Torture is a Moral Issue

[pecunium]

I know I spend most of my time arguing about the practical lack of utility for torture; because that's the way the torture-mongers, and apologists, frame it.

But that's only part of the issue. The whole point of the ticking bomb is to redeem the torture as a morally valid act. "If you just talk to him, people will die. Isn't it better to hurt him a little and save lives?"

It's a forced choice, of course, with a poisoned pill. At it's heart it the sort of thing one argues about in late night bull sessions: "Would you kill Hitler to avert WW2 and save millions of people?" There is only one answer acceptable to the people who pose such things... "Yes, of course torturing someone to save a lives is the lesser evil."

At which point we are one has made the choice to join them in condoning torture. It may be posed as saving hundreds, but once you cross the line, the only thing one is haggling over is the price. They have already decided they accept torture. They want affirmation they have done the right thing.

If is interested in discussions of the actual moral question, there's a conference in June (26/27)

Torture Is A Moral Issue: Panel & Conference for People of Faith.

I'll be speaking on both days.


(if there is a recording/transcript, I'll see how one gets a copy)

Comments

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Well, yes. The thing that is seldom noted about being the lesser evil is that it's still evil. Nobody wants to embrace the fact that certain actions can never be good, in the sense of virtuous. There no war is ever virtuous. No torture is ever virtuous. These are evil acts, and the people who commit them will be tainted and corrupted by their actions for the rest of their lives. Lady Macbeth's hands will never be clean again.