EPTSo close that it is the dot.
Bush Torture Memos - Page 5
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Tyrant
Korea (South)234 Posts
So close that it is the dot. | ||
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SnK-Arcbound
United States4423 Posts
Technically speaking we should prosecute them under afgan/iraqi law, but because it is nearly impossible to have any proof of what the people have done. I've talked to lots of marines who have served tours, and they will shoot at you until you kick down the door, and then they profess that it was his brother that was shooting at you. Torture shouldn't be done. | ||
IntoTheWow
is awesome32278 Posts
On April 17 2009 13:39 Brett wrote: What? 24? I've never watched a fucking episode of that show. Don't be a twit. The ticking bomb scenario is a fictional scenario. And it is purposely SIMPLISTIC. BUT THAT IS THE POINT; IT'S AN ILLUSTRATION . And holy balls have you missed the whole issue. Did you not read that I said you're over simplifying the debate? You've done it again. Time is one of the main factors that complicates the debate. Those in support of torture pose that time is a factor in getting the necessary information before it is acted upon or before the window of opportunity is shut. The criminal justice system is incredibly slow, and there are just as many individuals involved in the criminal justice system whose rights are as important as those of the person who may be subjected to torture. That is but one facet of the argument which you clearly have failed to even consider. Before you go spouting off at the mouth (fingers?) about my views, let me tell you this: I'm against torture, but I'm ultimately against it because it has been used contrary to the rule of law. The difference is I can admit that it's not as simple as "torture or dont torture" and "trial or no trial". Don't be so naive. What does it being the Bush administration have to do with any point I made? If anything, you're again showing your ignorance. Like I said, Go and look at Bagram and what OBAMA's DoJ has to say about the subject. In case you're too daft: they're (Obama's DoJ) challenging the applicability of the Boudameine (sp) ruling to Bagram because they want to be able to, essentially, abduct foreign nationals, move them to Bagram, hold them indefinitely contra to habeus corpus and do who knows what the fuck ever they do to that person to get information. FFS, they even adopted the Bush administration's arguments. Your final quote is about the only thing of value in that post and I wholeheartedly agree with it. Rule of law. That's exactly my point. How are you enforce a law that is based on subjective determinations. When is the bomb ticking? This is a very manipulable thing and have seen rules that follow the same enemy spotting criteria before. Most immigration rules that follow the "subject looks suspicious" argument have proven to be nothing but an excuse for officer to abuse other human beings. How can you enforce a law that breaks lots of international pacts and national laws? The ticking bomb argument is nothing but a slippery slope, that takes a few exceptions to the rule, blows it out of proportion and creates panic and paranoia in the people of one country to abuse the power and go feinting on the rules that protect the people. Being in the Bush administration has to do with the argument. I barely watch American TV channels and the first thing you realize after 9/11 is how the government (with the help of the media of course) manipulated people's fears to enforce the patriotic act which we known what critics has received from all human rights organizations. Honestly, go check some numbers experts on terrorism give: the ticking bomb scenario is very very uncommon, and giving authorities an excuse to torture harms people's life more, than whatever threat the government or the media tells you is knocking at your door. | ||
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IntoTheWow
is awesome32278 Posts
On April 17 2009 13:02 SerpentFlame wrote: Take a look at Kennedy's administration. Full of Ivy league scholars and whiz kids and smart people like that. MacNamara anyone? And everyone in the administration was like "HMMM I THINK THE VIETNAM WILL JOIN RED CHINA WE MUST STOP THIS FROM HAPPENING. Ticking time bomb!" The time bomb never ticked. In fact we later uncovered evidence that showed the time bomb never really existed. And the Soviet Union / Chinese have had a millionfold more resources than the modern day "terrorists" ever had. This goes back all the way through US (and human) history, from fear of Soviet and Chinese saboteurs in the Cold War to fear of the Japanese immigrants in the WWII era to fear of the Southern European newcomers in the post-Reconstruction era to the fear of Native Americans in the pre-modern era to the fear of English sympathizers in the post-Revolution era to the fear of Spanish and French agents in the new Americas from the day our country was born. How many times have these threats been real? Well they all were real, they were all just stupendously overexaggerated, and paranoia kills. Thank you. | ||
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benjammin
United States2728 Posts
