Why is torture intrinsically evil but not the death penalty?

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Torture:
“Torture which uses physical or moral violence to extract confessions, punish the guilty, frighten opponents, or satisfy hatred is contrary to respect for the person and for human dignity” -CCC 2297

But it’s well known that the death penalty can in fact be justified. Why is torture unjustifiable? If the one being tortured is guilty of war crimes and murder, torturing that person is not an eye for an eye, but is lesser than the crimes they committed. It further does not prevent that person from finding redemption, as the death penalty might do. By these guidelines, it seems it is better to kill a guilty person than it would be to torture them for 10 minutes and let them live. This does not make sense to me.
 
This is a good question. For comparison I include the relevant paragraphs on death penalty from the Catechism:

2267 Assuming that the guilty party’s identity and responsibility have been fully determined, the traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude recourse to the death penalty, if this is the only possible way of effectively defending human lives against the unjust aggressor.

If, however, non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect people’s safety from the aggressor, authority will limit itself to such means, as these are more in keeping with the concrete conditions of the common good and more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.

Today, in fact, as a consequence of the possibilities which the state has for effectively preventing crime, by rendering one who has committed an offense incapable of doing harm - without definitely taking away from him the possibility of redeeming himself - the cases in which the execution of the offender is an absolute necessity “are very rare, if not practically nonexistent.”

Note that the death penalty is justified in rather extreme circumstances, at least as how the paragraph envisions, and only for the purpose of protection against an aggressor. The passage does not condone the death penalty as a means of punishment, because it excludes all possibility of discipline and remediation.

Torture, on the other hand, is a form of punishment, not of protection. A tortured aggressor can still be an aggressor, and lesser forms of preventing aggression (confinement, imprisonment, exile) should all be looked upon first, as they are with the death penalty.
 
In addition to that great answer above, there is also the fact that the death penalty can be administered humanely (in a certain sense - i.e., without gratuitous suffering), whereas torture, by its very nature, cannot.
 
Does the Catechism say that torture is intrinsically evil? Sorry, I don’t have time to do the research right now. I would also say, that definition of torture is one of the more poorly written statements I have come across in the Catechism. Heck, is spanking my child torture?
 
Torture, on the other hand, is a form of punishment, not of protection. A tortured aggressor can still be an aggressor, and lesser forms of preventing aggression (confinement, imprisonment, exile) should all be looked upon first, as they are with the death penalty.
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Personally, I am not comfortable in equating torture with punishment. This is because punishment is an instrument of justice. Torture in the strict sense is the application of force for the sole purpose of inflicting pain. Torture becomes the end to the means of pain, and in my view there is no judicial purpose that can be married into this couple that would make this union ethical.

Another consideration needing to be addressed is, in order for the judiciary to ensure the additional criteria of punishment, which is to quantify it to ensure it is condign, then some accurate means of measure to quantify the discomfort(debt) would need to be employed. I think most tortures would be difficult to estimate and control. Many factors could come into play such as accurate application of pressure, which would vary according to the physical ability of the torturer. The horror stories of the medieval times abound.

This is why such real world punishments such as incarceration, etc are easier to estimate. Probably flogging is also easier to approximate than for instance electrical shock, etc. A torture of thumbscrews for stealing a pencil may seem to justify the old law practice of an eye for an eye, but removes for life the ability the use of his hands, thus overflowing into the category of excessive punishment (2 Cor 2,6).

Too many variables and potential for abuse in my estimation.
 
losh14 said:
Torture, on the other hand, is a form of punishment, not of protection.
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It depends. Some can argue that torture is a form of protection when information could be obtained from the subject that is essential for ensuring security.
 
So if you want to compare torture and the death penalty, you instantly take away any use of torture other than for punishment of some heinous crime. The death penalty, as we have seen posted, is very rarely justifiable because of all the other possibilities in existence today that were not around, say, in the Middle Ages.

