Is Fraternity Hazing Torture covered by Geneva Conventions?

nimh, I am primarily talking about Gitmo, not Bagram or the prison in Iraq. I agree where incidents of torture are proven, and the individuals responsible should be accountable. I think these are the exceptions rather than the rule and I do not think Gitmo has a standard practice of torture, as authorized by Bush, which is the impression libs and Democrats have tried to portray.

And they will be talking about torture at the hands of their own, as well.

After all, countries like Syria are where this US government sends its prisoners to be tortured via outsourcing.


Odd isn't it...the same people who say (the WMD having been lies) that the war is about saving Iraqis from torture and abuse.....are those who defend (or still even dare to pretend to deny the prwctice) America happily sending people to be tortured by other regimes.


It is enough to make you want to be sick.

The following looks at the evidence and concludes we are "saints" compared to our opponents in terms of how we treat our prisoners.

http://www.tacitus.org/story/2005/6/23/154642/736

How have we come to this point, where we congratulate ourselves for not being as brutal as some of the other torturers in the world?

Wouldn't it be nice if we could just call ourselves (or our government) humane?

I think Okie sees punishing these accused terrorists as payback for 9/11.

I see one of the incidents cited in the report I posted was a guard had the audacity to put duct tape over the mouth of a detainee because he was too disruptively loud. We can't have such torture going on.

It is mostly about preventing more and preventing some bad actors out to plan more.

Why do you suppose prisons are maintained all over the world for criminals, Drewdad? Where do you and all the other whackos come from anyway?

Typically, prisons are for convicted criminals. What part of convicted do you not understand?

Furthermore, we're discussing the use of torture in interrogation... would you say that you would be willing to have your local police use the same procedures that are in use at Gitmo?


I come from a country that loves freedom, justice, and human rights. How about you?

Well, I've worked in a prison, at a probation office, within the justice administration and the police; and did study law.

I would really like to know YOUR response, okie.

Oh, and I'm from Germany. (Living exactly at that place what the coordinates below my pic say.)

No, I probably wouldn't want the police to handle suspected criminals they've arrested in the same way as enemy combatant detainees or whatever you label them as. But to get things straight here, people can be held in jail under our criminal justice system before they are actually tried and convicted, and if deemed dangerous enough, this may involve a very long period of time, no different than prisoners being held at Gitmo.

If we had to try these people under our civilian court system, it would be virtually impossible to do it given the number of people and the logistical difficulty of obtaining forensic evidence from a battlefield and many other logical reasons you should be able to figure out.

I think this matter of torture boils down to what really constitutes torture, and I think the threshold is being lowered considerably by terrorist apologists. I am not a lone wolf in this matter. I think the vast majority of people in this countlry agree with me. Another obvious point is that it is right out of the terrorist handbook to use negative publicity in their cause, so detainees will lie about things down there any chance they get in any way they can, and naive people and libs have more tendency to believe such propaganda. It is very difficult to sort through all the claims, the counter-claims, and distortions, and figure out the truth. My conclusion is that the claims of a culture of torture at Gitmo is a huge exaggeration if not an outright lie.

I am simply attempting to cast some proper perspective into the discussion here, and I used the example of what has happened with college fraternities to help do that.

I assume you want me to respond to my own question?

It is my opinion that prisons are maintained for the primary purpose of removing criminals from society in order to protect society or law abiding citizens, and secondly to provide a venue for punishment and possible re-habilitation so that if and when the criminal has completed their incarceration, they might be less inclined to commit crimes against society.

I see a place like Gitmo in a similar manner except that information may be extracted from prisoners at Gitmo that might prevent crimes against the country, some potential crimes having monstrous consequences, example nuclear devices or other terrible weapons of mass destruction potentially. This factor requires that we treat such prisoners in a different manner than we do the criminal justice system here in this country.

All of this should be intuitively obvious, Walter!

Might be for you.

I live in a democratic country with a constituion, parliament, laws etc etc.

And in the 21th century (although most of what I've learnt and studied was done in the 20th century).

So, a prison for me is an institution for the confinement of persons convicted of major crimes or felonies. (A quick search confirms that I'm not alone with my opinion but that it is shared in all democratic countries.)

Walter, have you ever heard of terrorism, wherein enemy combatants may be captured on foreign soil, so that your country's criminal justice system has no jurisdiction? It is a proven fact that the previous Clinton administration treated terrorism as a criminal problem rather than a national defense problem, and the policy utterly failed, Walter.

I've heard of such, but the Sovjets (and their vasalls) didn't care a lot about their juridal system as well. Besides, it wasn't a democratic country at all. (None of those countries.)

I just noticed this thread got switched to "Legal," which is kind of hilarious. Apparently the operators of this forum can't recognize good sarcasm when they see it. It was all designed to illustrate absurdity with absurdity, altogether political absurdity, which of course belongs squarely under Politics. There was never any thought that frat rats were covered by the Geneva Convention, for crying out loud, some of you people get a clue will ya!!

This thread is from the first page onwards in the legal category as far as I remember.

I guess I just now noticed. Oh well. I started it in politics anyway.

And politics was less hilarious for your "intended sarcasm", you think