I have long been intrigued by questions of morality. Our individual and collective sense of morality helps define us as a person, a society, and a species. For some, morality is something that is black and white and engraved in stone. For others, morality is a set of situational ethics that are malleable and changeable. Still others seem to have a decidedly under-developed sense of ethos.
The why and wherefore of it all fascinates me no end. Since at the end of the day it is all about me, I have decided to toss an occasional moral question out into cyberspace and hope at least a few folk will think it over and provide their answer.
I have been reading James Shott’s blog, Observations, for over three years now. He is an excellent writer and, while we rarely agree on anything political, his offerings make for an interesting and informative read. Recently, he wrote a piece he titled, Tortured Reasoning. The subject is water-boarding.
Mr. Shott and I don’t exactly see eye to eye on the subject. That I don’t see eye-to-eye with him doesn’t mean I fail to see that he makes some absolutely valid points. I disagree with him, but am conflicted.
So … if you don’t like my question, you need to blame Shott. He inspired it.
The setting is a major metropolitan city. Police officers responding to an alarm apprehend a man that has placed a deadly bomb in a large, popular department store. The bomb is set to go off when the store is at its busiest. The bomb squad disarms the bomb and the bomber is taken to interrogation.
The bomber confesses that he has placed a number of similar devices in high traffic areas all around the city. They are all set to go off at the same time. If they explode, the death toll will be enormous.
Then the bomber invokes his constitutional rights and asks for his attorney. It is absolutely obvious there is no way he will voluntarily give up the location of the bombs.
Are the police justified in torturing him to get the information?
What if torturing his wife in front of him was the only way to get the information?
Whatcha think? I’d really like to know.
Friday, December 14, 2007
A Question of Morality
Posted by Buffalo at 4:34 PM
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22 comments:
It's an age old question - one life, or many. What's one life next to thousands, what's one person's few hours of pain next to thousands of deaths and thousands more mourning?
I don't know, but as I vote, I'll leave it to the people who should know to protect those entrusted to their care.
I think if you torture that scumbag (which incidently probably won't reveal the info you want anyway), you open up pandora's box, which means all bets are off, the rule of law means nothing, tell our soldiers and citizens they are totally on their own if caught in foreign lands under trumped-up situations, and we can turn on each other knowing our once-sacred human rights have been given over to hysteria, and learn to love the police state. You CAN learn to love the police state, you know. The Russians, apparently, can't WAIT to get their police state back in return for "security and stability", which, incidently, Bush has been trying to shove down our throats for years now.
You know, we might could try interupting a day of mindless capitalism and evacuate the stores and malls until such time the bombs detonate and people can safely return to their God-given right to shop. After the mess has been cleaned up, of course.
I am not the least bit conflicted. I either live in a free society or I don't. If I don't, let me know so that I can take at least one of the gestapo's sent to haul me away to shut me up with me when they discover they have to kill me instead.
I don't believe they are justified.
Not the answer you were expecting from me, I'll wager.
Poor wife. Torturing him should be enough.
From what I have heard about water boarding, it's not that bad of a torture. It's more of a fearful annoyance than anything. Of course, if the "facts" are right, the gig is up and the "tortured" will now know they will live, which kinda kills the whole point of that form of torture.
I can think of a dozen horrible things to do to a human body, and let it live, to get the results I want. Sure that would end in "disposable" parts, so what?
Yes, that sounds sadistic and morally repugnant, but if making some asshole suffer a little (sorry to ruin your day Mr. Bomb guy) to try and save a number of "more valuable" and perhaps innocent lives gets those lives saved, it works for me.
If it takes tying his bomb-planting ass to an electrified spring mattress to even get a clue at where those lives will be lost, his ass would fry. And, no, if he died in the process, I wouldn't blink if I could save some stupid consumer from having his or her bag full of goodies blow up in their hand (Pretentious Macy's shoppers excluded - - HA!). They're stupid consumers, not malicious bomb planters.
Oh, and I think the Wife thing was an unfair curve ball to the argument. In reality, the shoppers would be ashes before she was even tracked down and water boarded.
Believe it or not, I'm an existentialist, so morality is just another social construct.
However, I do believe there must be order (morality for lack of a better word) in order for the skinny, 98 pound weakling to just have as much voice in the world as the 6'2, 300# behemoth kicking sand in his face. That's what I call civilization.
Anarchy is something that would be most undesirable to those who desire it when they get it - - they're usually too weak, physically, to fight and are the first ones to bitch about being oppressed.
This isn't 1066 feudal Europe.
Christ! It's an essay when I just meant to leave a little comment.
I deleted the other sixteen directions I was aiming at. But that's the thing, nothing is cut and dry.
