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The Pew Research Center Forum on Religion and Public Life reported April 29 on a poll of Americans’ attitudes toward torture.
Across the entire spectrum of the 742 people polled, 49% said torture is often or sometimes justified, while 47% said it rarely or never can be justified. When religious affiliations were factored in, the results were quite surprising. Those with no religious affiliation were the least likely to condone torture, at 40%. Torture reached its peak of 62% approval among white evangelicals.
The largest group that felt torture is never justified were the white mainline Protestants, at 31%, followed by the unaffiliated group at 26%.
Even more shocking was the result that the more often a respondent attended church, the more likely they were to condone torture:
The same data set was analyzed differently on April 23. There, it was found that 64% of Republicans approve of torture, while only 36% of Democrats approve of it.
The results for Republicans and white evangelicals are remarkably similar. Going from "often" to "sometimes" to "rarely" to "never", the numbers for Republicans are 15%, 49%, 21% and 14%, while for white evangelicals they are 18%, 44%, 17% and 16%.
The Republican party has been catering to the white evangelical community for some time. These results suggest that on the question of torture, Republican politics have overcome Christian teachings. It is very difficult for me to understand how approval of torture can be aligned with the primary teachings of the Christian church (remember "love one another"?), so it is very hard to escape the conclusion of politics overriding religion on this point.
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Well, if we can dunk/drown women for being witches, I guess there’s no problem with waterboarding a terrorist.
Waterboarding. It’s not just for witches.
This is a great map of the work we have to do to get our nation back to sanity about this issue. We should never, ever forget that just getting investigations and (hopefully)prosecutions and convictions is not enough.
We have to re-educate the public about the horrors of torture, we have to bring back that visceral repulsion to this, and finally engender a sense of pride that we are not a people which condones it.
It is a steep hill to climb, but if we don’t climb it, the future is dark indeed.
All together, now, to the tune of “What a Friend We Have in Jesus”:
Praise Interrogator Jesus,
Pass the jug and praise the Lord.
Baptize unforthcoming heathens
On the holy waterboard.
Heed the teachings of Saint Bybee:
“Torture,” to deserve the name
Must feel just like crucifixion;
Other methods are fair game.
Spare the rod and spoil the Muslim
Squeeze him for the greater good.
Ticking time bombs must be thwarted
(‘cept those at Planned Parenthood).
The Afgahan police and the church attendees have something in common. The survey results are to be expected when leaders like Warren advocate killing the heads of other governments.
*************
” Fewer than 20 per cent of Afghan law-enforcement officials are aware it’s illegal to torture someone accused of a crime in that country, a report by a Canadian government-supported human-rights watchdog says.
The Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, whose mandate comes from the Afghan constitution, also says “torture and cruel, inhumane and belittling behaviour” is widespread among that country’s law-enforcement agencies. It says Afghan police are alleged to be responsible for more than 65 per cent of the incidents in its study.
Critics say the Afghanistan commission’s findings raise questions about whether Canada and NATO allies are properly mentoring army, police and law-enforcement officials in the war-torn country. Canada was by far the biggest donor to this rights commission last year, funding more than one-third of its budget. “
http://www.theglobeandmail.com…..onal/Asia/
Jim: I’m still laughing about your title, “Shall we gather at the waterboard?” If only it weren’t so painful.
Perhaps the lyrics could be rewritten. Wouldn’t that upset a few of those torture-condoning evangelicals?!
Shall we gather at the river,
where bright angel feet have trod,
with its crystal tide forever
flowing by the throne of God?
Refrain:
Yes, we’ll gather at the river,
the beautiful, the beautiful river;
gather with the saints at the river
that flows by the throne of God.
2. On the margin of the river,
washing up its silver spray,
we will walk and worship ever,
all the happy golden day.
(Refrain)
3. Ere we reach the shining river,
lay we every burden down;
grace our spirits will deliver,
and provide a robe and crown.
(Refrain)
4. Soon we’ll reach the shining river,
soon our pilgrimage will cease;
soon our happy hearts will quiver
with the melody of peace.
(Refrain)
There is a UN report out on Iraqi abuses of prisoners, in 04/29/09 Newsweek (as well as on the UN site and others). Excerpt:
Today on Amy Goodman, DemocracyNow.org, she interviews a professor/author of Wisconsin State U whose recap of torture from 1970 on without prosecutions leads him to believe that the current disclosures will also produce nothing. Well worth hearing.
