“Like a Dog!”: Humiliation and Shame in the War on Terror

Abstract

An examination of the disturbing practice of torture and abuse in the “global war on terror,” focusing on the methods and motivations of the United States. Proceeding from the imaginary yet all-too-real world of Kafka and the Kafkaesque, it highlights the themes of humiliation and shame in the waging of this war, noting that the damage so caused is reciprocal and indivisible: “Whoever degrades another degrades me.”