You Anti Torture Guys Are Phonies... Unless

[colonel Feathers 5]

Forget terrorists for a second.Your daughter was kidnapped and hiddened somewhere'One of the guys involved was caught, and during interrogations which you attend, he just laughs and tells you whats in store for her.The interrogator ask for your OK to torture to find her.Please tell me your gonna say that we dont torture in this country.

[navybuttons 15]

ohhhh waarcrimes.

[Sal Paradise 57]

liam neeson doesn't need your help.

[LongLiveYorke 38]

So, your general policy for making laws is that if one would want to do it under extreme duress, it should be legal?Yeah, that should work flawlessly.

[hblask 1]

Forget terrorists for a second.Your daughter was kidnapped and hiddened somewhere'One of the guys involved was caught, and during interrogations which you attend, he just laughs and tells you whats in store for her.The interrogator ask for your OK to torture to find her.Please tell me your gonna say that we dont torture in this country.

I saw a discussion on this issue with a couple of intelligence experts, and their opinion was that you can't just torture people hoping to get random information; it won't work.They did seem to imply that if you knew that had a specific bit of information, it is possible to torture that out of someone.But to answer your question, I have different standards for what I as an individual would do in an emergency than what I expect from the government as a matter of policy.For example, if I were stranded on a -40 degree night, and the only house for 20 miles was locked up, I would have no problem breaking down the door to survive the night (and later compensate the owners).I would not support a policy of having federal agents break down random doors just in case a cold person wanders by and needs a place to stay.Perhaps you see no difference between these two cases, but most people do.

[Jeepster80125 0]

liam neeson doesn't need your help.

That movie was violently awesome. Is it wrong that I wanted her to get raped, but only a little? Couldn't they have made her masturbate on camera or something?

[BigDMcGee 3,352]

The only question, in my mind, if we should use torture is if it works or not. Unfortunately, in order to study if torture works or not, you'd have to do experiments that would be essentially illegal for the scientific community to do. I'm sure there are people in this country that have studied torture's effectiveness, but those people don't publish their findings in psychology journals. I will say this, I'm sure people in the intelligence community know a great deal more about torture's effectiveness than pundits on television do. Using emotional examples like "well, yeah, but what if it was your DAUGHTER", are patently retarded. We should not make decisions, as a society, based on what we would do on what if something was done to our daughter. If my daughter was raped, i'd want to kill the man that raped her. If she was paralyzed by a drunk driver, i'd want to cut of his legs. Emotional pleas is not a way to make national policy decisions. We should try and minimize emotion as much as possible, not play to it.

[timwakefield 68]

Yeah the problem with the OP is that it's a fantasy. In reality, the amount of children who are kidnapped for the purpose of rape/murder is extremely small, and sadly something like 90% of those kidnap victims are dead within 3 hours. In other words, the use of torture to determine the location of an alive-but-dying victim just wouldn't ever happen, or if it did it would happen like once. A much more important question is if, how, and why we should or shouldn't use torture against 'enemy combatants,' aka accused terrorists. When thinking about torture I think we need to look at real-world examples, not fantasies. I will stand by the idea that I don't think torture should be used to gain information on dead victims, and like I explained before it would be extremely unlikely that the opportunity to use torture to save a live victim would ever come up, in terms of domestic law enforcement. So, should we torture terrorists for information? Not like Abu-graib-style random humiliation, but Jack-Bauer style 'I'm going to cut out your eyeball unless you tell me where the bomb is?' Our government absolutely does use 'interrogation techniques' that border on torture, and I would be quite surprised if they don't also use downright illegal torture as well. But how do I feel about it? I'm not sure. I don't think they're doing it for the enjoyment of torturing ugly hairy men, but rather in an effort to save American lives (that sounds cheesy, but it's true). So of course I want to torture somebody if it will save my daughter, but that's Hollywood bs. Do I also want to torture somebody if he might know information about attacks against American civilians or soldiers? I dunno, but I think I might.

