24

[Are_grits_groceries]

The teevee show "24" is one of the reasons torture is okay. People watch this show, and they take it for gospel. You can talk to them about reports, testimony until you are blue in the face. They believe in Jack Bauer. By God, they know that you can get the right info immediately if you just torture people. They live in a fantasy world, and "24" is a documentary.

[NightWatcher]

1. I'm tired of getting in debates where 24 is cited by them as reasons to torture

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5527063&mesg_id=5527063

[Are_grits_groceries]

2. Didn't see your thread. sorry.

They need to do something, but the damage is done I fear.

[NightWatcher]

7. our point cannot be made enough

this is BS.

full disclosure, I have only seen it once (online). I like Janeane Garafalo, but I dont get her participation on the freeper's #1 show (please dont try to enlighten me)

[Starbucks Anarchist]

3. Those people are idiots to begin with.

It's like the shooters blaming Marilyn Manson for Columbine.

I watch the show myself, but unlike others, I can distinguish reality from fantasy.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

4. The people who swing that way

are as twisted as the people who came up with the torture plans. And they fall right into the "24" bit because it already conforms to what they cherish - their most secret, sick desires that they are unable to act on, but they can at least, vicariously, get off on watching it on TV, sort of, and they need to believe that real life is like that. That's the only way they can tell themselves they're not deviants - that there are others out there just like them.

That they're actors doesn't enter into their warped consciousness, but it will make them vociferous in their defense of people like Yoo and Addington and Bybee and the biggest sicko of them all, Dick Cheney............................

[jeff30997]

5. I totally agree.

Also there was this politician,I can't remember his name,who asked "what would Jack Bauer do ?"

The guy was arguing that torture was the solution to get informations that would save numerous

lives because it worked on a TV show.I mean WTF ?

[nadinbrzezinski]

9. Congressman Hoekstra and by god he is not the only one

who made references

Even during the presidential primaries one of the Rs running, mr. 9.11 himself, also referred to Jack Bauer as if Jack was real

Never mind that in the real world where some of us live, his actions would be classified so deeply neither would even have a clue

[jeff30997]

14. Thanks for the infos nadinbrzezinski.

I found this article while googling "Hoekstra Jack Bauer":

Hoekstra: Stark Reality Will Cause Obama to Reconsider Gitmo and Enhanced Interrogation

http://www.phillyimc.org/en/hoekstra-stark-reality-will-cause-obama-reconsider-gitmo-and-enhanced-interrogation

Yeah that guy sure knows a lot about reality.

On the same site an article about 24:

http://www.phillyimc.org/en/torture-debate-over-it-and-tv-show-24

[nadinbrzezinski]

6. Oh and notice, like any good fictional show, Jack Bauer has YET

to make a mistake

:-)

[NeedleCast]

8. I watch a lot of Futurama

I still don't think it's possible to flash-freeze a human and wake them up two thousand years later.

[Seen the light]

10. Oh give it a rest

Jack hasn't even tortured anyone this season, the conservatrolls have left the show, and Janeane Garofalo stars in it.

IF people believe that the show is real, it's their own fucking fault not the show's.

[Postman]

11. If someone really wanted to do harm, torturing wouldn't matter...

The ticking time bomb scenario doesn't work. If a zealot is intent on catastrophic destruction, they could torture till they're blue in the face....ain't going to work.

[Caliman73]

12. Toture was around long before 24.

There have been movies which glorified "roughing up" the bad guys to get information since way before 24 came out. Admittedly I do not watch 24, but our history shows that the idea of beating a confession out of the "evildoers" is a longstanding tradition. If anything precipitated the "acceptability" of torture it was the fear and hate stirred up during and after the attacks on 9/11. Just like Pearl Harbor justified the internment of American citizens of Japanese ancestry in the eyes of the public in the 40's, the fervor over the attacks and the focus on Muslims as the enemy of the free world has dehumanized the people we call terrorists to the point where we are not outraged at their treatment at our hands. It is amazing the levels of cruelty that we can inflict on each other if we are just convinced that our adversaries are even slightly less than human.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

13. I blame that scene in Empire Strikes Back.

They didn't even ask him any questions.

[mrfrapp]

15. Not just 24

In the last few years every single American TV drama that I've seen has a torture subplot. Every single one. Battlestar Galactica, Chuck, The Bionic Woman, Heroes, Lost, 24, etc.

Admittedly, not all shows are supportive of torture necessarily but the exposure makes the practice seem normal. I can't help but think that it's intentional.

[blue_onyx]

16. IT'S JUST A TV SHOW

In fact, the show has been dealing with the moral dilemma of using torture this season. I would guess that if a poll was done to see if the show changed a person's position on torture, it would show that 24 had no effect. I watch the show and do not take it as gospel. Can I ask....do you even watch the show?

[yardwork]

17. I only recently found out about 24, and I agree with you.

I know somebody who is highly intelligent, generally progressive, but unaccountably became very angry whenever anyone suggested that the U.S. was wrong to invade Iraq, torture suspects, etc.

A couple of weeks ago she was raving in anticipation of the new 24 season, and telling me how much she loves it, watched the whole series over again on DVD, etc. When she described the show's plot, the penny dropped. Bingo.