Bugsy...you said:

"Legalised torture is an abrogation of peoples individual rights for the security of the state. It is at complete odds with libertarianism."

Sounds very pristine mate...but you avoided the hard question raised by Col. Ultimately, it comes down to your family and it's exposure to increasingly huge attack potential.

We have long since past the days when a few crackpots might just take a few potshots at others.. or.. explode the local pizza parlour for not paying it's 'tax'.... we now stand on the threshold of either

-Dirty bombs
-Nuclear devices.
-Biological weapons.

all being used by terrorists.

Pericles.. I didn't make myself clear on that 'psychological and technological' bit.. I was not meaning 'as a means of torture' I've heard of an approach which uses brain wave analysis to show when people are lying. It's quite benign and harmless and there's not even an 'ouch'....

The GOAL of course is 'information' not to inflict pain and suffering on the moron who is in custody.

yes, I quite accept all those points you raised from the various documents.
I think governments must assess all the variables and possibilities in such situations, and balance their approach to the potential risk.

Bottom line.. it is not 'human rights' which should sway them, but the safety of the community. After all... the community has a much higher human right than the captured terrorist.. to live in safety and peace.

I tend to share Col's idea that when a man runs amock with an AK47 and kills hundreds of people.. and has a sack of grenades on his back.... he somehow lost his right to anything. There should never even be a trial.

Col seems to think we should torture killers does that say we turn our prisons into torture chambers?
Poly firmly refuses to tell us if torturing Christians is different that Muslims.
Look at why we have terrorists and murders like those that send Polycarp into a flutter.
Educated to hate, belief in a God, some very real reasons to hate some purely insane.
Each step we take to match the inhumanity primitive hate is a step away from what separates us from terrorists.
You only have to re read the thread to see poly is again peddling his bike.

I can routinely think of exceptions where I'd probably be willing to override one set of principles because the exception seemed justified. The ticking bomb scenario, a case where a child has been abducted and you are really sure you have the abductor in custody but don't know where the child is. Both are rare.

What I'm not willing to agree to is authorising others to have the legal authority to make those calls on my behalf. People who may enjoy the job a little to much, people who might have agenda's which are not mine, people who might serve political or religious master who I have no passion for. I don't choose to do my bit to turn society into the type of place where torture is allowed.

The charater of our society comes at a cost, sometimes that cost is a high one but the cost of going the other way is far higher.

If there are hard men in a backroom doing dirty work to keep my hands clean I don't want them doing their deeds in secret and outside of the law. I don't want politicians to be able to give vague directions which don't incriminate the politician and yet have "faceless" people know that their duty to my country is to do dirty deeds.

If I thought it might save the life of someone I love I might be willing to torture but I don't want the place where I live to be the kind of place where others might make the decision to torture me or someone close to me because they thought it was important.

The cost is too high.

R0bert

Pericles, Don't drink, don't smoke & the missus won't let me associate with bad women.

I am still waiting to see the sickly sweet crowds Dot Point on how they would extract reliable information from a terrorist.

1. Tell them that you love them.
2. Give them a nice warm bath & some nice clothes.
3. A lolly to be good.
4. A bean bag for time out.
5. A nice hot cup of tea & a lie down.
6. A nice meal.
7. Someone to massage away their fears & worries.
8. A phone call to mummy.

I can see it all now. They'd be so confused they'd squeal like pigs. (Sorry you can't say pigs, their Muslim, will parrot do?)

Bugsy –“If you can answer that one truthfully, then you will know who the real hypocrites are.”

Actually, I have answered that all ready and the only allusions to hypocrisy are all yours.

I guess, Bugsy you do illustrate why I prefer the heartless bastards, they are more honest than you sanctimonious hypocrites

ROBERTS post comes very close to the core of the issue.

When balancing the greater/lesser good.. it is indeed a most diffucult situation and frought with all kinds of dangerous pathways which could take the whole society down a very ugly direction.

But while difficult.... sometimes dirty work needs to be done for the sake of the many. The law is something from ourselves. It does not stand in it's own right separate from we who make it..and it definitely does not remain the sole exclusive property of the lawyers who gain their living from it.

Who chooses what needs to be done.. how far from the law it can go, on whom it may be applied...how much can be applied... really boils down to a judgement call by those entrusted with our defense and welfare.

We are not faced with an all or nothing scenario.. we are faced with a 'What will give the best outcome' one.