But in one of those cases where the sentence of death would be fitting, what are the alternative punishments? If it is bad enough to incur the death penalty justly, that means the person never could be released into society again. So, you are talking about life in prison. Does that then merit torture additionally? I think not, because it would provide no rehabilitative or constructive good. And since death is an equal punishment, one could not simply torture and then let the person go, as we have ruled that they could never be released back into society.
 
So lets say that a murderer kidnapped and hide a child in a dungeon. It is proven that he did and that the child will die in a few days. However the murderer does not want to tell where the child is, but torture may force him to tell. Here I think torture would be justifiable.
 
Andre1000 said:
So lets say that a murderer kidnapped and hide a child in a dungeon. It is proven that he did and that the child will die in a few days. However the murderer does not want to tell where the child is, but torture may force him to tell. Here I think torture would be justifiable.
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Sorry, but it fails the test. The intentions are to save the child, and the ends could be to save the child, but physical violence of that sort is not justified as a means. What happens if the murderer doesn’t tell and you beat him anyways? Or what if you beat him so bad he dies, and the child does as well? Are you then, responsible? In situations like that are when we have to keep our morals. To paraphrase C.S. Lewis - you never doubt the strength of the rope until you are clinging to it for life. In moments like this is where your true humanity and compassion show.
 
In the law of Moses there are the stone to dead(Lev. 20:1-2, 14) and burn to dead penalty, this combines torture and dead penalty(torturing to dead). So it cannot be intrinsically evil, it is still a God given law(even if Jesus law is better).
 
losh14 said:
This is a good question. For comparison I include the relevant paragraphs on death penalty from the Catechism:

2267 Assuming that the guilty party’s identity and responsibility have been fully determined, the traditional teaching of the Church does not exclude recourse to the death penalty, if this is the only possible way of effectively defending human lives against the unjust aggressor.

If, however, non-lethal means are sufficient to defend and protect people’s safety from the aggressor, authority will limit itself to such means, as these are more in keeping with the concrete conditions of the common good and more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.

Today, in fact, as a consequence of the possibilities which the state has for effectively preventing crime, by rendering one who has committed an offense incapable of doing harm - without definitely taking away from him the possibility of redeeming himself - the cases in which the execution of the offender is an absolute necessity “are very rare, if not practically nonexistent.”

Note that the death penalty is justified in rather extreme circumstances, at least as how the paragraph envisions, and only for the purpose of protection against an aggressor. The passage does not condone the death penalty as a means of punishment, because it excludes all possibility of discipline and remediation.

Torture, on the other hand, is a form of punishment, not of protection. A tortured aggressor can still be an aggressor, and lesser forms of preventing aggression (confinement, imprisonment, exile) should all be looked upon first, as they are with the death penalty.
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But the Catechism only makes those specifications for the death penalty. Only when talking about the death penalty does it imply to use less severe means first. It doesn’t say that about torture. Unlike the death penalty, the Catechism makes no mention of any instance where torture could ever be used, even if all other means are impractical.

Is the Church against punishment entirely? It seems the only reason it ever says any means of punishment are acceptable are to prevent future crime, not to serve justice. And even then it refuses to classify the punishment as punishment, but merely as a deterrent. I really struggle with this. I struggle to find justice in letting evil go unpunished. And I honestly don’t believe that you should kill a man who killed a man, because that WOULD be an eye for an eye. But why can’t you kill a man who has killed six million men? That is hardly an eye for an eye. That is hardly even justice. A death sentence in exchange for genocide is like a slap on the wrist in exchange for 1 count of murder. It seems as if, no matter the circumstances, under Church law, punishment is never justified for the sake of punishment nor for the sake of justice, but is only justified for the sake of protecting other innocence. This honestly makes me angry. It seems so unjust to me. Lord help me understand the justice in this situation.

