Soldato
What I'd like to know is how Bush and friends, all claiming to be good christians, square away allowing people to be tortured? Even with my very limited knowledge of christianity I can't see how that would make their god too happy.
They do it very easily, as history has shown time and again. Christianity as a religion has as much right to claim innocence in past involvement with torture as OBL does with terrorism - i.e. none whatsoever.
none of those "methods" would work on me
they prob thought "lets release the minor torture... so we are elevated in are morality"
ever been properly waterboarded? get a friend to place cling film over your face while water is poured over it.
see how long you can stand feeling like your drowning
Why do people keep say that it takes a "strong" person to make the decision to torture somebody?
No it doesn't. That's like saying you need to be brave to be a mass murderer. No...you just need to be an inhumane sociopath with dubious morals.
Aye, I'm sure Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld lost countless hours of sleep fretting over the poor souls they where exposing to such barbaric treatment...NOT!
Taking waterboarding as an example, I don't think I would have too many problems with it,
Um, that's not waterboarding. Waterboarding they poor the water on to a towel directly over your mouth - not your forehead. You feel like you're drowning because you're sucking water through the towel and thus really are drowning - just in a controlled way. If you try holding your breath you make it worse for yourself because the towel pulls itself closer round your nose and mouth (because it's wet and being pulled at both ends); the next time you try to breath you thus struggle to as it effectively starts suffocating you.I've also tried it (willingly of course) in a school experiment, and it is unbelievable. Just because it's a few drops of water on the forehead it seems like nothing. But when it's happening it starts to be irritating very quickly, and then you really do panic...and this was in a completly controlled enviroment.
Do I post a serious reply...
The strength in what Obama is doing is that he is showing he is willing to protect those who were merely following orders - I would like to see prosecutions brought against those who provided the advice and go-ahead to the people carrying out the acts. Going after the generals and not the soldiers - it will win him a lot of support with the common man, I would have thought.
In regards to torture, until you have been subject to it you cannot say how it would affect you. Some of the strongest, toughest people crack quite quickly when subjected to mild torture, others who perhaps would be considered weak, can prove surprisingly resistant.
Eventually torture will crack all people - just depends on whether you get any useful, true, information from them before they crack and start telling you anything they think you want to hear.
The good thing is it's not psychological.
With the greatest respect, despite an otherwise sound post, we have no way to actually measure the effectiveness of torture, we only hear about the opposite. It is not as though the we get Ingsoc's "Oceania Times"...History has proved that torture should have no place in modern society. Yet still the chattering masses who have no clue or understanding of the use of torture and its history think they're entitled to hold a worthy opinion on it.
The waterboard is a really bad one. I remember seeing it being tested on random indaviduals and very few off them lasted morethan a couple of minutes.
I've also tried it (willingly of course) in a school experiment, and it is unbelievable. Just because it's a few drops of water on the forehead it seems like nothing. But when it's happening it starts to be irritating very quickly, and then you really do panic...and this was in a completly controlled enviroment.