The silence of those who bear executive responsibility can be a form of white torture: silent, without wounds and without blood, yet at times lethal. Such silence can drive a citizen to psychological collapse, suicidal thoughts, isolation, or social and political elimination; it may actually cause them to take their own life.
Killing with silence and in silence is one of the most insidious methods of killing a human being. In this form of killing, the killer does not need to use a firearm or a blade. There is no need to stage an accident. No poison is required. It is enough for political or bureaucratic officials to remain silent in the face of a citizen’s legitimate request; not an accidental silence, but a prolonged, systematic and responsibility-evading silence. In such a situation, the citizen gradually loses their psychological equilibrium and may take their own life.
This is precisely the point that Realpolitik seeks to exploit: the citizen dies, but apparently no one has killed them. The citizen collapses, but apparently they simply ‘could not cope with the pressure’. The citizen ends up in a psychiatric hospital, but apparently they merely had a ‘psychological problem’. Yet if we trace the path from the beginning, we observe that the silence of officials, leaving legitimate requests unanswered, blocking avenues for recourse, and the continuous wearing down of a person’s nerves are all part of the very process of killing with silence and in silence.
Of course, a distinction must be drawn between ordinary silence and a silence that turns into white torture. Not every administrative delay, organisational irregularity, or short-term failure to respond can be termed white torture. White torture begins when silence goes beyond a simple incident or an administrative error and becomes an erosive method of disregarding a human being.
For the silence of officials or institutions to become white torture, at least four important conditions must be present:
- The official or institution in question must have a legal or administrative duty to respond. This means that the citizen is asking for an answer from someone who is under a duty to deal with their legitimate request.
- The silence must be continuous, systematic and erosive. A delayed response is not the same as a silence that continues for months or years, trapping the citizen among offices, letters, files and unanswered requests.
- The citizen must have no real and effective avenue to receive an answer, obtain proper examination of the matter, or gain access to justice. If all doors are closed and every path leads back to the same silence, silence is no longer merely the absence of an answer; it becomes a wall that traps the human being inside it.
- The institution or official must know, or at least be in a position to know, that this silence is harming the person concerned. When the citizen repeatedly warns, writes letters, explains, asks for the matter to be examined, speaks of psychological pressure, or even talks about the risk of collapse and suicide, continuing the silence is no longer ignorance. In such a situation, silence becomes an act: silent, but devastating.
In this essay, ‘silence as white torture’ does not mean that every administrative failure to respond constitutes torture. The point is that when officials who are under a duty to respond deliberately and for a prolonged period remain silent in the face of a citizen’s legitimate request, leaving no effective way out of that situation, this silence can do to the human psyche what white torture does: silent erosion, without wounds and without blood, yet at times lethal.
In its established meaning, white torture refers to methods that break the human psyche without leaving visible wounds. In this text, the concept is extended to the silence of officials, because its moral mechanism is the same: harm is inflicted, yet no trace of blood, blows, a rope, a blade or a bullet remains. The victim collapses, yet the agents of power can say: ‘We did nothing.’
This is precisely the problem. This very ‘doing nothing’, when accompanied by a duty to respond, awareness of the harm caused by silence, and the absence of a way out, is no longer simple inaction; it is a responsibility-evading and devastating act: morally condemnable, and one that must also be legally actionable.
Such killing is a familiar practice in Realpolitik. A human being is driven out of their psychological equilibrium not by a firearm or a blade, not by a staged accident, and not by poison, but by the silence of a politician or bureaucrat.
Why?
Because politicians and bureaucrats do not want to accept responsibility and fulfil their duties. They do not respond to the citizen’s legitimate requests that they fulfil their duty; they simply remain silent. A systematic, prolonged silence. Such silence puts such pressure on the citizen’s nerves that it may drive them to suicidal thoughts.
Either the threat becomes reality and the citizen takes their own life, or the citizen threatens suicide and is then forced by the political-bureaucratic apparatus into the path of compulsory psychiatric intervention. I documented the second scenario — the declared threat of suicide and the transfer into the psychiatric system — so that it would serve as evidence against the political-bureaucratic apparatus of Realpolitik.
The point is not that every psychiatric intervention is wrong. We are speaking of a situation in which the responsible apparatus itself drives a human being to the brink of collapse through deliberate, systematic and erosive silence, but then records that very collapse not as a sign of institutional violence, but as a ‘personal problem’. In such a situation, we are faced with one of the most dangerous forms of institutional irresponsibility.