What if you cut the hands off of a man who cannot stop stealing things? This is obviously a classic example of an eye for an eye, but what if your intention is not to mame the person, but simply to prevent him from stealing again? You are employing not torture, but a means of preventing him from ever stealing again. You are not doing it to make him suffer, but you are doing it to protect the property of innocent citizens. Is this ever justified? I expect the answer to be no, because we can just place him in prison instead. But if the prisons are full or civilization collapses and we go back to the stone ages, could this method be employed? If it can be employed, as it once was, then it must not be intrinsically evil.
 
AndyF said:
Personally, I am not comfortable in equating torture with punishment. This is because punishment is an instrument of justice. Torture in the strict sense is the application of force for the sole purpose of inflicting pain. Torture becomes the end to the means of pain, and in my view there is no judicial purpose that can be married into this couple that would make this union ethical.
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Why can’t pain be an instrument of justice? Was it not for many centuries? Is that not why parents used to spank their children? When you feel pain, you are less likely to do whatever it is you did that warranted the pain.

I cannot imagine that inflicting pain on another person is an intrinsically evil action. I played football for 10 years and did an awful lot of pain inflicting, and was on the receiving end even more. This made me tough, and made the other men tough.

I thought there was redemption in pain and suffering. Why can we not inflict pain on criminals who commit heinous crimes if in it they can find redemption?

If it is just to give an A to a student who scores a 95, and an F to a student who scores a 50, and if it is just that a hard working man receives a bountiful salary, and that a non-working man receives nothing, and if it is just that a law abiding citizen reaps the benefit of the law, why is not just for a murderer to receive even a fraction of the pain he inflicted on others? In every single situation, justice is shown in that the effect is directly proportional to the cause, EXCEPT in the case of the murderer.

I’m also curious, was opposition to the death penalty always a part of Church teaching?
 
Mumbles140 said:
Sorry, but it fails the test. The intentions are to save the child, and the ends could be to save the child, but physical violence of that sort is not justified as a means. What happens if the murderer doesn’t tell and you beat him anyways? Or what if you beat him so bad he dies, and the child does as well? Are you then, responsible? In situations like that are when we have to keep our morals. To paraphrase C.S. Lewis - you never doubt the strength of the rope until you are clinging to it for life. In moments like this is where your true humanity and compassion show.
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First, you are right, because the Church actually does teach that torture can never be used to extract information, according to the USCCB document, Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship.

But I still don’t see why. Why is physical violence of that sort not justified as a means, when it is plainly stated elsewhere that physical violence itself is not intrinsically evil. Violence against innocent human beings is intrinsically evil, as is murdering innocent human beings, but if the act of killing, which is a violent action, is in itself not intrinsically evil, then it necessarily follows that violence is similarly not intrinsically evil.
 
I will attempt to answer my own question:

Let us establish the following scenario:
  1. He who is receiving physical violence is not an innocent human being, but is a terrorist.
  2. Information extracted has serious prospects of preventing a terrorist attack. (GOOD EFFECT)
  3. Violence used against this man will inflict pain and suffering (BAD EFFECT)
The reason I did this long and drawn out argument is because as others have said, “torture” is subjective. Violence is not. We all know what violence is, and it needs no quantification. If we use violence as the means, and torture is a consequence of the violence, then we can solve this using the principle of double effect.

The principle of double effect requires that the means not be intrinsically evil. Using violence is not intrinsically evil. It also requires that the good effect be greater than the bad effect. In this scenario that is certainly true.

But it also requires that the bad effect not be a means of attaining the good effect. This is where the argument fails. No matter what way you look at it, the bad effect is the means.

Ugh. I guess I just have to suck it up and grow in spirit. The only way I can see torture being justified in this situation is if the bad effect that I listed is not truly a bad effect, which is actually what I was begging to ask in an earlier post. Is it actually evil to inflict pain and suffering on a guilty person, especially when the pain and suffering is significantly less than the pain and suffering he has caused in the lives of others? This is the fundamental question I need answered.