[Nimue1995 1]

Yeah the problem with the OP is that it's a fantasy. In reality, the amount of children who are kidnapped for the purpose of rape/murder is extremely small, and sadly something like 90% of those kidnap victims are dead within 3 hours. In other words, the use of torture to determine the location of an alive-but-dying victim just wouldn't ever happen, or if it did it would happen like once. A much more important question is if, how, and why we should or shouldn't use torture against 'enemy combatants,' aka accused terrorists. When thinking about torture I think we need to look at real-world examples, not fantasies. I will stand by the idea that I don't think torture should be used to gain information on dead victims, and like I explained before it would be extremely unlikely that the opportunity to use torture to save a live victim would ever come up, in terms of domestic law enforcement. So, should we torture terrorists for information? Not like Abu-graib-style random humiliation, but Jack-Bauer style 'I'm going to cut out your eyeball unless you tell me where the bomb is?' Our government absolutely does use 'interrogation techniques' that border on torture, and I would be quite surprised if they don't also use downright illegal torture as well. But how do I feel about it? I'm not sure. I don't think they're doing it for the enjoyment of torturing ugly hairy men, but rather in an effort to save American lives (that sounds cheesy, but it's true). So of course I want to torture somebody if it will save my daughter, but that's Hollywood bs. Do I also want to torture somebody if he might know information about attacks against American civilians or soldiers? I dunno, but I think I might.

I have to question whether the guys doing the torture are really doing it for the country or because deep down they might just enjoy it a little. I think it has to take a certain kind of mindset to get into that business. Which means that somewhere in that person's psyche they want to do that kind of thing. Which is why I object to torture on not only humanitarian grounds but also because there is always the chance that someone will take it too far. And we all know that nothing would ever come out about it if they did.The only example I can think of at this moment is Charles Manson. He sent out 5 people to murder for him, 4 were predisposed to do what he wanted with no thought of conscience. His downfall is that he sent one human being that said "I can't kill anyone Charlie". No matter how much you might want to think that our guys would only torture someone to get information, there may well be a majority of those guys that just enjoy torture. The human beings would be the ones that would say they couldn't do that and would either get transferred or run out of the service.

[vbnautilus 48]

It's OK to do pretty much anything as long as you are really angry and out for personal revenge.

[Sportsmack 0]

I have to question whether the guys doing the torture are really doing it for the country or because deep down they might just enjoy it a little. I think it has to take a certain kind of mindset to get into that business. Which means that somewhere in that person's psyche they want to do that kind of thing. Which is why I object to torture on not only humanitarian grounds but also because there is always the chance that someone will take it too far. And we all know that nothing would ever come out about it if they did.The only example I can think of at this moment is Charles Manson. He sent out 5 people to murder for him, 4 were predisposed to do what he wanted with no thought of conscience. His downfall is that he sent one human being that said "I can't kill anyone Charlie". No matter how much you might want to think that our guys would only torture someone to get information, there may well be a majority of those guys that just enjoy torture. The human beings would be the ones that would say they couldn't do that and would either get transferred or run out of the service.

We should send Charles Manson in to interrogate the terrorist imo.

[Loismustdie 0]

I have to question whether the guys doing the torture are really doing it for the country or because deep down they might just enjoy it a little. I think it has to take a certain kind of mindset to get into that business. Which means that somewhere in that person's psyche they want to do that kind of thing. Which is why I object to torture on not only humanitarian grounds but also because there is always the chance that someone will take it too far. And we all know that nothing would ever come out about it if they did.The only example I can think of at this moment is Charles Manson. He sent out 5 people to murder for him, 4 were predisposed to do what he wanted with no thought of conscience. His downfall is that he sent one human being that said "I can't kill anyone Charlie". No matter how much you might want to think that our guys would only torture someone to get information, there may well be a majority of those guys that just enjoy torture. The human beings would be the ones that would say they couldn't do that and would either get transferred or run out of the service.

You don't have to question anything- you just do it because you have nothing better to do, but even if they did enjoy it, good. That means they will probably do it really, really well. People get captured that have possible information about possible bad, bad stuff that could very well happen to your family, or mine. The military does what it does to try and find out what they may or may not know. Nobody loses eyes. Nobody loses digits. Nobodies balls are ground to pulp. Most of the techniques used are designed to make the mind think something is happening. It's effective. Until someone has a better idea, let the people that do what they do, do it, so you can go on whining about your life in Montana with the rest of the hicks.

