Spy Games, 6/1
Sarah started the class by handing slips of paper to Katina, Agnes, Alice, Claire, Edmund, Effy, Griff, Karla and Liir assuming they were all here. "If you get a piece of paper," she announced, "don't read it out loud, don't show it to your neighbor, don't drop it on the floor. Consider it classified information."
The papers said THERE IS CANDY ON THE TOP SHELF OF THE CABINET IN THE BACK OF THE ROOM, so it might not have seemed all that cloak-and-dagger, but Sarah was a spy.
"Anyhow, today we're talking about persuasion and interrogation. It's another basic piece of spywork -- somebody knows something you don't know, and you want to find out what it is. The ideal is to get them to tell you without realizing what they gave away, but that's not always possible. I'm passing out a handout listing off some common interrogation techniques, ranging from direct questioning -- which actually works most of the time -- to 'good cop-bad cop', playing on the other person's emotions, repeating the question until the other person gets bored enough to answer, or lying to convince the subject you already know everything anyhow. I'd recommend you take a few minutes to read through the handout before we move on." She did that, reviewing it herself while the class read.
"As you may have gathered from the start of class, half of you know something now. You're interviewees. The other half don't. You're interrogators. Interrogators, you can use any tactic up to the threat of physical force to find out what was written on the paper. No actual physical force, and if your interviewee seriously tells you to back off, back off. Work in interrogator-interviewee pairs or in small groups. And if you find out what's on the paper, you may put the information to use at the end of class. That goes double for any interviewee who makes it through without cracking."
The papers said THERE IS CANDY ON THE TOP SHELF OF THE CABINET IN THE BACK OF THE ROOM, so it might not have seemed all that cloak-and-dagger, but Sarah was a spy.
"Anyhow, today we're talking about persuasion and interrogation. It's another basic piece of spywork -- somebody knows something you don't know, and you want to find out what it is. The ideal is to get them to tell you without realizing what they gave away, but that's not always possible. I'm passing out a handout listing off some common interrogation techniques, ranging from direct questioning -- which actually works most of the time -- to 'good cop-bad cop', playing on the other person's emotions, repeating the question until the other person gets bored enough to answer, or lying to convince the subject you already know everything anyhow. I'd recommend you take a few minutes to read through the handout before we move on." She did that, reviewing it herself while the class read.
"As you may have gathered from the start of class, half of you know something now. You're interviewees. The other half don't. You're interrogators. Interrogators, you can use any tactic up to the threat of physical force to find out what was written on the paper. No actual physical force, and if your interviewee seriously tells you to back off, back off. Work in interrogator-interviewee pairs or in small groups. And if you find out what's on the paper, you may put the information to use at the end of class. That goes double for any interviewee who makes it through without cracking."