That was then

If the true story of the Inquisition is any indication (as told by Monty Python), Catholics don’t really know what torture is

If the true story of the Inquisition is any indication (as told by Monty Python), Catholics don’t really know what torture is

I’m not familiar with the MP take beyond, “No one ever expects the Inquisition.” but the Church has long acknowledged the wrongness of torture, even when employed by church tribunals:

“In times past, cruel practices were commonly used by legitimate governments to maintain law and order, often without protest from the Pastors of the Church, who themselves adopted in their own tribunals the prescriptions of Roman law concerning torture. Regrettable as these facts are, the Church always taught the duty of clemency and mercy. She forbade clerics to shed blood. In recent times it has become evident that these cruel practices were neither necessary for public order, nor in conformity with the legitimate rights of the human person. On the contrary, these practices led to ones even more degrading. It is necessary to work for their abolition. We must pray for the victims and their tormentors.”

I’m sure we have to endure people reflexivly throwing out the Inquisition card for the rest of history, but the fact is there is not much mileage to be gotten out of it.

I say this not in dissidence, but in genuine… ignorance, or curiosity, or some such thing.

I’ve seen descriptions of waterboarding and even some short video clips of it, but I don’t understand what is so terrible about it. From what I understand, they just make you feel like you’re going to drown but you know you really aren’t. Given that, I don’t understand why it would ever work. Why would a terrorist give in when they know they aren’t going to be killed?

“Terrorist rights advocates?” How about “all human advocates?”

Please spare me the rhetoric. I think terrorism needs to be stopped as much as the next guy, but the methods in which we do it need to distinguish us from the bad guys.

There is no way that we can re-write torture as love for our enemies, sooooo….

I’m not suggesting the thing is moral, what I am confused about is simply that if I were a terrorist who had ever taken 5 minutes to watch CNN or to look up water boarding on the internet, I’d know I wasn’t in any danger.

That’s because CNN descriptions of waterboarding are pure abstractions. Being at the mercy of people you don’t know is completely different. I suppose you could say, “Now I know from CNN how waterboarding works, so you are not supposed to actually let me drown me right?”, but COME ON people.

Malcolm Nance describes what he underwent:

Waterboarding is slow-motion suffocation with enough time to contemplate the inevitability of blackout and expiration. Usually the person goes into hysterics on the board. For the uninitiated, it is horrifying to watch. If it goes wrong, it can lead straight to terminal hypoxia – meaning, the loss of all oxygen to the cells.

The lack of physical scarring allows the victim to recover and be threatened with its use again and again. Call it “Chinese water torture,” “the barrel,” or “the waterfall.” It is all the same.

One has to overcome basic human decency to endure causing the effects. The brutality would force you into a personal moral dilemma between humanity and hatred. It would leave you questioning the meaning of what it is to be an American.

“Much ado about nothing from folks who define torture according to the day of the week from the safety of their lazy-boys.”

I didn’t fight in World War II, but I can safely say that the Holocaust was wrong. Try again.

Have you ever been water boarded?
Have you spoken to someone who has been?

I have– and I’ve been informed in rather empathetic terms that it is no more torture than cold rooms (“threat of freezing”) or loud music. (A few polite “no, it’s not” but most were rather heated– frankly, I have an unfair edge, here, since I served on a ship with a LOT of Marines.)

Water boarding is often part of SEAR school– our service members go through this, along with other indignities.

Frankly, I’m rather disappointed at seeing so many usually very sensible folks jump on the redefinition bandwagon.

Torture is “the act of inflicting excruciating pain, as punishment or revenge, as a means of getting a confession or information, or for sheer cruelty”– it is not causing discomfort, it is not scaring folks, it is not being impolite.

If you want to make an argument about the morality of water boarding, go for it, but don’t stoop to changing the meaning of a word, and then slamming everyone who doesn’t agree with the new version. That’s as disgusting as the idiot evangelical that tried to inform my mother that the reason they didn’t carry Catholic Bibles is because they’re a “Christian” bookstore.

