Context, torture and moral relativism
Bookworm on Sep 27 2006 at 8:12 am | Filed under: Uncategorized
I really have to do some paying work, so I’ll just take a minute here to urge you to read Jonah Goldberg’s sterling column about context, torture and moral relativism.
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Makes sense. Torture is ambiguous after all. If you look up the definition, you’ll know why. It has to do with having two separate definitions for one rendition of the word. Words like key, have many renditions and many definitions, so there is not that many confusion in the vernacular usage. Torture can both mean to inflict harm purposefully and to inflict harm for the purpose of revenge, and you can’t tell based upon context. Such as Democrats saying torture is wrong, all torture. Do they mean inflicting mental and physical pain on purpose is always wrong, outlawing police interrogation tactics? or do they mean inflicting harm for revenge and personal pleasure purposes?
If the Democrats cleared up their meaning, they would be put into an untenable situation, given that Americans don’t interrogate people for pleasure, but for information. If you outlaw interrogations for information, then you outlaw all police tactics. If you outlaw physical pain, this still leaves mental pain free for American use.
So, the Democrat trick is to obfuscate. Confuse, distort, create illusions. They are… adequate, I suppose. Not as good as the Islamic Jihad, of course, but adequate for the games they play.