Torture- A Permissible Tactic In analyzing the reading, “The Case for Torture” written by Michael Levin, the reader can infer that the author is trying to persuade the audience into believing that torture is not only necessary, but “morally mandatory” (Levin1) in certain situations. Although most people would argue that torture is inhumane, there are some possible situations that should be put to thought in which torture could be used to prevent future attacks on the U.S. and potentially save the lives of innocent human beings. “Well, if the individual is all that important, and he is, it is correspondingly important to protect the rights of individuals threatened by terrorists.” (Levin2). Yes, it may be unconstitutional to allow torture, but you must keep in mind that the terrorist on the receiving end of the torture signed up for the job. It may be a harsh truth to accept, but he deserves to take on the torture that can inevitably await him in the future. This is not to say that torture should be used as punishment per se. Torture should only be used when completely necessary. You must keep in mind that the terrorist is a human being as well, however how exactly can you tell when it is “completely necessary”? “Torture only the obviously guilty, and only for the sake of saving innocents, and the line between "US" and "THEM" will remain clear.” (Levin3). Yes, there is a possibility of the misinterpretation of a situation, but any functionally human being should be able to interpret when someone is “obviously guilty”.
Torturing an innocent by stander is obviously wrong on many different levels of the morality scale, but you cannot necessarily make the same claim for someone who is potentially a threat to our country and our country’s lives. For example, say police caught word that during the Boston Marathon, in April of 2013, terrorists were planning to plant bombs throughout the Boston streets near the marathon route. Police track these terrorists beforehand, but they refuse to give away the bomb locations. “But millions of lives surely outweigh constitutionality.” (Levin1) By using torture as a tactic, police could potentially abolish the catastrophe that was to come. “I asked four mothers if they would approve of torturing kidnappers if that were necessary to get their own newborns back. All said yes…” (Levin2). Throughout