Here, the connection between this text and the Problem Replacement Pattern becomes clear. In that pattern, instead of receiving an answer, the critic themselves is turned into the ‘problem’. Once the critic has been turned into the problem, officials’ silence also appears justifiable. They are no longer dealing with a citizen who has the right to receive an answer; they are dealing with someone described as ‘difficult’, ‘a nuisance’, ‘unstable’, ‘angry’ or ‘problematic’. In this way, the Problem Replacement Pattern makes silence appear legitimate; and silence makes white torture possible.
The reality is that few people emerge alive and mentally intact from the ordeal of systematic silence to testify against it. My case and that of Märta Stenevi are exceptions. I entered this ordeal with full awareness, documented it, went through it from within, and was able to testify against it while maintaining my psychological equilibrium.
Years before I reached the point of documentation, my friends warned me against continuing to challenge the political-bureaucratic apparatus of Realpolitik, citing examples in which individuals had either taken their own lives or lost their psychological balance. A prominent Swedish jurist, who is a friend of mine, spoke of a prosecutor who lost their mental equilibrium under the pressure of systematic silence. Another spoke of a case that resulted in admission to a psychiatric hospital. My answer to those friends was that I am so psychologically resilient that the entire political-bureaucratic apparatus of Realpolitik cannot disrupt my mental equilibrium. And so it proved to be.
The other exception, Märta Stenevi, was different. Although she contemplated suicide, fortunately she never acted on it. I have read Märta’s book “Breathe. Survive.” three times. At one point she says: ‘I am glad that I am alive.’ I wrote in the margin of the book: I, too, am very glad that you are alive. [1]
Märta’s passage through the ordeal of systematic silence was extremely costly for her and her family. The suffering she and her children endured is reflected in her book and does not need to be repeated here. Yet this very experience demonstrates that silence, when imposed by a power structure, is not merely the absence of sound; it is a form of continuous pressure on the human psyche.
My moral duty, and the moral duty of other responsible human beings, is to do our utmost to put an end to the process of killing with silence and in silence.
It is truly impossible to know how many citizens each year in Sweden, or in other so-called democratic countries, take their own lives or lose their psychological balance under the pressure of officials’ silence. This is because this type of killing is not usually recorded in official statistics as a death caused by silence. If someone takes their own life, the case may be closed as depression, a personal crisis, or a psychological problem. But who investigates the process that drove them to that point? Who pieces together the unanswered letters, the closed doors, the circular referrals, the administrative humiliations and officials’ silence, and asks: did this human being really take their own life alone, or were they killed by silence?
A distressing example of the irresponsibility of the Swedish political-bureaucratic apparatus is the tragedy of keeping a large number of children under the age of six hungry in a chain of preschools. This very issue surfaced twice in the Swedish media over a period of nine years. The children’s parents, at least based on the files I was able to obtain, filed complaints against the owners of this preschool chain with bureaucratic authorities from 2012 to 2024, yet achieved no effective result, and the preschool continued the same practice of keeping children hungry. In one of the files, a rightfully angry parent says: ‘If you do nothing about this fraudulent company, I will take the matter further.’ [2]
The parent thinks they can go beyond that bureaucratic apparatus and obtain redress. However, the experience of twelve years of complaints and the futile efforts of dozens of parents demonstrates that, in practice, there is no effective and independent avenue for redress. If they try again, they will once more face the same silence, referrals, irresponsibility and psychological erosion. In such circumstances, if the parent breaks down and takes their own life, who is responsible for their death? Indeed, who will investigate the process that drove them to suicide?
Unlike Märta Stenevi, who is largely well known in Swedish society and whose lived experience of the ordeal has been both published and read, ordinary citizens have little chance of being seen or read, even if they write down their experiences. Thus, alongside my own experience, as far as I know, the book Breathe. Survive. can serve as an example of the suffering of those who have endured both silence and the pressure produced by silence.
