Much has been said about the “Enhanced Interrogation” technique know as water boarding. I myself have not decided where I fall on the scale of for or against. While I am sickened by the thought of any human being causing pain to another human being, I am also sickened by the memory of 911. If it is true that waterboarding saved untold lives by garnering information about a terrorist attack on Los Angeles, then I lean towards believing it might be a valuable tool. On the other hand, if it is true that information has been gotten by other, less dehumanizing means, then I think every possible way of gaining information should be tried before something like waterboarding is utilized.
That said, I’d like to hear both sides. Meanwhile, here are a few famous torture scenes as well as a “real life” video of a form of voluntary torture called “Suspension”….
WARNING: THIS VIDEO IS PRETTY GRAPHIC. KEEP IN MIND THAT THEY ARE DOING THIS FOR “FUN”!
AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT…
My husband and his friends love to quote Monty Python’s “No one expects the Spanish Inquisition!”
I really think that, looking at Catholic doctrine, there is no room to torture. Torture is not part of just war theory, and obviously not part of the pacifist movement. There is no room in Catholicism for the ‘total war’ realists.
Supporting torture is a flawed consequentialist reasoning, and the church is not consequentialist.
Which is of more value… 1 life or 1000? 1 or 100? 1 or 10? 1 evil person or 1 innocent person? Your life or a killers?
Stu, would you kill one innocent person to save 10? I don’t mean let an innocent person die; I mean kill him. If the lives of ten innocent people have more value than the life of one, then we should be okay killing that one person against his will to save those ten. I mean if it’s just about a value numbers game.
When is a person evil enough to be of lesser value than an “innocent” person? You might as well ask when a fetus becomes a person. Is human life inherently valuable, or it isn’t it?
I’m aware that torture is not intended to kill people. But you’re asking PIP whether her life has more value than a killer’s. That seems like an interesting way to frame the issue.
“Stu, would you kill one innocent person to save 10? ”
One guilty person, sure..why would you be bothered by killing? you think killing unborn humans should be legal.
Thousands of our troops are waterboarded every year as part of their training, but not until it was done to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed — mastermind of the 9/11 attack on America — were liberal consciences shocked.
Now lets be clear, KSM is not some random human being. He is a stone cold killer, by his own admission. He happily claimed his role when asked. Proud of it too..
So if you have the choice, you choose Osama Bin Laden life over the 3000 that died on 9/11? How about if all it took to stop it was to water board him? How about putting him in a box with a caterpillar for an hour? What if all it took was to make him very uncomfortable, with lack of sleep, standing for long duration, keeping his room cold, making him stand naked, be questioned by a woman or listening to Obama give a speech off teleprompter?
All of the above is now torture and not allowed. So explain to me, how you get an answer out of a person like KSM if you have no strength to play to. You can’t threaten his life, he is willing to die for his cause. You can’t threaten to send him to prison for the rest of his life, he knows you will never let him go. You can’t make him uncomfortable or torture him. Under the Geneva Convention you are not allowed to question him on “military tactics or plans”.
So what is your suggestion here?
Stu, you didn’t answer my question.
Again, if the tactics we’re using are harmless to the point of being laughable, then why does anyone think they’ll elicit confessions?
I’m no military advisor, so my only suggestion is to rely on intelligence-based options, especially given that to my understanding, many of the “torturous” tactics are derived from exercises used by communist governments to elicit false confessions from US soldiers. The purposes of these exercises was to make the prisoner agree to anything — not to find valid information.
So if it’s not torture — why do we think it will be effective? And if it is torture — why do we think it will result in accurate intelligence?
I find it entirely implausible that all it would take to stop 9/11 would be putting a caterpillar in a box with Osama bin Laden. I think it would probably at least come down to something like killing his children in front of him, one by one, until he confessed; and even then we would need to know that he was planning SOMETHING in order to make such an option even viable at all.
