9/11 dude learns to breathe under water

[Twisted Intestine]

What I think Jingus' point is, is that he'd rather be waterboarded than have his nipples ripped off. As would I.

I don't know why that makes him insist on saying it's not torture.

 

[snuffbox]

I'm trying to find the ad hominem attacks I posted.

 

[still fly]

I think I would rather get my nipple ripped off, then being simulated being drowned for a month straight. That's a little too gnarly for me.

 

[Twisted Intestine]

Okay, but what if you had the choice between getting chunks of skin ripped off for a month straight or being drowned for a month straight? I think after so long I'd get used to the drowning. If it's mostly a psychological thing of making your brain think you're going to drown, I might catch on after awhile that I'll come out of it alright and not panic.

 

[still fly]

Well they can break my bones only once and I only have so many nipples, so there you have it. Kinda choosing between getting fucked in the ass with a stick or fucked in the ass with a cucumber. Neither are too pleasant.

I apologize in advance for derailing TSM liberals vs. Jingus part 1872.

 

[Gary]

"All torture's good torture, baby!"

 

[Jingus]

Twisted Intestine gets it. The stuff I think of when I hear the word "torture" is so radically worse than waterboarding that I don't think they fit in the same category. Shoving a red-hot poker up someone's ass and pouring water in their face are such different levels of harm that I do not feel comfortable lumping them together under the same label.

And oh yeah: CWM or whoever, changing someone's profile info on a message board is never acceptable behaviour for moderators. Even if it's as innocuous and WTF to changing my avatar to a picture of a pogo stick, appropos of nothing.

I'm trying to find the ad hominem attacks I posted.

Calling me inane, for one. And the troll-ish comments along the lines of "just stop talking" aren't raising your intellectual debate level either.

 

[Precious Roy]

Man, I wouldn't have started this thread had I known it would end up like this.

My main point was, we did this to him 183 times, after the first dozen or so he had to build up a tolerance for it. right? It's like every day they walk into his cell, wake him up, time for your bath! By the 183'd time he must have been awesome at waterboarding! I bet he liked he. He probably popped boners.

 

[Jingus]

That is a valid point. What information did they still think he was keeping secret after session #182 that he needed another one?

 

[Nightwing]

Thinking up various fantastical tortures though is not a real defense. In fact, it's really an attempt to say "Well, that's bad... but it could be worse!"

Sure, it could be worse; anything can be worse. But saying "it could be worse" doesn't negate something from being "bad". You don't walk onto a murder scene and say "Well, it could have been worse. Instead of shooting him both knees before beating him to death with the butt of his pistol, he could have broken his fingers too!" You say "What sort of sick fuck does this?!"

Waterboarding is torture. Just because we can think up worse doesn't mean that it isn't horrifyingly bad in the first place. Trying to do so is just trying to avoid the issue at hand.

My main point was, we did this to him 183 times, after the first dozen or so he had to build up a tolerance for it. right? It's like every day they walk into his cell, wake him up, time for your bath! By the 183'd time he must have been awesome at waterboarding! I bet he liked he. He probably popped boners.

That is a valid point.

1) Okay, Precious Roy's act is getting old.

2) How is this a valid point? Just because you know what's coming up does not mean that it's any less painful. I can't see how you can "adapt" to dozens of near-drowning experiences. I'm honestly surprised he hasn't experienced some sort of brain damage yet.

 

[Tawren]

2) How is this a valid point? Just because you know what's coming up does not mean that it's any less painful. I can't see how you can "adapt" to dozens of near-drowning experiences. I'm honestly surprised he hasn't experienced some sort of brain damage yet.

He probably has.

 

[Precious Roy]

Act? What the fuck. Why the fuck does everyone think I'm a "troll" all of a sudden.

It's my honest assessment of the situation and I think a valid fucking point. Humans have a high degree of adaptability and survival instinct, it's obviously going to become less effective the more they do it to him. You honestly don't think he could build up a tolerance to it?

 

[Perfxion]

Once you do something that many times, the point of it goes away. On a lighter scale, its no different than "I'm Rick James, Bitch!". It stopped being funny a long time ago. Doing it over and over, it still isn't funny, its just there. This guy being waterboarded yet again does not gain anything for the CIA.

