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the house of lords serves yet another good purpose
Former Member
Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4509530.stm
so we cannot use intelligence if it's suspected to be gained by torture, HURRAH
so we cannot use intelligence if it's suspected to be gained by torture, HURRAH
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evidence from torture is often VERY unreliable as well....
we should get our own evidence for suspected 'terroist' activities not cart people off to despots to be tortured
linked to... http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4505886.stm
and its a brilliant story, we're in a country where our police don't do torture and thus we shouldnt accept supposed intelligence from places that torture people into false confessions, as happened in uzbekistan the other week after their government killed innocent protestors and blamed their armies response on a terroist threat, and then fiddled the death count
1. Nothing, but absolutely nothing justifies torture: otherwise we are every bit as odious as those who fly planes into buildings or carry bombs into the tube.
2. Information obtained under torture is not reliable. You could get the Pope to confess to wearing ladies underwear, if you apply enough pressure.
3. It is counter-productive and for every 'terrorist' captured through information obtained by torture 10 times as many young men and women out there will gladly become new 'martyrs' for the cause.
Read what the Senior Law Lords said about the proof needed to invoke the "obtained under torture" clause...
I know it is a fictional TV show, but what about the old story in 24 of a bomb being planted and you have arrested the man who has planted it and you need to find it to disarm it. I would shoot the guy in the knee caps and cut of his thumbs to get to that bomb in time.
Although that is a very very unlikely occurance. They never know who has planted a bomb until after it has detonated after all!
Tortures get told what they want to hear, not always the truth.
The first few words explain why your "plan" is just bollocks. Shooting someone in the knee cap (assuming that you can shoot that accurately) would not stop a detonation...
I could make you confess to being a communist three-headedl izard monster with torture.
Unless... you actually are?! KILL HIM!
Yeah, good law by the lords, they are upholding it instead of breaking it for a change.
How many minutes of torture do you think it would take to get you to argue that you think torture is a terrible thing, even if the guy has a bomb?
Secondly...what plan?
Thirdly, im just saying torturing someone who planted a bomb that is going to explode in several hours to find out where the bomb is seems pretty acceptable to me.
Then again you can just lock them up and do nothing and let the bomb go off and kill who ever is near it, thats just as good a solution i guess.
3, 5, 7, what for you to say what you think the torturer wants to hear?
Of course, if you had left a bomb, you could lie - until it goes off?
No?
No one is doing the old torture rtricks of the Rack or owt liek that nowdays, certainly not even the USA.
However some countries, like the old Saddam regime used similar, torture whhere cutting was invloved and severre and permanent physical pain.
That kind of totrue is unaccpetable.
But say having someone in one position for a long time so the lactic acid builds up and hurst like hell but causes no actaul physcial damage I think is ok. Sneseory deprevation technicques and such liek that, used by the western countries I think are ok for people who are terrorists, not just ur ordinary criminal though.
You see while the arguement can be made that you can get unreliable evidence from torture and that people only say what the torturer wants to hear, I think that only really applies to people like us, orifnary people.
Proper terrorists are highly trained and resistant to the usual interrogation techniques of good cop bad cop, and mind tricks. Attacking the physical does break down this mental conditioning and you can in fact get highly reliable information. In fact, it may be the only way you can get information.
I also agree that in emergency situations that a degree of torture and physical pain is accpetable to use. One person suffers pain or thousand may die. I know which choice I'd go for.
Thing is, the very anti-american feeling, the anit-government feeling and the high ideals culture that is has come into society in the last few years seems to cloud peoples minds to the entirity of the issue.
Torture is not nice no and it shjouldnt be used as a permanet fixture, openly used on anyone that oppses the government but using it in exceptional circumstances and people who are trained to resist the normal technicques and if its for the safety of the general populous then yes I think its accpetable.
But it doesnt, it works some of the time, but you cant tell which times its worked and which times it hasnt.
And of course this ruling does nothing to stop MI5 and the Police using torture evidence.
You can't be naive about the subject. Its necassary and should be used in certain circumstances.
Except its never that simple, you just grab someone you think is involved and want him to talk.
If you torture him you get what you want to hear, not always the truth.
The people actually being tortured are in their immense majority fighters and insurgents. The biggest piece of information they could possibly hold is who they bought their weapons or got their bomb making training from, or who or what motivated them to take up arms.
There is no Al Qaida "mega organisation" that controls the people fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan or planting bombs in London, Madrid or Bali. Al Qaida nowadays is little more than a concept. All these people are independent cells sympathetic to the cause, and the information they could possibly hold is not going to deliver Mr bin Laden or save us from future bombings- since they almost certainly don't know where, when or by whom future bombings will be carried out.
Torture, in whichever way or form, is a despicable, vengeful and counterproductive tool and we do not have any right whatsoever to tell other countries about 'freedom', 'democracy' and human rights when we see fit to illegally kidnap people and fly them to secret concentration camps in third countries to be tortured.
Juts coz its the the west and bush that you hate so much doesn't make it wrong. Every country has been doing this kind of thing for years, same as everyone listens in on each other. Its standard and nothing new.
