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Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Stop the Bad Faith Argument

It's to be expected of the mindless Liberal Left, but I'm seeing far too many otherwise thoughtful conservatives, particularly those who are Catholic, haphazardly throwing around the word "torture" to describe CIA interrogation techniques, e.g., waterboarding, which entail an infliction of pain to the person being interrogated. Even more annoying is how these opponents to interrogation by pain infliction try to support their position by comparing it to the intrinisic evil of abortion.  

The ridiculousness of comparing an admittedly extreme interrogation technique like waterboarding to abortion is perfectly illustrated in this 2006 Catholic Answers piece by Fr. Brian Harrison. If waterboarding is morally comparable to anything, at least from the standpoint of the Catholic faith, it would be to something like capital punishment or the death penalty. Opponents to interrogation by pain infliction who throw around the "torture" label in a preemptive attempt to cut off debate would be well advised to remember this, lest they want to be regarded as making an unserious, bad faith argument.

1 comment:

Mark D. said...

Great commentary here. You are spot on and I couldn't agree more. Thanks for posting this -- and I hope that you are going to keep posting more regularly. I really appreciate your insights and hope that you will continue to share your views and news with the rest of the internet community.

Cheers!