And that isn't a trollish answer, it is him being him. He has a point in his weird delivery.

 

[Nightwing]

]It's my honest assessment of the situation and I think a valid fucking point. Humans have a high degree of adaptability and survival instinct, it's obviously going to become less effective the more they do it to him. You honestly don't think he could build up a tolerance to it?

How do you build a tolerance to being asphyxiated? It's not like they're holding him down for 59 seconds every time, where he might be able to hold his breath longer; they're holding him underwater until his survival instincts are causing him to thrash his body around and inhale water. That doesn't stop being painful. It's not like stabbing the same spot until the nerves are gone and you can't feel it any more. There's no way you can stop feeling it, until your brain decides to die on you.

 

[Jingus]

2) How is this a valid point? Just because you know what's coming up does not mean that it's any less painful. I can't see how you can "adapt" to dozens of near-drowning experiences. I'm honestly surprised he hasn't experienced some sort of brain damage yet.

He probably has brain damage by now. But my antipathy towards this guy and my apathy towards his harsh treatment is purely petty revenge emotions based upon the level of genocide he intentionally caused with his crimes. Waterboarding, in theory, wasn't supposed to be about punishment and revenge; it was supposed to be about gathering intel. Well, after 100 times under the faucet, why bother with 83 more? Any secrets he knows and hasn't told you after the first hundred, he's not ever gonna confess. Most likely it just turned into some guards sitting around the base, bored, and saying "nothing good on TV today... hey, let's go waterboard the 9/11 guy again! That's always a hoot." While I cannot fault them for wanting to cause as much pain and misery to that motherfucker as humanly possible, it's still an egregious abuse of a harsh interrogation tool which was not supposed to be used for those means.

 

[Precious Roy]

]It's my honest assessment of the situation and I think a valid fucking point. Humans have a high degree of adaptability and survival instinct, it's obviously going to become less effective the more they do it to him. You honestly don't think he could build up a tolerance to it?

How do you build a tolerance to being asphyxiated? It's not like they're holding him down for 59 seconds every time, where he might be able to hold his breath longer; they're holding him underwater until his survival instincts are causing him to thrash his body around and inhale water. That doesn't stop being painful. It's not like stabbing the same spot until the nerves are gone and you can't feel it any more. There's no way you can stop feeling it, until your brain decides to die on you.

I pretty much agree with this, but I disagree on a key point, and that is that after they do it to him so many times I would think the fear would be gone. He knows what's coming, he knows what it's like, he knows it's going to suck, but he's been through it so many times, every day, I just think there would be a point where you'd stop giving a fuck because you know they're not going beyond a certain point. Like, this is the worst you guys can do to me? Bring it.

Let's face it, waterboarding is a pretty tame form of torture, they do far far worse in the countries that this guy used to roll in.

 

[Nightwing]

]It's my honest assessment of the situation and I think a valid fucking point. Humans have a high degree of adaptability and survival instinct, it's obviously going to become less effective the more they do it to him. You honestly don't think he could build up a tolerance to it?

How do you build a tolerance to being asphyxiated? It's not like they're holding him down for 59 seconds every time, where he might be able to hold his breath longer; they're holding him underwater until his survival instincts are causing him to thrash his body around and inhale water. That doesn't stop being painful. It's not like stabbing the same spot until the nerves are gone and you can't feel it any more. There's no way you can stop feeling it, until your brain decides to die on you.

I pretty much agree with this, but I disagree on a key point, and that is that after they do it to him so many times I would think the fear would be gone. He knows what's coming, he knows what it's like, he knows it's going to suck, but he's been through it so many times, every day, I just think there would be a point where you'd stop giving a fuck because you know they're not going beyond a certain point. Like, this is the worst you guys can do to me? Bring it.

That makes no logical sense. Knowing that it's coming doesn't make it any less painful. Just because you're emotionally dead by that point doesn't negate the painfulness, and only serves to highlight how horrifying this torture is.

Let's face it, waterboarding is a pretty tame form of torture, they do far far worse in the countries that this guy used to roll in.

That doesn't mean anything, though. Because there are worse things doesn't mean that this isn't horribly bad in its own right. And waterboarding is a fairly common form of torture in a lot of different countries. I wouldn't say that it separates us torturers in other countries, but rather makes us much more similar.