On April 17 2009 16:10 SnK-Arcbound wrote: And yet you all ignore that the people being detained don't qualify to be protected under the geneva convention, so the conditions breaking the genev. Technically speaking we should prosecute them under afgan/iraqi law, but because it is nearly impossible to have any proof of what the people have done. I've talked to lots of marines who have served tours, and they will shoot at you until you kick down the door, and then they profess that it was his brother that was shooting at you. Torture shouldn't be done. no one's ignoring that fact, that fact is just immaterial. just because they are unlawful combatants doesn't it make it morally or ethically right to torture them for the bad intelligence you'll get. | ||
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pyrogenetix
China5098 Posts
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Brett
Australia3822 Posts
On April 17 2009 14:48 Railxp wrote: @ Brett: Perhaps i am being naive and stupid here, but what exactly is so complex about torture? I honestly don't see where the grey area is. I think it is agreed by now that: a) Torture is morally wrong b) Torture is ineffective (for extracting accurate information) From there on it it seems to be rather black and white. And just for the sake of clarity: Definition from Oxford Eng Dictionary: + Show Spoiler + Torture: The infliction of severe bodily pain, as punishment or a means of persuasion Please elaborate/enlighten me about your position. In response to a) Torture is normatively wrong. I would agree with that; It's very difficult to argue against it with any weight. But does it continue to be morally wrong when the torture may result in information that saves thousands of lives? This is a theoretical argument, fully of many ifs or buts, I understand that. Consider it from the perspective of those in power: Is it morally wrong to fail to exercise an executive power available to you when facing the prospect of large scale carnage? I could easily argue that it is. Particularly in democratic nation states where the executive is readily held accountable for what occurs. It's also hard for people in power to sit around and say "yes, I would let thousands die rather than torture an individual/a select few". They would ultimately have to justify that to the families of those who die and the public at large. This is the position that those in power face. Now some may counter as above, that they're chasing ghosts, they're insecure/paranoid whatever. And then the retort is 'well, what have we disrupted by being so proactive? How do you quantify that?' then people anti torture retort 'where do you draw the line?' and so the argument wheel turns. (I'm being very simplistic here because I'm heading out in 5 mins, I'll happily write more later if you want me to expand on this). In response to b) Why is it ineffective? Because you get some false confessions? They are not entirely useless when viewed outside of the moral vacuum. Like Jibba espoused: To what degree is it ineffective, particularly when used in conjunction with the many other information gather techniques? Not everyone will be innocent. What value do you place on the information gained from those who you torture and DO possess such information? Again, I'm being simplistic because I'm short on time. But these are arguments that are expounded upon by a great deal of writers. I ultimately conclude that torture is wrong. My hat is tipped in that direction because I believe in the rule of law. However, I don't come to that conclusion lightly, and when someone responds to other people's opinions (which are contrary to their own) with 'lol'... That I don't need to expand upon. | ||
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Brett
Australia3822 Posts
On April 17 2009 15:42 FakeSteve[TPR] wrote: attention brett: NO ONE FUCKING CARES ABOUT YOUR OPINIONS ON OTHER PEOPLE'S ABILITY TO ARGUE. TALK ABOUT WHAT WE'RE TALKING ABOUT IN THIS THREAD AND LEAVE YOUR STUPID BULLSHIT AT THE DOOR. DO NOT GET PERSONAL AND DO NOT PRETEND SOMEONE ELSE IS "ARGUING WRONG". YOU ARE NOT HERE TO WIN THE ARGUMENT BECAUSE NO ONE FUCKING CARES. that is all Nobody cares about quality of argument on this forum? FUCKING news to me. If people are encouraged/allowed to post with 'lol' as a response, this place will degrade into 4chan. Settle the fuck down. | ||
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uNcontroLable
United States1180 Posts
On April 17 2009 12:21 Jibba wrote: It's not at all the same as what Ford did for Nixon. These were secret memos, he could have kept them secret. He made them public for political leverage for the entire party. According to what I've read, a lot of his decision not to prosecute was based on the fact that, under the Bush administration, these actions were officially sanctioned. At the time, these people had official approval to do what they were doing. It may have been wrong, but I think Obama is right not to seek to punish people who were acting according to government policies. To focus on dismantling that governmental framework and building another one that will not make the same mistakes or allow people to take such actions ever again is the right course of action imo. Keep moving forward. | ||
FakeSteve[TPR]
Valhalla18444 Posts
On April 17 2009 16:38 Brett wrote: Nobody cares about quality of argument on this forum? FUCKING news to me. If people are encouraged/allowed to post with 'lol' as a response, this place will degrade into 4chan. Settle the fuck down. yeah cool man fight the fucking power!!!! see you in a week, next one's permanent. mind your fucking manners, especially when a moderator tells you to. what do you think moderators are here for, benign suggestions we sincerely hope you will take to heart? edit: for anyone curious, this is not the first time Brett has wandered into a discussion thread intent on calling everyone stupid. I understand arguments can get heated, but there has to be a limit in place or this place will degenerate into a cesspool of armchair intellectuals engaging in overly-verbose battles over nothing | ||