In the end I'll wake up dead. But I would still ZAP some mother fucker to get info on where the bombs were.
Those people may have plans for tomorrow.
Lili: It is an age old question and the answer usually means the demise of the few.
Since you're Canadian, not American, here is a question for you prompted by the last part of your answer. Do you trust your government?
Michael: Each time we allow an egregious action for the "greater good" we make it easier to take the same action for a lesser reason.
Hidden Flames: Doesn't surprise me in the least.
Nuri: For the purpose of the question the only effective torture was to make him watch a loved one being tortured.
whirlbrain: I agree that morality is a social construct designed to allow us to live in close proximity. Anarchy works best in societies of one.
The wife was right across the plate, my friend. It is one thing to torture someone that is guilty as hell and whose actions are going to have an immediate disasterous impact on many. Tossing an "innocent" into the equation is a nice twist.
Excellent response by the way. Appreciate it.
whirlbrain, You brought up the concept of the ones too physically weak to fight wishing for anarchy.......hate to tell you this, but within this fine construct we like to call modern civilization, those weaklings you sneer at are now gaining access to some fine equalizers and killing a few of those fine citizens in the making who like to bully said weaklings. Might might make right, but I dare you, if you think your size is going to protect you, to NOT keep a constant look over your shoulder, if you think that gives you the right to exercise your ability to oppress rather than your ability to demonstrate compassion.
You already know what I think on similar issues, Buff, so I won't bore you readers with my opinion.
Michael: After re-reading whirlbrain's comment I'm thinking you read something there that I didn't.
JS: I hope they took the time to read your essay. It is well worth reading.
I thought about it, but only for a minute. No, we either live by our law and constitution or we don't. If we don't, then we don't live by any part of it and it might as well be torn up and thrown out. Bush is temporary. The constitution is long term.
An alternative might be drugs.
"those weaklings you sneer at are now gaining access to some fine equalizers and killing a few of those fine citizens in the making who like to bully said weaklings." Followed by: "demonstrate compassion."
Ummm . . . I'm a little befuddled and disturbed. It's okay to kill?
First of all I never sneered at anyone in my statements. I merely meant that in a True Anarchy, a place with NO LAWS, there will always be a leader, usually a really big guy with "wealth" and physical dominating power over the weak. That's why I mentioned 1066 feudal Europe. Most of the people I see wanting anarchy are usually skinny pale guys whose crops I'd either physically take, or by swindle, in a second, if that were the case.
But it's not and here's my second part:
"if you think your size is going to protect you, to NOT keep a constant look over your shoulder, if you think that gives you the right to exercise your ability to oppress rather than your ability to demonstrate compassion."
Sentence fragment aside - - I get your point. I was an 11 year old gang member on the streets of Chicago. I'm still not a big guy, physically, and when I visit there I constantly look over my shoulder.
Size does matter when there's no law to protect the weak. The constructs of "prestige" and "honor" help as much as hinder, and those have proved well for me not getting my ass kicked while there, but also put a bad light on me in the "normal" sense.
So dare me all you want. It was the rules (aka LAWS) of the gang that protected my ass out there. It was the bigger, older guys that watched out for me because "by law" they had to. If that wasn't the case, I'd be dead right now.
If that ain't an education in what anarchy is and what it will develop into, I don't know what is.
Now, I'm older, and luckily, all grown up. I lived in a place where the biggest and the baddest reigned and I have learned first hand where the world would be without rules.
---
Oh and Buffalo, that's my take and I'm sticking to it :)
A nice twist, indeed. It may have been over the plate. That's what curve balls do, fuck with your perception. I'm blind to most pitches, so I'll swing anyway, unless I get a flaming fastball.
Oh, and Expatbrian: Temporary! Yes! Thank the stars, or something.
The constitution is long term, so far. It's a test of time to see how constitutional it is.
Reading this post, and answering it, tells us a lot about the kind of people we are both individually and as a collective.
How do we define ourselves as a nation?
Sure. You remember that theme of Rule of Law" or "Rule of Men" question from school.
Hi, I would answer your question with another question:
It's a beautiful sunny day and my wife is getting ready to take a walk. You earlier called me and told me that you looked out the door and noticed a herd of cows flying around in the sky. Should I tell her to carry an umbrella?