EDIT: Also, we have to define what torture is. Even if torture is intrinsically evil, it might be that this situation does not employ torture, but merely employs violence. Torture would just be the bad effect that I have listed. In this case, could it be permissible that by using violence on a guilty party in order to get that person to reveal information, but not for the intention of inflicting pain, rather as a demonstration of authority, that the infliction of pain is merely a side effect?
 
“Does that then merit torture additionally?”

I think we could have a play on words going on here. What I’m saying is that if you are trying to incorporate torture in it’s true sense and make it an instrument of justice, then we are trying to marry an intrinsic evil to a divinely sanctioned process. Punishment is something every Christian abhors to apply, and it should be revolting to him to witness. Punishment is a cleansing, or making right, not a vector to destruction for it’s own sake. The Church implies a default that never extinguishes life, provided, his living is not a threat to others. The CC states this should be a rare occurrence.

The Church defines the parameters in which we can think. Now, we can only think of the justification for capital punishment in terms of imminent threat to society. The two conclusions are now spontaneous in our assessment. If the judge deems someone has deserving of capital punishment, he can only consider it if the offender’s living is a threat to another. Therefore, if he can be incarcerated and not a threat(first analysis), then he does not warrant the death penalty(final decision). Always these two factors must be considered.

Most of these responses do not address society’s oft forgotten final responsibility, and that is to ensure condign punishment (forget the CC paragraph) is applied. This is the hard part, and in tests such as these we find the measure of true Catholics.
 
AndyF said:
Most of these responses do not address society’s oft forgotten final responsibility, and that is to ensure condign punishment (forget the CC paragraph) is applied. This is the hard part, and in tests such as these we find the measure of true Catholics.
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What is condign punishment?
 
From the CCC:

2266 The efforts of the state to curb the spread of behavior harmful to people’s rights and to the basic rules of civil society correspond to the requirement of safeguarding the common good. Legitimate public authority has the right and the duty to inflict punishment proportionate to the gravity of the offense. Punishment has the primary aim of redressing the disorder introduced by the offense. When it is willingly accepted by the guilty party, it assumes the value of expiation. Punishment then, in addition to defending public order and protecting people’s safety, has a medicinal purpose: as far as possible, it must contribute to the correction of the guilty party.

So then, punishment is in accordance with justice when served proportionally to the gravity of the defense. Why then can we not inflict pain upon somebody who has killed say 12 people and injured 70? That is barely even approaching proportionate.

The CCC also only mentions the death penalty as a means of protecting other citizens, but what about when the death penalty is a punishment proportional to the gravity of the offense, say in the cases of serial killers? Again, it is hardly proportionate, yet I suspect it is still forbidden.
 
The command relents to Christ’s grace that allows us to redeem ourselves while living. The time of death of the individual is left to God in determining if this is possible for a certain individual. We need to live the New law of reconciliation and mercy just has Christ lived his example for us. Even with 12 murders and 70 injuries a person can still be saved if he dedicates the rest of his life in such acts as prayer,sacrifice for others, and helping other inmates. Besides, temporal punishments may run their course here on earth, but continue in the next.
 
Andre1000 said:
So lets say that a murderer kidnapped and hide a child in a dungeon. It is proven that he did and that the child will die in a few days. However the murderer does not want to tell where the child is, but torture may force him to tell. Here I think torture would be justifiable.
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Your example is legal extortion. That is the difference.
 
One thing no one has considered:

Someone has to actually perform the torture. Someone has to hear the screams, the sound of another human being pleading for a release from the pain.

What is happening to that person’s humanity over the period of time the torture is implimented? Does not their soul become hardened? In a way that imposing capital punishment wouldn’t harden them.

Tortue is the purposeful infliction of pain. And lot’s of it. That’s the difference.

Also, many experts in the field say that torture is unreliable. Therefore the protective aspects that allow for the death penalty in some cases fall away here.
 
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