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L
Canada4732 Posts
I think Brett's point is valid though. It's more grey than most people think, and it's easy to make moral judgments on an internet forum, but it's not so easy when you're actually held accountable if an attack goes off. No, it isn't more grey than most people think; its more black and white that most people think, that's the problem. Sophistry based upon dishonest, but difficult to detect fallacies does not make an issue morally relative. Torture goes against the fundamental assumptions which comprise both of the major western legal traditions. Our society is ordered in a fundamental way as a rejection of the possibility of outside coercion (especially from government), that's why our system of land tenure and ownership are exclusive. The entire move from a feudal system to one of modern ownership was done specifically to limit the ability of the state to do such things, and the integrity of the rule of law was designed to prevent it from just uprooting people without trials and put them into special prisons. This had nothing to do with the status or standing of the person, it was the entire movement of legal thought from roughly the French revolution until now. This shit is grey? No it isn't. Its even more than the black letter of the law, and more than the spirit of a statute or a bill. Its the ENTIRE FOCUS OF WESTERN SOCIETY. The pardoning of G. W. Bush similarly wasn't a 'neutral' action which let bygones be bygones. Criminal (and to a certain extent tort) law is designed to be a punitive force designed to deter people from doing something. In this case, the deterrence would be against completely ignoring the constitution, which seems like a fairly valid use of the law. Letting someone get away with actions this egregious completely violates both constitutional principles and constitutional content. If he's innocent, let a trial decide that. If he's not, let him pay the price that the law prescribes. | ||
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Railxp
Hong Kong1313 Posts
On April 17 2009 15:10 Jibba wrote: Inconsistent, and dangerous if you rely on it as your only source of information. But it's possible that the FBI has enough resources to cover all bases, including false positives. You can also triangulate through various sources to confirm information. Say you torture 10 prisoners and get confessions out of all of them, but 9 are lying to end the torture and only 1 knows something (and we assume torture WILL make him confess, but that is disputable too.) As long as you can prepare/check for all 10 stories, it'll work out. That would be the utilitarian argument for it (which I disagree with) - that the information could very well be wrong, but you can afford for it to be wrong as long as you're testing other possible alternatives. There is still the ethical component, and the many other problems associated with violating codes of conduct with prisoners (such as our own soldiers being tortured.) I am interested in attacking the utilitarian argument because once that is gone....i don't see any other reason there would be for torture. Regarding triangulating information or using info gained from torture to verify other info: The purpose for doing this is to get the truth. But since we know that there is humongous incentive to lie under torture, it would be LAST on my list for getting accurate info. If the guy being tortured was innocent, he would claim "i dont know" and when that doesn't work, make up something so that the pain would stop. If the guy being tortured was indeed a terrorist and planned part of the attack, he would ALSO lie (say target location is the white house instead of the pentagon, or claim attack will be a week from now instead of tomorrow.) In either scenario, theres no way to get any solid confirmation details. I think this undermines the torture for verification idea. *** The other option is to torture for initial information, which you can then follow up leads and verify info gained from that. In this scenario, if info gained from torture is false, at best you are lead on a goose chase and end up wasting resources. At worse, you go all out and kidnap many many innocent people and torturing them too just to justify confirmation bias. In the name of protection, you destroy your own country (lives as well as global image). In the other scenario, if the info gained from torture is true, you would still have to verify it because it is unreliable. At best, one person suffers plenty of physical pain, and the torturer becomes emotionally traumatized, and you save thousands of lives. At worse, you don't believe what he said, and go out to torture even more innocent people to get a confirmation. TL;DR: _________________ Believe info ____________Dont believe info Lie under torture:-----| Many Innocents Die --------- Many Innocents Die Truth under torture --| Utilitarian Justified ----------- Many Innocents Die Here the utilitarian argument implodes on itself, because this is NOT efficient at all, and does not serve the "greatest good for greatest number of people" because you are much more likely to get everything wrong and to fuck someone up that to get anything right. Moreover, THERE IS NO REASON TO NOT BELIEVE. If you don't believe in the answer, there would be no torture in the first place. The only thing to gain out