P&N Torture Poll

[shira]

Originally posted by: palehorse74

Originally posted by: shira

Originally posted by: palehorse74
The point is simply this: sometimes it is necessary for there to be fighting and killing. Those who refuse to ever see the necessity of either are the naive ones, not I. They live in a fantasy land, not I.

But why are you even raising this so-called point? What do "ultra-pacifists" have to do with the views of the much more mainstream left represented here on ATPN?

I'll bet I could come up with some ultra-right groups who advocate policies Hitler would have been pround of. Do you think that linking such groups to those who voted "sometimes" or "rarely" in this torture poll would be relevant to this thread?

no, but it may be safe to equate them to those who answered "Often," just as I chose to link the ulta-pacifists to those who chose "never."

So you're making the claim that those who say that torture is never justified are usually ultra-pacificists?

I have some bad news: I answered "never" and I'm not an "ultra-pacificist" as you define the term. I don't even remotely believe that wars are never justified. And more bad news: I'll bet you'll be hard pressed to find more than one or two "ultra-pacificists" out of the 47 (thus far) who've voted "never."

Maybe you should restrict your arguments to what people actually believe here on AT.

 

[EatSpam]

Originally posted by: CSMR

Originally posted by: Tab
For those who say something other than never, why?

"in order to gain important information"

Funny that a Christianist, such as yourself, thinks torture is ok, but an atheist like me does not. How does that work, what with your moral superiority and all?

 

[PrinceofWands]

Originally posted by: ericlp

Originally posted by: CSMR

Originally posted by: PrinceofWands
I do not know how effective it is as compared with other methods. So I do not know how often it will be useful. However as long as it is effective some of the time (even "seldom") my answer would not be "never".

The problem is... How do you know who to torture? What? Do we just draw numbers out of a hat? I mean... How do you know what guy is going to have the most information (if any) to give you... You really don't so maybe we should just torture all of them...

It would suck if you were just a kid pulled off the street ... And the US GI thought you knew something and you really didn't...

I guess the REAL problem is.... If you got drafted and sent to go fight a war in China ... Would you want them to torture you if they cought you? We are setting a really fine example for the rest of the world to follow.

LASTLY....... If you watch front line... The experts say that torture does not produce any real "information"... It's not worth it... So why does the rumsfield and boosh think its ok??? I guess I found it funny that the OP siad something about cathlics... But isn't boosh a born again?

Boy did you misquote the hell out of that thread.

 

[CSMR]

Originally posted by: EatSpam

Originally posted by: CSMR

Originally posted by: Tab
For those who say something other than never, why?

"in order to gain important information"

Funny that a Christianist, such as yourself, thinks torture is ok, but an atheist like me does not. How does that work, what with your moral superiority and all?

People differ in moral views. For example there are people like me with certain moral views, other people with other moral views, and atheists who reject absolute "morals" (and atheists who say they are atheists but are really non-Christian theists). So as an atheist, it would be surprising if you considered me morally superior since you don't believe my moral views. I don't know why you would have expected me to be morally superior anyway.