A question for those who oppose torture.

Erik Mesoy said:
And please stop with the "boom your family and friends just blew up", it's a stupid, cheap shot. Boom, your family, your friends and you are being tortured in return because you've made it clear that torture is acceptable.
The arguement by precedent is absurd, when it applies to the most extreme cases torture can be used as a last resort. The black and white idea of it being acceptable or not is silly. There's a lot of grey in between.
 
Truronian said:
If there was no time for a trial, and if other options had been exhausted. Bear in mind, this kind of situation is not going to be common (unless you live in the 24 universe).
Look, once you say the authorities can do anything outside of the legal loop (and thus the rule of law), and even more so when you specifically say its in emergency situations with no time to get in the loop, you have no way of really make sure that the authorities and/or the people who make them up and work for them won't abuse this. You are effectively saying that when someone thinks it's an emergency, they can forget about the basic principles of democracy and go ahead and be an inhumane monster, torturing, killing, whatever. They'll later plead that they thought they had to do what they had to do. The message has to be absolutely clear: the authorities can do exactly what the laws say they have to, and cannot do anything else. They must always act completely within the democratic legal system, no matter what. It's not a question of a lot of lives vs. a bit of pain. It's a question of either losing some lives or losing democracy. Democracy without Rule of Law is nothing.
 
It's not a question of a lot of lives vs. a bit of pain. It's a question of either losing some lives or losing democracy. Democracy without Rule of Law is nothing.

Now who is being emotive? I think you'll find that torture is not extinct in the American democracy that everyone is so fond of. What people don't know doesn't hurt them
 
Blasphemous said:
Look, once you say the authorities can do anything outside of the legal loop (and thus the rule of law), and even more so when you specifically say its in emergency situations with no time to get in the loop, you have no way of really make sure that the authorities and/or the people who make them up and work for them won't abuse this. You are effectively saying that when someone thinks it's an emergency, they can forget about the basic principles of democracy and go ahead and be an inhumane monster, torturing, killing, whatever. They'll later plead that they thought they had to do what they had to do. The message has to be absolutely clear: the authorities can do exactly what the laws say they have to, and cannot do anything else. They must always act completely within the democratic legal system, no matter what. It's not a question of a lot of lives vs. a bit of pain. It's a question of either losing some lives or losing democracy. Democracy without Rule of Law is nothing.

Thats one of my favourite posts in this thread so far. Good job.
 
Truronian, care to answer to the point? What's to stop the authorities from abusing this out-of-the-loop justice/enforcement for less than noble causes? If the authorities were officially given the authority to do this kind of thing, what, aside from ideology, is gonna stop them from going down the SS's path? If Anytown, USA's police chief decides the black community is gonna burn the rei--, erm, town hall in a couple of hours, what's to stop them from using these emergency powers to brutalize an ethnic minority "'cause they had no time for a fair trial and lives were at risk"?

@RedWolf:
Thanks. :)
 
Blasphemous said:
Look, once you say the authorities can do anything outside of the legal loop (and thus the rule of law), and even more so when you specifically say its in emergency situations with no time to get in the loop, you have no way of really make sure that the authorities and/or the people who make them up and work for them won't abuse this. You are effectively saying that when someone thinks it's an emergency, they can forget about the basic principles of democracy and go ahead and be an inhumane monster, torturing, killing, whatever. They'll later plead that they thought they had to do what they had to do. The message has to be absolutely clear: the authorities can do exactly what the laws say they have to, and cannot do anything else. They must always act completely within the democratic legal system, no matter what. It's not a question of a lot of lives vs. a bit of pain. It's a question of either losing some lives or losing democracy. Democracy without Rule of Law is nothing.
What does this have to do with legality? The question is about morality. To do something against the rule of law is not always bad. I would torture someone and go to jail for a few years if it meant saving the lives of many people. Of course, the laws could be adjusted to allow it in such extreme cases but have an extensive and harsh review process to ensure proper application.
 
@ Blasphemous

I'm not saying give the police the authority to torture, I'm saying give it to the secret service, or whoever is likely to deal with terrorist threats or other large scale life endangering situations. Bear in mind that the secret services of the world already use torture (to believe otherwise is plain naivity), and so by your description, democracy is already dead (and so none of this matters).
 
Perfection said:
What does this have to do with legality? The question is about morality. To do something against the rule of law is not always bad. I would torture someone and go to jail for a few years if it meant saving the lives of many people. Of course, the laws could be adjusted to allow it in such extreme cases but have an extensive and harsh review process to ensure proper application.
What I'm saying is that you can't say that it's legally okay to use torture just like that, without a trial. I don't think torture is effective or useful anyways, I just think it's really bad for a democracy to allow the authorities authority outside the rule of law.
Truronian said:
@ Blasphemous

I'm not saying give the police the authority to torture, I'm saying give it to the secret service, or whoever is likely to deal with terrorist threats or other large scale life endangering situations. Bear in mind that the secret services of the world already use torture (to believe otherwise is plain naivity), and so by your description, democracy is already dead (and so none of this matters).
See above, pretty much.
It might just be that I'm tired, but I feel I've nothing more to say to that except for what I wrote in response to Perf.
 
Urederra said:
Time is over, you haven't tortured the terrorist and the bomb exploded, killing 10000, your family included. Live with it.

So you're torturing the terrorist, and he finally reveals that it was the city hospital that his buddy hid the bomb in (disguised as a locked file cabinet), and that the plan was for it to go off at noon. Nothing he states contradicts your own intelligence up to this point. It is 11:30 now. Your spouse is in the operating room there getting brain surgery and can't be moved for 30 minutes or she'll die. Do you order the building evacuated?

Urederra said:
would it be considered torture to rub pig's fat over his/her body? Pork is banned in muslin countries.

Would it be considered torture to force a Christian to eat red meat on Fridays? Roughly the same level of stupidity involved. :rolleyes:

Oh, and boom, the bomb exploded in the evacuated crowd standing outside the hospital. Pity about your wife.
 
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