Waterboarding and Torture Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Waterboarding and Torture - Essay Example Torture refers to an act in which there is the infliction of suffering and severe pain, which may be mental or physical. The main objective of inflicting this pain encompasses obtaining information for a crime they may have committed. Numerous debates have arisen over whether waterboarding can be regarded as torture; in my opinion, waterboarding can be considered to be torture. Hostettler (2011) asserts that the use of this method to obtain information form suspects constitutes torture because it inflicts severe mental and physical suffering. Persons who undergo this form of torture have their minds and personality destabilized. Furthermore, their senses as well as mind undergo profound alteration, which results from the torture they experience. In addition, waterboarding violates the Geneva Convention, which states that war prisoners should always be treated humanely. Article 18 of the convention prohibits any form of coercion as well as mental and physical torture. Another reason why waterboarding constitutes torture is because the person under torture is in the custody of the one inflicting the pain. Thus, the victim of the torture cannot be able to rescue himself from the situation since the interrogators con trol him