“I think it would probably at least come down to something like killing his children in front of him, one by one, until he confessed; and even then we would need to know that he was planning SOMETHING in order to make such an option even viable at all.”
Jack Bauer did it.
Sort of.
From the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
CCC 2267: (discussing prisoners that are found guilty) …the traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude recourse to the death penalty, if this is the only possible way of effectively defending human lives against the unjust aggressor. If, however, non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect people’s safety from the aggressor, authority will limit itself to such means, as these are more in keeping with the concrete conditions of the common good and more in conformity with the dignity of the human person.
This is discussing people found guilty and if prison or capital punishment is appropriate. I find it interesting that capital punishment isn’t something that is completely ruled out however some here think the Catholic Church says waterboarding to save lives of thousands is against the teachings. So, capital punishment is okay if it is the only way to protect the people, but waterboarding isn’t okay when it has been proven that it saved thousands of lives.
CCC2297: Kidnapping and hostage taking bring on a reign of terror; by means of threats they subject their victims to intolerable pressures. They are morally wrong. Terrorism threatens, wounds, and kills indiscriminately is gravely against justice and charity. Torture which uses physical or moral violence to extract confessions, punish the guilty, frighten opponents, or satisfy hatred is contrary to respect for the person and for human dignity.
We did not want to extract a confession, nor punish the guilty, nor frighten opponents, nor satisfy hatred. We were trying to save the lives of thousands – which we were able to do by the least violent means possible. KSM was smug, and kept telling us to Just wait and we will see the deaths of thousands of Americans. He was talking about the 2nd planned strike that was averted because of the waterboarding. According to memo’s the waterboarding was one of the last things used and not the first.
CCC 2314: Every act of war directed to the indiscriminate destruction of whole cities or vast areas with their inhabitants is a crime against God and man, which merits firm and unequivocal condemnation.
If we are to condemn the acts of Sept 11, wouldn’t it be prudent to believe that preventing those acts – when it was well known that there was a plan for these attacks – should take priority to protecting the people? Just as capital punishment is indeed okay as a last resort – shouldn’t something like waterboarding be okay to prevent the destruction of whole cities or vast areas?
And now – the definition of waterboarding from the memo’s:
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/04/28/despite-reports-khalid-sheikh-mohammed-waterboarded-times/
The memos describe the controversial process: a detainee is strapped to a gurney with his head lowered and a cloth placed on his face. Interrogators pour water onto the cloth, which cuts off air flow to the mouth and nostrils, tripping his gag reflex, causing panic and giving him the sensation that he is drowning.
At that point the cloth would be removed, the gurney rotated upright and the detainee would be allowed to breathe. The technique could be repeated a few times during a waterboarding session; Zubaydah said it was generally used once or twice, but he said he was waterboarded three times during one session.
The Justice Department memos described the maximum allowed use of the waterboard on any detainee, based on tactical training given to U.S. troops to resist interrogations:
– Five days of use in one month, with no more than two “sessions” in a day;
– Up to six applications (something like a dunk) lasting more than 10 seconds but less than 40 seconds per session;
– 12 minutes of total “water application” in a 24-hour period
Please read the fox news report – even if you hate fox news – it shows where the confusion is and how the media got the info wrong. It also brings up how the Red Cross actually confirms what our military said. An example:
The New York Times reported last week that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, was waterboarded 183 times in one month by CIA interrogators. The “183 times” was widely circulated by news outlets throughout the world.
It was shocking. And it was highly misleading. The number is a vast inflation, according to information from a U.S. official and the testimony of the terrorists themselves.
A U.S. official with knowledge of the interrogation program told FOX News that the much-cited figure represents the number of times water was poured onto Mohammed’s face — not the number of times the CIA applied the simulated-drowning technique on the terror suspect. According to a 2007 Red Cross report, he was subjected a total of “five sessions of ill-treatment.”
All of those individual pours were scrupulously counted by the CIA, according to the memos, to abide by the procedures set up for the waterboardings.
