One of the most common arguments used to justify torture is that it may save lives by gaining information about future terrorist attacks. This information may help stop or prevent this hypothetical terrorist attack. But what happens when the suspect does not know anything or is innocent (as is the case in Rendition)? In the movie, Anwar, a completely innocent man, is tortured. After many scenes of torture he finally confesses that he helped build a bomb that was set off in a public square. He then gives the names of his “co-conspirators”. The CIA agent in charge of his captivity later questions his confession, after the names are found to be the members of an Egyptian soccer team. The CIA agent questions the legitimacy of torture by quoting The Merchant of Venice: “I fear you speak upon the rack. Where men enforced do speak anything.”
What justifies hooking a battery to a human being, and pressing the on switch every time he gives an answer you do not like? The Untied Nations and the Geneva conventions say that nothing justifies torture. Both give protection from cruel and unusual punishment to captured enemy combatants. I also believe that no nation has the right to torture under any circumstances. When a suspected, or even known, terrorist is disappeared to a secret prison, they have no way of knowing if this person has any actual information of a plot to kill. Even if the person did have credible information, the morality of the nation is compromised. If we torture what makes Guantanamo Bay any different from the Hanoi Hilton? How are our leaders that sanctioned torture any different from Saddam Hussein or Ferdinand Marcos?
graphic descriptions of torture. Good argument
ReplyDelete