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Originally Posted by Willravel
Three people. The first one was a dare and the second two were about proving it was torture. I figure I took CPR in high school (required course) so even if something goes wrong there's not a big chance of anything going wrong.
I know this is off your point, and I agree with the point you're making, but what does it mean if you're not willing to kill for your way of life? Isn't that just a different principle?
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Personally, I don't think it means any less if someone isn't willing to kill for a way of life. I don't even think I believe the will to kill for a cause is the ultimate act of dedication. For me it's an effective method of pointing out the ridiculousness of the idea that the act of dying is somehow more noble than not dying or that those who did die died with intent of demonstrating dedication to a cause.
How does this relate to torture? Because the arguments used use emotion to elicit a response that doesn't mean anything other than we're emotional creatures who like to respond with emotion. The argument "Wouldn't you want a terrorist tortured if it meant gathering information that could save your family?" is a meaningless argument. It's supposed to tug at our emotions, to get us to believe that life is like an episode of "24" and we'll get the answers just in the nick of time and save those innocent people!
It also means that you cannot successfully argue a legal point with someone who makes these determinations from a purely emotional standpoint. We could sit here all day and unload truckloads of evidence that supports the viewpoint that torture is ineffective and immoral and they'll still respond with, "Yeah, but what if it was your family being held and the terrorist with the information to save them..." and so on and so on.