Torture

[Patroklos]

On the contrary, a great many people in Gitmo and other prisons held without trial for terrorism have been found to be completely innocent.

I have yet to hear of any GITMO prisoner who has been tortured using any realistic definition of the word. Or substatiated by anything other than their own suspect word.

I know you probably think taking their underarmor underware away was teh evil, meh.

[Berzerker]

A teacher can tell if a student has a learning disability when they are trying to teach them. Do you thing psychologists would be able to diagnose students with a learning disability who didn't have one without the teachers knowing?

A learning disability is easier to detect than the reason for the learning disability. You didn't answer my question, clearly you have a learning disability but is it ADD?

what if someone who you're 'sure' is a terrorist, turns out to be completely innocent?

Then torture is immoral, dont change the subject. I said it is moral to torture someone you know is a terrorist.

do you think that your government should be allowed to torture people they suspect of terrorism? should they be allowed to torture you if they think you're a terrorist?

Nope, this is about known terrorists, not people who may or may not be terrorists. I thought I explained this already... in my OP...

of course it's an issue of freedom, giving a state the right to torture people to extract information, how can it be anything else. in any case, torture is morally wrong and not something that civilised countries should be involved with, or civilised people should condone.

It is not an issue of freedom, terrorists gave the right away when they started murdering people.

That doesn't explain why it would be cool to torture one group, but not the others. Why not torture all kinds of suspects to get them to admit stuff? Or what's your goal with the terrorists?

Sure it explains it, terrorists are engaged in an ongoing conspiracy to kill others. And contrary to what some people here think, these terrorists (or POWs in general) are not protected by the same due process we enjoy. During war enemy soldiers are subject to the will of Congress.

To declare War, grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal, and make Rules concerning Captures on Land and Water
art 1 sect 8

[BeBMan]

So you think they should be given POW status? International rules the US is agreeing to don't permit torturing POWs, and I think esp. the US military would not like it's gov giving up that position for obvious reasons.

But my question isn't really about the legalese around it, more about what's considered right and what not. A danger that they'd continue to kill others could be constructed for a lot of criminals too. And organized crime is certainly a conspiracy of some sort, sometimes to kill others.

[Zeeboe]

Nevermind. I'll stick to talking about the Hermann H. topic on the other thread.

[SlowwHand]

Why don't you stick to fresh topics instead of dragging through the archives?

[Zeeboe]

Because this topic is new to me.