Torture Again

I've had cause recently to recall a philosophy course I took in college. I remember one particular day, when, during our daily topic discussion / arguments, one courageous young woman took the unusual position that killing was wrong. I say courageous because, despite strong opposition from a majority of the class, she held to her view.

The opposition didn't really dispute her stance - nobody actually argued that killing was right. But, the argument against her was that she was unwilling to make exceptions, especially exceptions for the state. And, it seemed, many felt that killing wasn't wrong in the same way for the state.

I was mostly an observer that day. My strongest prior influence on the topic had been Justice Van Pelt's assertion that state execution should be reserved for professional assassins - it constituted an occupational hazard. In all other instances, the state should refrain.

But as I listened to the arguments in class that day, it occurred to me how strange it was that something we would abhor, something we would expressly forbid individuals from doing, we would grant authority to the impersonal body of the state to do.

I hear the same argument playing out again today. There are those who take the unusual position that violence, especially violence conducted expressly to advance one's goals or ends, is wrong. They argue that there shouldn't be exceptions - that the state shouldn't retain for itself the right to commit violence in our name without our prior, specific approval.

And then the opposition, yesterday articulated by former Vice President Dick Cheney, arguing that the state application of violence to obtain information is the best means we have, that it saves lives, and that our goal of saving lives justifies the state application of violence in secret. Today, I predict that the violence apologists will spring up across the news spectrum, taking up the call for society's approval of more state violence.

At least Justice Van Pelt's position had a certain logic: To be eligible for state execution, you had to be demonstrably employed in a specific profession, and you had to have been convicted of a very specific crime.

But the calls to allow state sponsored torture lack any of that - there is no requirement for specific actions, no requirement for conviction of a specific crime. Without very specific criteria - criteria that prevent abuse, that prevent it from becoming nothing more than some individuals using the state as cover to explore their personal desire to perpetrate violence, then it becomes just an acceptance of violence in society. It begins to take on overtones of racism and xenophobia - since we have no clear guidelines to its application, it will be applied to individuals based upon other individuals beliefs and fears and preconceptions. Surely a recipe for abuse.

Will we support Attorney General Holder's investigation into torture abuse? Will we pressure our representatives for stronger laws prohibiting and regulating torture?

Or will we be left with the sad conclusion that in America taking the position that violence is wrong is the unusual one?