 

[Charlie]

The true straw man theory in this debate is one act that everyone agrees is illegal and bad is defined as torture. Nobody says the US gov should do it but yet this is going on with no real point to it.

Allow me to be the first, then.

 

[Precious Roy]

I'm not saying it ceases to be torturous, I'm saying it loses effectiveness with repetition, same as anything else.

I'm going to have to agree to disagree here, we have a fundamental difference of opinion.

 

[Gary]

The true straw man theory in this debate is one act that everyone agrees is illegal and bad is defined as torture. Nobody says the US gov should do it but yet this is going on with no real point to it.

Allow me to be the first, then.

As well as the last.

 

[bigolsmitty]

Gonna C&P some posts I made at TSM last time this topic came up:

Waterboarding is a form of torture that consists of immobilizing a person on their back with the head inclined downward (the Trendelenburg position), and pouring water over the face and into the breathing passages.[1] Through forced suffocation and inhalation of water, the subject experiences the process of drowning and is made to believe that death is imminent.[2] In contrast to merely submerging the head face-forward, waterboarding almost immediately elicits the gag reflex.[3] Although waterboarding does not always cause lasting physical damage, it carries the risks of extreme pain, damage to the lungs, brain damage caused by oxygen deprivation, injuries (including broken bones) due to struggling against restraints, and even death.[4] The psychological effects on victims of waterboarding can last for years after the procedure.[5]

Waterboarding was used for interrogation at least as early as the Spanish Inquisition to obtain information,[6] coerce confessions, punish, and intimidate. It is considered to be torture by a wide range of authorities, including legal experts,[4][7] politicians, war veterans,[8][9] intelligence officials,[10] military judges,[11] and human rights organizations.[12][13]

Painting by person who was waterboarded in Pol Pot's Cambodia.

Journalist Waterboarded by French Forces during Algerian War:

HENRI ALLEG: A tap, yes, tap water. So, very quickly, the water ran all over my face. I couldn’t, of course, breathe. And after a few minutes, fighting against the impression of getting drowned, you can’t resist. And you feel as if you were drowning yourself. And this is a terrible impression of coming very near death. And so, when the paratroopers, the torturers, see that you’re drowning, they would stop, let you breathe, and try again. So that impression of getting near to death, every time they helped you to come back to life by breathing, it’s a terrible, terrible impression of torture and of death, being near death. So, that was my impression.

John McCain, torture victim:

Anyone who knows what waterboarding is could not be unsure. It is a horrible torture technique used by Pol Pot and being used on Buddhist monks as we speak.

...in 1947, the United States charged a Japanese officer, Yukio Asano, with war crimes for carrying out another form of waterboarding on a U.S. civilian.

In the post-Vietnam period, the Navy SEALs and some Army Special Forces used a form of waterboarding with trainees to prepare them to resist interrogation if captured. The waterboarding proved so successful in breaking their will, says one former Navy captain familiar with the practice, "they stopped using it because it hurt morale."

 

[Jingus]

I'll go you one better, he's a video demonstration.
[flash=200,200]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LPubUCJv58[/flash]
They never specified if these guys were actual military or intelligence operatives who had official experience with this technique. And sweet jesus that guy gave up fast, was that even ten seconds?

EDIT: there are also some versions of the report out there that claim Khalid was waterboarded 183 times in one month. Apparently there's some debate over whether this is true or not. If it is true, obviously that's pretty horrible.

 

[Tawren]

EDIT: there are also some versions of the report out there that claim Khalid was waterboarded 183 times in one month. Apparently there's some debate over whether this is true or not. If it is true, obviously that's pretty horrible.

Once is too much

 

[Chazz]

The true straw man theory in this debate is one act that everyone agrees is illegal and bad is defined as torture. Nobody says the US gov should do it but yet this is going on with no real point to it.

Allow me to be the first, then.

As well as the last.

Next to last,then.

 

[ericmm]

Jingus, you're being an idiot and the very worst kind of dupe.

The reason, the very REASON, that Waterboarding is such a popular form of torture is that it leaves no visible marks on someone's body, and it can seem to many people to be "not such a big deal"

There is a difference between "torture" and "maiming", which you do not seem to get.

