What do you know? American "torture" worked...

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Asher
9/10. Very well done.

[Nubclear]

What do you know? American "torture" worked...

Nov. 18, 2005 — Harsh interrogation techniques authorized by top officials of the CIA have led to questionable confessions and the death of a detainee since the techniques were first authorized in mid-March 2002, ABC News has been told by former and current intelligence officers and supervisors.

[BeBMan]

Stop that!

[Nubclear]

Sorry.



USA! USA! USA!

You are either with us, or with the TERRORISTS!!1

[BeBMan]

[Velociryx]

If we persist in stooping to this level, if we continue to rely on techinques proven to give less than reliable "confessions," then I say that we're terrorists ourselves, and the greatest terrorist of them all would have to be the President who gave his blessing to proceed.



We need a "Régime change."

-=Vel=-

[Pekka]

Those techniques are definitely torture. Attention grab doesn't seem like a torture though. But you can make something out of those too.

Doing the stress positions thing is torture. Hey, I don't care if some people here have stood 2 hours straight and not moving. That's kind of not what they do, get it?

Slapping is not far from punch, the impact is about the same, the surface is just different. Have you ever seen fights without closed fists? I have. They are brutal, it's called open palm strike. B1tches slap... it's open palm striking, which is equivalent to any kind of striking.

The water part? classic torture methods.

These are all known methods, attention grab, I don't know what that is though.

But nice names for torture. I like the slaps, kind of like some people do to their kids. Or long time standing. I mean, that's just standing, right?

But what can I say. I trust in the law of karma.

[KrazyHorse]

Torture

Torture apologists

[Nubclear]

It's very sad to me to watch American views toward torture continue to twist and warp. Before torture would have been completely unacceptable - "We are Americans, we are Westerners, torture is something that the communists do, not us!"
But now that they've been scared senseless, more and more Americans have no moral qualms at all about torture or the destruction of due process or the destruction of seperation of powers or anysuch. As long as they are told it makes them safer, they seem to support it...

Oh well.

[Velociryx]

Hey, don't lump ALL Americans into that boat, Tass.

I'm just glad that other nations don't use the same low standard we devised in invading Iraq when determining whether or not to invade US. After all:

We do a helluva lot more sabre rattling than Saddam ever DREAMED about.

We not only HAVE weapons of mass destruction, but we sell them to all sorts of nice people (including Saddam) to use as they see fit...see, in this way, the movers and shakers behind the scenes in Washington get to mass murder by proxy...we can wail and gnash our teeth in mock horror when the tin pot dictators use them for what they were designed for and still manage to call ourselves the "good guys" at the end of the day, and we have a President who has seen fit to stack his administration full of people who seem dead set on ripping our Republic to shreds in the name of some meglomanical quest for personal power.

These are the guys who freakin' KNOW they're breaking the law (thus the need to strongarm new legislation thru Congress to make their actions retroactively legal), and who don't really give a $hit.

Impeachable? Oh hell yeah.

The greater bulk of the Administration deserves to rot in a federal prison. I would say we should send them to one of their own secret prisons, but that would be stooping to their level.

-=Vel=-

[Pekka]

being known for torture was .. few years ago to make a country into rogue category, and one reason more to pick a fight if needed, used as justification. It's been a big turn around for sure. I often see the scenario, if we used torture to save all these people, wouldn't it be worth it?

But that's the wrong question to ask. You can justify anything with false questions like that. The same goes on with trading your privacy to what, security? Privacy IS security!!

You guys are losing so much in so few years, in terms of civil 'rights', and no one is really even fighting for it. Privacy is equally important as is freedom of speech. I bet, that if there was '10 point plan' to fight terrorism or other threats, and it included banning some phrases used in communication, you wouldn't fight it. Let's say that they are known key words and codes for terrorist communication, so why nto just ban from you to use it in your lives. I'm 100% there woudl be no fight for this, even though it makes no sense. I mean it makes sense in some perspective, but... not in the perspective of freedom and security. These bad boys aren't excluding each other out... they are overlapping. Or at least should be. Since when did Americans want someone to tell them what to do anyway? I thought that was a no no... think for yourselves, that's why you have brains... and fight any deprivation of privacy in the name of security.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Actually warping is an interesting take. I submit there really isn't that much warping considering the admittedly blood thirsty nature of the US and rather broad support for death penalty.

Americans have always felt monsters should pay dearly including with their lives if necessary for the greater good. Nothing much changed despite the inferences that we are all just frightened little children.

[Cyclotron]

Even if torture "worked" - which is doubtful - how is that relevant to anything? Most people don't oppose torture primarily because of its ineffectiveness, they oppose it because it is torture, and morally wrong. Who cares if it "worked?"

Good people do not torture. I don't care if it makes me safe for the rest of my life; profiting off torturing and humiliating others is a bankrupt existence.

[Nubclear]

Originally posted by Ogie Oglethorpe
Actually warping is an interesting take. I submit there really isn't that much warping considering the admittedly blood thirsty nature of the US and rather broad support for death penalty.

Americans have always felt monsters should pay dearly including with their lives if necessary for the greater good. Nothing much changed despite the inferences that we are all just frightened little children.

Perhaps, but I remember a time where most Americans would have been apalled by the thought of torture, or where most Americans would have thought that classifying spying programs in the name of "State security" is a cliche, not a reality.....Where Americans were just more willing to stand up to their government and demand civil rights, not offer it for the fuzzy concept of "security".
It's just sad, because it says to me that Americans don't really stand for anything - no ideal is worth giving up "security"

I realise, of course, that not all Americans are this way. But there are enough that it is problematic.

[Q Classic]

"As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century, free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master."
-- Commissioner Pravin Lal,
"U.N Declaration of Rights"