October 13, 2004

There is a stereotype called the good cop/bad cop. It is a tactic of persuasion and it resembles the relationship between the con artist and the shill who baits the sucker into raising the stakes. The good cop is the handler and the bad cop is the rottweiller. Headway is made by the bad cop who extracts punishment that is larger than the circumstances and bludgeoning the witness with threats and/or a chair. The good cop yanks the leash and gives the witness short shrift to comply with their wishes. Rinse and repeat.

The main purpose is to break down the nerve of the witness; Complementing their excellent progress, then imposing unreasonable demands (like implicating his family) and penalise the witness for being uncooperative. As a result the witness doesn't know if he is coming or going. He loses his ability to "read" his interrogators. He loses the rational capacity because the mixed signals do not make sense and the single logical certainty is: If I do and say whatever these people tell me, I will not have to endure this anymore. This is, of course, the conclusion your interrogators want you to arrive at.

It rarely comes to this, the utter confusion disrupts your rational sense and the lack of sunlight and windows disrupts your sense of time. The double-header leaves you askew or at least off-kilter. Maybe you go into the ordeal with indignant feelings on unethical interrogation techniques. Nil bastardes carburundum. Or something: Do not let the bastards beat you down. From Handmaid's Tale. In the book, the quote is revealed to be comical in tone. The icing is you give it up willingly. What you give up is your accountability. It is the signed confession that you sat atop the grassy knoll.

It's not a stereotype it's a persuasion tactic. I've seen too many cop shows. The good yin to the bad yang. It makes very disturbing sense and the solution appears to be breaking the fourth wall. Outright calling out the strategy as the interrogators use it.

But cooperation is the burden of the witness. Not even a panic button. Any ground gained by the witness is negligible when your interrogators have two hands firmly grasping the rug, openly inviting me to fuck back, ready to pull out from under at any time.