Gina Haspel, C.I.A. Deputy Director, Had Leading Role in Torture

It must have been said already in this thread. Despite the movies, torture does not work. Not only that and ignoring the morality of it, it can even make the situation worse.

Now the best way to get information requires intelligence not brawn

https://www.theguardian.com/law/2017/jan/26/does-torture-work-and-is-it-worth-the-cost-donald-trump

It has been known for a very long time that torture does not work. Hence the only reason to use it is bullying and sadism. Obviously this has been the state of affairs throughout most of history but we had supposedly become more intelligent and humane. There is no reason to deliberately harm just because we want to harm. I'd rather we did not move backwards for my grandchildren's future.

 

You don't but anyone with any reasonable intelligence inside or outside government knows torture cannot possibly work. It's plain old common sense and requires no statistics. Anyone, including you would readily confess to any crime under torture just to make it stop. Several of those who were tortured made that claim. As a result, anyone who "confesses" to anything under torture makes such a "confession" totally unreliable.

Your ears are irrelevant as is your consent or lack thereof. There are interrogation methods that do work, experts in intelligence and law enforcement have been using them for decades and they do not include torture.

The usual misleading parroted propaganda. No war has been officially declared since the beginning of WWII. There is no such thing as a "war on terror", no one can wage a war against an ideology.

 

And somehow that justifies the murder of 50,000 human beings ??

 

I would like to weigh from a slightly different angle.

We always here absurd hypothetical's being brought up this debate "If someone knew about a nuclear bomb ... and so on".

Clearly there would be a line over which almost anyone would accept torture. The question is then "where is that Line" ?

This of course has been hammered out in various treaties, of which we were signatories. The torture methods used (regardless of whether someone agree's or not) have been deemed illegal - not only by international Law but under our own Law. Lindsay Graham was on CNN this morning stating just that.

Regardless of the above "IF" we are going to torture people "Then" this should be done publicly and with full transparency. It does not have to be done outside in a public park but, any "citizen" of voting age should be able to access footage of this torture.

If this were the case - we would not be using torture. End of discussion.

 

When did this ever stopped anyone? How many people died in the American Civil War? Was it worth it?

 

In Hollywood.

 

That’s tragic but that’s not murder.

 

So, just curious which terrorist organization do you represent?

 

Well in your case, it sure sounds like you represent one of the most dangerous ones on the planet, the CIA.

 

Psychopathy.

That also drives the disfigured and diseased mind to support torture.

 

This is why you do not let your war criminals go unprosecuted. They wind up in positions to do the same to your own population and they wind up on TV pushing more endless wars of aggression and profiteering that generate terrorism.

 

Yup, our militarist adventures have set us up for terrorism. And Don is pursuing the same path, still.

 

I don't think so.

 

Oh sure he is, we're supplying the hell out of the Wahabist Saudis in Yemen and supporting ISIS in Syria.

 

Under Trump, ISIS no longer has a state in either Iraq or Syria.

Yemen ??? President Obama said the greatest achievement he made as President was Yemen.

 

Oh they can both be wrong, see how that works?

 

The one I'm trying tofigure out, was it Obama or Hillary who was wrong.

During President Obama's last interview he conducted as President, Obama was asked what was the biggest mistake he made as President ?

Obama response was "Libya"

When Hillary Clinton was asked what hew biggest success as Secretary of State was ?

Hillary response was "Libya."

One of the two were obvious wrong.

 

I notice you cannot argue against what I wrote and devised the above to indicate just how out of it you are. In another thread I was reminded of Erich Fromm and his ideas concerning Nazism. I have come to a bit already which I think is what this is about and what the difference between White Nationalists/lovers of torture just because they enjoy causing pain to others and so on is about and their argument against who they see as 'liberal' and PC. He is talking about people who have lost their sense of Self and how they need to get it by belonging to something bigger - he is talking about Germany in the 30's but of course White Nationalism would also do. That is the psychology of this. Not having a firm sense of Self people feel the need to belong to something bigger, Our Country, Our Race. Such people obviously have an Authoritarian personality - it is par for the course. They do not feel strong enough within themselves so they subordinate themselves to something bigger than themselves which they need to fit in with. This is the sort of thing which gave rise to Nazi Germany. New Studies have also shown that there are people who in the general scheme of things will not have authoritarian personalities but who when certain conditions are there and they become vulnerable will. These conditions are there now and are very similar to those prior to WW2 as well as of course the particular vulnerabilities of American WWC as they lose their place of privilege as the majority.

