Torture
Planning | Introductions-Defining the Issue | Proofreading
Definitions:
See Aliprindini and Stingl and Sontag for definitions of torture and also for laws on torture. You will need to cite them
Morality: a system of values, normative rules, or principles according to which intentions or behaviours are judged to be good or bad, right or wrong. Such judgment can arise from cultural, religious, or philosophical beliefs.
"morality." Concise Medical Dictionary. Oxford University Press, 2010. Oxford Reference Online. Web. 31 October 2011.
Most students suggest rereading selected parts of the essays. Look over your notes for specific reasons for or against torture.
More specifically, look over the following quick outline and the more detailed examples below.
It ain't easy, is it? If you're not a demagogue, you should have conflicting opinions: you probably find that there is both good and bad elements of any issue. This is as it should be. Your goal now is to winnow out the positives and negatives and decide which, on the whole, is best for America .
"How do I winnow?" Glad you asked. Remember essay #2? After some pre-writing you generated a list of different reasons for an against a topic. Same thing here. Using the ideas in the readings, your new-found (or tried and tested) knowledge of current events, the "How Do I Come up With Reasons " in I&C, and considering both short and long term effects, generate a list of reasons for and against your topic. Putting this on paper should help you determine which position is best for America .
The main point here is to choose your divisions and practice persuading your reader why these divisions prove your position is valid. Again, try, whenever possible, to relate your position to "real-life" to illustrate its relevancy.
A general idea? Okay.
Torture helps/hurts America because of ________, ________, and _________.
For ideas on divisions, look over the specific reasons you've developed, both through the readings and (gasp!) through your own thinking on this issue.
When introducing (providing a context) your examples or explaining them, use the verb list in the "Citing Sources" section of I&C to shift your language into an argumentative discourse.
You could also try the following:
"The problem with ___ is that _____."
"This ______ helps American workers/industry/rich because __________"
The advantage/s of ________ is/are _______."
It's your job to prove why your view on how torture helps or hurts America . Using argumentative discourse will help ("This will" "These statistics prove") shift your essay into, well, an argument.
Should you use personal examples? Yes. Should you use examples from the readings and or from textbooks from other courses? Yes. Should you use examples from "real life"? Yes. Could you invent scenarios? Yes. Should you tell your readers that these scenarios are invented? Yes. Most importantly, should you remember that this is only the first of many drafts and the most important thing to do is finish the darn thing? Yes. Are you tired of me asking "yes" questions?
Consider, finally, a more traditional outline such as the example below
Introduction/Defining the Issue
What's needed in an introduction and to define an issue?
Note that there's two parts to this question. Introductions grab the reader's attention, set the tone. The definition helps reader understand the issue and sets the term of the debate.
For an introduction try
Take a look at how the authors in the assigned readings opened their essays. Could you do something similar?
To define the issue
This is similar to an introduction, but it can be a separate paragraph. Remember that you need to make it clear to the reader what, exactly, you’ll be arguing. Often, for issues that are easily understood – as in capital punishment – your thesis can both announce your position and explain the issue, but for other topics, as in torture, you may need to provide background information that will help readers understand what you are talking about.
Try these questions to develop your explanation of the issue:
Example #1
Is it appropriate for the United States to engage in torture under any circumstances? Well, first, let’s decide on a definition of torture. Torture has no actual “medical” definition, and thus, governments and interest groups often will alter its meaning to suit their purposes. I believe a simple, workable definition of torture is described in the article “Torture: An Overview”. According to the author<<<S, “Torture is the employment of severe physical or mental pain during captivity. It has been used throughout recorded history for a wide spectrum of motives, including punishment, the extraction of information, and repression.”(Aliprandi and Stingl). That is a very sanitized, almost clinical description of a variety of unethical military practices which still go on today. Unfortunately, the U.S. has in the past and continues to engage in torture of prisoners of war.<<<PROVE THIS. ESTABLISH THIS TOPIC’S RELEVANCE FOR TODAY. America should never use torture because it is morally reprehensible, ineffective, and fuels terrorism, NO COMMA WHICH ENDANGERS endangering American lives at home and abroad.
