emsr2d2,
With all respect, I don't agree with you. Many people have never killed anyone with a gun, a knife or a stone, but they understand when a writer compares killing using these weapons or tools or mentioning these ways of killing. The majority of people have never experienced torture, but they will make their own picture of torture when they read that word. Many people have never been drunk or have never seen a drunk person especially in Arab countries. Does that mean that you should not write, "he behaved like a drunk" because some people do not know how it feels to be drunk? They must use their own imagination to create a picture of a drunk.
Readers have to use their own mind and imagination and not only read a sentence and then read another without thinking about what they are reading.
The majority of people have never used drugs and they have never seen a drug addict, but they understand if you write, "he behaved like intoxicated."
If you write "he behaved like a madman" readers get a different picture of that person. A psychiatrist will have a certain picture of him, a person suffering from mental illness another, and those who have never seen a mentally ill person or never suffered from a mental illness will think of him in their own way. I as a man do not know how it feels to be pregnant or to have a menopause, but I must use my own imagination to understand what is happening with a woman's body in those conditions.