Fromm says that once people have identified with the bigger thing - country/race or whatever any tiny criticism against such has a massive emotional impact on them and they respond maybe like you have above - but they see it as something personal. He says it isn't possible by any strategy to get through to such people. I for instance was unable to touch you by showing you how tortures only use is to allow bullies and sadists to inflict pain. The very fact that I said that made you respond with nothing on topic but simply a misogynist and Muslim hating rant showing clearly you cannot tolerate even hearing this.

Due to this problem with people once they have subordinated themselves to this bigger thing/race or country, Fromm suggests the way out is not to do that but instead to allow ethical principles to be what defines you. ...and this was very much taken up after WW2.
It does however now seem to be something which as people move away from ethics, condoning for instance things like torture we are in danger of losing as more people take on a more authoritarian/fascist stance as they did in the 30's.

Exert:

https://pescanik.net/wp-content/upl...m-the-fear-of-freedom-escape-from-freedom.pdf

 

I am not sure if there really is a change of policy in the region or partisanship causes people to see that.

 

Ok I am not sure you are referring to what I said but will assume you were and try to answer that.

I am unsure what you yourself are saying. Fromm is talking about how people can be swayed to be loyal to something like Nazism or fascism or similar. He was a German Jew and he moved to the States before WW2 and was part of the Frankfurt School. As I am sure you are aware the Frankfurt School are who the hard Right blame for things like policies against racism, ideas on equal rights and so on and they certainly did have a part to play in that. After WW2 they set themselves the task of finding how to avoid the possibility of anything like that ever happening again.

Fromm's main area of expertise was as a psychoanalyst moving more to humanistic counselling. Like Jung he believed that the deepest truth lay within our Selves but that we as people had to varying degrees got out of touch with our inner feeling Selves. When we are in touch with our inner feeling Selves we know what truth is. We can feel it. However to the extent that people have lost touch with this inner knowing they need something to replace this. He suggests that this is one of the reasons why things which one would think people would not approve of morally, like torture, they can be brought to agree to if those they have identified themselves with believe in it. It is because the sense of belonging comes not from genuineness and genuine relationships with others but from a need to put on mask in order to fit in. Societies condition people to fit into their societies from childhood. As you can see because Fromm's basic discipline is depth psychology he looks at things not just from a political stance. His concept of Self is similar to 'no self'' in Buddhism. It is basically about being 'true to yourself' and that being a Self which is healed. Such a self would by its very nature not harm. At the base of this is a belief it is possible to heal the world and create a world which could live without oppression.

This psychological component was also a very strong element of thinking even political thinking after WW2 until 9/11 when we reverted to old type and started talking about us and them and evil and good. We returned to a black and white world and gave up everything we had learnt since WW2. In particular Western Countries lost the ability to self reflect. Self reflection does not involve taking the blame but rather seeing where the other is and you are and if you are doing anything to aggravate the situation and what you can do to improve relations where they are difficult.

After 9/11 had the United States noticed how the entire world was with them – the entire world was shaken by this random taking of so many random civilian lives of people just trying to earn a living, it could have been seen that 9/11 actually opened a window for moving towards world reconciliation. Had the US at that time gone by International Law and listened to the voices all over the world who were willing to find the people who engineered this massacre they could have been brought to justice. As part of how the West was operating at the time, well certainly how Europe was operating a further dimension of that would have been to look at how people could possibly have been motivated to not only kill thousands of random people from countries all over the world but themselves. Those involved would have been punished for the deed but work would also have gone on to 'heal' the underlying problem.

In this I can see why the hard right blame the Frankfurt School for the changes after WW2 and although people possibly were not aware of it a large part of those changes were working on healing the world psychologically – hence the self reflection and knowledge that people do not do things like 9/11 without some intrinsic motivation – of course the motivation people were told was envy and wanting 72 virgins.

