Answering Derschowitz
Harvard Law professor Alan Derschowitz poses the question,
When you torture somebody to death … everybody would acknowledge that’s torture. But placing a sterilized needle under somebody’s fingernails for fifteen minutes, causing excruciating pain but no permanent physical damage – is that torture?
Jim Henley replies.
Dershowitz’s mouth certainly seems to outrun his brain sometimes.
Hell yes that’s torture. Not that there’s anything wrong with it…
I’m unclear on what Dersh’s point is — considering that he was all in favor of torturing terror suspects, back before there was hope that Abu Ghraib could be used to turn public opinion against Dubya…
Being tied in a chair with your eyes propped open and forced to watch Derschowitz rambling on inanely on TV …. now that would be torture.
Using pepperspray to swab the eyes and mouths of protestors and/or criminals that are actively resisting arrest and/or removal would also be considered torture by the above definition.
This from the guy who’s all upset about how eyewitness ID isn’t reliable enough to convict people. (I agree with him on that, to some extent.) I guess we could replace line-ups with needle-ins until somebody confesses.
What about sleep deprivation? It could be said that making your kids get up in the morning for school is a form of torture.