“[I]t is important that every application of the waterboard be thoroughly documented: how long each application (and the entire procedure) lasted, how much water was used in the process,” read a memo from May 10, 2005.
Never once claimed water boarding was “harmless”. It isn’t. Its mean, its horrible and should only happen when there is no other choice. I don’t wish it on anybody and I would love to live in a world where it would never happen. But I don’t and that is reality. There are “actually” lives on the line and people who want us dead.
As for a caterpillar getting answers… Abu Zubaydah (terrorist) is extremely afraid of bugs and they determined that the caterpillar was the least cruel thing to use. They want to put one in his cell…. From what I understand it never happened, but is that torture?
KSM was the mastermind behind 9/11 and LA plot (hijack planes flying into the US from overseas); which was prevented by his water boarding.
So if traditional methods of intelligence will work, why hasn’t it? They don’t care for money (bribes), they don’t care about freedom (life of luxury here), and they don’t have military bases that we can spy on from 200 miles in orbit. How do you get somebody to infiltrate a group of religious zealots…. You can’t “pose” as one, you have to be one. Bin Laden has a $20 million bounty and they have never gotten a single lead from the public.
As for would I kill/torture/scare an innocent person to save another innocent person. No. That would be illogical.
Would I kill/torture/scare a cold blooded killer to save innocent lives. Yes. So we are not talking about “innocent” life. This is not some guy who stole an apple to eat or even stole billions in a ponzie scheme or some gang banger in LA. Would you like to see KSM behead Daniel Pearl? Just go to YouTube…
As for the torture by the North Vietnamese Army (NVA), they didn’t want the truth, they want propaganda. They tortured soldiers into confessing they agreed with Marxism. They didn’t want military intelligence or “when is the next bombing raid”. They knew that the soldiers didn’t have long term intelligence or planning information. John McCain didn’t know when the next mission was when he was shot down. If they had captured his admiral father, they would have sought the high level plans and they would have wanted the truth not a false confession. So understand KSM wasn’t a soldier out on the battlefield, he was a commanding general with long term knowledge of where his assets were, the operational structure of his organization and the operational plans that were in motion.
Just like all interrogation, you balance what somebody says with what they have said and the information you have verified. So you know what the truth is.
“So if traditional methods of intelligence will work, why hasn’t it?”
Who says it hasn’t? If we had been taking advantage of traditional methods of intelligence, 9/11 may never have happened.
This is long, but is a pretty interesting read: http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200705/tracking-zarqawi
“Never once claimed water boarding was “harmless”. It isn’t. Its mean, its horrible and should only happen when there is no other choice. I don’t wish it on anybody and I would love to live in a world where it would never happen.”
Then why don’t you support actions that you believe constitute torture? Beating, etc. Why draw the line at waterboarding?
“As for the torture by the North Vietnamese Army (NVA), they didn’t want the truth, they want propaganda. They tortured soldiers into confessing they agreed with Marxism. They didn’t want military intelligence or “when is the next bombing raid”.”
That’s the point. They didn’t want the truth, and they found a reliable way to make people admit to anything. They wanted lies and they got lies; but that doesn’t mean that because we want the truth we’ll get the truth.
We train our soldiers to resist certain torture techniques. Terrorist organizations undoubtedly do the same. They give false information to waste time, and also as a natural human response to pain or intense fear — didn’t KSM also confess to plotting against a bank that wasn’t founded until after his capture? — and in the classic pro-torture “ticking time bomb” hypothetical (extremely implausible, but most frequently used to justify things like waterboarding) the terrorist is likely to be LESS susceptible to the physical punishment, since he knows he only needs to hold out for a specific amount of time.
Ugh I have to go to bed, I’m sorry. It’s been a rough week.
I have no problem torturing people who would just as soon kill/torture me and everyone I care about (and even people I don’t).
And yes, I’m serious.
