We knew that torture didn't work 400 years ago, what happened?

[ck4829]

This is from Friedrich von Spee, who is considered to be one of the first anti-torture activists.

He wrote these points in 1631 in his publication, Cautio Criminalis:

* (17) That alleged witches should be allowed a lawyer and a legal defense: the enormity of the crime making this right even more important than normal.
* (20) That there is real danger innocents will confess under torture simply to stop the pain.
* (25) That condemning alleged witches for not confessing under torture is absurd. Spee opposed the notion that such silence was itself evidence of sorcery, as this made everyone guilty.
* (27) That torture does not produce truth, since those who wish to stop their own suffering can stop it with either the truth or with lies.
* (44) That denunciations of accomplices by tortured "witches" were of little value: either the tortured person was innocent, in which case she had no accomplices, or she was really in league with the Devil, in which case her denunciations cannot be trusted either.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_von_Spee#Arguments

9/11 changed everything? Did it make us stupid? To put it in perspective, at the same time we had people questioning the value of torture, we were still grappling with the belief that the universe revolved around the Earth. The pro-torture crowd made us roll back 4 centuries of human progress, are they happy for this?

[TwilightZone]

1. I think we are beginning to understand fully that the Bush/Cheney administration motto was:

"By any means necessary."

They were desperate to make the case for war. When it appeared that even 9/11 wasn't going to be a big enough excuse (or so they thought), their desperation led them to more extreme measures, eventually including torture.

[spanone]

2. here's what happened....dick cheney

[TheCowsCameHome]

3. That was BC - Before Cheney

'nuff sed............

[EarlG]

4. Torture works just fine

If your purpose for using it is to get exactly the answers you want to hear.

In the 17th century it was used to find witches. In the 21st century it was used to find connections between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein.

In both cases the torturers found plenty of witches and connections between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein.

[Spike89]

5. Torture works fine for many things

Torture is great for installing a sense of dread among the populace. It is great for getting propoganda "confessions". Most important, it is great for making the case that you're serious about the issue (witches, terrorists, liberals) and the non-torture people are idealistic wusses.

Bush and Cheney knew exactly what torture would deliver and it worked for them. The toxic side effects have been thrown into the future (well, the future is now). So, torture does indeed work, if your goal is evil.

[Vidar]

6. New batch of sadists.

[Caliman73]

7. Torture works.

I agree with those posters who say that torture does work. The fallacy that people often stumble into is that torture is ineffective. That is not true. As others have said, torture is useless in eliciting cooperation towards the goal of truth. The thing is that torture is not used to extract truth, it is used to extract confessions. Torturers do not care about truth. They care about justification. Torture is very effective at intimidating the populace on which it is used and in bending them to the will of the torturers. Saddam Hussein used torture to suppress his opposition for decades until a larger military force removed him. It was one of the highly effective tools of terror that kept a fragmented country together in fear of their dictator. The Bush administration used it effectively to get the information they wanted in order to justify their war.

People continue to play by the Republican framed argument regarding the effectiveness of torture. Who care what its effectiveness is. It is ILLEGAL and a violation of human rights therefore we do not do it. We settled the legality of it long ago.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

8. You should only beat your children until YOU feel better.

Torture isn't about gleaning information, or protection, it's about hurting people to our satisfaction.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

9. "Torture doesn't work" is not a good line of argument.

Firstly, because while torture is no use for extracting reliable confessions, it *is* useful for extracting information on e.g. enemy troop movements and the like.

Secondly, arguing "we shouldn't torture people because it doesn't work" leaves open the possibility that if it did work, it would be justifiable - "we will torture people better" is just as logical a response as "we will stop torturing people".

Torture should be illegal *even though* in some circumstances it can "work".