The Torture Report

[TheVictors]

There's some picture of a beheading going around Twitter with the caption, "and we're supposed to be upset about pouring a little water on their face?!"


I hadn't realized water boarding was revenge for beheading, I thought all the drone attacks and military troops on the ground were.

 

[Gulo Blue]

Even the CIA director trying to cover for his department said this:

He admitted that some CIA officers' actions were "not authorized, were abhorrent and rightly should be repudiated by all. And we fell short in holding some officers accountable for their mistakes."

"rightly should be repudiated by all"

I don't think we're reached that.

 

[Gulo Blue]

He said detainees who faced "enhanced interrogation techniques" did provide some information that provided useful -- as well as other information that didn't.

Technically, if you torture someone and get them to change a "no" to a "yes", you could claim you got a right answer and a wrong answer.
...although they are careful not to suggest they got useful info from EIT, just people that had seen EIT at some point.

 

[tigersofjustice]

But Jews didn't try and kill Germans..so I'm Hitler now?

If you think they deserve to go to an American court .. that's fine. Fucked up but fine.

Hitler is really never going to be a very fair comparison.

But having the desire to torture other human beings is pretty sick in addition to being pointless. People will tell you they are space aliens planning and invasion if that's what you want to hear.

 

[Monster]

There's some picture of a beheading going around Twitter with the caption, "and we're supposed to be upset about pouring a little water on their face?!"


I hadn't realized water boarding was revenge for beheading, I thought all the drone attacks and military troops on the ground were.

From what I hear, most people would prefer a beheading than being waterboarded over and over again.

The only time I would ever support torture is in extreme cases. When there is actual intelligence that suggests an attack is imminent. Gathering intelligence for a long term problem is a very poor excuse. Of course, these rules would be bent and eventually broken, so I guess that would never work.

 

[Thumb]

From what I hear, most people would prefer a beheading than being waterboarded over and over again.

The only time I would ever support torture is in extreme cases. When there is actual intelligence that suggests an attack is imminent. Gathering intelligence for a long term problem is a very poor excuse. Of course, these rules would be bent and eventually broken, so I guess that would never work.

The problem is even then, any information you get is unreliable. There is simply no situation where torture resolves anything whatsoever. You might as well throw darts at a wall covered in theories, because that's about as good of a chance as you will get with torture, to actually uncovering any useful data or plots.

 

[Monster]

The problem is even then, any information you get is unreliable. There is simply no situation where torture resolves anything whatsoever. You might as well throw darts at a wall covered in theories, because that's about as good of a chance as you will get with torture, to actually uncovering any useful data or plots.

I agree with you, but I'd rather take a risk on getting bad info than not doing anything useful. As I said, it'd have to be a scenario where a 9/11 is happening tomorrow and we have absolutely no idea where it's coming from. I'd choose to have potentially faulty info (to go after the bad guys) in a situation like that than having absolutely nothing to go on and just letting it happen.

 

[Gulo Blue]

FYI, mild stress can enhance memory, but extreme stress actually impairs memory.

http://download.cell.com/images/EdImages/Trends/814.pdf

 

[zyxt9]

I think sleep deprivation coupled with creating some disorientation would yield more accurate Intel than waterboarding.

Part of the unanswered elephant in the room is, what is NOT torture? Seriously, even something like listening to your favorite song in the confinement of your own bedroom can feel like torture if it is repeatedly played too many times. Any type of confinement is a form of torture, even prison. Point being, where we draw the line today will be considered barbaric at some point in the future, but does that mean we should not have prisons when no viable alternative currently exists?

 

[zyxt9]

FYI, mild stress can enhance memory, but extreme stress actually impairs memory.

http://download.cell.com/images/EdImages/Trends/814.pdf

ANY applied stress can be interpreted as a form of torture, especially if you are the one undergoing that stress.

 

[Gulo Blue]

ANY applied stress can be interpreted as a form of torture, especially if you are the one undergoing that stress.

I'm not exactly sure what point you are making, but this cites two methods of testing. 1) food and sleep derivation screws with memory and 2) injected cortisol (which people produce under stress) screws with memory. How much cortisol a person produces will vary from person to person, but that's not some arbitrary interpretation of stress; it's a physiological response.

And this is a pretty high impact factor journal.

 

[Gulo Blue]

I think sleep deprivation coupled with creating some disorientation would yield more accurate Intel than waterboarding.

Part of the unanswered elephant in the room is, what is NOT torture? Seriously, even something like listening to your favorite song in the confinement of your own bedroom can feel like torture if it is repeatedly played too many times. Any type of confinement is a form of torture, even prison. Point being, where we draw the line today will be considered barbaric at some point in the future, but does that mean we should not have prisons when no viable alternative currently exists?

I think we probably go with interpreting cruel and unusual as a standard. Cruelty is contextual and has everything to do with what your viable alternatives are.

 

[zyxt9]

I'm not exactly sure what point you are making, but this cites two methods of testing. 1) food and sleep derivation screws with memory and 2) injected cortisol (which people produce under stress) screws with memory. How much cortisol a person produces will vary from person to person, but that's not some arbitrary interpretation of stress; it's a physiological response.