But when I say “I have no problem” I don’t mean I think torture is great or anything. Cause I don’t. I’d like it if we could all live in peace and harmony and sing campfire songs while we hold hands around a fire. But that’s not how it is, so you do what you gotta do.
“So, capital punishment is okay if it is the only way to protect the people, but waterboarding isn’t okay when it has been proven that it saved thousands of lives.”
In that case, we have this man in our power. He is under our control. The CCC said that the only way the death penalty would be okay is simply for self defense. When you are torturing someone, you are not defending anyone from their aggression. You are the aggressor. This is not a difficult concept.
Also valerie to some of your problems with interpretations of the catechism, go back to that post that Janet linked to..and read some of the comments. They also post some church documents that are very informative.
Sigh. Reading these arguments, I just become incredibly sad. I don’t think I can do this anymore.
You can’t see what you’re supporting at this point, I can’t really do anything for you. I just hope that you might look deeper into the RCC’s theology of war.
PIP –
I have looked into the CCC regarding war and torture. My father looked into this as well – being a Vietnam Vet AND a Catholic he found comfort in the CCC because the Church says that the world isn’t black and white. She knows that there are shades of gray in this world. She knows not everyone in this world is going to do the moral thing.
Do you believe that abortion is okay if the life of the mother is in danger? Ectopic Pregnancy as one of many examples. Why is abortion okay in that situation when it is listed as a mortal sin? Shouldn’t they both die then? Or are there exceptions that say killing one human being is okay to save the life of another?
What you claim, and many others claim, as torture – I say saved thousands of lives. The attack on L.A. didn’t happen. Do you think it should have happened? It doesn’t matter that YOU believe a man who had no problems beheading an innocent man (Remember KSM admitted he did this – before he was captured) would have told us all about the 2nd attack because we tickled his belly – but that isn’t reality. This is a cold blooded killer who wants to see every American Dead or converted to his way of thinking.
“When you are torturing someone, you are not defending anyone from their aggression. You are the aggressor.
Please see the other parts of the catechism that I posted. You will see that it is actually a very difficult concept.
I understand that this is upsetting you. I know how it feels because I remember arguing with many people that Partial Birth Abortion should be banned…etc. And now I am saying hurting someone is okay. I don’t like saying that! You are acting like I am taking my position on this without knowing the facts. Without knowing my faith. Well, guess what – I’ve researched it and I’ve talked to multiple priests about this sort of thing. You know better than most here that I don’t come by these kinds of decisions without heavy research. You are not the only one who has read up on this.
Go to downtown big inner city – wait until a drug dealer approaches you and remember that the world is in black and white. Remember that he is not to be injured. Even if he kidnaps you, buries you alive and the police catch him knowing he knows where you are and that you are alive. Remember, his comfort is more important than your life. (This situation has happened in America multiple times before. Not just on Law and Order and CSI). Is that the kind of world you really want to live in? The bad people being protected before the innocent?
Also, the Catechism is the official teachings of the Catholic Church. I will follow that and not someones interpretation of what they believe the Catholic Church should be teaching.
__________________________
Alexandra –
If we had been taking advantage of traditional methods of intelligence, 9/11 may never have happened.
What? We WERE following traditional methods in the 1990′s when it came to the terrorists under the Clinton Administration and 9/11 DID happen. As a matter of fact – we were in a position to kill Osama Bin Laden back then however this wasn’t how we did things. (no fault of Clinton or his administration) We thought it was the best to follow those traditional methods. We were wrong. Dead wrong. 3,000+ dead wrong.
____________________________
Elizabeth –
Thank you for putting it so well! I just don’t understand how anyone can think we actually like taking this position. I hate it. I don’t want it. But that just isn’t reality.
Val, I’m referring to the intelligence information about suspicious men taking flight classes, which was not given appropriate attention.
Alexandra –
Well, now I’m even more confused!
