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As if somehow being born within these borders granted us special rights that the rest of humanity did not also deserve.
Good post.
Yup. Since the Y-meister has me on ignore, ask him this question:
If the bill of rights was created because of the ideals of freedom, do those ideals not apply to "all men"? ("all men are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights")
Is is obviously the letter of the law rather than the spirit of the law that he is concerned with.
Without the spirit the letter is meaningless. It has been the policy of the US for decades to advance the causes of fair process and human rights. Does all that go out the window now?
It all goes back to the question: "If your neighbors do evil, does that make it ok for you to do evil?"
As if somehow being born within these borders granted us special rights that the rest of humanity did not also deserve.
Good post.
great article on the some of the recent history on torture.. to be fair both political parties and adminstrations have condoned it for decades now... but of course I will get attacked for merely pointing out the obivious.... so go ahead shoot defend your side of the aisle... on this subject as well....
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/...664174,00.html
It was the "Mission Accomplished" of George Bush's second term, and an announcement of that magnitude called for a suitably dramatic location. But what was the right backdrop for the infamous "We do not torture" declaration? With characteristic audacity, the Bush team settled on downtown Panama City.
It was certainly bold. An hour and a half's drive from where Bush stood, the US military ran the notorious School of the Americas from 1946 to 1984, a sinister educational ins ution that, if it had a motto, might have been "We do torture". It is here in Panama, and later at the school's new location in Fort Benning, Georgia, where the roots of the current torture scandals can be found.
According to declassified training manuals, SOA students - military and police officers from across the hemisphere - were instructed in many of the same "coercive interrogation" techniques that have since gone to Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib: early morning capture to maximise shock, immediate hooding and blindfolding, forced nudity, sensory deprivation, sensory overload, sleep and food "manipulation", humiliation, extreme temperatures, isolation, stress positions - and worse. In 1996 President Clinton's Intelligence Oversight Board admitted that US-produced training materials condoned "execution of guerrillas, extortion, physical abuse, coercion and false imprisonment".
Some Panama school graduates went on to commit the continent's greatest war crimes of the past half-century: the murders of Archbishop Oscar Romero and six Jesuit priests in El Salvador; the systematic theft of babies from Argentina's "disappeared" prisoners; the massacre of 900 civilians in El Mozote in El Salvador; and military coups too numerous to list here.
"within these borders"
Nah, Yoni MUST include naturalized US citizens as also being better humans with "unalieanable" rights than non-US citizens with fully alienable rights.
For Yoni and incorrigibly chauvinistic retrogrades of similar ilk, it's the Bill of US Citizen Rights
For people of advanced intellect, seriosity, with broad vision of humanity (ie, most Ameicans, even some sheeple), and TRUE Christians, it's the Bill of Human Rights.
Meaningless Bump.
(bows)
Looks like the protorture camp has fled the field. Too bad they still might vote...
No, one should not commit evil just because others do.
And state sanction torture is not evil. It is under the powers God has given to states to execute for it's own.
I thought i already made my point on why torture for personal gain, and torture for saving lives are two different things.
Let me ask you something.
Should by that same principle should Christians kill others in Combat?
Cmon Jockjuice, Phenambagamboa, Random Guy!
Awnser my question.
Here's my argument again.
No one's dodging the bullet here.
Explain to me out of proper biblical exegis why I'm wrong?
Hallmark Verses need not be written here.
So any evil a state does is OK with God? You imply that evil becomes not evil when the government does it. Is this correct?And state sanction torture is not evil. It is under the powers God has given to states to execute for it's own.
So committing adultry for seemingly good reasons is also ok? Stealing for good reasons is also ok?I thought i already made my point on why torture for personal gain, and torture for saving lives are two different things.
I would also argue that in the long run such methods cost more lives than are actually saved by inspiring further attacks.
There are no few Christians who don't believe in killing even then.Should by that same principle should Christians kill others in Combat?
If the role of the government is to protect its citizenry from endangerment, then why torture?The role of Government is to protect it's citizenry from endangerment, therefore as to where as a christian, Christ compels us through paul's epistle to "Make you're body a living sacrifice unto God", as well as "turn the other cheek", this is christ's instruction for daily living to be executed by individuals and not nations.
If it is known that we torture, and this leads to more attacks, is this policy not failing to protect?
Prove this assumption.Random Guy, do us all a favor and remind yourself that our political and practical actions in the war on terror, used in a positive way as to show goodwill, to change the hearts of potential recruits for terrorism, is useless.
It denies common sense to think that the vast population of muslims from which recruites are drawn are somehow immune to good PR. They are thinking rational people. To think otherwise is to deny them of humanity, is it not.?
People don't start out "cruel and dedicated". They are exposed to information that makes them that way.My argument is not about how cruel and dedicated and fanatical they are to obtain their goal.(killing innocents, beheading school girls etc) But how they are so fanatical that anyway you deal with them, you will always be wrong because you are not under submission of allah.
Don't play this cheap card of "But our methods will recruit more terrorist" again. It's dishonest and pointless.
It is not dishonest and pointless. It is the very heart of the pragmatic and dogmatic argument. You seek to make it that way because you know you cannot defeat the logic, so it is easier to simply dismiss it out of hand than actually admit that your position is neither logical or moral.
I'm not really going to enter into this debate again but, I have an interesting aside about a couple of the so-called "passive" exhortations of Jesus. I'm doing this from memory so, please, if you can expand on it, do.