But this pattern is not limited to Sweden. Killing with silence and in silence, or wearing down a human being with silence, does not occur in only one country and one language. There are examples in other countries as well, showing that powerful institutions, instead of responding and being accountable, can turn silence, denial, delay and irresponsibility into instruments for destroying human beings. Let us consider just a few examples:
1. The Minamata Disease Disaster in Japan
Minamata disease was first officially recognised in 1956 in the city of Minamata, Kumamoto Prefecture. Its cause was poisoning by methylmercury, a substance that entered the sea through industrial wastewater from the Chisso Corporation’s factory, accumulated in fish and shellfish, and then reached human bodies through the consumption of seafood. For years, the victims and their families faced physical, psychological and social suffering, as well as denial, delay and a lack of answers.
The significance of this example for our discussion is that silence and denial did not merely conceal the truth; they prolonged the suffering of the victims and left them alone in the face of the corporation, the state and society. Minamata demonstrates that officials’ silence, when sustained in the face of evident human suffering, can become a form of white torture: the victim is harmed, yet power seeks, through delay, denial and silence, to distance itself from accountability.
The Japanese government finally announced in 1968 that Minamata disease was caused by the consumption of fish and shellfish contaminated with methylmercury discharged from the Chisso chemical factory.
2. The Windrush Scandal in the United Kingdom
People who had arrived in the United Kingdom, mainly from Caribbean countries, in the decades after the Second World War, and who had lived there for most of their lives, suddenly faced the risk of losing their jobs, services, residence, healthcare and security because they were unable to provide documents that the government itself had, in many cases, failed to retain or manage properly. To prove their most self-evident right — the right to be in the place where they had spent their lives — many of them were confronted with bureaucratic walls, unanswered requests and institutional coldness. The official Windrush Lessons Learned Review demonstrates that this was not merely an individual error by a few civil servants, but a structural issue in the government’s treatment of citizens and lawful residents.
3. The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo and the Disappeared in Argentina
During the military dictatorship in Argentina, from 1976 to 1983, thousands of people were forcibly disappeared. Their families, particularly the mothers, had only one clear and legitimate question: Where are our children? They turned to state institutions, the police, the military and the courts, but power’s response was silence, denial and a refusal to answer.
The significance of this example for the discussion of ‘silence as white torture’ is that in enforced disappearance, silence is not merely concealment; leaving the families without answers is itself part of the suffering and torture. The mother does not know whether her child is alive or dead. She does not know where they are. She does not know if they have been tortured, killed, or are still being kept hidden somewhere. She cannot mourn, she cannot find closure, she cannot demand to know the truth, and every day she remains trapped between hope and terror. Through this very deliberate ambiguity, power inflicts psychological erosion upon the survivors.
In this example, the four conditions for silence to become white torture are clearly visible. The institutions of power had a duty to answer; the silence and denial continued for years; the families had no other genuine avenue to discover the truth; and the institutions knew that this very state of not knowing wore a human being down. Here, silence is not simply the absence of an answer; silence is an instrument for inflicting suffering. The family has the right to know the truth, but the institution of power, through silence, keeps the truth suspended and abandons the human being in an endless state of waiting, anxiety and powerlessness.
The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo gathered in the Plaza de Mayo from 1977 onwards, and through their peaceful yet persistent presence, transformed the government’s silence into a public question. This example demonstrates that sometimes power tortures a human being not with a false answer, but by providing no answer at all. Silence in the face of the right to know becomes, in itself, an instrument of torture.
4. The Bhopal Disaster in India
On the night of 2–3 December 1984, a toxic gas leak from the Union Carbide pesticide plant in the city of Bhopal caused one of the world’s worst industrial disasters. Thousands of people died within those first few days, and a far greater number suffered long-term illnesses. However, the disaster did not end when the gas leak stopped. For years, and then for decades, the survivors and the families of the victims demanded accountability, fair compensation, the clean-up of the contaminated environment and criminal proceedings.
The significance of Bhopal for this treatise lies not solely in the disaster itself, but in its aftermath. Responsibility was diffused among the corporation, the state, the courts, administrative bodies and international structures. The victims pursued their cases repeatedly, only to be met with delay, referral, denial, silence and prolonged psychological erosion. Here, ‘silence as white torture’ intersects with the Circular Referral Pattern for Suspending Responsibility: responsibility is shifted from one institution to another until it is ultimately lost in bureaucratic and legal pathways.
Bhopal demonstrates that Realpolitik does not operate solely within the domestic politics of countries; it is also present in the relationship between major corporations and states, as well as between courts and injured citizens. The victim is left with illness and contamination, and is then worn down and ultimately destroyed by prolonged, futile referrals and unending silence.