As for the fundies, I have a storehouse of knowledge about that, having been exposed to it in my childhood. I remember the very day that I determined that I would have no more of that. (65 years ago). At that time sermons concentrated on fear and manipulation of emotions. I tried church again after my first children were born. Not much change, so gave it up. I was in my 20’s before I ever heard of a God of Grace and Love.
…Steep hill, indeed, Dog.
Not to toot my own golden trumpet, but did you read upthread?
I did, and I apologize for not commenting on it in real time. My only excuse is that I was so wrapped up in laughing at “Shall we gather at the Waterboard,” that I forgot my manners. (There’s a reference to that “River” hymn in one of my favorite movies.)
You definitely have talent in the area of parodying lyrics.
Maybe you’d like to take a crack at the other one, too?
There’s just something so horribly ludicrous about gathering at a waterboard. Something like when a mob assembles for an honor killing.
Thanks, but I just ducked a client call regarding the work I didn’t get to this morning….
That’s awesome, thanks!
As you are well aware Jim, there are religious groups that have seriously taken on the torture issue. The most active is the National Religious Campaign Against Torture (NRCAT). Jason Leopold has a good post on this at Open Salon.
http://open.salon.com/blog/jas…..al_counsel
Your link goes to Newsweek’s home page rather than to an article about UNAMI’s report. These link to the original rather than what some reporter says :-)
1. United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq
2. UNAMI Human Rights Report, 1 July – 31 December 2008 [PDF]
It’s 30 pages long – but I strongly suggest that anyone interested in this topic at least read the executive summary.
du
@ JimWhite Friday May 1, 2009 5:47 am
None of this is surprising though is it?
The thing that always has struck me about white fundamentalist Americans and the American rightwing is how frightened they are. Ditto their politicians.
Look at Cheney’s what Cheney did in response to the September 11th attacks.
They are the actions of somebody who is very very frightened.
du
I am so frakkin’ tired of these survey’s that purport some sort of fact.
Look, there are 330M U.S. citizens. Lets say that 60 per cent attend some sort of ‘church’(I think that’s a high estimate but let’s go with it).
That means that 198M people are church goers. Ok, let’s deduct children from the number by estimating that half are children.
That leaves 99M adult church goers. One percent of 99M is 9M.
742 people doesn’t even come anywhere close to the number necessary for ANY significant statistical deviation necessary for a valid poll or election.
More media garbage being s(pew)ed for propaganda sakes.
That one should be posted on the front door of every church in the country. Better yet, hand out a copy in the church bulletin so the so-called Christians can take it home with them and sing it together around the dinner table.
WWJD? We should all ask that.
Thank you, Dubhaltach. I had read about the same summary on 3 sites, including the UN site – - I must have copied the wrong link.
In the interests of pluralism and equal time, I’m also modifying the lyrics to Hava Nagila with whimsical references to the use of disproportionate force and incendiary munitions on concentrated civilian populations, but for some reason, perhaps related to my all-but-evaporated Hebrew vocabulary, the project is slower-going.
Unfortunately, a Hebrew version will be way past my language skills but the English version is a thing of perfect clarity.
WWJD? as orcatjf said, indeed.
See my follow-up post for some thoughts on a possible subconscious connection between waterboarding and baptism for evangelicals.
My fiancee and I attend church weekly, and no such ‘apostasy’ (condoning torture) has ever crossed our minds. Our pastor is a pacifist (and all around good guy who preaches radical hospitality) so your comment on the survey is a bit insensitive to him and his wife (she’s also a pastor).
I offer that many conservative Christians apparently can’t wrap their minds around the radical love that Jesus preached and taught, so “…do unto others as you would have them do unto to you (still a way to express love, but less direct) is a better teaching to challenge those who have forgotten that Christ taught that loving your friends is nothing (”…even the heathen do that…”) but you are to love your enemies also.
Guess I lost most of you there, eh?