First, this "turn the other cheek" business. It is my understanding that at the time, when Roman soldiers would slap a subject it was with a particular hand across a particular cheek -- I think it may have been with the left hand across the right cheek (I'm not certain). This was a sign of dominance and superiority, and in the screwy protocols of the first century, if you turned the other cheek the person doing the slapping would have to concede you are his equal -- by slapping the wrong cheek with the wrong hand -- or discontinue the assault and be bested by the person he was slapping.
Or something like that.
Then there is the "go the extra mile" story where Jesus is saying, if a soldier makes you carry his pack for a mile, go two instead. Again, according to the screwy laws of the time, a soldier was only allowed to force a subject to carry their load for a mile at a time. And, if the soldier was caught forcing someone to carry their load for more than a mile, they were punished. So, carrying the load for a second mile could result in the soldier being disciplined.
Again, these are vague recollections of a conversation had with a Presbyterian theologian a few years ago. He probably expressed all this in more biblical language, including chapter and verse. I also know he talked about other supposedly passive commands of Jesus.
The point was that Jesus wasn't telling people to lay down and be run over. He was telling them to be creative in their resistance to improper authority being exerted over them. Cause the perpetrator more discomfort than it is worth to pick on you.
??? OK, the namecalling is unnecessary.
This is an apples and oranges comparison. In combat both sides know that their life is at risk. Once someone has been captured however, their human rights have to remain intact and have to be valued -- that is the moral, civilized thing to do (and also why the Geneva Convention charter was agreed upon).
Should a Christian kill an unarmed defenseless person??... No.
If they were to kill in self defense, be it in a military field or in their home have they committed a sin?... I believe not.
As an aside, I believe conflicts should be solved diplomatically and not with military force. Terrorists of course don't want to open the lines of discussion and that has led to the problems and dilemmas we as a nation are facing today.
Rationality is not universal in all human cultures. It is far from being a prerequisite of humanity.
Outside of Western culture, entire patterns of thought are unrecognizable to us. They are not Westerners. They do not spring from the same core assumptions Westerners do. They do not process information the same way. They do not approach problems the same way. Thinking is cultural.
I find this to be a common liberal (and conservative, for that matter) fallacy, that people from different cultures can be reasoned with like a bunch of Western liberal critical thinkers.
rationality is what makes us human, and seperates us from the animals.
What would Jesus, the mass murderer, do?
The catholics solved all this dilema long time ago - it's all ok, as long as they're not christian. (see crusades/inquisition/witch hunts)
That is one explanation... except that the Bible clearly defines what Jesus' teachings with regards to those concepts actually was. He was not advocating for 'creative resistance'... otherwise He would not have taught his followers to 'pray for your enemies' and to 'love your neighbor and your enemies' as thyself. He would not have healed (and restored an ear) of the soldier that arrested Him. More importantly he would not have prayed for the forgiveness of those that crucified him (including --- you guessed it... the Roman soldiers).
First, praying for your enemies -- that they do God's will and that they be made right with God, isn't a passive direction either. If you believe in prayer, it is an active pe ion to God that your enemies will change.
Second, I would make a distinction between the Great Commandment, "to love your neighbor as yourself," and the directive to "love your enemies," (and, I'll note, Christ doesn't say "as yourself"). And, this will lead into my response to your other two points.
Loving someone doesn't mean you acquiesce to them or that you surrender to them but, that you recognize they are human and deserving of forgiveness and grace. Further, loving someone doesn't mean you accept their behavior or that you shield them from the consequence of their actions.
You can love someone and still be capable of killing that person. I'll give you an extreme example because, apparently, you don't buy that killing the enemy is consistent with Christ's teachings.
How about the mother who shoots to death the husband in the process of harming their children? Would you claim that her love for her husband should outweigh her protecting her children? No. Just like I wouldn't expect a soldiers love of mankind -- which may extend to the enemy -- to outweigh his sense of obligation to kill that enemy in order to protect his country or himself.
As for Christ healing the soldier's ear and forgiving those who crucified him. Okay, first, he's the Messiah and he knew beforehand his fate. I believe these soldiers were only fulfilling a destiny layed out and foretold in scripture and that Christ recognized this. Second, they were merely soldiers doing their jobs.
You'd have a point if, when the Sanheedren (sp?) handed him over to Pontius Pilate and demanded he be crucified, Christ had verbally forgiven them. But, as a Christian, we believe Christ died so that we all may be forgiven our sins...including the sins of those who crucified him.
Christ sets an impossible standard because, well, he is God and he knows the beginning and the end. Further, the events in which he was involved while here on earth were pre-ordained...and beyond everyone's control. That would include Judas Iscariot who betrayed him. There never was any doubt how the story of Jesus would end.
You are thinking of cognition, not rationality. Not all cognition is rational.
WWJT
Who Would Jesus Torture?
They are good points Yoni... but clearly I do not believe Christ would sanction any form of torture.
Again, in my other post I even inferred that killing in self-defense was different from causing premeditated death. And obviously though not all torture leads to death, it does cross the fine fringe of premeditated harm. That is not a Christ-like at ude no matter how you spin it.
Nor do I. And, nor do I condone any form of torture. The problem here seems to be what is torture?
Again, you'll have to define torture.
Then, once that is done, you'll have to tell me how causing extreme discomfort (with no lasting physical impairment) in exchange for actionable intelligence is a bad thing.
WWJW
Who Would Jesus Waterboard?
I am being a bit flippant, but Yoni's devil is in the details.
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