Sam Brownback is such a disappointment to me, as a Kansas and a Catholic. I would be glad that he is stepping down as senator after this term, if I wasn’t worried a pro-abort would take his place.

From the CCC:

Torture which uses physical or moral violence to extract confessions, punish the guilty, frighten opponents, or satisfy hatred is contrary to respect for the person and for human dignity.

Waterboarding unambiguously fits. It dehumanizes both victim and perpetrator.

violence 2. rough or injurious physical force, action, or treatment: to die by violence. (definition one was related to weather)

Another point from the catechism:

“2486 Since it violates the virtue of truthfulness, a lie does real violence to another.”

This demonstrates that not all violence is physical.

It does not cause injury. It causes *fright.*

In other words, they are terroizing their victims.

I am claustrophobic to the point that I will sometimes blackout–that doesn’t mean that if I am caught in a crowd between a bunch of folks who are taller than me, they are guilty of torturing me.

If a bunch of tall folks got together and decided to deliberately surround for the purpose of scaring you, they most definately would be guilty of torturing you. Torture is a chosen act.

For that matter, it isn’t used to extract confessions, either– it is used to get raw information. It’s not punishment or a threat.

I’m sorry, but this is obscuring truth. The victims are human. Not a lockbox full of data in which we get to do whatever we want to break it open. This is part of the dehumanizing aspect.

My husband wants to add that it’s very unlikely, if water boarding were torture, that they’d have to constantly use the cutoff on volunteers for “Survival, Escape, Evasion & Rescue” school.

Last I heard, torutre training has been suspended in the military.

There is no way to logic-chop this away. Waterboarding violates the Church’s teaching that we must treat prisoners humanely.

That would be moral violence, Scott. By making it impossible for someone to make an informed moral choice.

By say, scaring the hell out of them? This is why waterboarding is immoral.

They may be doing wrong, but they are not *torturing.*
To abuse the word so bends it beyond usefulness– which is exactly the point of my objection. If you use “torture” to mean “acted in an impolite manner” then you’ve pretty much dumped the actual meaning.

Let’s just stick to the inescapable fact: If they did this deliberately, it would be objectively immoral, just like waterbaording is.

I’m sorry, but this is obscuring truth

How on earth is describing EXACTLY what happens “obscuring truth”? You may as well accuse those who describe in medical detail what happens in a partial birth abortion of “obscuring the truth.”

You make accusations. When informed the precise ways they are not true, you then accuse the explainer of “obscuring the truth.” How on earth is that rational?

It is obscuring truth because it leaves out the most important detail: Terrorizing the living Hell out of a another human being in order to break their will.

You have yet to actually prove, using the proper meaning of the words used, that water boarding is torture. If you’re going to set the basis that you will, as a founding logical principal, assume that water boarding is torture– fine. But state that assumption. Clearly and often.

I pray that you will see sense on this. People are not objects whose wills we can just break because we think they know something. It’s dehumanizing and dishonorable. Church teaching is clear. We must treat prisoners humanely. Waterboarding does not do that. Not by a long shot.

My definition of violence reads, exertion of physical force so as to injure or abuse. I think waterboarding does fall under the definition of violence, for it does use physical force and is abusive to the person. I would also like to add that just because it may be used in our military training does not automatically mean it is not torture or is not contrary to the dignity of the human person. Our military is not perfect (and I could also see why some might think it beneficial to use this form of torture as a method of training, because as has been noted it leaves no lasting damage)–and the point about it being different when you are in the enemy’s hands as opposed to a CNN description is definitely salient. Finally, we are ignoring part of the catechism’s definition of torture which was posted (my emphasis here):

Torture . . . uses physical or moral violence to extract confessions, punish the guilty, frighten opponents, or satisfy hatred is contrary to respect for the person and for human dignity.

I think the very fact that it is frightening does not exonerate waterboarding but rather makes it even more suspect as being a form of torture.