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| Moral High Ground by Sally Santana I believe that there are no circumstances that justify torture. “You’re not responsible for the security of a nation, either,” you may say. True. But what does it say about a society that condones and uses it? In an article in the May 14, 2004 Seattle Times, guest columnist Darius Rejali, author of the book “Torture and Democracy”, outlines the extent and types of torture that are used in our world. It’s on the Web; please read it. He writes, “In 1956 the CIA commissioned two experts...who described the effects of forced standing. The ankles and feet swell to twice their normal size within 24 hours. Moving becomes agony. Large blisters develop. The heart rate increases and some faint. The kidneys eventually shut down. In the 1920’s, he says, forced standing was “a routine police torture in America.” My America? Home of the free and the brave? The South African and Brazilian police made prisoners stand on cans or bricks, the edges causing excruciating pain. In 1999 the South African Truth Commission determined that forced standing (used to sound innocuous, didn’t it? After all, they do it voluntarily on Survivor) was the third most common torture during apartheid, after beating and applying electricity.” The jolts of electricity would make the hooded victims feet stick to the cans and force them to stand up straight. This particular technique of torture, we learn, is called “the Vietnam”; American and South Vietnamese interrogators using field phone batteries commonly used it. For those who think the end justifies the means, is that just supposed to work to our advantage? We call them barbaric; they call us the same thing. Our actions speak louder than our words. We’ve been torturing folks we needed something from for ages, it would appear, to one degree or another, yet we make it sound like we own the moral high ground. A line from Matthew 7 crossed my mind. It reads, “...first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye." (ESV) If you believe in a loving, compassionate, forgiving deity, how do you square this behavior? If you also believe in a God that punishes evildoers, do you think we’re cooperating with God by treating our enemies this way, or that we’ll get our just desserts for what we’re doing when the time comes? In their eyes, we’re the evildoers to their people. Does it bottom line to “They don’t believe in God the way I do. Therefore they are not made by God; not made in the image and likeness of God. So I can do to them what I pray they never do to me.” We gloss over the death toll from the other side every time we’re in a violent conflict. Seeing the pictures we’ve been seeing recently has shown us our dark side, dramatically. We’re the only ones who can change it. If you feel its wrong, do something. Sally Santa writes a religion column for The Sun, out of Bremerton, WA. Since January 2003 her column has been carried by Scripps Howard News Service, and can be read all over the country. Contact Sally at sally.santana@wavecable.com
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