What is torture?

[Year of the Tig]

What, in your opinion, constitutes torture? And is it ever permissable to use information gleaned from it in a court of law?

 

[alastair69]

My idea of torture is to do something to somebody else that will result in them having no option but to follow.

I belive that information that has been taken from someone who has been tortured, should be used in court as long as there is good ground for this to be used. In other words if the torture belives and has some kind of evidence that a person has done a crime, then yes this evidence should be used if not then NO.

 

[Rich]

I belive that information that has been taken from someone who has been tortured, should be used in court as long as there is good ground for this to be used.

Great idea, let's go back to the middle ages eh, why not start burning witches again

 

[Year of the Tig]

If you permit the use of information (which is questionable at best) you therefore permit torture. If that is the case then you must change the Geneva Convention and International Law.

Do we really want or need to go down that route?

Bear in mind, the vast majority of torture victims are in fact not charged with any crime, are denied due process and are denied any legal representation.
We think of torture being only used against 'others'. If we, as a society, permit it, how long before it becomes routinely used against us in a variety of situations?

We cannot hold the moral high-ground if we permit barbarism even if it is only permitted overseas.

 

[selenau837]

# anguish: extreme mental distress
# unbearable physical pain
# agony: intense feelings of suffering; acute mental or physical pain; "an agony of doubt"; "the torments of the damned"
# torment: torment emotionally or mentally
# distortion: the act of distorting something so it seems to mean something it was not intended to mean
# subject to torture; "The sinners will be tormented in Hell, according to the Bible"
# the deliberate, systematic, or wanton infliction of physical or mental suffering by one or more persons in an attempt to force another person to yield information or to make a confession or for any other reason; "it required unnatural torturing to extract a confession"

All the above is a def or torture. It has to take a cold person to extract information by these means.

Also, how do we know if the information is valid. If I am having electrodes placed on my person and shocked, or my finger nails torn out, I would admit to anything. Hades, I would admit to not birthing my own children. Saying what you want to hear to stop the pain.

Point is, if we do not know if the information is valid, how can it be allowed in a court of law? Why would it want to be used. I feel that if I was a juror and was hearing evidence I knew was obtained by means of torture, I probably wouldn't believe it to be true. That is just me though.

 

[jsanders]

IN Vietnam they shot one or more of the recently round up combatants. Needless to say the others were more cooperative.

If the information gleamed from torture is “dubious at best” then it would not exist as an option.

When people speak of torture it is always from an emotional stand point.

Hear my words and you will be enlightened; if the so called leaders in the Middle East don’t come to grips with this terrorist problem and start to help us solve it, then before it’s all over, we will have the “Mother of All Wars”

I personally don’t condone torture. But if a terror attack is imminent then what ever is necessary to get the information is justifiable.

Selena the information is valid if they capture or kill more of the enemy.

 

[Year of the Tig]

Torture, according to International Law does NOT exist as an option. We have heavily criticised regimes such as that in Uzbekhistan and Saddam's Iraq for use of such methods.

It has been proven that such information so obtained is useless and only further radicalises certain groups.

The terroris problem is a global problem, and a problem made worse by the world's greatest superpower which on one hand overthrows one despot (Saddam) only to court favour with another (Karimov of Uzbekhistan). Whatever is necessary is not ever torture - the information from this cannot ever be relied upon as the victim will say whatever they think the torturers want to hear. They would even admit to being Bin Laden himself if it will stop the agony.

As for a terror attack being ever imminent I feel that our governments have played this card far too often to cow us into accepting what is unacceptable including the Patriot Acts (I & II), wiretapping of citizens, detention without due process, torture and ID cards.

Big Brother state gets closer and closer.

We do not beat the barbarians by being barbaric ourselves.

 

[Rich]

I personally don’t condone torture. But if a terror attack is imminent then what ever is necessary to get the information is justifiable.
.

Communists, terrorists, Martians, who's next on the paranoid list of imminent invaders?
And how the hell a country that locks up funny looking people without trial or just cause can lecture the rest of the world beats me.
Fortunately our civilised House Of Lords threw out the government's attempts to allow evidence obtained by torture.

 

[Year of the Tig]

It is only a matter of time, if this continues, that these methods of 'interrogation' are used against the general population as a matter of course.