Regarding morality: I am a moral absolutist. I believe there is absolute right and wrong, and that torture is wrong. This is a religious belief based on my faith, but there is also a utilitarian issue at hand here, which is that nations which believe torture is right generally are nasty hellholes that are not good places to live (and yes, I've been watching the United States slide towards that direction for thirty years of my adult life, life in most of the United States is harder now than it was thirty years ago despite all the Chinese-manufactured crap that Americans have now). Torture may seem expedient, but a nation that would sanction and condone torture rather than accept that freedom has a price and sometimes that price is the lives of people who die for freedom is a nation of cowards. That's my call. In your cows flying situation I would not torture because a) the utilitarian argument (torture does not -- ever -- produce reliable information, totalitarian regimes use it to intimidate their populace and to obtain not-usually-true confessions to use in show trials of dissidents, not as a source of information), and b) the moral argument -- it simply isn't the right thing to do. I would, however, use methods that are more effective such as drugs which reduce inhibition, "good cop bad cop", putting the dude in a cell with a snitch, etc.
Meanwhile, you can talk about cows flying around over the street near my house all you want, but I won't tell my wife to carry an umbrella. Silly hypothetical situations aren't real. They're just silly. Cows can't fly.
- Badtux the Morality Penguin
The bomb planting guy probably doesn't care about human life, including his own, so torture or the threat of death would probably do no good. If you rec'd information from it, would it be accurate information?
That aside, I agree w/ the michael in that, if you allow torture for anything, where does it stop? There are rules for a reason. My first instinct, however, was do what it takes, to HIM, not the wife, being the emotional creature I am. But...yeah, once it starts...
Brian: At least we hope the constitution is long term.
whirlbrain: Better to step up to the plate, swing and miss than to have never swing at all.
lurch: Questions of morality are always revealing, I think.
badtux: Interesting comment and I appreciate your input.
I do not believe that absolute morality exists. Although I won't, I could argue that no religion actually teaches absolute morality.
To state that torture never, ever, produces reliable results fails to acknowledge the fact that virtually every person has a breaking point. Once that point is passed reliable information will result.
Tarring either a person or nation with the brush of cowarice is as inaccurate and manipulative as the President's contention that anyone who doesn't agree with him is not a patriot.
At what point does survival trump morality? Taking the high road of morality makes for interesting intellectual discussion - a discussion that couldn't take place if one doesn't survive.
I do agree that torture simply isn't the right thing to do. I believe it puts us on that proverbial slippery slope that can take us places we really don't want to go.
Since I have no particular trust for any government I have to wonder what else they are doing if they ask us to sanction waterboarding.
I've never seen a flying cow. I do know people that have a proven record for honesty and reliability. If one of them called to warn me of flying cows I would grab an umbrella.
Truly appreciate your response.
Poet Girl: The bomb dude surely doesn't care much about life. The question about the wife was tossed in to complicate things a little more. The assumption was that he couldn't be broken by "normal" torture - but that he loved his wife so much....
Things in life often come down to justifying actions we know to be wrong in order to obtain a given goal.
Well, Buff, I grew up old school, by the old code. A man didn't throw the first blow in a fight. A coward did that. A man didn't start fights. A man ended them. Right and wrong weren't things to argue about. They simply were.
I'm not the person who tarred an entire nation with the brush of cowardice. That was a man by the name of George W. Bush who threw the first blow, who started a fight, who invaded a country that had never attacked America and had no capability to do so -- and the American people let him. That was when it really hit home just how much of a nation of cowards the United States had really become. I mean, I'd already gotten some inkling. All the parents refusing to let kids be kids (climb trees, ride bikes around the neighborhood, etc.) because it's "too dangerous". People supporting police tactics of bust heads first, ask questions later, because the police usually do that in neighborhoods where the people are, let us say, suspiciously dusky-skinned. People supporting every damnfool authoritarian nonsense to come down the pipe because "think of the kids! Oh the kids!". But throwing the first punch... that's just something that a man doesn't do, only a coward. Sorry.
Regarding absolute morality, I suggest you talk to a Quaker about the notion that there are no moral absolute. Specifically, talk to a Quaker about the notion of taking a human life for any reason, whether via war, capital punishment, etc. Pose a question to a Quaker: "If someone is about to kill you and your family and there is a gun in your hand, what will you do?" The answer will be "put down the gun" because Quakers do not believe in killing even in self defense because all killing, to them, is moral atrocity. Now me, I wouldn't give that answer. But there are people who have the courage of their convictions. They aren't typical today, which is why there is maybe a million Quakers in the entire world. But you unfairly tar all religions with the brush of moral relativism when in fact there are quite a few examples where that is not true.
Finally, when it comes to torture, the problem is that yes, all men have their breaking point. But when you exceed that breaking point, what you get is not truth. What you get is psychotic ramblings of a broken mind saying anything, everything, to stop the torture, a broken mind incapable of telling truth from confabulation. There has not been a single terrorist captured due to information obtained via torture. You can bet that if there was, the Bush Administration would be touting it as "see, our policy works!". But they don't do that, because they can't. Because torture is a means for sadistic people to cause pain to others, not a means to obtain reliable information. That is why we have two "twentieth hijackers", quite embarrassing -- each, when tortured, named himself as the twentieth hijacker, because that is what he thought his interrogators wanted him to say in order to end the torture. We will probably never know which of these men intended to be the 20th hijacker, because the torture has broken their minds and it's simply impossible to get accurate information out of a broken mind.