Example #2
Cruel Intentions
Imagine eating dinner with your family and enjoying what seems to be a normal night. Now imagine several armed officials bust down your door, and throw a bag over your face, and throw you in the back of a truck. After what seems to be a never ending ride, stops and you are dragged into a dark room, undressed and chained.<<THIS COULD WORK – HOW ABOUT CHANGING THE YOU TO A PERSON? The officials are abusing you and interrogating you until you squeal about an attack, such as the Oklahoma City Bombing, you have no clue about. How do you describe this torture?
Example #3
Beginning at 8:46 a.m., on a Tuesday morning in September, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed’s dreams became realities. At that moment, the first hijacked airplane crashed into the World Trade Center in New York City. It was September 11, 2001. As a result of his hard work in conceiving and planning the attacks of that day, nearly 3,000 people were killed within the United States. Mohammed must have been proud. He had faithfully served his terrorist organization, known as al-Qaeda. Since Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was admittedly such an instrumental player in the September 11th terrorist attacks, surely he was privy to other al-Qaeda plots of mayhem. When Khalid Sheikh Mohammed refused to divulge potential future attacks, what should we have done? Give up? Let him sit in a prison with cable television and three square meals a day for the rest of his life?
GREAT OPENING
Torture, as defined by the United Nations is “any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. It does not include pain or suffering arising only from, inherent in or incidental to lawful sanctions”<<<BLOCK INDENT IF OVER FOUR LINES (“Convention”). The use of torture on prisoners dates back to the times of the ancient Greeks and Romans. Writers Michael Aliprandini and Alexander Stingl call torture “the employment of severe physical or mental pain during captivity. It has been used throughout recorded history for a wide spectrum of motives, including punishment, the extraction of information, and repression”.<<<PUNC. GOES INSIDE IF NO CITATION. A BIT MORE ON CURRENT MANIFESTATIONS OF TORTURE.
Example #4
It Doesn’t hurt <<<TITLE CASE
Torture has existed for all of recorded time. Whether it was used for the purpose of intimidation like the rumored tales of Vlad Tempest >>or )better known as Vlad the Impaler), who was reported to impale the soldiers of his enemies on steaks for all to see, or we have seen these acts on television and movies like saw whose “devices were modeled after the devices used during the Spanish inquisition”( James Won Writer of saw I& II). <<<SENTENCE REALLY FALLS APART BY THE END – CAN’T FOLLOW ITS LOGIC. TOO MUCH INFORMATION The fact is that it exists and has for ages. There are vast<<<LAWS AREN’T VAST – THEY CAN HAVE A VAST SCOPE, BUT AREN’T VAST IN THEMSELVES international laws like the Geneva Convention and United Nations Resolutions that call for humane and fair treatment to prisoners of war and criminals in general. Is it reasonable to hang someone upside down and beat them with a stick because you believe they have valuable information? Or maybe deprive them of sleep and food till they decide to tell you what it is you think they might know? The questions are vast in the discussion of the use of torture. Torture is defined as the act of inflicting excruciating pain, as punishment or revenge, as a means of getting a confession or information, or for sheer cruelty. <<<CITE SOURCE
Example #5
TITLE?
Torture has been a controversy for hundreds of years. For example, it has been documented that water boarding has been around for a good 600 years, maybe even longer.<<<CITE SOURCE Torture is illegal. Any kind of treatment that causes physical or mental pain, committed for any reason, is a violation of international law.<<<CITE SOURCE It is known that<<<NEEDED? torture inflicts horrible pain whether it is physical suffering and/or even mental suffering. It is a way of coercing out confessions from people whether they are innocent or not. In recent years torture has been a controversial issue in cases with terrorists and the issues going on in Guantanamo Bay and many other “black list” areas,<<<THIS IS A START – NEED MORE SPECIFICS HERE because it has shown to be the methods of use are completely inhumane. Based upon these readings,<<<WHAT READINGS? I do feel that the torture that was being used now should not be allowed. The way it is used, it is most definitely “cruel and unusual” punishment. CLEARER DIVISIONS NEEDED.
See proofreading section of I&C and packet noted above for suggestions on proofreading.
© 2008 David Bordelon