What is torture? Torture, as defined by Article 1 of the 1984 Convention Against Torture, is the “cruel, inhumane, or degrading” infliction of severe pain or suffering, physical or mental, on a prisoner to obtain information or a confession, or to mete out a punishment for a suspected crime. Torture is an advanced physical interrogation technique that is more effective than other interrogation methods. Physical torture is the definitive violation of another human beings basic human rights; nothing and nobody has the right to violate them. Nobody has the right to deliberately harm another human being with the objective of causing them physical and emotional pain in hopes of obtaining information that is uncertain. However, some believe that
People think this way because sometimes they do not know the full story to an incident, and what they know is enough to fuel up the anger and hatred in them. For those people, the question in mind is; why show these criminals any remorse? Torture is exactly what they deserve; it is exactly the right place for disgusting terrorists where they cannot harm anyone. Torture has been outlawed in all circumstances everywhere, but global terrorism may be leading America to bend the rules. American intelligence agents have been torturing terrorist suspects, or engaging in practices pretty close to torture. However, I believe that physical torture should not be leagalized in the U.S because it is immoral, and it costs us the moral high ground that we have professed to over 200 years. It gives encouragement and relief to our enemies. It weakens the certainty of our own people and military personnel in the importance of our core and conduct. One reason to prohibit torture is to get our enemies to do the same. “Cruel and unusual punishment” is prohibited by the 8th amendment of the U.S
The question on everyone’s mind is should prisoners torture be legalized. On my end I believe that torture itself is immoral and inhumane. We are in no position to violate someone’s basic human rights. Some believe otherwise, do to them what they did to others, maybe even worse. Yes people make mistakes and they deserve to be punished but torturing them is not the answer. In many states where the death penalty is prohibited because of its gruesome ways, how can one resort to torture. This is not justifiable under any
Some believe that even in the most dire of situations, the act of torturing a prisoner to obtain information is not the most effective or efficient way to glean accurate information of a threat or terrorist group; experts have said that it is actually a very inefficient way to go about this and even that it is only on rare occasions that this results in useful, accurate information. However, there are also those who believe the exact opposite; that the only way to get information from a terrorist, or someone believed to be involved in terrorist activity, is to mentally break them down until they have suffered enough to surrender any information they might know or to the point where they just say whatever is necessary for the “interrogation” to stop, as in
...less outside of intimidation. Currently we are debating whether torture would be a useful tool in society, but some have solved the answer for us many years ago. Those who commit crimes are often willing to sacrifice their life to keep the secret. Torture simply lowers us to their standards and facilitates increased terrorist activity in the long run. Why put salt on the wound when you have a Band-aid? Torturing cannot be morally justified.
...s invaluable. The efficacy of torture can be seen in the capture of Zubaydah and the prevention of the “Dirty bomber,” Jose Padilla. Effectiveness has also been proven; it has hypothetically saved many lives and has prevented many plots known to the general public. Ex-Vice President Dick Cheney said in a speech in 2009 that the “enhanced interrogation” of detainees “prevented the violent death of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of innocent people” (“The Report of The Constitution Project's Task Force on Detainee Treatment”, 1). Since it has been deemed illegal by the UN it has to be done in secrecy. In result, it cannot be deduced how much has been prevented by this procedure since that information is classified. However, it is irrefutable that torture, in its essence, is beneficial and should be accepted as a means of ensuring public safety.
The definition of torture is the act of causing severe physical pain as a form of punishment or as a way to force someone to do or say something (Webster). There have been different hypothetical situations looking at using torture to get a positive end result and how it could be successful. There should be strict restrictions, rules and guidelines that go along with using torture as a means to justice. Pro torture is not meant to be used for just any circumstance, but when many people are in danger and questions are not being answered, a certain type of punishment like torture could solve the case/save many lives.
The motivation to torture is guided by gut feelings and “what if” stories. Using torture to gain information involves a tremendous amount of assumptions. The Torturer is assuming that there is an actual danger, they are assuming that they have the correct person as well as assuming their level of their involvement and guilt in the situation, and lastly by using torture they are assuming that there is no alternative way to extract the information.
Torture is the intentional infliction of extreme physical suffering on some non-consenting, defenseless person. Torture in any form is used to punish, coerce, or afford sadistic pleasure.
In conclusion, torture can be very useful in gathering information and using as punishment for those who commit heinous crimes. Even though, there are no set rules for torturing and shows a bad reputation. One of the most popular ideas is the ticking time bomb method. Therefore, torture is acceptable in certain cases. Torture Helps our live succeed.