Weren’t we taking advantage of traditional methods of obtaining information used before 9/11? We had reports on almost all of the hijackers (I think) before 9/11 but we didn’t act as quickly as we should have. Honestly, when it comes to obtaining information about the pilots who flew the planes into the world trade center – I’m not sure how we would have known before hand to stop it. Then again – I don’t have the top secret information that the Clinton Administration had.
However, if we are talking about suspicious men taking flight classes, I don’t think there were any ‘traditional’ or any other kinds of methods in place at that time. Who would have thunk people would do that? Seriously? I know I was in complete shock as I was watching the second plane hit the tower live on TV. I know I was in just as much shock as the reporter who freaked out on air as we all watched it happen. Even after the fact we were still confused as to how they did it and what had just happened.
But then again….I may still be confusing myself.
“Weren’t we taking advantage of traditional methods of obtaining information used before 9/11? We had reports on almost all of the hijackers (I think) before 9/11 but we didn’t act as quickly as we should have.”
I’m of the belief that not acting as quickly as we should have — or taking information as seriously as we should have — means that we were not taking advantage of traditional methods of obtaining information. The spring and summer of 2001 saw a crescendo in reports and concerns from the intelligence community; not reacting quickly and appropriately to them indicates a failure in response, not a failure in methods of gathering intelligence.
As for the flight classes — the FBI had known for some time that the terrorists were taking them. Most believed that the focus was on “normal” hijacking (that is, hijacking a plane and demanding the release of political prisoners, that sort of thing) but in July 2001 there was a specific report that indicated the possible use of airplanes as missiles in and of themselves. There were problems both in connecting the dots and in finding the dots important enough to connect — but that doesn’t mean the dots weren’t there.
It was really shocking, though — I agree with you on that. I was in my first month of college and I remember I saw it on the gym TV’s, with no sound; but I thought it was a movie since I just saw a clip of it as I was getting ready to leave. When I went to my Greek mythology lecture an hour later the hall was PACKED with people, not just students, with a projector screen playing the news. I couldn’t believe what was happening. It seemed ridiculous.
I was in Boston, at a school which a distant relative (something like a neice?) of Osama bin Laden was attending — we had a number of safety alerts in the following weeks, and the whole atmosphere was very tense. My family, obviously, was mostly in NYC. Actually my dad had flown from Newark to San Francisco the day before, basically 24 hours away from being on the wrong plane! I spent most of 9/11 trying so hard to remember what day he was scheduled to leave; it was hours before I could get in touch with anyone — really scary.
Even when I went back to NYC and went to the site, it was just unbelievable. Like I almost didn’t believe what I was seeing. So surreal.
Alexandra –
Before 9/11 we were using the traditional methods of that time.
Unfortunately there were just as many reports denying the possibilities of hijackings as there were confirming them. There was too much confusion when it came to this because we weren’t as aggressive as needed to be in gathering information.
It is amazing that we weren’t more aggressive considering:
The bombing in the Twin Towers on Feb. 26, 1993
The Khobar Towers bombing on Nov 13, 1995
The embassy bombings in Kenya, Nairobi, Dar es Salaam, and Tanzania on August 7, 1998.
The USS cole being damaged by a suicide bomber on Oct 12, 2000
among many others that I don’t have time to list.
For some reason we just didn’t think we were in any danger. And for some reason we are beginning to believe again that we are not in any danger.
When it comes to how we react to the terrorist Obama is going back to the Bill Clinton era of thinking. We didn’t do anything on the occasions we were attacked by terrorists before Sept 11 – do we really want to go back to that way of thinking? (just a hypothetical question – I know that is not what you have said)
Do we really want the terrorists to know that we are going soft again?
Okay – now I’m just digressing!
Alexandra –
I remember watching fox and friends right after the 1st plane hit. They thought it was an accident. The initial reports were saying that it was a smaller plane. Then the information came out that it was a passenger plane. I remember watching E.D. Hill going pale.