The fact is, it works in circumstances and is neccassary some of the time. To say it should never ever be used and never works is naive.
Sorry? Do you want to explain how we hate 'the west' so much?
And yes, people have been doing it for years, but then slavery was legal for years too. Whats your point?
Did torture get the Birmingham 6?
Kindly provide evidence to support your absurd claim that I "hate the West"...
Not exactly true is it? How many countries set up illegal, secret concentration camps in third countries? How many countries have Guantanamo-style camps running?
No it isn't.
Oh bloody hell, do you belive everything you hear on Iraq? Jeez. The news reports every bad thing and leaves off the good things. When there was a lul in insurgent attacks and suicide bombings the news didn't say a word, as soon as one happens its all over it like white on rice. Yes the government doesn't fill us all in on every aspect of the entire situation, yes things are missed out or presented in different ways, yes they use the wrong plans and yes some even lie but jeez, put a naother record on. The whole Bush Bad, Iraq, conspiracy is getting so boring now. The general populous will never be in 100% of the operation of Iraq liek they aren't involved in 100% of anything else int he political sphere. Its not practical.
And the most important point to make is, these recent reprots of torture camps and people saying thwey were kidnappend and torutred etc are all ALLEGED, nothing has been proven yet and so we cannot take it as fact it happened.
Oh and if you think the news programes tel the truth well....
Every country at one time or another has put the rough treatment on people that are enemies of the state, namely terrorists and spies. The only countries that do so on ordinary citizens are dictatorships/totalitrain regimes and they do so openly and are hence wrong. So yes it is true.
Yes it is.
I'll take the top part as you saying sorry.
So its ok to give terrorists and spies a bit of 'rough treatment', how do you know they are terrorists? Does the 'rough treatment' come before or after the fair trial?
Just because the word exists, doesn't mean theres anything really connected to it. How many unicorns you seen?
Our "country" just has better PR mate. It's exactly the same as all the others. The state is just the largest criminal gang, the "country" just the area it runs a protection racket in. You might have more apparent freedom but you try growing canabis in your own garden and find out how free you are.
Most of your "freedoms" are directly related to your ability to be productive.
My other major point is - we should have no right to use evidence gained by torture. The Stalinist show-trials are historical proof that with sufficient pain and persistence, you can force someone to say whatever you tell them to.
Sometimes you don't have timne for trails, and they wouldn't be iof use anyway. The harden terrorist doesn;t care about prison or trial and how many trials have been fraces anyway. they don't quarentee anything.
Let me put it this way, say someone kidnapped your daughter and she was gonna die, he slipped up and you captured him but your dauughter is still out there locked away, noit easy to find. the guy is a nutter but a smart guy to. he sisn't gonna just say where she is. Now imagine its you that has him and not the police, would you offer him a cup of tea and a chance to talk out differences or would smakc him around a bit, threaten him, even torture him???
No seriously think of that question and then try and judge how the people in these postions feel, the ones who decide on who gets torutred and who doesn't. You have terrorist with vital information that could save thousands of lives, what wouldn't you do to save those lives? Would you really put those lives at risk because of some view of ethics?
They don't care these terrorists and they shouldnt be viewed as just criminals, they are trained, they are focused, they are deadly and you need to break them down, If a degree of torture does that I am all for it.
Remember, we are not on about ripping open guts, or any of the old torture methods.
As I said it needs to be certain circumstances and genuine targets and risks.
But your question in meaningless because it assumes the Police always know they have the right man, which they dont.
And, I ask again, how do you know the person you have is a terrorist before you torture them? Or is a few innocent people being tortured a price we have to pay?
There is no country. The reason we don't have the totalitarian regime here is that most people accept the basic "facts" that they have been given and behave accordingly. My favourite example, and it's one I fanatically batter on about, is that the "country" itself isn't real.
It's a fictional distinction. Of course, once you have accepted that the "country" is real then you will happily do what you are told, pay your taxes and obey the laws, or at least think you have done something wrong when you don't.
No need for troops on every street when everyone has good enough lies in their head.
As to your point Bong, well these people are experts. MI5, MI6, CIA, NSA, Military Intelligence and even the various squads in the police. They know what they are doing, they obserev, colect the evidence, find the link and trace it.
And yes they have made mistakes and go tit worng. They are human, in infallible. and yes its terrible when they get the wrong person, an innscent but if a few innoscents suffer coz they got it wrong but it manages to stop real terrorists killing hundreds, thousand, even millions of people then yes I am in favour.
you don't have to agree with me, not saying anyone does, just that is my opinion.
I am saying that when you definately know there is a bomb or a terrorist attack like 9/11 about to happen, i would be all for torture if it was neccessary. These sorts of things do happen, you just do not hear about many, after all who wants to tell the people of their country they almost had a terrorist attack as bad as 9/11 happen. Also who wants to say it could have been prevented because they had the culprits in custody, they just couldnt get them to talk, because of human rights laws preventing thme from getting the information they needed.
I am not saying nor have i ever said that toruture should always be used all the time or as a first resort. But it is not a case of NEVER using torute, sometimes you have to!
After Iraq how can anyone beleive that the intelligence services are at all competent?