Alan Dershowitz's Argument For The Legalization Of Torture?

In the article, “The Torture Myth,” Anne Applebaum explores the controversial topic of torture practices, focused primarily in The United States. The article was published on January 12, 2005, inspired by the dramatic increase of tensions between terrorist organizations and The United States. Applebaum explores three equality titillating concepts within the article. Applebaum's questions the actual effectiveness of using torture as a means of obtaining valuable information in urgent times. Applebaum explores the ways in which she feels that the United States’ torture policy ultimately produces negative effects upon the country. Applebaum's final question is if torture is not optimally successful, why so much of society believes it

Let us begin with Michael Levin, whose thesis states, “There are situations in which torture is not merely permissible but not morally mandatory,” in the second

The definition of torture is perceived differently to every person. In this dispute, the two opposing sides are generally immovable. Many claim that it is not an effective tool, it is downright wrong, and it just does not work, while the other side claims the opposite. The argument “The Gray Zone: Defining Torture” by Barry Gewen examines the controversial issues that erupt from the touchy topic of torture. Gewen writes a successful and persuasive argument for his favorable position towards torture as an effective mean for gathering information and halting life-threatening situations which he does through his use of strong premises, logos, and ethos, building him a credible and structurally sound argument.

The use of torture to obtain information from a person is a practice that goes back thousands of years. In today’s society most individuals believe the practice of torture is a barbaric concept with no place in civilized society. But a question has arisen in the past few decades. Is it ever justifiable to torture a person in order to say the lives of other people? Since the events of September 11th, 2001, Americans have debated this question and many articles have been written on the subject. In their respective articles, Henry Porter and Seumas Miller, take opposite sides of the argument. Porter explains that torture is never an option, while Miller describes how torture is justified in certain situations.

The United States citizens have been wrestling with the question of, whether their government intelligence agencies should be prohibited from using torture to gather information. According to Michael Ignatieff, this is the hardest case of what he describes as ‘lesser evil ethics’—a political ethics predicated on the idea that in emergencies leaders must choose between different evils Before the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, torture was viewed by most American’s as only actions that brutal dictators would employ on their citizens, to keep order within their country. However, this all changed when in May 2004, The New Yorker released photographs from the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. The disturbing pictures were released on the internet showing bodies of naked Iraqis piled onto each other, others showed Iraqis being tortured and humiliated. There was a huge up roar, which caused the President at the time George W. Bush to publicly apologize, and threaten the job of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Soon after, the CIA Conformed the use of waterboarding on three Al-Qaida suspects in 2002 and 2003, which further annihilated the topic. Since these reports, torture has been in the forefront of national politics, and the public opinion has been struggling to commit on whether torture is right or wrong.

In “The Case For Torture” an article written by Michael Levin, he attempts to justify the use of torture as a means of saving lives. Throughout the article, Levin gives the reader many hypothetical examples in which he believes torture is the only method of resolution. Though I agree with Levin, to some degree, his essay relies heavily on the fears of people and exploits them to convince people into thinking pain is the only way. In certain aspects, I could agree entirely with Levin, but when one reads deeper into the article, many fallacies become apparent. These fallacies detract from the articles academic standing and arguably renders the entire case futile. Levin’s strategy of playing with the fears of people is genius, but, with more

Michael Levin’s “The Case for Torture” argues that there are various reasons for allowing torture to exist in the United States of America. Levin would love to see society change its negative views on torture so that, under certain circumstances, torture would be permissible. The article starts off with a very brief description of how he believes society views the subject of torture as a negative thing. He leads on to oppose that way of thinking and provides three cases in which he believes torture must be administered with various reasons attempting to support his thoughts. The hypothetical cases Levin uses range from very extreme situations, to a situation where we may sometimes see on the news. Levin makes it clear to the audience that

Hatfield contends that torture is so fundamentally wrong that it requires no written prohibition. At the core of morality, it is simply not acceptable. However, there are many international doctrines of peace-keeping which outright prohibit torture such as the Universal Declaration of Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the Geneva Convention and so on (pg. 132). He feels that as a lawyer, he is demoralized when other lawyers seek to revisit the legality of torture. However, the United States has submitted a document, the Bybee Memo, which enacted a law contrary to these accepted credos of behavior and these proponents of human dignity. “...what is clearly torture by any moral standard is not torture under American legal standards” (pg. 132). So how is it that one of the world’s largest democracies, can proclaim that “coercive interrogation” is not “torture”?