I'm very, very glad you don't get to decide what is and is not torture, at all. Because you show no capacity to make that judgement. And anyone here, I don't remember who, who mentioned "losing fear" of waterboarding is inane. It's not the fear of the waterboarding that is the primary torture, it's the experience of it. You are DROWNING, your body goes into panic/survival mode.

It's against the law. Jingus, your "it's the 9/11 mastermind, do what you like" is so reprehensible.

Are you proud of how blase you can be with the actions of America towards its enemies? How badass you're being towards the terrorists? How cool it is to drag America down to the nitty gritty Jack Baur level of visceral revenge justice that you dream about? Disgusting.

 

[snuffbox]

Vyce agreed with you, Jingus. It's really time to reconsider when that happens. You don't really want your life dictated by television/radio celebrities too, do you?

 

[Jingus]

The reason, the very REASON, that Waterboarding is such a popular form of torture is that it leaves no visible marks on someone's body, and it can seem to many people to be "not such a big deal"

Yeah. Clearly. That's not well-known?

There is a difference between "torture" and "maiming", which you do not seem to get.

I'm very, very glad you don't get to decide what is and is not torture, at all.

Christ, hasn't this already been discussed to death before you came in and whined about it? To the first, I think to be defined as real torture that it should involve some degree of maiming. It's very apparant that I am in a small minority with that opinion. To the second, what the fuck does it matter if I think it's not torture? Even aside from the obvious part that my personal semantic opinions do not influence national policy. Because even if I could just wave my wand and be the wizard that did it, that doesn't change the fact that I do still think (and have said OVER AND OVER here) that waterboarding is bad and America shouldn't be doing it.

It's against the law. Jingus, your "it's the 9/11 mastermind, do what you like" is so reprehensible.

Are you proud of how blase you can be with the actions of America towards its enemies? How badass you're being towards the terrorists? How cool it is to drag America down to the nitty gritty Jack Baur level of visceral revenge justice that you dream about? Disgusting.

...what the fuck are you even talking about? None of those things I described are gonna happen to that guy. I already said that none of those things I described are gonna happen to that guy. I also said that clearly they went overboard (ha) in their Aggressive Interrogation Techniques with their ridiculous 183 sessions, seeing that obviously they're not even trying to use the waterboarding for its alleged original intent of information gathering.

As to wanting him to be in pain: so? It's a revenge fantasy. You never had one of those? Earth to Eric, there's a difference between idly thinking "heh, it would be cool if that guy suffered a lot" and "Mr. President, I stand here in your Oval Office and I am officially DEMANDING you send people into that man's cell with fishhooks and a blowtorch RIGHT NOW!". Come on, tell me that even you aren't such a moaning pacifist that you've never seen the footage of the WTC collapsing and thought, even for the briefest of moments, "I hope we get those bastards that did this". If you really are THAT nonviolent that you don't even want the frigging assholes responsible for 9/11 to be hurt, then I don't know what to say.

 

[snuffbox]

I don't know about Eric but if somebody is hurting another in my vicinity, I will act to stop it. But I try not to make a habit of turning that kind of behavior towards everything I see on my television.

We should have seen the folly of drawing upon irrational anger/hate. It seems to lead to things like amnesty for Osama bin Laden.

 

[Gary]

You don't really want your life dictated by television/radio celebrities too, do you?

 

[Jingus]

But I try not to make a habit of turning that kind of behavior towards everything I see on my television.

Once again we seem to be talking about totally different things. What does "behavior" have to do with this current subject at all? I've never tortured anybody, and never will torture anybody. I don't in any way help decide our policy for usage of torture or anything resembling torture. I am talking 100% idle fantasy of "boy I hope that guy burns in hell, and wish we could give him a beta test version while he's still alive". Obviously we're never ever going to do that, since that goes totally against all our laws. I even said that the real-life example of him being waterboarded 183 times was clearly beyond excessive and pointless. I've already said ALL of this, so I have no idea where you're pulling things out of your ass like talking about "behavior".

We should have seen the folly of drawing upon irrational anger/hate. It seems to lead to things like amnesty for Osama bin Laden.

Irrational anger/hate towards some of the biggest mass murderers in history leads to things like amnesty for one of those murderers? I don't get what you're aiming at here.