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So much to admire in this @apcbapcb review of @Laurence_Ralph's #thetortureletters. For one, the articulation that we can practice listening and writing in a way that holds off voyeurism and promotes healing. | A Legacy of Torture in Chicago https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2020/07/02/legacy-police-torture-chicago/ via @nybooks
"The writer who takes up violence always risks becoming a voyeur, or, more accurately, a scavenger, harvesting and arranging the details of other people’s suffering for purposes that may include stimulating and facilitating the voyeurism of readers."
"It is... easy to push aside one prejudicial account (in which they are fundamentally inferior) only to [replace] it with something not much better: a story in which they are fundamentally broken. The scholar Eve Tuck has a useful term for work like this: 'damage-centered.'"
"The Torture Letters shows a... commitment, never shying away from torture’s destructive effects but also refusing to present those effects as a dark morass that is impossible to overcome."
The review describes @Laurence_Ralph's process, gathering people affected by police brutality into groups, to listen with reverence, and contemplate the letters. Writing not "about," but "with."
Here's the NYT's animated rendition of some of #thetortureletters, read by the author @Laurence_Ralph. https://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000007205588/the-torture-letters.html