That's why fascist dictatorships do not use torture for information -- they use spies, informants, wiretaps, etc. for information. They use torture to obtain confessions. Torture is real good at obtaining confessions. Is there a dissident who is trying to tell people about democracy? Fine and dandy, round him up, and torture a confession out of him that he intended to bomb the main market square of the capital city and kill hundreds of people, then televise his confession and execution as a warning to other dissidents who might want to talk about democracy. But information? Nope, not useful for that.
badtux: Considering that my Dad was born in 1894 I'm thinkin' I was reared nigh on to "old school." The thing folk seem to forget, or never take into account, is that some of those "old schools" were in where the Marquis de Queensbury was a sissy boy that would have his ass handed to him on the mean streets.
All of those "manly, Jack Armstrong" rules are well and good if you are in a contest and everyone goes home at the end. That ain't the real world.
I was dead-set against the invasion of Iraq long before the first boot hit the ground and nothing has happened since to cause me to change my mind. This particular discussion about torture isn't about Iraq. It is about torture. That Iraq is the "playground" is not of any relevance.
It might surprise you to learn that I have discussed religion (and all that entails) with Mormons, Baptists, Pentecostals, Catholic priests, Buddhists and Quakers to name just a few. Their faith leads them to believe there is a cosmic, absolute truth/morality. That I do not agree with them tars them with nothing - any more than my abhorence for the actions of the current administration tars his supporters with anything.
Fascit governments have, and still do, utilize torture of all varities. The worthiness of the information they gather, I imagine, depends on the skill of the interrogator.
Good interrogators don't use torture. They don't need it. Just ask the WWII interrogators who got all manner of info out of the captured Nazis they interrogated -- using warm tea, a game of chess, gentle conversation.
The issue of torture and the issue of Iraq are intertwined because both are failures of courage. Both are instances where cowardice leads a people to support actions that are morally abhorrent in order that said people can "be safe". We have gone from "there is nothing to fear but fear itself" to "fear everything! OMG the brown people are going to swim the Atlantic with knives in their teeth and sneak into our bedrooms and KILL US ALL!" and nobody seems to notice or care. That cowardice is also leading us as a people to give up our God-given rights as free men to unelected elites who appoint our leaders via their closely-controlled media and corrupt political processes. Because, after all, we have jobs to protect. Mortgages to pay. Jails to fear. And it's not so bad, is it, to be a sheep?
Okay, I'm cynical. But I've talked to too many of my fellow Americans and seen too often how they handle the conflict between safety and morality to have a high opinion of the personal courage of the average American. I don't view myself as particularly courageous, but there's places I've gone and situations I've handled where people around me looked at me as if I was crazy for doing the right thing rather than the easy thing or the safe thing. Forty years ago they wouldn't have been looking at me like that. But that was back when Americans had brass ones rather than marshmallows.
You are incorrect if you believe that torture wasn't used by our side in all of the wars. Talk to veterans of the different wars. There is much that is left out of the history books.
There was wide spread support for going into Afghanistan and, in my opinion, rightfully so. Although the administration had support for the invasion of Iraq it was far less.
I think you will find it has been the legislators, not the American Public, that has given such over whelming support to the President. There is more of a feeling of helplessness that blankets the country as citizens realize that their elected officials aren't being responsive to their wishes.
Yes, I acknowledge there are those that are scared crapless by the thought of millions of blood thirsty terrorist pouring across our borders. I feel sorry for them. I don't think they are anywhere approaching even a significant minority.
In case it has been lost somewhere amongst all the rhetoric - I do not advocate sanctioning torture - especially as a nation.
That doesn't for a moment mean that I wouldn't jump off the moral high horse and do whatever was necessary to get vital information. Other than in a situation where that information was needed immediately .... nope.
Water-boarding isn't something that can be done in the arena of combat.
I appreciate the contributions you've made to this thread - and appreciate your civility.
There is a difference between what I as an individual might do to procure information and secure the life of a loved one and what I think is acceptable action on the part of any authoritarian agency. Any governing entity that makes use of torture against "the enemy" generally develops an elastic definition of that term. History shows that most often torture is deployed against the persons governed than against any outside threats.
For myself, it is not a question of the morality of torture or the necessity of torture, it comes down to simply this: how do you stop once you've started down that road?
No, absolutely not.
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