Torture is wrong because it violates the basic dignity of every person. Doesn’t matter whether that person has a Harvard degree or is a ditch-digger, is two years old or eighty.

I agree that the issue of whether those who torture others have forfeited a chunk of their humanity is a real one. Is torture evil? Yes. And I agree that the speech seems to be directed at what you (”dunno”) call polyannish beliefs. Rightly so. To believe that with a little education we can fix evil is unrealistic. (And I say this as an educator who works her tail off to make a difference in how students will choose to live their lives — also as a professional minister who as such is also an educator.) This is what used to make me nuts, back in my UU days, when they had a brochure (which mercifully does not exist any more as far as I know, and note, I am not trashing all the lovely UUs on this blog who let this happy Anglican barge in and chat) in which the UUA proudly advertised that as a denomination it had more people with master’s degrees than any other, or some such. The implication being that this was a reason to join up. To which my answer was, since when did graduate degrees make people compassionate and just? The Nazi doctors were highly educated. I’m still not going to resign from being a professor, or from preparation for ordination as a priest, but one can be uneducated and deeply humane.

Okay, rant button *off* — I need to go read about church trouble in the 4th century ;-).

But, more generally, it seems to me to repeat one of the same mistakes that PeaceBang (with all due respect) made earlier in the great Calvin debates. It is mistake to think that recognition of inherent human dignity is equivalent to the recognition of basic human goodness. The first is a claim about what presons deserve–and is fully compatible with believing in original sin–the second is a claim about the moral character of persons.

An upholder of inherent dignity believes that even bad and depraved people deserve certain sorts of treatment, for example equality before the law, a fair trial, freedome from torture, and perhaps much more (depending on the moral philosophy). The dignity view entered our moral lexicon in the 18th century with the moral philosophy of Immanuel Kant, who held–roughly–that our capacity for rational autonomy was the basis for our dignity. He also, btw, maintained a version of origianl sin. The Kantian view of diginity and autonomy is a basis for claiming that there are universal human rights–a view that Schultz just ignores.

Most surprising and disappointing in the Schultz piece is his rejection of inherent dignity given that he has lead a major human rights organization that upholds integrity of HR documents such as the UN Declaration (and others) which *explicitly* found the notion of human rights on inherent dignity! There seems to be deep confusion here, in my humble opinion.

One cited reason is that most everyone believes their cats and dogs have worth and dignity, but virtually no one believes that’s because some human bestowed these qualities upon them. They have it inherently. That’s why our love for them is unconditional (well, most of the time).

The implications of that need to be considered for the beings trapped in the cages and machinery of our industrial agriculture system. Humans are different than other types of beings – they’re different from one another, too. When it comes to being tortured, though, all of us scream.

I got the link at http://www.returningblog.com/?p=269