Ironically Bin Laden apparently believed that Western liberalism was only skin deep and could be thrown off keel at the slightest thing. He believed 9/11 could do that and he was right – though how much that was because of the weakness of Western liberalism or rather the fact that the shock of 9/11 allowed those who were waiting in the wings for the excuse to already begin taking away personal liberties and imposing the way people saw things is another question. PNAC comes to mind and without any conspiracy just taking the chance as such people always do – Nazi Germany taking a similar opportunity with the burning of the Reichstag. Very quickly the US moved to bringing in words like Patriotic and criticising people who even questioned why this had happened – wanted to get to the bottom of it so that they could see whether that reason be that the perpetrators were just somewhat mad or that there was a serious wrong being committed against people which could drive them to be able to commit this atrocity – were seen as unpatriotic. It took longer to make its mark in Europe but it most certainly has now and really such changes happen so gradually that people are hardly aware they are happening. On the economic level it had already been operating since neo liberalism came in with Thatcher and Regan so that things which in the 50's, 60's and 70's people spoke vehemently against like letting businesses have a monopoly and in particular allowing individuals to have such in respect of our press, started being allowed. The response to 9/11 bit by bit has allowed for the gradual stamping out of opposing thought. For instance with Corbyn meeting people who may be unsavoury. In the 70's people became aware that if you wanted to sort something out then you had to know where the people who were apparently causing problems were coming from. You need to talk to them. You are going to get nowhere with them if you just tell them you think they are evil so obviously you try to create a relaxed atmosphere even for instance calling them friends 'in a very lose way'. This was accepted at the time for what it was because it was known for what it was and people understood you do not resolve things without understanding where people are coming from and resolving differences. However nowadays this is presented as Corbyn hobnobbing with terrorists. Indeed alternative views more and more are seen as themselves 'evil' Hence Corbyn just making the point that we really should make sure it was the Russians who did the poisoning on British soil – a leader of the opposition's job is to confront the Government but even such a little thing as this starts to get viewed in the press as him supporting the Russians – so we are all moving towards the backdrop for Totalitarian states in any case at this time. One in which ideas become black and white and opposing views are bit by bit suffocated.

Now to go back to what you said. “I am not sure if there really is a change of policy in the region or partisanship causes people to see that.”.

People do not 'see it'. Indeed it is the very unconsciousness of the process which allows it to happen. Fromm was looking at the background which allowed Germans to have loyalty for Nazi Germany. He noticed that once opposing thoughts had been removed which they had once the Nazis had put in place their dictatorship that even people who Nazism did not have much appeal to, when they heard their country criticised instead of agreeing with that criticism would in fact move to being more loyal to fascism. This is caused by a need for belonging. In the same way today because the American far right approve of torture even though it is well known it does not produce results and hence is just the sadism of the bully, people who have positioned themselves with the far right are unable to accept this truth because that truth threatens what is most important to them – the Authoritarian group into which they have invested their identity.

In that way Fromm could see that when people are vulnerable they need something to hold onto, something bigger than them. They become open to authoritarianism. The believe something bigger than them is needed to resolve the situation – the strong leader and they replace their normal morality by loyalty to something bigger than themselves – our state, our race. Notice how often people think that by saying they are 'patriotic' they can let themselves off the hook for any other manner of defects. Same with how White Nationalists are using this.

From acceptance that people had a need for a sense of belonging. He noticed that this need for a sense of belonging could allow people to give up basically all morality and allow what happened in Germany in WW2. People who ordinarily would not have put up with such things did, because they had invested their identity with the State.

The way out Fromm and the Frankfurt School saw, was to tap into the thing which was lost once people are lured towards authoritarianism, Ethics. That does not depend on what country you come from, what your religion is, what colour your skin is. It is something which despite these differences we can all share and as such all belong as we work together to create an ethical world and that was how the West was in the main working until 9/11 but this all changed with 9/11 and bit by bit we have been drawn into a one dimensional world where the Authoritarians in the West appear to be winning and hence where we are on the edge of giving up our morality, our individuality, our right to be ourselves, our right to speak out when things are wrong – and fall into Tyranny as the whole west was playing with in the 1930's and Germany acted out..

 

Your link doesn't work

 

I don't believe waterboarding is torture.

For the purposes of this Convention, torture means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession,

Pouring water on their face doesn't cause sever pain or suffering.

 

Do you understand the meaning of the term "physical or mental"? Apparently not.

Back when Bush, Yoo and Gonzalez were instituting the torture program and people were talking about it, a radio announcer with a name like "mad cow" or something, actually volunteered to be water-boarding, and his intent was to prove what you claim, that waterboarding really was not torture.

After his experiment was over, he declared that it WAS torture, after he had experienced it.

It's a safe bet you have never experienced yourself.

Waterboarding is assault and battery against the individual, and is illegal in 18USC2441

 

That of course is another way of trying to avoid the guilt of taking responsibility for what you support. You are of course correct that pouring water on the face doesn't cause severe pain or suffering, if you for instance are doing it yourself in the bath.

I will believe you when I see the video of you yourself enjoying this innocent water boarding.

https://www.independent.co.uk/voice...ologist-investigate-truth-claim-a7547676.html

 

Have you ever been waterboarded?