The author Jonathan Alter has written essay titled:”time to think about torture.” Mr. alter refers to the time. It in the United States history as the: “autumn to of anger.” He describes multiple torture methods and gives examples in detail their uses. He refers to the time: Prior to September 11th, “hopelessly September 10th.” Mr. Altar explains that that era of time had many wrong assumptions about law and its enforcement in reference to terrorism. By a vote of 98 to 1 PM The Anti- terrorism bill was passed and history was made. Chief Justice Robert Jackson stated:”the Constitution is not a suicide pact. “This comment by the Chief…
The “Cruel and Unusual Punishment” Clause of the Eighth Amendment came from the English Bill of Rights that were adopted in 1689. This provision was written into the English Bill of Rights after Titus Otis, who lied causing many innocent people to be executed, was punished in a cruel and unusual way at the time. George Manson first used the cruel and unusual punishment clause in 1776 when he drafted the Declaration of Rights for the Commonwealth of Virginia. In 1791, the clause was added to the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution. People feared that if this clause was not added that Congress would abuse its power and use cruel and unusual punishments as a tool to oppress them.…
According to Donald Trump, people in different nations would hurt us more for invading their territory, the consequences would be deathly. He also says that EIT is an alternative, and people shouldn’t feel bad for wanting answers (“Should Interrogation Techniques”). Furthermore, the CIA has brought people to black sites where they were interrogated for years. Ever since the black sites and all of the interrogation happened, there our less and less people who our getting hurt. There are also less attacks (“Conspiracy stuff”). This all ties together because of all the interrogation, there have been less attacks and the United States should interrogate one person instead of letting everyone…
In addition to the overwhelming public support for the use of EITs, the same ABC News survey found that 53% of Americans believe that the interrogation techniques used by the CIA produced important information for the United States fight against terror, and indeed they were correct. Of the 119 individuals detained after the 9/11 and subjected to EITs only 26 did not provide actionable intelligence or were “wrongfully held” (Ashkenas). In addition, only 3 detainees were subjected to the harshest technique of waterboarding. Waterboarding is defined by the BBC…
At some point everyone has heard of torture. It could have been in a movie or on the news, but they have heard of it. In this day and age, people would like to have believed it was all behind us in the past. Then 9/11 happened, everyone’s lives were changed with one simple act of cruelty. Before 9/11 hit the U.S. in a wave of pain, panic, and anger, our viewpoints on torture would probably have been less likely that it should be allowed. The decision to torture people who are suspected of being part of terrorist groups has always been decided by the government, for the simple reason that it is required to keep us safe from harm. Some people believe that torture is cruel, unsightly and just inhumane. On the other hand there are people who see it the same way but also believe it could be necessary in extreme circumstances. We’re going to look at two different points of torture: When it is acceptable and when it is not acceptable.…
This type of situation has been repeated in history with one example being the War Crime Trials for the Nazi soldiers after the Holocaust. In that instance, since people’s lives were lost, these Nazi officials were given the death penalty because people believed they should receive the same type of punishment for their actions. In this hypothetical example, no deaths were lost, but there was torture and terror involved which some people argue that torture is far worse than just being given the death penalty. So is being tortured actually worse than just being given the death penalty? The importance of considering this question is that if torture is worse than the death penalty then the death penalty would be a lesser punishment and any punishment “above or below what would be acceptable for the crime committed would be immoral because it does not…
Torture is a concept that Americans attempt to avoid. If a criminal possesses the opportunity to harm innocent lives, the delinquent should be stopped. The idea presides in Michael Levin’s “The Case for Torture”; Levin attempts to portray a point that the act of torturing terrorists in order to save innocent lives is justifiable. Throughout the article, Levin fabricates situations to present his argument that torture is not a bad idea. He voices that torture is not established to punish criminals, but instead it is established to hinder future malicious events from occurring. Although the United States government deems torture unconstitutional, Levin validates torture being acceptable through the utilization of the rhetorical appeals pathos and ethos.…
