Just What Is Torture?

by John Waddey⁽⁴⁰⁾
firstcenturychristian

From all directions we hear a cacophony of voices screaming, " torture, torture. " It reminds one of a chant at a political rally or the voice of a demagogue stirring the mob to violence. The word torture was used as a club to punish former President Bush and V.P. Cheney. It is being used by those who hate America and our military in an effort to discredit them before the world.

All of my life I have heard and read of torture. There were horror movies showing torture chambers. I visited a medieval torture chamber in Europe. For some reason, the current political connotation of the term " torture " does not measure up to its true meaning.

Before the anti-Bush, anti-war political activists redefined the term, torture meant, " " to punish or coerce by inflicting excruciating pain... " (Webster). Perhaps you have seen pictures of the victims of the Nazi death camps, or the Japanese abuse of prisoners. Prisoners were starved to death or worked to death. Some were beaten unmercifully. Others were used for painful, deadly medical experiments. I remember seeing a news story during World War II of a US soldier who had been tortured by Japanese soldiers. They had blinded him, cut out his tongue and inflicted other horrors.

The use of torture is an ancient practice. The Assyrians would flay (i.e. skin) some prisoners alive. They cut off their right hands so they could not use a weapon. The Persians impaled their victims on a pole and left them to die. The Romans forced them to fight ferocious animals. They boiled them in vats of oil, fried them in iron chairs, burned them at the stake or crucified them.. They disemboweled them and left them to die. The ancient Chinese inflicted death by a thousand slices of the knife. In the Middle-ages in Europe and England they sometimes blinded prisoners, used white hot blacksmith tongs to tear away the living flesh.

They put victims on a rack and pulled their arms and legs out of socket. They tied each limb to a separate horse and caused the powerful animals to run in different directions, tearing the victim apart. The hung them by their thumbs or feet. They drove splinters under their nails or ripped the nails off. They roasted them to death with slow burning green wood. The American Indians sometimes buried a prisoner up to his neck then pour honey on his head and face and let the ants kill the victim. They scalped them. These are just a few of the cruel methods of torture that evil men invented and used in the past. Evidence showed that in Saddam’s Iraq they made regular use of this kind of torture, even filming their actions.

Now compare this with what our intelligence agents did to terrorists captured while making war against our nation. They left bright lights on in their rooms. They played loud music. They manipulated the temperature in their cells. They questioned them for long periods of time. They made them to stand or sit for long periods of time. They put a bug in their cell.

But the critics from the Left shout triumphantly, " they water-boarded the poor victims. " In three cases they water boarded prisoners who had knowledge of other planned attacks. Many of our special operation troops undergo water-boarding as part of their training. (Just like policemen who use tazers must allow themselves to be tazered). Some news reporters have volunteered to undergo the water-boarding so they can write about it. It was administered in carefully controlled circumstances. With medical personal present. It could only proceed for seconds. It worked. How can these practices used by our troops be truthfully branded as torture? The Leftists redefined the word torture and feckless media spokesmen eagerly repeated the mantra. This manipulative use of language is not new. Lewis Carroll described it in Alice and Wonderland. " When I use a word, Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone, " it means just what I choose it to mean–neither more nor less. " It is an old method and it is a high form of deceit.

The word torture has a secondary meaning that we all occasionally use. Enduring the summer heat without air conditioners is torture. Some young recruits call boot camp torture. For adults to listen to acid rock and rap music might be called torture. For some folks, going to the dentist is torture. What our agents did to the Muslim terrorists can legitimately be called torture only if we use this secondary, metaphorical definition. To compare what they did to the terrorist to the classical meaning of the word torture is an abuse of language and a disservice to our troops and our nation. To do so to gain political advantage is especially shameful. Don't let the manipulators deceive you!

Article submitted Friday, May 22, 2009 & read 39 times.

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