I don't suppose it's even worth pointing out that corporals and sergeants at Abu Ghraib were prosecuted for far less than is outlined in these memos. Moral of the story: Don't be a grunt who takes pictures.
Re: Red Cross Torture Report
I don't suppose it's even worth pointing out that corporals and sergeants at Abu Ghraib were prosecuted for far less than is outlined in these memos. Moral of the story: Don't be a grunt who takes pictures.
Re: Red Cross Torture Report
Torture - Egregiously destructive and repetitive abuse.
My definition. I used to define it as too much homework or having to go to church. I guess those wern't too bad in hindsight.
I wouldn't consider putting someone through waterboarding for a few minutes as torture. A few hours and we are talking torture. I wouldn't call someone being hit in the face while tied to a chair once torture. I WOULD call someone being hit in the face repetetively while tied to a chair torture.
Removing even 1 fingernail with pliers? torture. The physical destruction and pain last. Telling someone that their parents and children have been killed or will be killed while under the perp is under arrest? Not torture. Showing them pictures of their bodies being defiled for weeks? Torture.
The "stand around naked and feel bad about yourself" thing isn't torture. It is weird and unsettling, but I think it should be governed by a different description.
Last edited by ICantSpellDawg; 04-17-2009 at 19:56.
"That rifle hanging on the wall of the working-class flat or labourer's cottage is the symbol of democracy. It is our job to see that it stays there."
-Eric "George Orwell" Blair
"If the policy of the government, upon vital questions affecting the whole people, is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court...the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned the government into the hands of that eminent tribunal."
(Lincoln's First Inaugural Address, 1861).
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Re: Red Cross Torture Report
TuffStuff, you do know that waterboarding is effective in minutes rather than hours, right? Point of fact, if you waterboarded someone continuously for half an hour, the odds are quite high he would die.
Given your definition of torture, should any of the soldiers at Abu Ghraib have been tried in a court martial?
Re: Red Cross Torture Report
Yes. I think punishing people in a degrading, amoral and unusual way should be grounds for court martial. They should be ashamed of themselves, but most of it wasn't torture.Originally Posted by Lemur
Torture is essentially putting someone with no recourse into physical/emotional shock that lasts and lasts. It elicits a serious and unequivocal response with duration.
I do believe that waterboarding to an extent is a gray area.
Last edited by ICantSpellDawg; 04-17-2009 at 20:01.
"That rifle hanging on the wall of the working-class flat or labourer's cottage is the symbol of democracy. It is our job to see that it stays there."
-Eric "George Orwell" Blair
"If the policy of the government, upon vital questions affecting the whole people, is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court...the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned the government into the hands of that eminent tribunal."
(Lincoln's First Inaugural Address, 1861).
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Re: Red Cross Torture Report
I'm not trying to be dense, TuffStuff, but I don't understand. Your definition of torture is egregiously destructive and repetitive abuse. There's a lot of room in that definition, and I'm curious about the coupling of "destructive" with "repetitive." So if I chop your foot off, it's certainly destructive, but it's not repetitive. Is that torture?
Going back to Abu Ghraib, I don't understand what was done by those soldiers that meets your definition. Enforced nudity? Ritual humiliation? A light beating or two? Dragging a detainee around on a leash? Human pyramids?
None of this seems to approach your definition. None of it is nearly as bad as some of the stuff authorized in the Bybee Memo. Why should Lynndie England have gone to the brig?
I want to understand where you're coming from.
Re: Red Cross Torture Report
Chopping a foot off is egregiously destructive and the pain lasts for quite a while in a serious way and it doesnt grow back. I would consider it torture.
I don't see how most of that stuff is torture. It is weird, has no place anywhere, and should be punished, but c'mon.
I think you understand my personal definition. It is a common sense defenition. I used to dunk my brothers head under water for prolonged periods of time when I was a kid. Some jerk held my head under water over and over again until I inhaled water and cried and cried. I wouldn't want him to be tried on torture charges because it wasn't torture. I can't imagine a few minutes of waterboarding being torturous. Exasperating and horrifying, yes - torturous, no.
We should keep "torture" rather specific, otherwise it loses its meaning. If forcing someone to stand around naked or be shaven is torture, I don't buy all of the cosmic condemnation of torture. It desensetizes.
Constant beatings and bone breakings ARE torture. Lets use our common sense like a civ.
Last edited by ICantSpellDawg; 04-17-2009 at 20:26.
"That rifle hanging on the wall of the working-class flat or labourer's cottage is the symbol of democracy. It is our job to see that it stays there."
-Eric "George Orwell" Blair
"If the policy of the government, upon vital questions affecting the whole people, is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court...the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned the government into the hands of that eminent tribunal."
(Lincoln's First Inaugural Address, 1861).
ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ
Re: Red Cross Torture Report
You'll pardon me, but that sounds kinda ill-informed. Here's a journalist being waterboarded. Enjoy.
Re: Red Cross Torture Report
They should have been court-martialed for dereliction of duty and general lack of sense, regardless of whether or not the abuses they heaped on prisoners rose to the level of torture -- and there is zero doubt that their behavior was abusive.
"The only way that has ever been discovered to have a lot of people cooperate together voluntarily is through the free market. And that's why it's so essential to preserving individual freedom.” -- Milton Friedman
"The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule." -- H. L. Mencken
Re: Red Cross Torture Report
Dereliction of duty? According to the soldiers and their C.O., they were specifically asked by Army interrogators to "soften up" the prisoners. "General lack of common sense" is not a criminal offense in the UMCJ, last I checked. "Abusive"? So what? President 43, Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld all announced in public that the Geneva Conventions did not apply to detainees.
So: The detainees were not tortured. The non-coms at Abu Ghraib broke no laws. By all reputable accounts they were obeying lawful orders from fellow soldiers. The abuse they heaped on their detainees was absolutely nothing compared to what went down at Baghram and Guantanamo. So why did they go to jail? Why is anybody shocked at what they did?
Is it just the pictures?
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