For Torture
If we believe that man is nothing
but matter, which is the logical consequent of the materialism of the day, I
see no problem with torturing known terrorists.
If we do
not hold that man is a supreme being, made imago Dei, then man only becomes a
human being based on the arbitrary standards that other human beings have
decided upon.
Given the
pro-abortion stance of this country, the “rights of humanity” are not conferred
to a first trimester fetus, or for that matter a second or third trimester
fetus. In some cases, the rights of humanity are not even conferred to a
fetus/child/baby/infant/half-person/ bundle of matter, whatever we wish to call
“it”, when it has partially emerged from its mother. Even further, some, like Princeton ’s celebrity ethicist Peter Singer, have argued
that we should, in certain cases, delay declaring these balls of atoms “humans”
until they have lived for a full month outside of their mothers.
Whatever
standard is chosen, being that it is man made, will be in essence arbitrary and
susceptible not to the slippery slope fallacy but certainly to the runaway
train fallacy. A first trimester fetus does not have the cognitive ability of a
one month old. On the same token a one month old does not have the cognitive
faculties of a five year old…etc, etc.
Mankind is
now in the business of deciding when a thing becomes a human. When we grant
this molecular mass the “rights of humanity” we are endowing them with both
positive and negative rights. They have the right not be killed or raped, but
they also lose the right to kill or rape others. They are, without their
consent, entered into a pre-determined social contract. They have rules they
must follow that they did not have a part in designing or implementing. This is
all wildly arbitrary, but these are the rules to the game we are playing.
Under the
current pretenses of this game, what is the problem with torturing terrorists?
Why not, for utilitarian purposes, make an amendment to the made up rules to
the game? If we are the arbiters and can confer the rights of humanity on
things, why can’t we take those rights back? If you are involved in terrorist
activities you have violated the made up rules and are henceforth removed from
the game. You, the terrorist, no longer being a human, can be tortured and
abused in any imaginable way with out any “moral” (whatever this word even
means in a world post mortem Dei) repercussions for the torturer.
It seems to
me, that one who is pro-abortion has no basis to be anti-torture.