of torture seems to be vengeance, and we all know vengeance doesn't save lives, it costs more lives actually .If you would allow a rather poor metaphor: it is like looking for your keys in the freezer where you know it probably isn't to begin with. Counter productive, waste of time, minimal chance of finding what you want. I think this defends my previous point B, but please point out the holes in it if you find any. *** It's more grey than most people think, and it's easy to make moral judgments on an internet forum, but it's not so easy when you're actually held accountable if an attack goes off. Moral judgments are universal, you cant just decide to leave them at the door when you go out to get dirty. And, while we are evaluating PURELY from a one dimensional, moral point of view....its not really the guard who is evil if he doesn't know and fails to catch a trespassing murderer. Its still the murderer's fault for killing people. And, to take a real (and sensitive) example, after 911, people weren't out there witch hunting for CIA/NSA/FBI agents who failed to prevent it, the mob was out there hunting for anyone with a turban and a beard. Even the media focused its attacks primarily on The Public Enemy. So no, the guards are not really held accountable at all in the big scheme of things. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- @Brett: I would distinguish between the moral and the normative, but that is another debate in itself. (Not want go there) Instead: Your argument against point A seems to be the utilitarian argument, which i have addressed above. Edit: Aww mods doing their job tempbanned him before he got to address my points.  i guess i will have to await someone else to test the validity of my arguments. and now i also need someone else to respond so i can boost my post count and hopefully get a cute zergling icon in the near future. | ||
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diehilde
Germany1596 Posts
Of course, punishing high-ranking government officials is a taboo, even if they pass bills which violate human rights.... disgusting 8[ | ||
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CharlieMurphy
United States22895 Posts
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omninmo
2349 Posts
On April 17 2009 09:02 SwaY- wrote: Yeah the bolded part was a big wtf, why are they releasing these if there is not intention of prosecuting? because its all part of the show sheep | ||
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wo0py
Netherlands922 Posts
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Physician
United States4146 Posts
- releasing the memos? who knows what's really going on behind that.. - insects I can manage, now they start throwing in arachnids I know I will lose it lol. + Show Spoiler + On April 17 2009 16:52 FakeSteve[TPR] wrote: yeah cool man fight the fucking power!!!! see you in a week, next one's permanent. mind your fucking manners, especially when a moderator tells you to. what do you think moderators are here for, benign suggestions we sincerely hope you will take to heart? edit: for anyone curious, this is not the first time Brett has wandered into a discussion thread intent on calling everyone stupid. I understand arguments can get heated, but there has to be a limit in place or this place will degenerate into a cesspool of armchair intellectuals engaging in overly-verbose battles over nothing ![[image loading]](http://www.yellowchrome.org/tlnethreads.jpg) + Show Spoiler + - you were weak to ban him though : ) - anyway since when you worried about manners? Just look at your own caps and language man, you almost single handily imposed the style in this forum lol (ok, ok unfair, I take that last part back) | ||
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Vex
Ireland454 Posts
meh. difficulty caring' its not like that wasnt already known | ||
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Mobius
Canada1268 Posts
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Yurebis
United States1452 Posts
It's not just Bush either. It's not just Guantanamo. For officials to kid around with " unlawful enemy combatant's" lives like that and get away with it, even if it wasn't an ordered thing, the higher tops at multiple intelligence agencies would have to at least be guilty by complicity or negligence. The president and it's cabinet aren't the only ones involved, not like it's Bush and Cheney themselves at those secret prisons crushing a detainee's child's scrotum with pliers. Perhaps they weren't even the originators of these orders. But it doesn't matter. There's a long chain of command to go through, they were all aware of it, and they were all compliant. The ticking bomb scenario is only pretext to do this sort of thing. Once you sell out to evil, you're fine with your own family being tortured if it needs to be. Please don't fall for it. Torture is completely useless for information gathering, and these ticking bomb scenarios 99% of the time don't even exist (except in 24). You may see it as justifiable "if it saves lives", but it doesn't. All it does is degrade the value of human lives, and give government yet another power. Not just over foreign "terrorists", but over you as well. Did you know you could be labelled an "unlawful enemy combatant" anytime, and be put to the same practices as them? Don't have to be a foreigner, anyone can be a terrorist in the eyes of the not-so-Patriot Act. There's absolutely no excuse for torture. None. Stop supporting it. Thank you. | ||
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