I had just started to watch Fox News so I thought they were over dramatizing things so I turned to CNN. Same story. Then I turned to some morning show – Good Morning America (?) – and they had a camera showing the burning building with no delay – totally live. I saw a plane in the background and thought that it was way too close to the building. Then we all just helplessly watched in horror while that plane hit. The reporter flipped out – she was screaming in hysterics – “It just hit the building….It just hit the building…” Then the station tuned out for a couple seconds before going back to the studio.
At that point I got on the phone to make sure none of my family was traveling. Thank God they weren’t. But my brother in law was (still is) in the air force reserves so that was nerve wracking as everything military got put on alert.
All day I was glued to the news. The worst thing I saw was people hanging out of the windows of both buildings and jumping to their deaths. Their choice was burn or jump. I can’t even imagine being in that position! They were showing everything live and I think it took some time for the producers to fully grasp what we were all seeing before they cut the feed. Later they would only show pictures and not the video of the people falling to their deaths. I don’t think the video’s of that were ever shown on TV again…..I can’t even remember what station I was watching when I saw that. I just kept switching from one channel to the next hopping it was all some sort of bad hoax.
Thanks Val!
Sometimes I like to keep it short, sweet, and to the point!
Alexandra,
Remember you are advocating “criminal prosecution” of terrorism. What is illegal about taking flight lessons? Until 9/11 they had not committed a criminal act, except false entry into the US. They only thing we could have done was kick them out and arrested them. What stops them from getting training then in another country and illegally entering the US? We don’t enforce our immigration laws as is…
The reality is there are tough decisions that won’t fit nicely in acedemic discussions or on a blog. The world does not fit into simple answers and at some point we have to do things we don’t like.
We may all admire the early Christian martyrs, but the reality was that it was Constantine that waged bloody wars that allow Christianity to flourish. It wasn’t being pacifist that created Western Civialization and it won’t be being pacifist that allow it to survive.
I remember it was a week or two into school for me of my last year at Catholic school. I remember there being an announcement over the loudspeaker about an accident having happened, but not to listen to any rumors we may hear later in the day until everything could be confirmed etc.
I found out by word of mouth and, since I have almost always been a latch-ley kid, when I turned on the TV and saw the coverage and the video looping over and over.
It didn’t really hit me until a few days later.
“Remember you are advocating “criminal prosecution” of terrorism.”
No, prosecution comes after the crime; I’m advocating non-torture methods of obtaining information, for both pragmatic and ethical reasons.
“We don’t enforce our immigration laws as is…”
And that’s part of the problem! We SHOULD enforce our immigration laws. Surely if there are people in this country illegally, about whom the FBI is contacted because of suspicious activities like trying to learn to fly but not land a plane, or being unable to converse in the language native to what they claim is their home country — surely there is more to do with these circumstances than either torture such people or simply allow them to fly planes into buildings.
“The reality is there are tough decisions that won’t fit nicely in acedemic discussions or on a blog. The world does not fit into simple answers and at some point we have to do things we don’t like.”
Well, we certainly agree on that.
Normal intelligence means do not work with organizations like this… You can not infiltrate a zealots organization, you can not buy information from people who don’t care about money, and you can not threaten a person willing to die for their cause.
Think of the Pope… Could you bribe him into saying abortion is “OK”? Could you threaten his life to say it was “OK”? Could you get an agent to the top of the Vatican without being discovered? Will a satellite give you any information on what the Catholics are planning? Would threatening him with life in prison break his will? This is just normal intelligence methods….
Have a good day, we are off to a friends.
“Think of the Pope… Could you bribe him into saying abortion is “OK”? Could you threaten his life to say it was “OK”? Could you get an agent to the top of the Vatican without being discovered? Will a satellite give you any information on what the Catholics are planning? Would threatening him with life in prison break his will? This is just normal intelligence methods….”
That’s not the extent of normal intelligence methods, though.
