I decided to post this thread because it seems like it's been a while since the subject has come up and I sort of got a reminder of this on another thread.
Here are my thoughts on the matter:
Torture, the act of intentionally inflicting pain on another person to coerce them to do something is neither inherantly good or bad. Like any other tool it all comes down to how it is employed and why.
The classic example of the "evil torturer" has some wicked authority figure torturing an innocent man until he confesses and signs a writ for his own execution or life imprisonment or whatever rather than face any more pain. This is of course wrong, and an example of the tool being used the wrong way.
A proper example of using torture is when you already know someone is guilty and in possession of information that they do not want to give you. Oh sure, there are humane methods involving building a mutal rapport and respect, or trying to exploit eventual stockholme syndrome. Alas information is oftentimes sensitive and if you don't have weeks or months to get a piece of information, such as tracking down a moving terrorist cell, the location of a hostage who is relocated or set to be executed on a timer, a bomb, ambush, or identity of an assasin or informant in a key location. In such cases using pain, degredation, and any methods nessicary are of course perfectly viable. Certainly the person might lie, but in general if your torturing someone "properly" chances are you have someone present with at least some information to put things into context. This is part of what the intelligence game is all about the captive doesn't nessicarly know what YOU know so in many cases you can tell if
he's lying simply by knowing other things he isn't aware that you know.
"I don't care, torturing someone is still wrong how can you do that to a person?". Well in my opinion in many cases it's the only right desician to make. When lives are at stake, dealing with a hostage, to maybe a half a dozen soldiers on a patrol, to literally hundreds or even thousands of people that could be victimized by a bombing , the choice is obvious. The discomfort of one person who is doubtlessly going to live, or the actual lives of other people, maybe even a lot of them.
Apologies, but I'm not sure the 50 guys taken out in a bomb blast because you couldn't get the information out of the terrorist you captured by asking nicely would agree with you. Oh sure, some people would say "I'd rather die than see someone tortured" but in situations on this level do you really have a right to speak for everyone else who would die? No, you certainly do not.
"But Therumancer, what if a mistake is actually made and the terrorist you capture and torture doesn't know anything?". This is again why you do things in the context of established intelligence. At a certain point your going to know if the person knows anything or not. If you continue to torture them once you determine this, then your wrong. But otherwise in the end when lives are at stake the victim of torture still gets to live at the end of the day. If your bothering to do this to begin with enough is at stake where people are going to actually die (directly or indirectly) if you do not.
I'll also be painfully blunt, I'll never have children, but if I DID have one and he/she was kidnapped and I caught a member of the kidnapping ring, I wouldn't have the slightest hesitation of beating the location of my kid out of them. I'm big enough to admit it. I think most people would do the same exact bloody thing under the circumstances and are lying if they say they wouldn't. Basically, we'll all torture people under the right circumstances and with the right stakes.
The problem is that when people hear the word "Torture" they have visions of out of control inquisitors slicing people in half with pendelums, or lovingly inventing torture devices "in the name of god" to extract confessions from heathens before "purifying the flesh" and killing them anyway. All of that stuff made a bit more internal sense dogmatically than many people give it credit for, but in the end that's wrong even if the people doing it usually felt they were saving the victims. That and traditions like native americans honoring captives by letting them "show brave" are NOT what we are talking about here. Nor are we talking about authorities using torture for purposes of criminal justice to extract confessions from criminals. While there is some merit to the idea of using it to extract information on other crimes from criminals who are already convicted (as opposed to bargaining for shorter sentences) that way leads to too many potentials for abuse and I don't support it unless your dealing with a very big issue with lives at stake.
In closing, if you think I'm a malignant monster, just hope that if you ever find yourself being held prisoner by a cult who say... wants to torture you for fun (no other purpose), that the guys looking for you think like me and are liable to rescue you. Rather than someone who is likely to spend time trying to get aquainted with a captured cultist and form a rapport over coffee and chocolate munchkins while someone figures out how many of your innards he can replace with rock salt before you expire.
