Stooping to Torture
Posted on Thursday, September 21, 2006
Today, the American people are being warned by President Bush and others that the threat to their safety - indeed, the threat to civilization itself - has become so dire that we must weaken the international ban on mistreatment of prisoners that we ourselves once insisted the world adopt.
Oddly, such a step wasn't deemed necessary during World War II. Somehow, we managed to defeat Nazi Germany, a regime of immense cruelty, without stooping to torture as a weapon.
A few years later, in the Cold War, we faced off against the Soviet Union. But despite the threat, our leaders nonetheless insisted on adhering to the Geneva Conventions, to our own laws against torture, to our own basic beliefs in the inherent dignity of mankind. However, it would be wrong to claim that we have never succumbed to hysteria, that we have never stooped to degrading and abusing fellow human beings in order to protect ourselves. More than 300 years ago, in the little town of Salem, Mass., for example, public officials of the day did stoop to torture to wring confessions and information out of those they suspected of posing a threat. Of course, the modern threat of terrorism, unlike sorcery and witchcraft, is very real, as are its victims. But no rational analysis can elevate that threat to anything close to the threat posed by our enemies in the not-too-distant past.
- The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
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