Posted on 06/28/2014 8:11:34 PM PDT by Morgana
VERNON — A former nurse practitioner from Vernon admitted in court on Thursday that he raped a 3-year-old girl and conspired to rape an 18-month-old baby.
Jay Mohler-Avery, 46, in pleading guilty, also admitted trying to get the mother of the 18-month-old to move her four children and herself in with him so they could be his sex slaves.
He claimed, according to the police investigation, as outlined by prosecutor Elizabeth C. Leaming, that children would not be harmed by having adults sexually exploit them.
"Children should be able to explore their sexual curiosity in the home with other children as well as adults," Mohler-Avery told the 18-month-old's mother, according to Leaming. Mohler-Avery also badgered the woman for days to bring her 18-month-old daughter to him so that he could "break her in early," Leaming said.
(Excerpt) Read more at courant.com ...
I get impatient with people who say, "Oh, oooh, this is so hard, because, actually, how do you kno-o-o-ow what torture is? It's so complex! You can never know!"
You, in particular, sitetest, are intelligent enough to sit down and in 20 minutes write a short but adequate list of objective criteria to determine what is torture and what is not. The U.S. Army Field Manual could do it, and so could you.
How do we know what is r-a-a-a-pe? How do we know what is po-o-o-o-rn? Hustler? An ad for Dove soap? It's so confusing!"
It's like saying, "How can you know if anything is really wrong?" So much of this alleged ambiguity is self-deceiving, and shows a tendency to use spurious casuistry to avoid primary moral judgment. Not saying that about you in particular. I'm just distressed about what was smeared on our mind's eyes in this particular FR thread, and others like it. That's why I can't unreservedly invite conservative friends to get involved in Free Republic. Too much that would make me ashamed.
“Feeding a guy through a wood-chipper is torture.”
So say you. Because you assume certain things, you say that it is intrinsically torture.
I disagree.
In my own view, most of the circumstances in which one might find oneself with the opportunity to feed someone through a wood chipper probably do constitute torture. But I can (barely) imagine circumstances, far-fetched though they may be, at least in my own view, where this action might constitute something other than torture, such as self-defense.
It strikes me that torture is more about intent than it is about action. A field doctor who amputates a limb without the benefit of any sort of anesthesia to save the soldier's life is hardly committing torture. But someone amputating another’s limb for funsies strikes me as someone engaging in torture.
But the Islamics amputate limbs as punishment, and it hasn't been unheard of entirely in the history of western civilization, either.
Where does punishment end and torture begin? Where does the desire to justly harm the miscreant, to mete out what is due him, transmute to the illegitimate practice of torture, where is the boundary for that?
If I see a stranger on the street and walk over and take out a club and, without provocation, start to beat him bloody, and send him to the hospital, I've acted with malice and cruelty. If I've just seen him rape a little old lady and I act thusly, I think that at the very least, my cruelty is mitigated, possibly even justified.
The fellow who pushes the old lady out of the way of the oncoming bus is different from the fellow who pushed her into the path of the bus, even though both fellows are pushing around little old ladies.
I'm very serious in that from my perspective, “torture” is more about intent than action. At the heart of the concept of “torture” is the failure to act justly. The doctor who severs the badly-damaged limb acts justly, even though he inflicts an atrocity of pain on his patient. The fellow who gets his jollies butchering folks doesn't. One is performing medicine. The other, it might be said, is performing torture.
And that goes to the heart of this thread. A heinous crime seems to scream out for a heinous punishment. The person who takes satisfaction, even a certain grim delight, in seeing the moral monstrosity receive his due in this life is different from the person who enjoys unprovoked cruelty.
There is a moral difference between wishing the wood chipper on the likes of Stalin, or Mao, or Pol Pot, and wishing it on a stranger just to see what it's like to kill someone in a most cruel way.
I would say that the intentional infliction of suffering is part and parcel of torture - but it is also part and parcel of just punishment and due discipline.
In picking that particular example, you try to sway the argument with a cheap parlor trick - oh! look at the blood and gore! surely that is torture!
Maybe.
But you ignored my question regarding imprisonment. Do you discount the opportunity to act wantonly cruelly, to perform torture, through psychological means?
In a supermax prison, many prisoners will spend as much as 23.5 hours each day confined in isolation to a windowless cell, without human contact, without books, or TV or music, or exercise equipment, or any distraction whatsoever. For folks who start out with reasonable mental health, long-term incarceration of this sort can badly damage the psyche. For the sort who generally wind up in maximum security confinement, psychosis is a real risk.
Would you prefer a brutal, but relatively-short death, or life-long psychosis?
Which is torture?
Why isn't the infliction of psychosis not torture?
Frankly, if torture is sort of an introduction to the vestibule of what Hell is about, then being driven mad is more torture than is being killed brutally, but quickly.
I discard the concept of “torture” in favor of distinguishing between right and wrong.
The impulse to punish the aggressor is right. The impulse to severely punish the most heinous aggressor is right.
But ultimately, we mediate our impulses. One hopes that we don't usually act on them without thought and consideration.
Upon reflection, we come to understand that the nearly infinite harm caused by some aggressors cannot be recompensed in this life, no matter how much we punish the aggressor. Thus, we accept the truncated justice available to us.
But that initial impulse to repay the harm in like amount is not unjust, and thus, is not demonic or bestial. In the worst cases, it is brutal and savage. But it is a place to start to work these things out. Without the admonishment of those who seem to get the vapors at the mere mention of rough talk as it might relate to the perpetrators of heinous acts.
sitetest
No, even if h repents he needs to go see God, who said ‘send them to me”. Now, the only way I know how to send someone to God is to take their Mortal Life.
God IS pro death penalty.
And this is all I’m going to say on the subject
Incidentally, I've tried to read G.E.M. (Elizabeth) Anscomb's short masterpiece, "Intention," several times without success. She was exploring these very things, the choice, the act "in itself," the act "under the description of" this or that, the intent as distinguished from motivation and as distinguished from expected consequence, as distinguished from "end", etc. etc. Analytical philosophy. I had a hard time making heads or tails of it. I am a great admirer of Anscombe, but I find the U.S. Army Field Manual more practical for moral guidance here.
As I remember, I didn’t say anything against the death penalty.
I think we have ranged far afield of my initial objection.
I don't think anyone on this thread will actually go out and throw any miscreants into a wood chipper.
I don't think the use of hyperbole in this thread is demonic or bestial. Jesus, Himself, could use imagery that could be rather gruesome, as well. He tells us that if our right eye offends, to pluck it out, if our hand offends, to cut it off. He suggests throwing folks into the sea with millstones around their necks. I don't know whether you've experienced drowning. I have. It isn't very fun. If it were intentionally inflicted on me, I might regard that as “torture.”
Clearly, He is engaging in hyperbole, and it isn't demonic or bestial, even though it isn't much of a stretch, by your standards, to judge that He is suggesting torture.
You may wish to consider resetting your rhetorical rheostat to be a little less sensitive to the things folks say when they're hot under the collar, especially when justly so.
sitetest
It's been nice talking with you, sitetest. Sleepy-time, complete with chamomile, for me. I have an early day tomorrow.
God bless you.
Then we don’t have a problem.
You want them to meet their Maker one way, and I plus others like the more creative Route.
Simple.
And it mutilates the soul of the person who inflicts it.
I agree, Mrs. Don-o, torture is inhumane and corrupts the soul of the one envisioning it.
We are told “do not delight in the suffering of your enemies,” and I stand with that...
You raised really good points, thanks.
Ed
Thank you.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.