The point here being that like many tools torture can be used properly and improperly. The arguement that "torture is never nessicary" arguably involves supporting evils greater than the torture itself. After all if 50 people die because you DIDN'T get information from someone you captured whom you know had it, arguably your responsible for killing those 50 people due to your principles. Especially seeing as chances are you wouldn't have even needed to actually take a life to save them.
For those who have taken Ethics (which I did, ethics contrary to popular belief does not teach you how to be ethical, but rather explains differant ethical systems) there is something called morality by the numbers. The idea that moral principles are easiest to uphold when applied to small groups. See people can argue that upholding a principle against torture is worth the lives of 1, 2, or perhaps even 50 people. But as those numbers climb, no matter what the principle is, the person holding it becomes increasingly monsterous to put their personal values before the good of what can rapidly become an entire society. Thus what is good and "right" on a personal level is NOT nessicarly good and right when the numbers get big enough and you start operating on a societal level. For example, to get "crazy" would someone with a prohibation against torture refuse to torture someone if it meant the nuclear annihilation of a major city? How about if it meant (for the purposes of arguement) the fate of the entire human race? In the latter case if you say "yes" then you have just declared yourself god (as my teacher would have put it).
As a result right and wrong are differant depending on scale. It's not right for me to say torture some kid to find out where he hid another kid's frisbee. But change the scale to a national level and involving lives rather than a child's toy, and the entire equasion changes even if the fundemental act is the same.
Truthfully the only time something can be considered universally "wrong" (or as close as it gets) is when your talking about victimizing someone else for no other reason than your own personal gratification. Thus if I genuinely torture someone simply because it amuses me to see them in pain, then this is wrong. If I have some purpose beyond myself, then it might not be depending on the scale (going to morality by the numbers). In general nothing, except the most selfish acts, can be considered truely wrong when the stakes of not doing something get high enough. Indeed no matter how seemingly moral once it costs enough it becomes wrong.
Oh and before someone decides to be a smart Alec, S&M is not wrong when it's between two willing participants playing. People have pulled that one on me before, typically the person on the receiving end is there because they enjoy it on some level.
Thoughts? Comments? Alternative opinions?
Not sure if it's my best job expressing those opinions (and I probably forgot something).
Here are my thoughts on the matter:
Torture, the act of intentionally inflicting pain on another person to coerce them to do something is neither inherantly good or bad. Like any other tool it all comes down to how it is employed and why.
The classic example of the "evil torturer" has some wicked authority figure torturing an innocent man until he confesses and signs a writ for his own execution or life imprisonment or whatever rather than face any more pain. This is of course wrong, and an example of the tool being used the wrong way.
A proper example of using torture is when you already know someone is guilty and in possession of information that they do not want to give you. Oh sure, there are humane methods involving building a mutal rapport and respect, or trying to exploit eventual stockholme syndrome. Alas information is oftentimes sensitive and if you don't have weeks or months to get a piece of information, such as tracking down a moving terrorist cell, the location of a hostage who is relocated or set to be executed on a timer, a bomb, ambush, or identity of an assasin or informant in a key location. In such cases using pain, degredation, and any methods nessicary are of course perfectly viable. Certainly the person might lie, but in general if your torturing someone "properly" chances are you have someone present with at least some information to put things into context. This is part of what the intelligence game is all about the captive doesn't nessicarly know what YOU know so in many cases you can tell if
he's lying simply by knowing other things he isn't aware that you know.
"I don't care, torturing someone is still wrong how can you do that to a person?". Well in my opinion in many cases it's the only right desician to make. When lives are at stake, dealing with a hostage, to maybe a half a dozen soldiers on a patrol, to literally hundreds or even thousands of people that could be victimized by a bombing , the choice is obvious. The discomfort of one person who is doubtlessly going to live, or the actual lives of other people, maybe even a lot of them.
Apologies, but I'm not sure the 50 guys taken out in a bomb blast because you couldn't get the information out of the terrorist you captured by asking nicely would agree with you. Oh sure, some people would say "I'd rather die than see someone tortured" but in situations on this level do you really have a right to speak for everyone else who would die? No, you certainly do not.
