Torture can be morally justified

Thank you Freeman for responding. First I would like to point out my opponent has not provided any reasonable contentions why torture is justified he merely attacked my points but not the ideal behind each one, the burden of proof rests on Pro; he dropped my contention 2 sub 3 regarding giving an arbitrary answer to relieve the pain and contention 4 regarding torture produces more enemies contention 6 regarding the long term effects of torture; and he attempts to debate unfairly by using hypothetical answers, "certain parameters" without defining them and using them arbitrary. Please note attacking one phrase isn't attacking a contention as a whole. Allow me to clarify my contentions: 1. Torture devolves interrogators, thus they become more bloodthirsty and addicted. Morality is solved through peaceful means not through violence. The good for society is based upon nonviolent means, look at how MLK, Cesar Chavez, and Gandhi achieved morality through peaceful means, the public favors nonviolence. 2. Basically reasons torture is ineffective and time consuming: 1. Torture cannot guarantee guilty as charged, thus we tortured an innocent; is this justified? 2. The suspected we catch usually isn't highly dedicated in the conspiracy, therefore his information is useless. 3. Accused will give what we want to hear, even if it's wrong, just to relieve the pain. 3. Torture seeks out races and religion because they're the ones usually associated with it. Example: During WW2 after Pearl Harbor U. S believed the Japanese-Americans were involved thus they spent them to torture camps. Justification and racism contradicts because racism is immoral as proved by the Civil War thus torture isn't justified. 4. Torture creates more enemies than allies (refer to R1). 5. The U. S should uphold constitutionality and enforce rights because it's a big part of our ideals that we shed blood on. Torture violates constitutionality thus it is unjustified because it contradicts our morals. If we wish to hold constitutionality then torture is unjustified. 6. Torture has long term effects on everyone involved ranging from revenge to inhumane acts. On to his rebuttals: 1. Definitions: He has no qualms yet he disagrees with sadism. If he agrees then he agrees with the whole definition. Both sides agree so my definitions are valid. 2. "How improbable such an event would be is simply irrelevant to the issue at hand. " I do not have to refute this argument so consider this as mute point. "An action can be said to be moral if it produces a net gain in happiness for ALL OF THOSE INVOLVED. " The accused isn't happy after beaten and bruised. You call that happy! ? What if you're beaten nearly to death? Because the happy net gain for the accused is none it isn't moral as described above. 3. Primitive being: No reasoning therefore it stands. 4. Washington Post: If authority isn't justified then why do we elect them? The Post clarifies it better. 5. Straw man: No reason why it's straw-man. This point stands because under stress in extreme circumstances we tend to be primitive and often make more mistakes and the information we gain usually isn't accurate (Contention 2). Torture in movies does not show the reality of torture under great stress. 6. Torturing innocent: My opponent is puzzled; I clearly stated torturing an innocent is unjustified. Justice is giving each their due. Yet Freeman is refuting torturing an innocent is giving what he deserves. For what crime? 7. Quote by Obama: Torture isn't decency because it's inhumane and it violates natural rights that the U. S protects (described in extensions below). Torture isn't decent because the world uses it with little good result. For example Middle Eastern interrogators interrogate the enemy for the location of the bomb, yet many deaths and explosions are resulted (witnessed by US soldiers). They're more experienced interrogators than us yet they fail to save lives. This isn't even an extreme situation, let alone during an extreme the situation stress would kill thousands. Anyway Torture isn't decent because they rarely work in the Middle East, let alone if an extreme case in the U. S we wouldn't have the advanced interrogation experience because the U. S are exposed to so few. 8. "THERE IS NO REASON TO JUSTIFY TORTURE. "-My bad I meant: my opponent has provided no reason torture is justified. 9. "Allow me to raise a second HYPOTHETICAL situation. " Again hypothetical examples are very unfair in debate and allow my opponent to come up with absurd moralities. Reasons why: 1st you have 15 min, too much stress= more mistakes & death. "he is unreasonable," We cannot achieve morality without logic. Yet I will not back down & be cornered with 2 choices. Alternative choice: The SWAT team/police has a tech whiz that can hack the security lock. So you could use this choice and bring the madman to justice through legal means rather than being a vigilante (proven immoral during Gold Rush). This saves my daughter, no one dies, brings the madman to justice, and it's legal and morally justified. 10. Torture=racism: Torture favors opposed race, religion, and sex. I believe it's clear because we torture a specific group we believe is inferior and ought to be extinct. For example from the beginning we trampled women's rights until FDR, we burn witches (a form of torture) whom advanced chemistry, rape them, and we force them to stay home. Torture obviously goes against justification because we trample the "equality for all. " On his R1: "I am not arguing that torture should be made legal. Torture, like theft, could be ethical under certain parameters and STILL BE AGAINST THE LAW. Nor am I arguing that a general practice of torture can be made from the scenario I outlined above. " He is clearly attempting to ditch is position. A legal law is the result of moral justification. If we didn't have morals, laws wouldn't exist, thus torture is justified; but we have laws and this is my parameter. Because torture is illegal it is unjustified. "utilities which in rare situations far outweigh its negative attributes thereby rendering it moral. " No examples that stand. Extension: Contention 5: a. The U. S Constitution and Declaration of Independence advocated and protected equal rights for all. We fought against the British & through our history we torture and are nothing better then the British, we still violate the rights that we claim to protect! Amendments 1,5,6,and 8 all describe rights given to the suspect. Torture techniques used in the U. S violates these rights before informing the suspected about their rights to remain silent, right for an attorney, etc. For example in Guantanamo we don't give them a choice for an attorney. b. Natural rights (rights to pursue happiness, freedom, and life) are violated through torture. Inhumane acts breach rights. Torture cannot guarantee the life of the accused nor any freedom. Again Guantanamo is an example. Torture upon slaves is also morally unjustified as proven in the Civil War. c. Everyone is born with natural rights; they have a value of infinity. Because society is made up of hundreds so we'll say 500 times infinite is still infinite. A person's value is infinity thus if we violate one person's right through torture we are also violating the rights of society (social contract theory), this contradicts the ideals that the U. S claims. Because of the human value described above there is no such thing that killing one person to save many is justified. Therefore torture is unjustified. Example: The terrorists have captured a U. S defense official and demanded whereabouts of important military files. My opponent position claims it's justify for terrorists to torture the official to find flaws in our defense. Justified? I have refuted all points made, and upheld my burden. The burden of the resolution lies with Pro, yet he fails to uphold it. I have attacked any points he made and his position.