Oh, I actually attend close to weekly, myself, and I know that the pastoral staff at the church I attend now would never condone anything approaching torture. I was just looking at what the polling said. That number on frequency of attendance suggests to me that evangelicals comprise a significant portion of those polled who attend weekly.
this supports what we all ready know..most americans don’t care about who we torture, illegally invade, kill, turn into refugees as long as they can fill up their gas tanks cheaply and keep that pedal to the metal and get to the mall.
this is why they hate us
It has long been my perception that the old testament in particular promotes hatred and violence towards ones “enemies”. The concept of enemy is prevalent. Why do Christians call themselves christians when so much of what they embody in their teaching is that other stuff. Shouldn’t they be called biblists or something.
JimWhite,
I am currently working to help some seminaries address this issue. Torture does not fall under the definition of Justified War Theory.
Many will try to make it fit. It does not.
I put up a UN poll the other day. I’ll find it again and link.
You’re probably already aware, then, that George Hunsinger at Princeton Theological Seminary has been a driving force on the National Religious Campaign Against Torture?
Jim, after I read your comment on my blog last night, where you asked if I had seen the Pew poll, I clicked on the link to the poll you provided. I then wrote a blog post about it. I had no idea you were doing one on it. LOL
I sent an email today to one of the social conservatives I met online who’s been writing anti-torture pieces and pro-accountability pieces on his blog telling him about the Pew poll. In his response to me he said that he thought this was a fight for the soul of this group of “Christians” who are advocating for the use of torture. I think he feels the same frustrations as we do. While I don’t agree with this guy on most issues I’m glad that there is at least a faction on the other side who are fighting just as hard as we are doing on this issue.
I think it’s fine for both of us to post on this important poll. We came at it from different angles and it deserves a lot of discussion.
I’m glad to hear about your friend. One thing we have to be careful about in these discussions is assuming that everyone who is socially or religiously conservative approves of torture. The numbers in front of us disprove that.
I agree that we can’t assume. Just look at that asshat Michael Kinsley in today’s Post. He is certainly not an ally but this pro-life Christian conservative is (at least on this issue). I’m trying to get him to post on my blog so that maybe we can collaborate on moving this issue where it should be…He promised me that he would eventually get over to the blog..I hope so.
These results don’t surprise me in the least; in fact, I would have been shocked to see the inverse.
First of all, irreligious people in this society learn, the hard way, what it is to be a vastly outnumbered minority. You can lose everything for failing to toe the religious line in our society, and we tend to pick that up quickly.
This tends to make one inherently suspicious of power, and makes it easier to empathize with those the powerful would abuse.
Second, though, and more fundamental (I believe) is that religious people are inherently, and by definition, more deferential to authority. Think about it: to be religious is to put, on some level, one’s own reason and personal autonomy below an outside and unaccountable authority. If you’re able to act purely on belief, where’s the logical cutoff point? What’s the fundamental difference between believing, with absolutely zero empirical evidence, that following a series of dietary restrictions and reading a book from the bronze age will get you into a magical afterlife, and believing, again with absolutely no empirical evidence, that torturing some poor schmuck from another hemisphere will make you safe?
If you believe in one tiger rock, you’re open to believing in all tiger rocks.
Jim, if according to the polls there are only 21% of the people who now self-identify as Republicans maybe there is more at work here than just people identifying with Republican politics. Could it be, as I suggested in my blog post, that these people are just against Muslims or Islam and not necessarily for torture? What else besides these two factors could explain these poll results? Too much TV (24)? Maybe it’s a combination of things. Can anyone else think of an alternative explanation?
fascinating: against abortions, for torture.
now that i think about it, that makes a good sound bite/bumper sticker, etc.
I can see someone creating another bumper sticker to counter yours…
For Killing Babies, Against torturing terrorists.
yes. :(
Yep.
My push has been with denominations that have social statements on War. There is a need for such statements to fully incorporate the issue of torture into their statements as not justified.
JIm,other posters, why are you so accepting of this poll given the inadequacy of it’s sample size?
Is it because it ‘fits’ what you want to believe? I just don’t understand the willingness to go along with fallacious methods of determining any groups outlook.
Please don’t get me wrong regards where I stand and where I stand is that religious fundamentalism of any type is very dangerous to any society.
Speaking for myself it actually doesn’t fit with what I thought or what I want to believe. I was actually quite shocked to see the results. Is this an inadequate sampling? I don’t know. I’m no polling expert. If I remember correctly the other recent polls released had around 1,000 people polled and this one had somewhere in the neighborhood of 800.
That’s an interesting survey. I clicked on the link and looked at the data.
I find it disturbing that 62% of the Democrats did not choose the answer “never justified” when finishing the sentence “The use of torture against suspected terrorists is…”. Instead they chose “often justified”, “sometimes justified”, or “rarely justified”. The Republicans were even worse. 84 % of Republicans chose an answer other than “never justified”.
How can this many people think torture is justified? Notice the survey did not use any euphemisms. The question asked about suspected terrorists. They did not say convicted, just suspected.
I can only hope that the 15% of Republicans and 12% of Democrats who chose “often justified” were joking.
“If I remember correctly the other recent polls released had around 1,000 people polled and this one had somewhere in the neighborhood of 800.” ; EXACTLY !!
I don’t know what State you live in but here in CA, if there is 1 per cent or less differentiation in the vote total between candidates/positions, then an automatic recount occurs. Such occurs even though the statistical studies indicate a 5 per cent figure would provide more reliable results.
Sample size is well parsed here.
So given my figure of 99M adult church-goers in the U.S., at least 9M would have to be polled for an accurate assesment of what such adults believe on ANY question.
I strongly suspect there are ‘players’ who fund such polls (and indicate how they want questions phrased -which makes a VERY large difference in peoples responses- along with their funding) and use the media to advance their ‘points’.
Divide and conquer is a very valid strategy.
There are differences between tabulating an actual sample and making estimates of the characteristics of a population from a sub-sample. In the first you are actually counting ALL the sample and the errors one is concerned about are technical errors in the count. And because even a single vote difference may dictate an election outcome a recount, using higher standards is undertaken if the count falls within a certain range.
A statistical analysis is an extrapolation. Thus the “error” relates to the probabilities if one did another count of the same sample size whether the same results would be replicated. A small sample size (1200 or 1000) is sufficient to obtain a reasonable estimate. That’s what the CE is about, what a resampling would likely produce. The CE narrows with larger samples, but only by about 1% for each order of magnitude in increased sample size. But you get down to smaller numbers and the CE increases dramatically. Below 30 and the probability that the numbers are widely off another resampling escalates.
“A small sample size (1200 or 1000) is sufficient to obtain a reasonable estimate. ” ; ok, so now we are in the world of semantics; what is ‘reasonable’?
742 certainly isn’t 1,000 or 1200 and I’ll not believe any poll that surmises that such a small sample reflects a VERY much larger whole.
Stats are juked ALL the time; they should be considered but one ‘data’ point in drawing conclusions.
I do agree that the phrasing of the questions is quite important. If they are offering up a “24-type” situational question and stating absolutes…that the torture is the ONLY way to obtain information that will definitely save thousands of peoples lives…then you are going to get a different response than if you asked.
“You have a person in custody that a paid informant has received a bounty for revealing that they are connected with a terrorist group. You are unsure of their role, or if they are actually in the group at all. Do you torture them until you obtain a confession?”
“Would you consider any other information about threats relaible, even if there was no other evidence regarding such attacks?”
JimWhite,
You’ve probably read this social statement drafted in 2007 by the National Association of Evangelicals.
There are parts that are strong and others which I differ, but over all, I commend the effort to draft such a statement.
742 is a large sample. As I pointed out the CE will tell you what the probabilities are of getting the same results if you resampled the same population again. A 5% CE means that 90% of the resampling, using the same methods and questions at that time would fall within a 5% window around your data points. It could be as low as 55% or as high as 65%. Only in 5% of the resampling would it be below 55%, and 5% above 65%. But as you go away from those numbers the odds become increasingly unlikely that another sampling would produce anything different.
Now if the question was poorly phrased, and you asked a different question, you might get a very different result. Or if there was some significant incident that change public opinion. Or if people became better educated about the lack of useful intelligence that derives from torture.
And certainly there are ways to “rig” a survey (though I doubt PEW would do so). On could have a pre-selected sample of individuals who don’t reflect the larger “universe” (this is why on-line surveys are immensely flawed in reflecting PUBLIC opinion…whatever their sample size).
Thanks, I hadn’t seen that.
I used to attend a very conservative church, for a couple of years pre-Bush. I was very surprised when the pastor said he wasn’t worried about wars, which he thought were imminent. I said, “What about our soldiers who will be killed? What about the innocent civilians and children who will be killed?” He explained (sigh) that all of that was unfortunate but as long as you have your salvation, nothing else matters.
And he said something about how it was all God’s plan anyway.
“I got my ticket punched for heaven” was the gist of it.
completely agree about the wording of questions and the manipulating of results. but pew says their response rate is 20-25%. that makes a big difference, if true.
“Let Us Prey”
Other surveys have shown the strong correlation between evangelical identification and membership in the Republican party. So that doesn’t surprise me.
The phrasing of the question might be prompting people to consider situations in which those who were “suspected terrorists” might have some information of an imminent attack. This, combined with the flawed idea that torture would elicit that information, might led them to accept torture.
So what is being reflected here are two things. Does the respondent believe that torture produces accurate intelligence? If they don’t then they would likely be an absolutist against torture (of course, there might be some that favor torture for punishment or retribution…even without the intelligence).
Of those that believe that information can be obtained they might think, “Okay what’s the odds that THIS guy has important information”; They might say “Do we have other means of solving this plot, what if you don’t?” Or they might be going “I don’t know if torture can get the information, but if under the gun you gotta do something if you know there’s a ticking time bomb.”
So that might produce those people who say “sometime” or “rarely”.
Not what about the folks that respond “usually”? I’d say these folks are very scared, and true believers in the idea that all people accused of being terrorists are in fact involved in acts of terror. They “trust authority”, or at least the Bush Administration’s “authority”. Like Pilate, they are washing their hands of moral responsibility. The fact that these are individuals who are not members of their own religion, likely plays a part…as many feel that they are involved in spiritual war with Satanic forces. So why shouldn’t torture those who are “less than spiritually human” (cohorts with Satan = demons).
I’d say our task is to deal with those that are educable. A trial of those who were in authority, detailing not only the realities of what torture does, but the inviability of obtaining any useful information…is what has to occur. I’d also point out that the “nevers”, and “rarelys” (which in my view can be won over). My point has always been….if you chose to torture, you face trial, it is incumbent on YOU to show truly extenuating circumstances and that your actions, did, in fact, result in lives saved that coiuld not have been saved in any other way.
It’s a crime…you face a judge and jury.
Ok, lets say the response rate is 25 per cent. 742 is 25 per cent of 2,968 persons polled. Still a long way from 9M which would be one per cent of those that are ‘churchgoers’.
And yes, Cinnamonpape is correct about “what the probabilities are of getting the same results if you resampled the same population again. .
BUT, if the sample size is too small in relationship to the whole the sample is supposed to represent, it’s a bullshit poll.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…..94830.html
i don’t understand where the 9M comes from.
also:
what do you mean by “too small”?
Bill Moyers had Bruce Fein and another man (didn’t catch name) on discussing BuxhCo and torture and wiretapping. PBS runs the program again about midnight where I am. Very good program.
The 9M comes from #14. ‘Too small’ is a sampling of a whole that doesn’t reflect at least one per cent of that whole.
If human behaviour could be reduced to a fractal, then a lower percentage would yield reliable results but human behaviour/thoughts are more like what Bjork sang:
“If you ever get close to a human
and human behaviour
be ready to get confused”
we’re going to have to disagree about this then. i don’t see why 1% or less is too small – we’re not talking about predicting human behavior, just about the frequency of answers people give to a few questions.
In effect, Jesus was tortured to elicit a false confession. To the extent that emulating Jesus is a positive, then torturers are being helpful.
Are you saying that you need to sample 1% of something to obtain a valid estimate of the characteristics of a population? That’s now how a statistical sample works.
Let’s say you want to test if a penny manufactured in a certain country flips “true” (50-50) within a certain range (say 49.5 to 50.5). Let’s say a 100 million pennies are produced in that country from a single mint with the same procedure. You don’t have to flip 1 million different pennies to test that they are true. Probably a 1000 flips of different pennies would easily do it. Of course there would be a CE.
The CE doesn’t mean you have to sample the same individuals again. You merely have to sample the same “population” again…the larger sample universe.
Have you had stats class?