Starvation: Birger King

How long could you survive if someone simply decided you weren't allowed to eat anymore?

In this episode of Torture: A Dark History, Kevin Young and Dan Hourigan explore one of the oldest and most horrifying forms of punishment imaginable: starvation. We begin in medieval Sweden with King Birger Magnusson, whose Christmas banquet at Nyköping Castle ended with his brothers locked in a dungeon and left to die without food.

From there, we travel through history to uncover how starvation was used by kings, emperors, governments, armies, dictators, and ordinary people as a method of torture, execution, punishment, and control. We'll visit Ancient Rome, China, medieval Europe, the Tower of London, the American Civil War, Nazi Germany, Stalin's Soviet Union, Mao's China, and modern conflicts, examining some of the most devastating examples of starvation being deliberately used against human beings.

But what actually happens to the human body when you stop eating? We'll break down ketosis, autophagy, severe malnutrition, marasmus, kwashiorkor, organ failure, psychological changes, and refeeding syndrome, and discover just how long the human body can keep itself alive when it has nothing left to consume.

We'll also get into some disturbing true crime cases involving people who used starvation against those who were supposed to be under their care, including the infamous Linda Hazzard, the so called “Starvation Doctor,” and several horrifying cases involving children who were deliberately deprived of food.

And because this is Torture: A Dark History, Kevin and Dan bring their morbid sense of humor to a subject where the phrase “I'm starving” suddenly becomes a lot less funny.

If you love starvation torture, medieval history, Ancient Rome, historical torture, war crimes, the Holocaust, true crime, dark history, mass starvation, famine, human survival, and some of history's most horrifying methods of punishment, this episode is going to leave you with a very different appreciation for your next meal.

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https://academic.oup.com/jicj/article/17/4/699/5721410

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Birger-Magnusson

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Trehenban#cite_note-2

https://www.iiea.com/blog/the-rome-statute-and-hunger-as-a-weapon-of-war-the-journey-towards-ending-impunity-for-starvation-tactics

https://www.fox19.com/2022/05/26/mother-her-boyfriend-charged-starvation-torture-8-year-old-twins-resulting-ones-death/

https://www.cleveland.com/court-justice/2022/10/euclid-couple-who-tortured-abused-starved-boy-get-decades-in-prison.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_Hazzard

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