Tag Archive for torture

Wintertime Viewing Choices

DID YOU SEE THAT?  The “good guy” is a murderer, the “heroine” can’t live without sex until the next commercial, and we’re supposed to cheer at the explosions and torture of the “bad guys.”  Such is typical TV and movie fare.  Violence, cruelty, and lust not only sell, they also demean life.  And they feed our culture of violence/cruelty/life-is-cheap. Our refusing to watch these programs and movies is a personal step away from that negative, harmful culture. Going another step forward, we can explain to our kids why our family doesn’t watch them, thus raising a more caring, sensitive next-generation.  One more step is to write letters to the theater, TV station, film-maker, and advertisers, reminding them that their profits depend on giving us what we want to see.  If I do that, and so do you, and our friends, and their friends….  It’s the snowball-effect. What better time than now, during the cold of winter, to get that snowball rolling?

So, What’s With Torture?

June is Torture Awareness Month. It happens throughout the world, carried out by many governments, including our own. We can be shocked by it while still condoning it. Even in fraternity houses, where torture is a right of passage into the brotherhood. (Like with the young man who was put into a cold area, sprayed with cold water, and made to drink gallons of water–to the point of hypothermia.)

It’s obviously against U.S. law and morality to torture people we want to get information out of.  Yet the art of torture has been perfected over the decades in places like Guantanamo. Obviously our nation must stop this inhumane practice.

We can still get what we want, though.  Just send prisoners to college and make them rush a fraternity.  The fraternity hazing process will achieve our government’s ends but not really be torture.  After all, unlike torture, hazing is all in good fun.  And if it goes a tad too far, well, we all know that boys will be boys. Or so the thinking goes.

We can still get what we want, though.  Just send prisoners to college and make them rush a fraternity.  The fraternity hazing process will achieve our government’s ends but not really be torture.  After all, unlike torture, hazing is all in good fun.  And if it goes a tad too far, well, we all know that boys will be boys. Or so the thinking goes.

Torture is torture. It’s wrong, immoral, cruel, not a game, and yields no good.

Children in Adult Prisons

Kids in adult prisons?  Yes, in 2013 there were 6,000+ in the U.S.  These kids have few appropriate services or support as they experience sexual assault, beatings, and psychological torture.  They are more likely to try suicide than kids detained in non-adult prisons, and once they get out are 77% more likely to commit crimes.  This does NOT sound like a way to rehabilitate them–and they’re at the age when they are very able to change.  Nor is it a way to get them ready for a productive adult life on the outside.

Read more at the Credo website.  While you’re there, sign their petition to Attorney General Loretta Lynch, which simply reads, “The Department of Justice must immediately launch an investigation into the practice of trying and jailing children as adults.”

 

 

Torture that Many Approve Of

Granted, Clayton Lockett committed a despicable crime, and he was legally sentenced to death.  Like it or not, however, we must remember that he was a human being, and no humans should be subjected to torture like he was.

If you missed the story, yesterday he was strapped onto the table in the Kansas death chamber and given the first of three shots of a new, unproven “cocktail.”  It didn’t take.  He didn’t lose consciousness as he was supposed to; he began convulsing and talking and tried to get up from the table, obviously in great distress.  Some 43 minutes (yes, 43) later he finally died–of a heart attack.

Botched executions are not uncommon, although this one was particularly bad.  Our country claims to abhor torture, yet there are people who will say he deserved it, and so do all the others being executed.  I disagree.  Even the Old Testament law (supposedly replaced by New Testament mercy) of “an eye for an eye” didn’t include torture.  Plain and simple, it’s against the 8th Amendment, being cruel, and it’s out-and-out barbaric.

 

 

Democracy in Tunisia & the U.S.

Recently Tunisia passed a truly historic constitution widely heralded as a progressive and monumental document. 

Here’s just some of what these brave elected representatives agreed upon in the face of strong pressure from the more extreme factions of their parties:

  • Guaranteed equality between men and women
  • A constitutional mandate for environmental protection, only the third country in the world to do so
  • A declaration that health care is a human right, with preventative care and treatment for every citizen
  • democracy with civil laws that respects freedom of religion
  • An established right to due process and protection from torture

 [Unfortunately, the U.S. falls short on some of these goals.  Let’s hope we and Tunisia can truly achieve all of them soon.]

In one stroke, Tunisia’s become more democratic than many Western countries have been for years. 

This is a revolution of democracy and a great victory for human rights — and the more we recognize that, the more Tunisia can shine as an example for the Western and the Arab world!

From http://act.watchdog.net/petitions/4238?n=61068103.4ibRdx 

 

 

Torture Animals: It’s Your Right

Maim and kill an animal so you can film it. It’s your Constitutional right, according to a Texas judge, U.S. District judge Sim Lake. Prohibiting you from making animal snuff films is infringing on your  First Amendment rights. Therefore, Judge Lake decided in favor of the couple who makes and distributes films in which puppies, kittens, rabbits, and other animals are tortured to death.

For more information, read Sam Wood’s article at http://www.philly.com/philly/news/nation_world/Judge_Animal_snuff_films_protected_by_1st_Amendment.html.