Too late then to 'fix' the laws.

I won't mention the fact that many of the victims of this torture are not in fact terrorists but innocent civilians. But they are 'us', so who cares?

 

[jsanders]

It is only a matter of time, if this continues, that these methods of 'interrogation' are used against the general population as a matter of course.

Too late then to 'fix' the laws.

I won't mention the fact that many of the victims of this torture are not in fact terrorists but innocent civilians. But they are 'us', so who cares?

Who is us?

 

[Year of the Tig]

The West. US and UK specifically who are condoning the use of torture as a means to defeat terrorism.

From everything I have read and heard supporting the use of torture the attitude seems to be that it is OK to use against 'them' meaning some kind of enemy (mostly Muslims).

My argument is that, apart from it being wrong full stop, it is possible that when this is 'accepted reality' by our wider societies, how long before it is turned against us?

 

[Rich]

The West. US and UK specifically who are condoning the use of torture as a means to defeat terrorism.
us?

Please read other posts, the UK does NOT condone the use of torture

 

[Year of the Tig]

Rich, you are right. Blair wanted to but Lords vetoed it. I stand corrected. And hoorah for the Lords!

 

[Rich]

And hoorah for the Lords!

and let's hope they continue to stop that twat from turning the country into a police state

 

[Year of the Tig]

He will only be followed by another twat. We need a revolution!

 

[Kraj]

Regardless of whether torture is an acceptable means of obtaining information, there's no way it can be admissible in a court of law.

Personally I don't believe torture is acceptable, but I will say that the few episodes of the show 24 I've seen make a very compelling case for use of torture. If you've caught someone involved in terrorist activities and you know something big is going down with very little time to stop it, are one criminal's rights more important than the lives of innocent millions? I don't think so. But on the other hand, it doesn't make much sense to protect our way of life by destroying everything we stand for. It's a hell of a hard question.

He will only be followed by another twat. We need a revolution!

I may be wrong on this, but I'm pretty sure that revolutions have just as much a chance to put a twat in charge.

 

[Rich]

We need a revolution!

and end up like the French?

 

[Year of the Tig]

LOL!! I know! Stupid comment, but I don't necessarily mean a violent revolution.

I have not trusted a single government in office since I was able to vote! One is as bad as the next.

Kraj, you make reference to 'one criminal's rights more important than the lives of innocent millions'. How many millions have terrorists killed? We are in danger of being swayed by political propaganda by using such hyperbolic language. It is what 'they' want. A terrified populace willing to hand more and more power and control to them.

The greatest terrorists are these governments who use such tactics. We have lost more freedoms because of them than because of who they call terrorists.

 

[jsanders]

LOL!! I know! Stupid comment, but I don't necessarily mean a violent revolution.

I have not trusted a single government in office since I was able to vote! One is as bad as the next.

Kraj, you make reference to 'one criminal's rights more important than the lives of innocent millions'. How many millions have terrorists killed? We are in danger of being swayed by political propaganda by using such hyperbolic language. It is what 'they' want. A terrified populace willing to hand more and more power and control to them.

The greatest terrorists are these governments who use such tactics. We have lost more freedoms because of them than because of who they call terrorists.

The revolution we need is to find a way to wean ourselves from dependence on OIL; period.

Then the entire Middle East can go back to riding camels and living in tents. We won’t have any use for them and they can live and war with each other as they have done for five thousand years.

 

[Year of the Tig]

The revolution we need is to find a way to wean ourselves from dependence on OIL; period.

Then the entire Middle East can go back to riding camels and living in tents. We won’t have any use for them and they can live and war with each other as they have done for five thousand years.

Stereotyping people in the Middle East is silly. What do you mean - riding on camels and living in tents? 900 years ago they had the greatest scientific and mathematical minds - they invented the astrolabe a form of navigation and a way of telling time more accurately than we had. They knew about algebra.

The Sumerians were the world's first civilisation who built cities and engaged in trade with many people across the known-world. The Sumerians lived in Mesopotamia - the land between two rivers (the Tigris and Euphrates) in what is now modern day Iraq.

Today they are as technologically advanced as anyone with large cities, universities, etc.

You describe them as backwards which is rather offensive.

As for weaning ourselves off oil - that will have more impact on the large global oil companies (mostly US and UK).