No 6...... Treat others the way you would like to be treated.

Frankly, thats daft. I would like everyone to give me cakes. That doesn't mean that
I should give cakes to killers.

"Behave in the way you think everyone should behave" is somewhat better, but it does not
make questions any less complex.

Well, yes, it does. Even though it's not what we would like to do. And certainly not what society has *conditioned* us to do.

Society has it's laws, and God has His. The unfortunate aspect of this is that it can place an individuals moral behavior at odds with what society expects. Fortunately, there are still those who respond to the higher law and give us all pause for thought:

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/a...801100414/1005
http://m.greenvilleonline.com/news.jsp?key=62190
http://www.asianimage.co.uk/mostpopu...ves_killer.php

Let's not end up in that senseless position of 'two wrongs make a right'. If you lower your standards and subsequent actions to those of your opponent you quickly end up in the pointless position we witness now in areas such as Iraq.

Torture is at best barbaric and inhumane, and the sooner everybody realises it and convinces their opponents it is not to be condoned ot practiced....all the better for everyone.

Whats in question here is the definition of torture. Some would argue that simply being locked up is torture. Others would think the definition wouldn't apply unless someone fingers are getting twisted off. So this argument here is, well, not an argument at all without a proper definition, and that defintion changes from person to person, to country to country.

-S

Skybird's quick instant definition of "torture":

An intentional measurement of threatening and/or carrying out measures that inflict massive physical and/or psychic pain and/or agony and/or fear for ones' own life or that of third persons, with the intention to win information, to break the individual for this purpose itself, or to gain satisfaction for the torturer in terms of a satisfying stimulus (sadism, psychic pervertion, revenge, etc.)

I am not saying we shoul not act compassionatly to all.
However, neither should we reward evil acts with cake.

Compasion, yes.
Cake, no.

Not even "devils food" cake"? ;) Or, how about Twinkies? Personally, I can't think of any confection more evil than Hostess Twinkies... And I'd consider being forced to eat Twinkies to be a form of torture...:dead:

I never ordered it, our colonel did, and at the risk of being shot for treason I carried them out. Part of the reason why I shot them was not only because they killed civilians, but also because they were in such bad shape I took pity on them (and also I wouldn't want the government to get their hands on them; that would be a thousand times worse).

I wonder who voted three?

Mine vote± 6

...and your point is :hmm:

the name list will become available once the poll has ended in nine days, I think. At least I have ticked the box to make it a public vote, as i said in the introduction.

Just click on one of the underlined numbers and you'll get the names.

Then you can make your List ;)

Ultimately, a society which, when confronted with fear, is willing to sacrifice the notions of human rights that it took so long to arrive at and which it prides on so much is, to me, not a society worth protecting in the first place.

To me personally, it's completely unacceptable. I see scenarios where it would be strategically acceptable, but then a society which condones it through supposedly democratic apparatus has no right to call itself anything but medieval and barbaric. :hmm:

That is quite strong in words. So let me play advocatus diaboli and ask if you think the last sentence in option 6 - hundreds killed by terror is better than to do torture ourselves - is less barbaric and medieval to accept!? Or is saving the lives of these hundred victims just of "strategical advantage", and no value in itself? The scenario assumes that torture would have raised the information needed to prevent this massacre.

Are you sure it is as easy as you make it sounding? :hmm:

Ah...! :) It works!

Thats the problem - some people would view the act of being put in jail for life to fall under what you describe.

-S

Not nearly as easy, no. But firstly I think anyone trying to justify it should permanently lose their moral pedestal, and secondly I think we need to be a little bit more responsible about the aims and values of the society in the context of the world we live in. I'm a little worried when a society armed with nuclear weapons is essentially willing to go back on its humanitarian principles. What would we be fighting for then? The rights of irresponsible populations of well-armed nations to eat, sleep and have sex?

If it was a direct threat... but then as I say, it's an extreme scenario you're proposing. It's inherently unlikely and certainly not worth implementing in principle. In reality, of course, when push comes to shove... things will happen. But the judgment on that would need to be made individually and not in principle. If someone indeed does have a terrorist in their hands who could give away info leading to hundreds of people being saved, it's on their conscience to act. They can't come back and say that I let them do it, nor should they be able to come back and say that the society as a whole let them do it. Then perhaps they'll act more responsibly and with the weight of the decision in their hands. But giving anyone a blanket license to break essential human rights is absolutely unacceptable, in any circumstances.

Certain circumstances may require such acts but to do it regulary is surely wrong. The type of situation that would require torture is so unlikely I can't even give a good example that would be likely to happen. Perhaps in a hostage situation where authorities have limited time to locate the victim.

It's sad that I think we live in a world where torture has a place but i'm afraid that's how it is.

And to restrict it to terrorists is wrong. How about kidnappers or criminally insane people?


The problem is, i'd like to say #6 but we don't and never have lived in that perfect world people. We ARE barbaric, we act like animals. Some of us still have compasion though.

I will gladly take a sinners life in trade for an innocent one.

I don't think you lock someone up for life without having gained the information beforehand to do so, I mean enough information to convict him of the crime in a fair trial, and if a criminal gets locked up for life, he is receiving his punishment. I mean, I wouldn't want convicted murderers roam the streets say after 5 years in jail, hell it might have been a crime of passion, but who's to say it won't happen again? Whatelse should we do with them, death sentence? You can never be 100% sure, so for me this wouldn't be an option. Maybe the days in prison will be monotonous and boring, but unless you're afraid of small rooms, I can hardly think of this as torture. I mean he is convicted of a crime, a suspect is not, if I lock up the suspect without trial and leave him unknowing of when he'll get out again, just to get information (as was done in the Eastern Block, along with sleep deprivation), then yes it's torture.