“To torture or not to torture” – the main topic in debate between Charles Krauthammer and Andrew Sullivan is whether torture should be permissible under certain circumstances or never at all. The debate of torture between Krauthammer and Sullivan began three years after the Bush administration defined “torture” in the narrowest terms – the permitted coercive, physical abuse of enemy combatants if the military necessity demands it. (317) Krauthammer discusses extreme situations that make the use of torture seem less morally unethical and almost acceptable; however, his examples are just hypothetical situations. When I weigh his scenarios against reality and think about how much torture can really affect a person’s life, Krauthammer’s make-believe stories have no weight and do not sway my opinion one bit. On the other hand, Sullivan makes a strong point that I completely agree with. We are all humans, but allowing torture to be permissible would only lead to people treating others in a manner less than any human would ever deserve.…
To most, torture is seen as action with a single definition that defines it, but in fact there are different types of torture that Henry Shue discusses in one of his articles. According to Shue there are rare conditions under which torture could be morally justified, but he does not endorse neither the interrogational torture not the terroristic torture. Although Shue agrees with illegality and morally wrongness of torture, he explains how one may go about defending torture and how it could possibly be morally justified.…
I agree with “Tortures Terrible Toll” article that we should not treat any person even prisoners with torture. Not only as mentioned in the essay that torture might not be effective, but also the inhumane and degrading treatment of torture will reflect the country’s moral standing. I agree with the idea mentioned in the article that all people are created equal with inalienable rights. But some people think that we have to revenge from terrorists by torture. I am not against loss of any terrorist’s life, but I am caring about the way they treated. Children who watch any torture scenes might grew up showing huge violence. No doubt, countries that use torture even to terrorists will be affected in their children. Of course to defeat prisoners…
far better than harming thousands. However, I think there is no scenario where it is acceptable to torture innocent children.…
In the article “The Truth about Torture”, Charles Krauthammer considers the ticking time bomb problem and argues that torture is sometimes not only morally permissible, but morally necessary. Krauthammer uses the example of terrorists in his example, what if we captured a terrorist with knowledge of an attack and the knowledge of future attacks; do we torture him for his information? Or simply just have him locked up? (Krauthammer 2). Utilitarian considerations are sufficient to justify using cruel actions against terrorists to extract confessions. Even though is cruel to torture one to extract information, it is our duty as citizens to maintain the happiness as a whole and do what is necessary to save lives.…
Torture is the act of inflicting excruciating pain, as punishment or revenge, as a means of getting a confession or information, or for sheer cruelty. Justify is to guide by truth, reason, justice, and fairness. In any circumstances, how could inflicting pain upon a human being be done in fairness? In any circumstances, how could torture be justified? It cannot.…
After having conducted numerous interrogations of his own, former veteran of the US Air Force, Matthew Alexander, came to the realization that more members were willing to cooperate with troops when they peacefully approached them while torturing them only did the reverse effect (34). Furthermore, a history professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Alfred W. McCoy, states in regards to bureau agent, Dan Coleman, that if a tortured man is “...going to be ashamed and humiliated... He’ll tell you anything you want to hear to get his clothes back. There’s no value in it” (qtd in McCoy). In the article of David Rose who is a contributing editor for Vanity Fair, he discussed the impact of seeing Abu Zubaydah tortured influenced F.B.I’s assistant for counterterrorism, Pasquale D'Amuro, to persuade director Robert Mueller to discontinue the bureau’s role in future C.I.A. interrogations in which use harsh and extreme techniques to extract information (47). After speaking with officials from both sides of Atlantic counterterrorist agencies , Rose discovered that “...coercive methods failed to generate significant and actionable intelligence, [and] have also caused the squandering of resources on a massive scale through ...[improbable] plots, and unnecessary safety alerts”(43). Evidently,…
It’s safe to say that torture may be one of the worst experiences that can happen to a human being. I know that if I were a situation where my options were being tortured to death or being put to death quickly, I would choose the quick death every time. The issue at hand is whether we should be allowed to torture terrorists for information or not. While most people have probably already formed their own opinion on the matter, it may not be as cut and dry as they first thought once they hear the argument from both sides.…