And this is a pretty high impact factor journal.

And there are those who view all of that as torture. One could argue vs injections, particularly if person receiving injection has a fear of needles... but there are also those who would argue that creating and using an ingestable or breathable form of cortisol is a form of torture as it is done against the will of the person receiving the supplement.

I don't have issue with these things personally, just recognize the progression of civilization will result in these tactics being labeled as torture at some future point. If that is the case for the future humans, one can easily question whether or not today's humans should consider them to be torture, or at a minimum illegal methods for obtaining info as it is obtained against a person's will and there will continue being a debate over effectiveness and accuracy of the info obtained, right?

 

[zyxt9]

I think we probably go with interpreting cruel and unusual as a standard. Cruelty is contextual and has everything to do with what your viable alternatives are.

Considering the fact a viable option is to not do anything against a person's will, anything beyond that is a form of torture.

 

[Michchamp]

there's another issue there, that goes along with the make-believe "ticking time bomb scenario" that idiots who watched too much 24 think has happened or ever will actually happen... and that is even if we did find ourselves in such a situation, where we had a terrorist in custody who knew of plans of an impending attack, and those planning the attack were stupid enough to still go through with it, knowing their plans had been compromised, sure, you could possibly justify beating/shocking/torturing the information out of the suspect. Then you could address the action with a presidential pardon... given that the War on Terror is about protecting American citizens the President would obviously have no problem granting, right? So no need to make it an official program and implement torture as CIA policy, like Bush did.

of course this hypothetical also assumes torture actually produces useful information beyond false confessions or red herrings (it does not), and the War on Terror is actually about protecting American citizens (it isn't.)

but instead, you guys keep arguing over the mis-information that the Bush Administration, (and even the Obama Administration), and intelligence agencies spread about the effectiveness of torture.

"Well... since I read somewhere it sorta worked, kinda, a couple times, probably, I think maybe we can't jump to any conclusions here."

 

[zyxt9]

What we need to do is create humanoid virgins and tell the terrorists they can stay alive AND have 10+ times the number of virgins promised by being a terrorist.... just join our side and tell us all you know...

Then they provide the Intel of their own free will.

Someone get all scientists, programmers, and engineers working on this immediately, provide more resources and money than was equivalently spent on Manhattan Project and Moonshot combined, and make it happen!!!!

 

[Gulo Blue]

And there are those who view all of that as torture. One could argue vs injections, particularly if person receiving injection has a fear of needles... but there are also those who would argue that creating and using an ingestable or breathable form of cortisol is a form of torture as it is done against the will of the person receiving the supplement.

I don't have issue with these things personally, just recognize the progression of civilization will result in these tactics being labeled as torture at some future point. If that is the case for the future humans, one can easily question whether or not today's humans should consider them to be torture, or at a minimum illegal methods for obtaining info as it is obtained against a person's will and there will continue being a debate over effectiveness and accuracy of the info obtained, right?

The point of injecting cortisol isn't to torture/interrogate. It's to control one of the factors involved in interrogation so you can study it. If you do something to put someone in fight or flight more, you screw with their memory. We know that now.

And regarding future humans, sure, they're going to see things differently. Cruelty is a moving target based on what's known and viable. Similarly, torture when you think it's saving lives is ethically different after you understand that it does not save lives.

 

[Gulo Blue]

idiots who watched too much 24

Ironically, one of the anecdotes I read about a successful interrogation involved the interrogator and interrogatee establishing relatability over their mutual appreciation of that show.

 

[zyxt9]

The point of injecting cortisol isn't to torture/interrogate. It's to control one of the factors involved in interrogation so you can study it. If you do something to put someone in fight or flight more, you screw with their memory. We know that now.

And regarding future humans, sure, they're going to see things differently. Cruelty is a moving target based on what's known and viable. Similarly, torture when you think it's saving lives is ethically different after you understand that it does not save lives.

I'm confused, the point of doing the injection against the will of person receiving the shot is not torture? Nor is the point of supplemental cortisol about interrogation but altering the factors of the interrogation, which is in fact then making its point about interrogating....sooooo....how then is it not torture/getting info from someone against their will?????

 

[Gulo Blue]

I'm confused, the point of doing the injection against the will of person receiving the shot is not torture? Nor is the point of supplemental cortisol about interrogation but altering the factors of the interrogation, which is in fact then making its point about interrogating....sooooo....how then is it not torture/getting info from someone against their will?????

It's research about memory. There's not a single mention of torture in the entire review. It just has implications for the use of torture to get information. It actually mentions the implications for witness testimony.

In clinical settings, volunteers (you can't do this stuff against someone's will) memorize words and then try to recall them while being scanned in an fMRI after getting cortisol injections. Sometimes they test immediately after trying to memorize, sometimes 24 hrs later, sometimes they show pictures along with the words.

http://webs.wofford.edu/steinmetzkr/teaching/Thesis/Wolf_Stress Review.pdf