Torture

[O Really]

Maybe, but "torture" is sometimes more effective as a fear than as a fact. I lived in Greece during part of the time when the military junta was in power, so I know a little about living in a country under a real dictatorship - which is way different from living under a not-even-wannabe "dictatorship" of a President Obama whose chain is held and yanked by the right wing loons. There were stories (probably with some basis in truth) of people being hauled off in the middle of the night by the police gestapo and taken to hidden chambers where their feet were beaten and other misery heaped upon them. It was easy to find somebody who "had a friend whose cousin got beaten..." but much more difficult to find somebody who themselves ( or their brother or their father) had been abducted and beaten. But everyone was convinced it happens - randomly and outside the control of the individual - and it was terrrifying. It was "Room 101." What is known can be fought. What is unknown but feared is much stronger. If you know the guy behind the screen isn't really Oz, you might very well be more willing to riot, or whatever.