Torture, the most extreme form of human violence, resulting in both physical and psychological consequences. A technique of interrogation that has been proven time and time again to not only be ineffective but also a waste of time. Studies have shown that not only does torture psychologically damage the mind of the victim, but also can hurt the inflictor. If there is proof that torture is useless, why do we still use it? Torture should not be used to get information out of prisoners because of the risk of false information, enemy resistance and utter uselessness.
Torture is the act of inflicting severe physical or psychological pain, and/or injury to a person (or animal) usually to one who is physically restrained and is unable to defend against what is being done to them. It has ancient origins and still continues today. The torture debate is a controversial subject to modern society. Because it is such a complex subject, many debatable issues come from it. For example, many have debated whether torture is effective in obtaining the truth, affects the torturers, threatens the international standing of the United States, or undermines justice. Others include what qualifies as torture, or whether or not the United States should set an example by not torturing. The two opposing claims to this topic would be: (a) that torture should always be illegal because it is immoral and cruel and goes against the international treaties signed by the U.S. and torture and inhuman treatment, and (b) yes, torture is acceptable when needed. Why not do to terrorists what they are so good at doing to so many others?
Cesare Beccaria discusses the issue of torture in his work An Essay on Crimes and Punishments. He states that either a crime is certain or uncertain, and in either circumstance, torture is not a legitimate punishment (Beccaria 530). When a crime has certainly been committed and already has a punishment assigned to it by law, it is useless to torture because you do not need to torture the convicted person to get a confession. If the proof is insufficient to convict the person in question of committing the crime, “it is wrong to torture an innocent person, such as the law adjudges him to be, whose crimes are not yet proved” (Beccaria 530). Torture, therefore, is not acceptable in any case of punishment and should not be used.
Torture can prevent the attacks resulting in terror or can go and prove no one, no one can infringe the right of Americans in the result of another attack, and therefore torture is justifiable. The similarities between ISIS and Al Qaeda is scary and torture needs to be in the back pocket of all officials to prevent similar disasters. The clock stopped ticking on 9-11, and anyone on the street can tell oneself where they were the minute they heard. The use of torture could save the lives of thousands, send the message that America is in charge, and can become more commonly accepted in the eyes of disaster. A ticking bomb could be going off at any time, it could destroy a spouse, a son, a daughter, a friend, a neighbor, or maybe the threat is to oneself, torture could get the information to destroy the bomb before it destroys one’s life. Torture is justifiable.
One of the groups argued that torture is sometimes okay while the other group argued that under no circumstances is torture allowed. In my opinion, the group that is against torture won the debate because they had more good points than the other group did. The group that was against torture argued that torture affects innocent people and ruins people’s lives. The group that is says sometimes torture is okay said that torture is helpful when getting information from suspected terrorists. There is also always a reason for doing it. The government gets background information about these suspects before even thinking about using “enhanced interrogation” techniques on them. It helps them find about key information because there is no other way to get information from them. The no torture group fights back saying that you don’t want to stoop down to their level and that you do not necessarily know if they are terrorists. If you keep getting the wrong people, you will just keep going in circles. You could even accidently kill the person while waterboarding them and there is no justification for killing someone you don’t know. The torture that is okay with torture clarified that torture is only okay under certain circumstances because there is no other way to get information from them. If you just kept them in a prison, they would wait their whole life before giving up any information. Then, the no torture group
In summary, torture can be physical, mental, or a combination of both of these aspect, and must induce pain or an aguish to bring about the information being sought. Next, if you apply either utilitarianism or Kant to torture neither allows for the use of torture to be ethical. Finally, the need to end torture facilitates the need for the suspect to lie if only to have the pain or anguish to end. In closing, the use of torture by law enforcement personnel in anti-terror operations is unethical and immoral.
The act of torture is something my family often has discussions about, since this is one of the controversial topics my family is passionate about. Like most people, some of my family members are against it, while others are for it. Growing up hearing about these discussions, left me feeling extremely curious, however unlike my parents and other family members, I wasn’t confident and couldn’t decide whether I was for or against torture. Therefore, after finding out that one of the options we could use as our topics for our editorial was torture, I was naturally and obviously intrigued. Therefore, I decided to take the opportunity to look at torture from both perspectives in hopes of being able to finally decide whether I am for or against this controversial topic.
Torture is the process of inflicting pain upon other people in order to force them to say something against their own will. The word “torture” comes from the Latin word “torquere,” which means to twist. Torture can not only be psychologically but mentally painful. Before the Enlightenment, it was perfectly legal to torture individuals but nowadays, it is illegal to torture anyone under any circumstances. In this essay, I will demonstrate why torture should never acceptable, not matter the condition.