5. The Antiretroviral Drugs Case in South Africa
In the early 2000s, patients, doctors and civil society organisations urged the South African government to provide widespread access to antiretroviral drugs, particularly to prevent the mother-to-child transmission of HIV. However, the government’s response was characterised by denial, delay, disregard and political resistance. While medical science had shown the way to reduce death and suffering, a political decision and the silence of officials delayed access to treatment for many human beings.
This example illustrates that the silence of officials sometimes does not merely erode a single citizen or a single family; it can destroy the lives of numerous people on a massive scale. When a government knows that delaying treatment can lead to death, yet still responds with denial, delay or silence, silence is no longer simple inaction. In such a situation, silence becomes a political decision, the cost of which is paid with the lives of patients, mothers, children and families.
The significance of this example is that it demonstrates white torture does not always occur in an interrogation room or behind the closed doors of a government office. Sometimes, it happens at the level of public policy: human beings ask for help, science points the way, the responsible institution has the power to act, but the real response is delayed. The result is erosion, illness and death.
These examples demonstrate that the silence of officials is not a local or personal issue. Irresponsibility, alongside immorality, lying and conspiratorial conduct, is among the defining characteristics of Realpolitik and manifests itself everywhere. The tragic aspect of this matter is that minds deprived of Wise Education, by accepting the logical fallacy of ‘It’s Like This Everywhere’, may perceive the global existence and presence of irresponsibility as natural and immutable.
The bitter reality is that in structures based on Realpolitik, silence is a common method for evading responsibility. When silence is coupled with power, when it is backed by law, bureaucracy, position, files and official titles, it is no longer merely silence; it is a form of organised pressure on a human being.
In such a situation, the citizen is not merely faced with an unanswered letter. They are confronted with a wall that does not speak, yet crushes them. They are faced with a system that does not say ‘no’, but blocks the path. They are confronted with a power that does not torture them physically, but targets only their psyche. And this is precisely white torture: violence without the appearance of violence.
The way out of this situation cannot be limited to exposing the truth after a disaster. Silence must be recognised as an act of evading responsibility before a disaster occurs. Institutions must be required to provide clear, documented and traceable responses to citizens’ legitimate requests.
Prolonged silence in the face of a lawful request must itself be investigated as a sign of danger and irresponsibility. There must be an independent avenue for citizens so that, when public authorities, politicians and bureaucrats remain silent, they can break out of that closed circle and gain access to a genuine and independent authority for redress.
It must be accepted globally that such silence, when deliberate, prolonged, systematic and with no way out, is morally and legally equivalent to white torture.
Here, we return once more to Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights, understanding and tolerance. However, a human being who has not learned from childhood what responsibility means, what rights mean, what justice means, what law means, and what the consequences of silence in the face of human suffering are, can become dangerous when they attain power.
When an individual deprived of Wise Education reaches an administrative or political position, they may think that the power entrusted to them is not a responsibility to answer to citizens and resolve their problems, but something they may use as they wish. A person lacking the full development of the human personality may not know, or even if they do know, may not care, that their prolonged silence in the face of human suffering is a silent crime.
The purpose of this text is not merely to name an affliction. Its purpose is to issue a warning. If a citizen has stood against the political-bureaucratic apparatus and spent years writing letters, lodging complaints, providing explanations and issuing warnings, yet received no response, society as a whole is responsible. The individual harmed by silence must not be left alone. Their suffering is real because the pressure that silence exerts on the human psyche is real. They must seek help from trustworthy people, doctors, lawyers, independent institutions, responsible media and any safe avenue that still remains. Asking for help is not a sign of weakness; it is a sign of resistance against an apparatus that wants the human being to break in silence and through silence.
The conclusion is clear: the silence of officials, when prolonged, systematic, deliberate and with no way out in the face of a citizen’s legitimate request, is white torture. Such silence can erode a human being, tear a family apart, destroy a reputation, push a citizen into the psychiatric system, or drive them to take their own life. In Realpolitik, power does not always violate human rights through action. Sometimes, power does nothing but remain silent; and this very silence itself violates human rights and can even kill human beings.
[1] The original Swedish title of the book is Andas. Överlev. The original Swedish sentence is: ‘Jag är glad att jag lever.’
[2] The original Swedish sentence is: ‘Gör ni ingenting åt detta bluff företag går jag vidare med ärendet.’