What Cole underwent most definitely qualifies as torture.
No matter how someone twists and turns it even if its for his own "good" he was a child undergoing brutal experiments that left plenty of damage to his psyche.
There's a whole plethora of issues with what happened to Cole. Obviously we have no clue what happened to the other kids (yet) but I have no doubts that Bramon did other extreme things with them.
People confuse me with this honestly even if he knew it was for his own "good" there is no way he as a child would ever just "suck it up" and take all that pain and punishment without begging for it to stop.
I'm not saying it doesn't make sense for him to hate Bramon, nor that it is acceptable to do that to a child (or anyone really) against their will, as i said "there are quite a few valid reasons to critizice HERO", but the superhuman world is dangerous no matter your age or choice, Cole from his own present way of thinking should understand that his "torture" had the purpose to make him stronger, or even be the difference between him being alive or dead, from what Bramon said he had to do that because he was too young and otherwise his body wouldn't resist, also if he worships Ella for the way she acts, she is the one sending people to the most dangerous situations to get stronger, if anything Bramon had him in a controled enviroment were he could stop if in real danger.
Yes it makes sense and is entirely justified that he hates Bramon and HERO but he deludes himself in thinking that it didn't serve a purpose, that it wasn't in his own benefit and that it was just for sake of hurting him.
Edit: Well, the definition of torture is to hurt someone with the intent of extracting information, at least on my country's judicial system, i'm not arguing semantics but hurting somenone with the purpose of making their body stronger and increasing their survival chances doesn't seem like a book example of torture, i think that performing surgery against someones will while not providing anesthesia is a better comparison.
Didn't you get that from all the dialogue in the game that Cole hates Tanos even more?He is with SIN only because of Ella the man literally only cares about is being with Ella and to be with her he knows he needs to be strong that's it as for the torture part it is torture ffs physical and psychological both doing experiments on a kid who wasn't even a teen is torture lol.It doesn't matter what "good" they wanted to do it's still torturing a child and guess what it wouldn't be even that bad if they didn't keep him and the others as lab rats.The kids got zero nurturing there was no adult to give them love or even appreciation.If after all the physical torture he got some love and appreciation he wouldn't be this fucked up.So not only was it physical torture it was mental as well.Cole wouldn't be this fucked up if hero nurtured them not to mention just imagine your life as kid is about every day you just go and feel pain and that's it.It is more likely than not that kid would be fucked up.It doesn't excuse him being POS but it's understandable why he turned out like this.I got zero love for Cole and would kill him if I get the chance but let's not change the facts and act like what happened to him as a kid wasn't torture in both physical and psychological manner.
Yes, everything about Cole hating HERO makes sense, but my answer was about SIN being hypocritical, manipulative and self deluded while critizicing HERO, Cole definitly hates Tanos at least as much as Bramon but SIN as an organization uses the same methods as HERO or even worse, even though the same Cole was preaching about how HERO tortures people while Tanos was doing the exact same thing in SIN and he was very aware of that.
Despite their personal views and feelings both Cole and Shen represent their organization and act as if they weren't doing the same behind the curtains.