I hope you have a good day with your friends! I will sit here and be jealous of you, since I’m spending today curled up with a box of tissues, a bowl of chicken noodle soup, and the best programs Tivo has to offer.
I only will say one more thing.
Torture cannot be compared to late term abortion; instead, it should be compared to ESCR. Why not sacrifice a few embryos so that millions of people might get cures?
-of course, we have more failures than successes, but one success may mean that all the experimentation is worth it
-the end doesn’t justify the means?
-fill in the blank.
PIP, I was thinking that exact thing myself when I said that I opposed torture for pragmatic and ethical reasons. Adult stem cell research versus embryonic stem cell research, and the arguments made for opposing ESCR, that sort of thing. That ESCR is, pragmatically speaking, not the only or even the best solution to our problems just compounds the ethical problems that exist with it.
“Torture cannot be compared to late term abortion; instead, it should be compared to ESCR. Why not sacrifice a few embryos so that millions of people might get cures?”
that is the most sickening thing i’ve ever read.
Why is that Jasper? Where is the difference?
Exactly, Alexandra.
You guys are talking about destroying innocents vs. destroying people WHO.WANT.TO.KILL.YOU.
Keep comparing apples and oranges if you must though. They’ll never be the same thing no matter how much you wish them to be.
Elizabeth- if all people are made in the image of God, it doesn’t matter. You are essentially saying, here, that these people ‘deserve it’ which qualifies the statement:
Torture which uses physical or moral violence to extract confessions, punish the guilty, frighten opponents, or satisfy hatred is contrary to respect for the person and for human dignity.
If it matters that these people deserve it then you are either punishing the guilty, or satisfying hatred.
It is contrary to respect for the person and for human dignity
Let’s take it elsewhere Elizabeth: would you consent treating American murder suspects like we treat terrorist suspects in foreign prisons?
In fact, ANY sort of coercive admission of guilt is inadmissible in court. If what matters that this person that I am torturing might want me dead, then American murderers are no different. You should be advocating for our “coercive interrogations” to be used here as well (unless citizen papers is what confers human rights).
It’s not about “deserving it” pip. It’s about protecting people.
If they weren’t trying to blow people up, I doubt anyone would be torturing them or even bothering with them. That also doesn’t mean they “deserve it.” It just means the people who are trained to keep us safe are doing what is necessary to continue doing so. It’s not like our government woke up one day and said, “Hey let’s start torturing some people, just for the Hell of it. They never flew any planes into our buildings or killed thousands of people, we should just torture them for fun.” I do not presume to judge the government for doing what it has to do so that I can sleep warmly in my bed at night. And so that I don’t have to be worried about getting blown up for absolutely no reason.
And I completely agree with you that it is contrary to the respect for the human person and human dignity. But I have this weird thing about living and breathing that I enjoy as well as I would like my family to enjoy safely. So, if people who are trying to take that away have to be tortured so that can be maintained, I can’t pretend like I’m outraged by it. I’m more outraged that it HAS to be done at all, and that there are people out there who want to kill us for their crazy ideologies. Like I said, I would reallllllly love it if it were unnecessary, and we could all live peacefully, and I don’t LIKE that we have to torture people, but the world isn’t all sunshine and rainbows.
Similarly, if there were domestic terrorists attempting to do the things foreign terrorists want to do to us, then they should be subject to the same treatment. If they get caught, and there is no longer a threat to anyone’s safety, then torture isn’t necessary, and they shouldn’t be tortured. I’m talking about people who want to commit mass murders of people, not murderers that once are taken off the street, stop murdering. That would be comparing apples and oranges as well. Once those murderers aren’t allowed to be out on the street, they no longer murder, and are not a threat to people’s safety, so there is no reason for them to be subject to torture.
It’s sad that it has to happen, and it sucks, but that’s life.
Elizabeth, sadly, most of our torture situations were “Jack Bauer” type situations where we know this person knows something, and that something can tell us what it is. If the LA situation was one like that, it was quite clearly the exception and not the rule. Establishing a rule based on an outlier is incredibly foolish.
