonic torture with German 'national' music, the loudspeaker system was also regularly put into action during festivals and holidays symbolically important to the Nazi regime. Examples of this included Workers’ Day (1 May), misused by the Nazis for their own purposes. The loudspeaker system was also used during elections, party congresses and plebiscites. On these days the Nazis tortured their prisoners, whom they had branded as 'nationless fellows', with speeches by Nazi party leaders.
CAMOUFLAGE FOR TORTURE AND THE DISINHIBITION OF THE GUARDS
Music was also used, finally, during interrogations and the torture that usually went along with them. 'The music coming from the loudspeakers in the camp mixed with the screams and moans of the tormented.' Often only a few notes of music sufficed for more experienced prisoners to realize what was happening and what kind of torture was being inflicted on one of their comrades.