What do you think?
Rate this book
Mainstreaming Torture: Ethical Approaches in the Post-9/11 United States
The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 reopened what many people in America had long assumed was a settled ethical Is torture ever morally permissible? Within days, some began to suggest that, in these new circumstances, the new answer was "yes." Rebecca Gordon argues that September 11 did not, as some have said, "change everything," and that institutionalized state torture remains as wrong today as it was on the day before those terrible attacks. Furthermore, U.S. practices during the "war on terror" are rooted in a history that began long before September 11, a history that includes both support for torture regimes abroad and the use of torture in American jails and prisons.
Gordon argues that the most common ethical approaches to torture-utilitarianism and deontology (ethics based on adherence to duty)-do not provide sufficient theoretical purchase on the problem. Both approaches treat torture as a series of isolated actions that arise in moments of extremity, rather than as an ongoing, historically and socially embedded practice. She advocates instead a virtue ethics approach, based in part on the work of Alasdair MacIntyre. Such an approach better illumines torture's ethical dimensions, taking into account the implications of torture for human virtue and flourishing. An examination of torture's effect on the four cardinal virtues-courage, temperance, justice, and prudence (or practical reason)-suggests specific ways in which each of these are deformed in a society that countenances torture.
Mainstreaming Torture concludes with the observation that if the United States is to come to terms with its involvement in institutionalized state torture, there must be a full and official accounting of what has been done, and those responsible at the highest levels must be held accountable.
Gordon argues that the most common ethical approaches to torture-utilitarianism and deontology (ethics based on adherence to duty)-do not provide sufficient theoretical purchase on the problem. Both approaches treat torture as a series of isolated actions that arise in moments of extremity, rather than as an ongoing, historically and socially embedded practice. She advocates instead a virtue ethics approach, based in part on the work of Alasdair MacIntyre. Such an approach better illumines torture's ethical dimensions, taking into account the implications of torture for human virtue and flourishing. An examination of torture's effect on the four cardinal virtues-courage, temperance, justice, and prudence (or practical reason)-suggests specific ways in which each of these are deformed in a society that countenances torture.
Mainstreaming Torture concludes with the observation that if the United States is to come to terms with its involvement in institutionalized state torture, there must be a full and official accounting of what has been done, and those responsible at the highest levels must be held accountable.
240 pages, Hardcover
First published March 13, 2014
2 people are currently reading
69 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
April 1, 2014
Mainstreaming torture is a fantastic look at both torture as it is actually practiced, and at the ethical discussions around torture -- because the key argument Rebecca Gordon makes is that those two are inextricably linked. I find this view compelling and in some ways it's very satisfying to read this book and make sense of why the theoretical arguments about hypothetical situations are so uncomfortable.
The book is also profoundly disturbing, in the literal sense that my world view was disturbed. The arguments for re-evaluating one's own position and behavior with respect to important issues of human life and dignity cannot be ignored. One of the tangents was the discussion of culpability of people who choose to remain ignorant of the facts of abuses, whether in domestic prisons or abroad. At least by reading this book, the reader has made steps towards less ignorant complicity.
i-want-money
August 25, 2014"Saying no! to Jack Bauer: mainstreaming torture"
Rebecca Gordon interviewed by Richard Marshall.
http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/saying...
"Rebecca Gordon is the bad-ass philosopher who argues that Jack Bauer is wrong to use torture. She is an applied ethicist who is engaged all the time with forging a dialectical relationship to the rest of the world, with current political realities, with torture as a government supported institution hidden in plain sight, with torture and Alisdair MacIntyre’s virtue ethics, with torture as a practice, about what Obama should do, about ‘enhanced interrogation’, why Jack Bauer is wrong, why Anscombe thinks certain thought experiments can erode ethical thinking, about whether her approach is universal, about rival approaches and whether there are reasons for optimism around this depressing reality. Come gather round people…"
Rebecca Gordon interviewed by Richard Marshall.
http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/saying...
"Rebecca Gordon is the bad-ass philosopher who argues that Jack Bauer is wrong to use torture. She is an applied ethicist who is engaged all the time with forging a dialectical relationship to the rest of the world, with current political realities, with torture as a government supported institution hidden in plain sight, with torture and Alisdair MacIntyre’s virtue ethics, with torture as a practice, about what Obama should do, about ‘enhanced interrogation’, why Jack Bauer is wrong, why Anscombe thinks certain thought experiments can erode ethical thinking, about whether her approach is universal, about rival approaches and whether there are reasons for optimism around this depressing reality. Come gather round people…"
December 28, 2015
Rebecca Gordon combines the fire and urgency of a long-time political activist with the intellectual rigor of an academically trained moral philosopher. She shows that that torture done by and in the name of sovereign governments isn’t just aberrant actions by out of control members of the military or deranged intelligence officers but is an ongoing practice carried out over long periods of time. It is institutionalized state cruelty and degradation with its own traditions, histories and rules.
The subtitle of “Mainstreaming Torture” shows Gordon’s method of attack. The question of torture as state policy seemed settled—we were the good guys and we didn’t do it. Torture was not only immoral but was also a felony and a treaty violation. Absolute prohibition of torture was one the key elements that set the United States apart from regimes that practiced it. We didn’t have death squads, we didn’t use poison gas against our citizens, we didn’t litter the streets with the bodies of those who suffered extra-judicial execution. “Disappear” wasn’t a transitive verb in American English—unlike the authorities in Argentina during the “Dirty War”, Guatemala during the 30 year civil war or in Pinochet’s Chile, our police didn’t “disappear” people. We didn’t torture.