This is what I mean by the ESCR comparison. If there is ONE success by ESCR, saving millions of lives, does it make years of experimenting on people worth it?
Likewise, if by torturing someone we got one success out of it, but in the meantime we are regularly destroying the very lives and dignity of people that are simply suspects, does it make all of those people’s suffering and degradation worth it? Do you really wan this to be our operating philosophy?
whoops most were NOT “Jack Bauer” situations..
“Similarly, if there were domestic terrorists attempting to do the things foreign terrorists want to do to us, then they should be subject to the same treatment.”
So if someone got a hint of Timothy McVeigh’s plan, would you support capturing him and subjecting him to waterboarding over 100 times and then use his admission of guilt and plans in court to arrest Nichols and throw them both in jail? Think carefully..is this something you want to happen in our society on a daily basis?
Or think of it this way. Perhaps someone received “intelligence” that a large abortion clinic was going to be bombed. Would you support people rounding up pro-life groups and interrogating them “harshly” because there were hundreds of innocent lives at stake and they received ‘intelligence’ that it came from one of those groups? Say you were part of this group and someone confesses and gives them information. While they investigate the lead you are all still in jail, and then they find out that the information was faulty. Are you ready for another round?
So if someone got a hint of Timothy McVeigh’s plan, would you support capturing him and subjecting him to waterboarding over 100 times and then use his admission of guilt and plans in court to arrest Nichols and throw them both in jail? Think carefully..is this something you want to happen in our society on a daily basis?
If it would have stopped the Oklahoma bombing, yes.
I’m pretty sure the parents of all those young children on the 1st floor daycare center would say the same thing as well.
Elizabeth…do you realize the path you are going down? This sounds fine and dandy when we are talking about guilty criminals. However, most of the people we imprison and use “enhanced interrogation” are suspects. Consider my second example.
I think we’ll just have to agree to disagree pip.
Elizabeth, I can say we disagree, but I will not simply agree on this based on what you have been telling me. It’s easy to say something is worth it when the need is done that spurs a good result; what’s difficult to imagine is making this kind of behavior the rule rather than the exception. Many JWT and realist philosophers have said that even if you do what is necessary, if it is against the law or the rule of law, you should still be prepared to recognize you did a wrong to gain a right and be prepared for the consequences that follow. If it is okay because it was successful once or twice out of over 200 interrogated suspects, and you feel the same way about domestic terrorist suspects, you are essentially allowing a tyrannical state to take over for reasons of national security. Are you really willing to sacrifice that?
Whether or not domestic and foreign terrorism should be handled in the same way is up to the lawmakers then, not me. I don’t really know the law as well in those circumstances of domestic terrorism so I would have to read more on it to be more informed. But as far as foreign terrorism is concerned, if torture techniques are necessary to get the information needed to protect us, I’m as “okay” as a person can be with that. I’m sure the decisions are not come to lightly, and the people who have to execute such techniques don’t do it for the pleasure of the experience. I hope that clears up my opinion on that for you.
I have a brother who is 10 years older than myself and he use to use this line all the time. I never could understand it!
The MP video is great! He was and still is a great MP fan!
I will concede that to you Elizabeth…my last words on this topic is that I hope you do look into it more. I think the more you look into it, the more my analogy to ESCR will make sense to you. They both come out of a flawed consequentialist thinking: that something is okay if pleasure of more people outweighs the pain for less people. While it sounds good in theory, what it allows is the marginalization of populations for what the public deems the “greater good.” That is why it is sometimes best to err on the side of the life and dignity.
PIP,
It’s always been the exception and not the rule.
Elizabeth is exactly right.
Jasper that’s just it. What happened was that Bush and Cheney authorized torture and other “enhanced techniques.”
But anyway, I’m done talking about this with you Jasper, but feel free to keep reading about torture from the Catholic perspective and let me know if anything changes.