Torturing For a Confession

Torture has been a practice used to inflict severe pain in the victim as a way of punishment, revenge, cruelty towards heretics or to get a confession. It is prohibited all over the world by law and it is a violation of the human rights, in other words torturing is seen as unacceptable and barbaric. This represents a problem in our modern society because in extreme cases where a confession could save thousands of lives and the only way to get it is by torturing the perpetrator, is seen as a violation of the human rights. Another speculation is that torture is morally wrong and does not comply with the ethics that our parents taught us as children. Also, it is difficult to resolve this dilemma since it affects us in many ways. It is left to the public to decide whether it is the right thing to do in life or death situations.

Throughout history, torture has been present since the second century but it was only used on slaves until then. It has been mainly applied as a way of punishment towards those who committed a crime, during the medieval times, and specially heretics and witches during the inquisition. Initiated by the Catholic Church, the inquisition is perhaps the most salient piece of history involving torture as a method of interrogation and ecclesiastical imprisonment. But in the modern world things have not changed significantly, torture is still practiced, possibly with the same purposes from the past even though numerous laws were passed to prohibit it. We might not know about the cases but when it comes to saving the citizens from a terrorist attack, where a bomb has been hidden and he will not confess where it is, the only way of obtaining an answer would be torturing him. The methods used are depriving the victim f...

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... getting an answer as soon as possible is important to ensure the safety of others. I believe the punishment for those who are evil, is their own conscience. As Levin said “Paralysis in the face of evil is the greater danger. Some day soon a terrorist will threaten tens of thousands of lives, and torture will be the only way to save them. We had better start thinking about this.” (Levin). And no matter how wrong it seems, and how morally wicked it is, torturing for a response will be the only way and the difference between life and death.

Works Cited

Pavlac, B. A.. "Prof. Pavlac's Women's History Site." Torture. MMXI, 2011. Web. 6 Feb 2012.

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Levin, Michael. “The Case for Torture” 575-577. Hirschberg, Stuart, and Terry Hirschberg. The Millennium Reader. 5th. Prentice Hall, 2010. Print.