Torture Is Not an Option

     What were you doing just a few weeks ago, specifically on June 26^th? Most of us just carried on life and participated in our normal activities. However, June 26^th was an important date because it was the International Day of Support of Victims of Torture.

     I recently read an article from the Huffington Post that talked about this special day and the ways certain people have been trying to end the horrible practice known as torture. As I read the article, I was shocked and disturbed to realize that torture is still a very real thing. It was hard for me to imagine that there are people in this world cruel enough to punish others in such horrific ways. Something that stuck out to me was the lack of effort being put into ways to end torture. In December of this year, 2014, the United Nations General Assembly will celebrate its 30^th year anniversary of the adoption of the Convention Against Torture. While this is a great thing to celebrate, it reveals that not enough efforts have been made to stop and prevent torture. For the past thirty years the United Nations has been attempting to stop the atrocious act, but they have yet to bring it to an end. I understand that stopping torture worldwide is a very difficult thing to do, and maybe even impossible, but they could certainly strive to do better. One easy way the United Nations could make progress would be to officially stop using torture as a method of interrogation in their countries. The United Nations is made up of almost 200 countries throughout the world. Many of these countries are known to use torture methods, such as waterboarding, to interrogate the world’s worst criminals. While I totally believe in punishing these criminals, torture is not the answer. Torture is a very serious and obvious human right violation, and it needs to be stopped. Every person on this earth is guaranteed certain rights, regardless of what he or she has done in the past. A very notable human right talks about being protected from cruel and unusual punishment, such as torture. This means that no person on earth should ever be tortured, even if he or she has committed horrible acts. However, like I mentioned above, many countries in the world still use these illegal practices. So, as people of this special planet we live on, we must make a better effort to end torture, beginning by removing it from our governments. If we all band together and remove torture from our governments, we can significantly reduce worldwide torture, and hopefully end torture eventually. If we do not put more effort into ending torture within our own countries, how can we ever expect it to end? 

Link to the article:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/curt-goering/june-26---honoring-the-st_b_5521268.html