This changed on 9/11/2001 according to the scoundrels who approved of torture, authorized it in the bureaucracy, justified it in the press and carried it out. Dick Cheney said "I have no problem as long as we achieve our objective”. His use of “our” as a modifier includes, as far as he is concerned, the American people and not just the band of evildoers responsible. Three former directors of the CIA wrote in the Wall Street Journal that “enhanced interrogation” which includes waterboarding the subject, confining him in a coffin sized box, as well as chaining him to the ceiling for days and locking him naked in a freezing cell, led to the capture of important Al Qaeda commanders, disrupted terrorist plots and saved thousands of lives. The three were the most senior members of the chain of command that led to torture. They made their claims without providing evidence, trusting that the confidence the American people had in intelligence agencies would be sufficient.
Defenders of torture try to defend their objectively evil actions by referring to a ticking time bomb theory. It goes like this: there is a nuclear bomb hidden somewhere in New York City and the terrorist responsible for setting it has been captured. Only he knows the code to stop it from exploding. Would you torture him and save the lives of thousands if not millions? The ticking bomb scenario is a powerful hypothetical and one that the unindicted war criminals who authorize torture hope you accept.
But it is only hypothetical. In, in real life you don’t get such clean scenarios—you don’t get Jack Bauer saving the world on “24”. In real life you get equivocation and confusion, lack of clarity and the fog of war. You get incomplete information that conflicts with what you think you already know about the nature, magnitude, and timing of threats, and about the identity of those responsible. You get what has always been the result to questioning under torture: lies, half-truths, anything that the victim feels will make his tormentors stop. And, as Gordon points out, you don’t have a lone wolf but heroic government agent doing the dirty work. There must be a sophisticated infrastructure of evil including trained practitioners, doctors and psychologists willing to help inflict pain, isolated places where torture is carried out, like Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and the prisons of compliant foreign governments plus lackeys and lickspittles prepared to justify it.
Once we start justifying immoral actions based on their hoped for outcomes, there is no principled place to stop. “Mainstreaming Torture is an important and necessary book that deserves a wide audience
The subtitle of “Mainstreaming Torture” shows Gordon’s method of attack. The question of torture as state policy seemed settled—we were the good guys and we didn’t do it. Torture was not only immoral but was also a felony and a treaty violation. Absolute prohibition of torture was one the key elements that set the United States apart from regimes that practiced it. We didn’t have death squads, we didn’t use poison gas against our citizens, we didn’t litter the streets with the bodies of those who suffered extra-judicial execution. “Disappear” wasn’t a transitive verb in American English—unlike the authorities in Argentina during the “Dirty War”, Guatemala during the 30 year civil war or in Pinochet’s Chile, our police didn’t “disappear” people. We didn’t torture.
This changed on 9/11/2001 according to the scoundrels who approved of torture, authorized it in the bureaucracy, justified it in the press and carried it out. Dick Cheney said "I have no problem as long as we achieve our objective”. His use of “our” as a modifier includes, as far as he is concerned, the American people and not just the band of evildoers responsible. Three former directors of the CIA wrote in the Wall Street Journal that “enhanced interrogation” which includes waterboarding the subject, confining him in a coffin sized box, as well as chaining him to the ceiling for days and locking him naked in a freezing cell, led to the capture of important Al Qaeda commanders, disrupted terrorist plots and saved thousands of lives. The three were the most senior members of the chain of command that led to torture. They made their claims without providing evidence, trusting that the confidence the American people had in intelligence agencies would be sufficient.
Defenders of torture try to defend their objectively evil actions by referring to a ticking time bomb theory. It goes like this: there is a nuclear bomb hidden somewhere in New York City and the terrorist responsible for setting it has been captured. Only he knows the code to stop it from exploding. Would you torture him and save the lives of thousands if not millions? The ticking bomb scenario is a powerful hypothetical and one that the unindicted war criminals who authorize torture hope you accept.
But it is only hypothetical. In, in real life you don’t get such clean scenarios—you don’t get Jack Bauer saving the world on “24”. In real life you get equivocation and confusion, lack of clarity and the fog of war. You get incomplete information that conflicts with what you think you already know about the nature, magnitude, and timing of threats, and about the identity of those responsible. You get what has always been the result to questioning under torture: lies, half-truths, anything that the victim feels will make his tormentors stop. And, as Gordon points out, you don’t have a lone wolf but heroic government agent doing the dirty work. There must be a sophisticated infrastructure of evil including trained practitioners, doctors and psychologists willing to help inflict pain, isolated places where torture is carried out, like Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and the prisons of compliant foreign governments plus lackeys and lickspittles prepared to justify it.
Once we start justifying immoral actions based on their hoped for outcomes, there is no principled place to stop. “Mainstreaming Torture is an important and necessary book that deserves a wide audience
July 13, 2014
A thought-provoking, accessible account which wrestles with how torture is viewed and practiced by the United States today. Gordon is particularly concerned with the philosophical justifications for torture, and convincingly refutes them.
Read
August 29, 2022I was so lucky to have this author as my Ethics professor in college :)
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews