# Can someone concisely formulate what makes torture so immoral? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 22, 2014, 11:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-someone-concisely-formulate-what-makes-torture-so-immoral/707903 "2014-12-22T11:45:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 171
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2015, 1:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-someone-concisely-formulate-what-makes-torture-so-immoral/707903/171 "2015-03-06T01:46:25Z")
> [@Robert163](#): > > Yeah, good points all around but no one wants to concede my point: What is the purpose of conceding a point that is wrong? > [@flashlights and space ships](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/flashlights-and-space-ships/3085/1): > > If it were you and you could break the rules, and use violence or torture to save a loved one or keep them safe, I think most people, if they are at all honest, would have to admit they would break the rules (assuming they were somehow able to). SO how can you say someone else is wrong for doing the EXACT same thing you would do??? This is silly. If my wife or daughter were sexually assaulted and beaten, I might very well lose control of my anger and inflict great harm or death on the person I believed was responsible. However, I would still be held liable for he harm I inflicted and there is always the chance that I had the wrong guy and inflicted harm on an innocent person. We do not excuse criminal behavior just because a person is angry and we cannot justify torture on the off chance that someone, somewhere used it (with a good probability of error) because they happened to hold an irrational belief that they were defending their family. --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-someone-concisely-formulate-what-makes-torture-so-immoral/707903)._