"But Therumancer, what if a mistake is actually made and the terrorist you capture and torture doesn't know anything?". This is again why you do things in the context of established intelligence. At a certain point your going to know if the person knows anything or not. If you continue to torture them once you determine this, then your wrong. But otherwise in the end when lives are at stake the victim of torture still gets to live at the end of the day. If your bothering to do this to begin with enough is at stake where people are going to actually die (directly or indirectly) if you do not.
I'll also be painfully blunt, I'll never have children, but if I DID have one and he/she was kidnapped and I caught a member of the kidnapping ring, I wouldn't have the slightest hesitation of beating the location of my kid out of them. I'm big enough to admit it. I think most people would do the same exact bloody thing under the circumstances and are lying if they say they wouldn't. Basically, we'll all torture people under the right circumstances and with the right stakes.
The problem is that when people hear the word "Torture" they have visions of out of control inquisitors slicing people in half with pendelums, or lovingly inventing torture devices "in the name of god" to extract confessions from heathens before "purifying the flesh" and killing them anyway. All of that stuff made a bit more internal sense dogmatically than many people give it credit for, but in the end that's wrong even if the people doing it usually felt they were saving the victims. That and traditions like native americans honoring captives by letting them "show brave" are NOT what we are talking about here. Nor are we talking about authorities using torture for purposes of criminal justice to extract confessions from criminals. While there is some merit to the idea of using it to extract information on other crimes from criminals who are already convicted (as opposed to bargaining for shorter sentences) that way leads to too many potentials for abuse and I don't support it unless your dealing with a very big issue with lives at stake.
In closing, if you think I'm a malignant monster, just hope that if you ever find yourself being held prisoner by a cult who say... wants to torture you for fun (no other purpose), that the guys looking for you think like me and are liable to rescue you. Rather than someone who is likely to spend time trying to get aquainted with a captured cultist and form a rapport over coffee and chocolate munchkins while someone figures out how many of your innards he can replace with rock salt before you expire.
The point here being that like many tools torture can be used properly and improperly. The arguement that "torture is never nessicary" arguably involves supporting evils greater than the torture itself. After all if 50 people die because you DIDN'T get information from someone you captured whom you know had it, arguably your responsible for killing those 50 people due to your principles. Especially seeing as chances are you wouldn't have even needed to actually take a life to save them.
For those who have taken Ethics (which I did, ethics contrary to popular belief does not teach you how to be ethical, but rather explains differant ethical systems) there is something called morality by the numbers. The idea that moral principles are easiest to uphold when applied to small groups. See people can argue that upholding a principle against torture is worth the lives of 1, 2, or perhaps even 50 people. But as those numbers climb, no matter what the principle is, the person holding it becomes increasingly monsterous to put their personal values before the good of what can rapidly become an entire society. Thus what is good and "right" on a personal level is NOT nessicarly good and right when the numbers get big enough and you start operating on a societal level. For example, to get "crazy" would someone with a prohibation against torture refuse to torture someone if it meant the nuclear annihilation of a major city? How about if it meant (for the purposes of arguement) the fate of the entire human race? In the latter case if you say "yes" then you have just declared yourself god (as my teacher would have put it).
As a result right and wrong are differant depending on scale. It's not right for me to say torture some kid to find out where he hid another kid's frisbee. But change the scale to a national level and involving lives rather than a child's toy, and the entire equasion changes even if the fundemental act is the same.
Truthfully the only time something can be considered universally "wrong" (or as close as it gets) is when your talking about victimizing someone else for no other reason than your own personal gratification. Thus if I genuinely torture someone simply because it amuses me to see them in pain, then this is wrong. If I have some purpose beyond myself, then it might not be depending on the scale (going to morality by the numbers). In general nothing, except the most selfish acts, can be considered truely wrong when the stakes of not doing something get high enough. Indeed no matter how seemingly moral once it costs enough it becomes wrong.
Oh and before someone decides to be a smart Alec, S&M is not wrong when it's between two willing participants playing. People have pulled that one on me before, typically the person on the receiving end is there because they enjoy it on some level.
Thoughts? Comments? Alternative opinions?
Not sure if it's my best job expressing those opinions (and I probably forgot something).
