Persuasion eassy about torture - Essay Example

What the of the piece in question is setting up is a straw man argument. Ultimately, there will never be a situation in which a terrorist hashidden a nuclear weapon somewhere in Manhattan and will only tell the requisite authorities where it is on pain of torture. Moreover, what has to be decided is not if the occasion warrants torture but rather whether the precepts and tenets of a free, liberal, and democratic society are with the possible sacrifice in lives that such a situation might inflict.

Ultimately, almost all of those individuals that have fought and paid the ultimate sacrifice for the freedom that this nation now experiences would say yes (Stout 489). In such a way, choosing to torture someone just in the hopes that such an inhuman process would provide the needed information would open up Pandora’s box with regards to the lengths that our society might then be willing to go to in order to pursue it’s ends. Not only is this unethical, it represents an affront to the many hundreds of thousands of individuals who have died to ensure that the United States remains free and provides a stark level of contrast to the many despotic regimes that exist elsewhere throughout the world.

Although the temptation may be strong to bend the rules and engage in what would otherwise be considered dehumanizing and inhumane treatment of others, these are not the principles that we should want to bequeath to our children and grandchildren. A far worse fate than losing lives to terrorism would be spitting upon all of the lives of the fallen who have died to ensure that this country remained a liberal and free democracy that did not engage in such inhumane treatment of others.Work CitedStout, Nathan.

"Ticking Bombs And Moral Luck: An Analysis Of Ticking Bomb Methodology." Human Rights Review 12.4 (2011): 487-504. Academic Search Complete. Web. 4 Apr. 2013.