[Nimue1995 1]

You don't have to question anything- you just do it because you have nothing better to do, but even if they did enjoy it, good. That means they will probably do it really, really well. People get captured that have possible information about possible bad, bad stuff that could very well happen to your family, or mine. The military does what it does to try and find out what they may or may not know. Nobody loses eyes. Nobody loses digits. Nobodies balls are ground to pulp. Most of the techniques used are designed to make the mind think something is happening. It's effective. Until someone has a better idea, let the people that do what they do, do it, so you can go on whining about your life in Montana with the rest of the hicks.

Do you think we'd hear about it if they were?

[Sal Paradise 57]

Do you think we'd hear about it if they were?

yeah exactly, because the federal government has been so consistently good at keeping secrets so far.

[Loismustdie 0]

Do you think we'd hear about it if they were?

Because the government is just awesome at keeping secrets.

[timwakefield 68]

Maybe a better example I should have used, very similar to the OP is this: Should we use torture if we capture an enemy who we believe has knowledge of captured American soldiers, reporters, etc? Like if we have a specific reason to believe this person was involved in the kidnapping or holding of the Americans, and you've seen enough underground terrorist broadcasts to know that while some victims are left alive for weeks or even months, others are killed on camera. In other words, there is a good chance that a rescue mission could be successful. I feel like this is a much more realistic scenario than the OP, but it is still much less likely or common than torture scenarios involving enemies with potential knowledge of terrorist attacks in the United States, or against US soldiers oversees.

[colonel Feathers 5]

I saw a discussion on this issue with a couple of intelligence experts, and their opinion was that you can't just torture people hoping to get random information; it won't work.

the original point was not looking for random info. One of the guys involved and knew where she was.

[hblask 1]

the original point was not looking for random info. One of the guys involved and knew where she was.

Don't act like this discussion has no larger world implications. If it doesn't, you are an idiot. If it does, you know exactly what my point was.

[CaneBrain 95]

yeah exactly, because the federal government has been so consistently good at keeping secrets so far.

when did we, as a nation, forget how to silence people? it is shocking how bad the federal government is at doing anything on the DL.

[BigDMcGee 3,352]

It's OK to do pretty much anything as long as you are really angry and out for personal revenge.

lol

[pokersean 0]

Waterboarding is not torture that causes physical harm. It causes psychological harm for a brief period of time. It should be 100% legal to use even if your daughter is kidnapped.

[colonel Feathers 5]

It's OK to do pretty much anything as long as you are really angry and out for personal revenge.

True, maybe we just need to understand the needs of kidnappers instead of our own petty relationships.

[LincolnK 1]

Waterboarding is not torture that causes physical harm. It causes psychological harm for a brief period of time. It should be 100% legal to use even if your daughter is kidnapped.

except for that whole thing about dying, since, you know, it's actually controlled drowning. that would probably count as physical harm.also, first hand account from an FBI agenthttp://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/23/opinion/...amp;ref=opinion

...One of the most striking parts of the memos is the false premises on which they are based. The first, dated August 2002, grants authorization to use harsh interrogation techniques on a high-ranking terrorist, Abu Zubaydah, on the grounds that previous methods hadn’t been working. The next three memos cite the successes of those methods as a justification for their continued use.It is inaccurate, however, to say that Abu Zubaydah had been uncooperative. Along with another F.B.I. agent, and with several C.I.A. officers present, I questioned him from March to June 2002, before the harsh techniques were introduced later in August. Under traditional interrogation methods, he provided us with important actionable intelligence.We discovered, for example, that Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks. Abu Zubaydah also told us about Jose Padilla, the so-called dirty bomber. This experience fit what I had found throughout my counterterrorism career: traditional interrogation techniques are successful in identifying operatives, uncovering plots and saving lives.There was no actionable intelligence gained from using enhanced interrogation techniques on Abu Zubaydah that wasn’t, or couldn’t have been, gained from regular tactics. In addition, I saw that using these alternative methods on other terrorists backfired on more than a few occasions — all of which are still classified. The short sightedness behind the use of these techniques ignored the unreliability of the methods, the nature of the threat, the mentality and modus operandi of the terrorists, and due process....

[Potomophobia 17]

liam neeson doesn't need your help.

Great reply.(EDIT)The movie was lame.

[Potomophobia 17]

Reading this thread is TORTURE.