Persuasive Essay: Why Should Torture Be Justified?

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Based on the UN CONVENTION FOR TORTURE AND PROSPECTS FOR ENFORCEMENT- Torture can be stated as the infliction of severe pain and suffering either physically, mentally or both, intentionally inflicted on an individual for various reasons (Boulesbaa,1999). In spite of this convention, torture continues to be practiced throughout the world. Torture has been used for thousands of years, and is still widespread, occurring throughout much of the world (Amnesty International, 2009).Torture has been shown to violate human rights, gather inaccurate data and cause detrimental effects to the health of its victims. These proven costs of torture have been shown to outweigh the possible hypothesized benefits of torture. This paper will examine the above arguments to prove that torture should not be justified. The first argument with regard to the …show more content…

(Bagraic&Clarke, 2005). The ticking bomb scenario is used by Alan Deshowitz in order to prove that the torture of terrorists is indeed the right thing to do in order to save other innocent lives that might be affected as a result of an imaginary bomb blast. This is because the rights one person should be sacrificed for the greater good (Bagraic & Clarke, 2005). However, the possibility of such a situation occurring is highly debateable. Further, the implementation of torture in such a situation raises uncertain questions. For example, is the subject in custody really related to the bombing plot, will the information he provides be credible, will torture necessarily extract the needed information from him in time? And, accordingly should torture be legalized over such extreme and hypothetical situations (Devine,2009). Thereby, though this argument strongly advocates for the justification of torture according to a utilitarian approach it still has numerous

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