[Heineken]

BTW, I love the way the Google advertising-machine cued in on this with something about "pain at the pump"!

[Heineken]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Roccland', 'W')e are hard wired to do bad things to others. This is why the elite believe we need to be governed...they are saving us from ourselves.

[Roccland]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Roccland', 'W')e are hard wired to do bad things to others. This is why the elite believe we need to be governed...they are saving us from ourselves.

[Serial_Worrier]

The most disturbing thing is that someone is probably being tortured in some basement in a neighborhood you live in. Think about it!

[Heineken]

It certainly disturbs me, Warrior.

The horrors we know about are only the iceberg's tip compared with what happens and is never discovered.

[Heineken]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Roccland', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Roccland', 'W')e are hard wired to do bad things to others. This is why the elite believe we need to be governed...they are saving us from ourselves.

[Roccland]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Roccland', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Roccland', 'W')e are hard wired to do bad things to others. This is why the elite believe we need to be governed...they are saving us from ourselves.

[Heineken]

I agree about the lying part, Roccland.

Not so sure about the hard-wiring.

[threadbear]

I flew off the handle and smacked somebody once. It felt good. I hope this doesn't put me in the same league as Alberto Gonzales.

Torture though? It's so awful I don't even want to imagine it. I don't think it's normal or natural, regardless of what people say. It is the pathological response of a pathology within a society.

[Jack]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'I') don't think torture is always a means to an end---or, if it is, that the means is justified by the end in 99.9% of cases. To me the barbarous and cowardly act of torture transcends almost any reasonable "end."

[Roccland]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'I') agree about the lying part, Roccland. Not so sure about the hard-wiring.

[hamlet]

We torture because our genes enable us to derive pleasure from it.

Torture serves social fitness, helps determine in-groups and out-groups, hierarchies, dominance, etc.

You don't need to teach a kid to pull legs off a spider or the wings off a fly. He does it spontaneously, joyously. A gaggle of junior high girls destroy the fat girl with taunts. Your brother gives you the indian rope burn, monkey bumps, a wedgie. College freshmen glued to lampposts. A leader endorses water-boarding... Nobody teaches them to do this, it comes naturally.

Ultimately, torture is fun. We're going to see a lot more of it when anarchy ensues, and social norms break down. We will return to our natural state, with scant supervision. If you are old, small, or weak, you're gonna want something in your pocket to level the playing field.

[dinopello]

Torture means we have too much spare time on our hands. Other animals are too busy foraging for food, sex and sleep.

[Ayame]

Hey Heinkein,

You should read these line of children books they have here in the uk Horrible HistoriesYou learn a lot like people having molten lead poured down their throats in Roman times and people being boiled alive in oil etc. Last time I felt queasy and throughly disgusted with the human species reading through one.

Oh god I just found this website on top 10 horrible methods of execution Wish I never woke up this morning now.

Anyway I don't think all torture can have a point because how could we then explain happy slapping incidents on strangers, farm workers throwing chickens into building walls and stomping on them for fun, and as someone mentioned tying fireworks to cats/dogs. Unless the point is that they are feeling angry/frustratated and it makes them feel better by causing pain for someone/something else. I personally witnessed as a small girl (and I will never forget) two boys my age picking up a grasshopper and repeatedly impaling it onto a cactus for absolutely no reason, and they seemed to derive some perverse pleasure from doing so.

[alokin]

I found the responses of you guy pretty scary. That PO aware people who should have a bit more in their brains than Mr everyoneelse, think this way.
Usually people who torture are moraly broken often tortured themselves. It has always been a mean of those who are in power.

The US is so far away from what is was meant to be, torture now seems to be simply a part of live. All what were the values of our Western civilization is gone.
If you want to learn about torture and if it is the way you think or not look at the pages of amnesty international.

[Micki]

There are of course many "justifications" or reasons for using torture;
- Getting the truth out of someone (highly questionable outcome)
- Getting someone to agree to something (highly questionable if it is agreement in heart that is desired)
- Making an example
- Sadistic pleasure or satisfaction from revenge
- Childrens play. The latter one more becasue of age as the child hasn't developed sense of what we consider right or wrong.
Usually a child who get good interaction with animals is more unlikely to want to harm that or another animal.

What is interesting though how perception of pain has changed into modern times. Today we have painkillers, medicin, dentists, hospitals etc. If you go back just a little in time, people often had to live large part of their life in pain and because of this pain didn't used to be thought of as anything strange.
It could be tooth ache that kept you awake everynight for years, if could a broken leg that didn't heal well and so on.
So a normal beating would generally not be considered as harsh as it is today.
Today, becasue we have such man ways of avoiding pain, we have grown extremely afraid of it.

For our Swedish visitors I can recommend all of Peter Englunds books. He is a historian who spent quit a lot of effort on looking int thigs like what was humour, what was scary, what did people think about death etc. in the past.
One of the anecdotes that stuck to mind becasue it is so perverse with our measures, was about a little boy who had caught a cat and was slownly grilling it alive. As the cat cried out in pain, people gathered around and laughed. This had been described in a letter and in a dry way as if there was nothing strange about it.

And you probably see the same pattern in the world today.
Those of us who have had good lifes are generally more concerned both about animal and human wellfare than people from poor conditions that themselves have experienced or seen hardship. They are sort of desensiticed since birth.

[alokin]

Abandoning torture and death penalty, acknowledging human rights are the cornerstones of what we are calling Western Civilization. That's what all the revolutions where fought for.

Children must be educated that they fit in the society. There is no excuse for torture.

Maybe some individuals saw too much brutal films and this influenced the thinking and what is thought to be normal.

Micky you're right that pain is now unnormal but toothache and torture are two different things! With toothache you're lying in your bed feeling safe only this bloody tooth aches horribly. Torture is about breaking someone in a way that if the victim survives he will never be the same mostly he will not be able to live a normal live anymore, which is possible after the painfull tooth extraction.

I thought our society has some values left at least some very basic.

[Heineken]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Jack', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'I') don't think torture is always a means to an end---or, if it is, that the means is justified by the end in 99.9% of cases. To me the barbarous and cowardly act of torture transcends almost any reasonable "end."

[Heineken]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Roccland', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'I') agree about the lying part, Roccland. Not so sure about the hard-wiring.

[Roccland]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Roccland', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Heineken', 'I') agree about the lying part, Roccland. Not so sure about the hard-wiring.