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"If the President has to crush the testicles of the person’s child to save the lives of 300,000,000 Americans, then torture away."
What is your number, then, Jake? How many crushed testicles ARE equal to the death of 300,000,000 Americans? At what point are those scales balanced for you?
Your intentional use of the word "Americans" in that sentence intrigues me. Do you really think the patch of land someone was born on should make such a vast difference in the value of his/her life versus anyone else's?
Let's just make the math easier, shall we?
How many non-Americans would you advocate torturing to save just one single American life? to save 100 American lives? to save 10 million American lives?
How many non-American lives would you end to save just one American life? to save 100 American lives? to save 10 million American lives?
How many Americans would you advocate torturing to save just one single American life? to save 100 American lives? to save 10 million American lives?
How many American lives would you end to save just one American life? to save 100 American lives? to save 10 million American lives?
And much more importantly, how did you arrive at your numbers? Your brain truly needs to be studied.
The sort of logic Jake uses here made a lot of sense to me long ago, when I used to think about things for a maximum of two minutes at a time. When I began to consider things just a little bit more deeply, it occurred to me that quality of life has infinitely more value to me than life itself. Honor has some value to me as well. And when I consider that people who are fighting "for me" might be torturing people to ensure some additional amount of security, I really want to tell our protectors/policy-makers that I don't want security if torture is the one of the reasons we have it. Don't think crushing folks' testicles is doing me a favor. It isn't. I'll take my chances at maintaining my present quality of life without that kind of edge, thanks. And this doesn't mean I don't appreciate American soldiers or that I hate America. I just don't want my "way of life" to be ensured because of a security blanket that includes torture. The phrase "blood money" comes to mind.
We all have numbers in mind where X amount of lives can be acceptable losses as long as it saves Y amount of lives. For some people, X=0 in all circumstances. For most of us, this problem is far too simplistic, and we need more information to fill in the numbers. Some people (secret service and the like) may feel like X can and should be much higher than Y, particularly if Y is an elected representative or a high ranking military official. For the authoritarians in office, I suspect that there may not be a ceiling to the amount of lives they would put in jeopardy to "protect the rest us". One of my greatest fears is that there are people out there (in power...right now...as we speak) who believe that no death toll is too high, as long as we don't show weakness. That would be the worst response of all when given questions such as this.
It really just comes down to what acts you are willing to be complicit with to maintain your quality of life and your security. I don't want to benefit from torture. Is your security so important to you that you will condone just about anything to preserve it? Where is the honor in that? What exactly is your definition of "The American Way"?
Hey! I just had a brilliant idea. You know the very best way to ensure the security of American lives? The fool-proof way? We can exterminate everyone who isn't an American!! That way, the only people who will be threats to Americans are other Americans. And at that point, who cares what happens next?!? America wins no matter what!!!
~Dallas
