[quote name='dopa345']The "slippery slope" argument is a fallacious one. You can't refute a point by saying something will inevitably happen without objective evidence. Other I could just counter by saying that by ruling out torture, we will encourage even more attacks since there will be a perception that there is relatively little to fear by being captured by Americans (which while I actually believe to be true, it is not an effective argument for this debate).[/quote]
I'm pretty sure making state sanctioned torture as a policy is the bottom of the slippery slope.
If he is an American citizen, he is entitled to the full protection of the Bill of Rights in that case and in my mind would not be subjected to torture. However, that guy from Istanbul, if he is affiliated with a terrorist organization and had time sensitive information that could save American lives, then yes I would condone torture if it came to that to get that information.
How do you know he has the information? How do you know torture will make him give it up? As several people have repeatedly pointed out on this thread torture has never been a reliable for of information gathering, you get guys who admit to anything you say, anything to make you stop, but that doesn't necessarily make their statements true, if anything it makes them more unreliable.
Everyone is entitled to basic rights but if you violate the law, they you forfeit those rights. We deprive liberty to criminals because they commit a crime. A terrorist, to put it mildly, has commited a crime and thus they forfeit those rights.
Even criminals have rights, humans, just by the sheer fact that they are alive, have rights. Even a terrorist is innocent until proven guilty, even Osama Bin Laden gets a day in court.
We have a long way to go before we've "lowered" ourselves to their level. If we start sending suicide bombers to civilian targets or videotaping our soldiers decapitating innocent people we picked up at random then yes, we've "lowered" ourselves to their level.
If we ever sanction torture solely to exact revenge, then I would also agree we are lowering ourselves to their level. However, I still think that is a far cry from torture in a "ticking bomb" scenario in order to save lives which is perfectly defensible.
Picking someone up at random and torturing someone who may or may not have the information you want is the same thing, you're still torturing someone. It's worse if you're a state, then you have to own up to it, pay the penalty for it in the international community, and for sure be sued by the guy if you get nothing out of him. The ends don't justify the means.
Or, Abu Gharib, same torture rooms, under new management.
As you say, the debate over the effectiveness of torture is almost completely speculative and any objective evidence is probably top secret. We don't hear any of the success stories of attack averted because of the use of torture (but I will concede it would be just an unlikely we would not hear of the "failures" as well).
Are you kidding me? This administration would be walking up and down Broadway with a bullhorn telling the world they stopped a terror attack, no matter how they got the information. More so now if they did it using torture, they'd come right out and say it.
The more I look into this the more overwhelming it becomes that there doesn't seem to be any rational defense of torture. It's complete unreliability is astounding.
That would be indefensible since you're involving a completely innocent party. However I have no problem making the suspect think we would/could do something like that. I've already put it at where I would draw the line. A terror suspect with time sensitive knowledge of an imminent attack.
And what if he still doesn't give it up? What do you do then? How many more suspects are you willing to burn the eyes out of for information? What, you'll burn a dudes eyes out but you won't
his daughter? Maybe she knows something, I mean she's affiliated to a terror suspect. She could have overheard him talking about the plan, let's burn her eyes out too while we're at it, it'll save American lives.
Nothing is stopping those countries from torturing anybody, they have their own policies on that.
So you WOULD be ok with it, just making sure. You'd let that slide? ok.
Anyway, the big difference is that if we were ever in a conflict with them, the Geneva Convention would apply so in theory, POW's on either side would be protected.
But that's the law they want to change, to redefine the word 'torture' as it allies to the Geneva Conventions. So if we can do it, why can't they?
All I can say is that I just don't understand how you could put lives of your fellow citizens over the well-being of a terrorist. But you are entitled to your opinion.
It's called being a human being, not just an American, understanding that one thing the neocons were right about is the middle east is going to be the focal point for the next century. And we started it out by invading two of their countries, killing over 100,000 of their people and now, torturing them. We will reap what we have sown for another 93 years.
I don't think that would be necessary since I don't think terrorists are entitled to Constitutional rights.
If they're americans they do.
I wouldn't know whether to laugh or cry if that happened.
Sad thing is, neither would I, but I think for some substantially different reasons.
[/QUOTE]