In this paper, I will begin by outlining Shue’s argument that while there may be some rare circumstances in which torture would be morally permissible, laws against torture should not be less severe, as torture does not satisfy the constraint of possible compliance (CPC), and other moral considerations. I will argue that since the cessation of torture cannot be guaranteed by the torturer, interrogational torture does not satisfy the CPC. Then, I will consider the objection that in practice, torture systems can ascertain the compliance needed by the victim, and can ensure this compliance is within the victim’s power. I will conclude by countering this point, as systems of torture have proven to be unreliable, and generally, unnecessary.

Torture has been a sensitive subject in our government and among the people of the US. The article “Torture is Wrong-But it Might Work” Bloche about how even though torture is not moral to some, it can still provide effective results because of advanced techniques and psychological studies. He goes on to say that many believe it is effective but others will say it does not provide adequate results in interrogation efforts. Senators such as John McCain (R-Ariz.) believe it does not help at all; however, other government officials, such as former attorney general Michael Mukasey and former vice president Dick Cheney, believe it does (Bloche 115).

Steele, Brent J. “ The insecurity of America: The Curious Case of Torture’s Escalating Popularity.” Justice, Sustinability, and security: Globl Ethics for the 21st Century, Eric Henze, 1st. Palgrave Macmiliian, New York, 2013.

With reference to authors’ arguments against torture, it may be true that legitimizing this system may cause slippage and mistakes to be made. However these mistakes can be prevented to the full extent of the law. There must be conditions that make unauthorized, and over-excessive torture illegal; violators will be prosecuted in the same way police are tried for brutality. In saying this I agree with Eric Posner, a proponent of the legalized torture system, in the sense that torture should be treated like any other form of evil that exists in our laws today (Rumney, O’Boyle,

Thus, Levin makes a logical argument that torture can be permissible if a terrorist or other criminal is known to be threatening innocent lives if the torture is used to save those lives. Torture must not be used as punishment but as a means to extract information that will stop an outrage planned for the future. He dismisses all the arguments against torture and those in favor of the rights of the terrorist by saying that the lives of the threatened innocents also have rights, and their rights outweigh those of the

David Figueroa Eng. 101A Professor Stern 4/20/15 Final draft In conclusion, in discussions of torture, one controversial issue has been on the use of it. On one hand, the people against torture argue that it is cruel and unusual punishment. On the other hand, those for torture argue that it should be used for the greater good. Others even maintain that under extreme circumstances, it may be admissible if it can save American lives. My own view is that no one should be subjected to cruel punishment because it is not only illegal, unreliable, ineffective, time consuming, it also has too many flaws that could potentially ruin innocent lives. The definition of torture is any act, whether physical or emotional, or maybe both, is intentionally subjected to a specific individual or a group for many reasons. Most of these reasons that torture is administered is for extracting information from an individual or just for punishing him/her for a crime that he/she has committed or is suspected of committing. The use of torture can be used to intimidate a person to give information that may be beneficial for a nation. The use of torture has been used for many centuries. The purposes of using torture have changed over the years as well as the methods in which a person is tortured. One crucial piece that has been established that separates us human beings from barbarians is the prohibition of using torture. There are many reasons why torture has been deemed a crime now in society. There are

The history of torture in Europe may seem at first to be a steady progression of barbarous tactics, leading from one social purge to the next, but this is not completely the case. Torture has been used in a progression from primitive methods to the present more modern styles. It has also developed extensively, both in severity and variety of methods used. But in the end, torture has gone full circle; modern forms of torture are more like those methods used by savages than anything in between. Overall, the severity of torture has fluctuated, growing and receding with the passing of each new time period, but eventually reverting to its original state.