A university academic in Australia has caused a furore, by expressing his view that extreme violence against a person may be justifiable in some circumstances.
The head of Deakin University’s law school is at the centre of a national furore after publishing an article advocating the use of torture in some circumstances.Academics, politicians and refugee advocates yesterday condemned the views of Professor Mirko Bagaric after details were published in The Age.However, Deakin University’s vice-chancellor strongly backed Professor Bagaric’s right to academic freedom, and refused to criticise his advocacy of torture.Professor Bagaric and a fellow Deakin law lecturer, Julie Clarke, have co-written a paper for an American law journal titled “Not enough (official) torture in the world?”, an extract of which appeared in The Age yesterday.In their paper, the pair argue that even torturing innocent people to death under interrogation may be justified if they could reveal information that could save many more lives.Four senior law lecturers from Deakin University yesterday publicly dissociated themselves from the views of Professor Bagaric and Mrs Clarke.Russell Cocks and Roger Gamble said while they respected the pair’s right to voice their opinions, they believed advocating the use of torture in any circumstances “is morally repugnant and shameful”.Mr Cocks and Mr Gamble also said they were worried that people would think the article’s stance was widely shared at Deakin.“This is wrong. Indeed, nothing could be further from the truth: there is widespread condemnation and a real fear that this article is a blight on the (Law) School as a whole.“May we assure the public, our graduates and current students, as well as the legal profession, that the views expressed in the article are not those of the Deakin Law School and are not reflected in the curriculum or the culture of the school.”Senior law lecturer Samantha Hepburn, in a letter published in The Age today, wrote: “The views of one academic at Deakin Law School do not represent us all. Torture is a base instinct… (and) there is no justification for it.”The paper also attracted criticism from federal and state politicians including Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, Greens senator Kerry Nettle and Premier Steve Bracks.
While the notion of torturing somebody is extremely distasteful, if you knew it could save the lives of hundreds of people, would you change your mind? What about thousands? What about a million people? We might all draw the lines differently, but the point is that this issue does provide some food for thought, and should not be easily dismissed.
In any event, I don’t seem to recall any similar uproars after the statements of other university academics who also support extreme violence against individuals in certain circumstances. The only difference being that these academics support the killing of innocent people (as opposed to the torture of suspected terrorists).
