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The fact that "24" with Jack Bauer routinely using torture ran for eight years with high ratings surely reflected the US public's tacit approval.
by snori74 12y ago
The fact that "24" with Jack Bauer routinely using torture ran for eight years with high ratings surely reflected the US public's tacit approval.
- caf 12y agoI don't think you can sensibly infer anything of the sort from television ratings. As I recall, The Sopranos, Breaking Bad and Dexter all rated pretty well too.
- deleted 12y ago[deleted]
- rakoo 12y agoJack Bauer is supposed to be the good guy; good guys aren't supposed to use torture, yet he does. I don't know about other shows, did "good guys" use torture ? Were they able to walk away without any problems ?
- pfortuny 12y agoDon't underestimate the power of fiction. Heroes are not necessarily "good." Read some Dashiell Hammett for example.
- tonyarkles 12y agoSince we're talking about fiction... In Burn Notice, they routinely stop people from using torture to try to get actionable intel, because "people will say whatever they think you want to hear, just to make it stop"
- rhino369 12y agoA lot of cop shows use the sort of light torture that America used. Rough the suspect up and get him to talk.
- glomph 12y agoTony Soprano is the protagonist. He has people killed and kills people. He isn't set up as a villain.
- steveax 12y ago24 is a terrifically evil show and helped sell torture by showing Jack routinely torture people and get the right actionable information every time without any ramifications.
- MichaelGG 12y agoThat always ruined shows for me. They punch someone, they say nothing. They punch them again, and they immediately give them the truth and stop the torture. But they can't check the truth for quite a while, possibly not without killing or letting the suspect go.
- glomph 12y agoYeah and the popularity of the Sopranos showed tacit approval of the American mobsters.
- gpcz 12y agoEven worse, "Madam Secretary" is now spreading torture apologist rhetoric by framing the character that worked for the CIA and approved torture as a successful but war-worn, down-to-earth realist that acknowledges that "life is more complicated than you think," while the character that vehemently opposed torture is framed as an overly-idealistic young adult that dropped out of college in protest and has to work menial jobs in retail to "learn how the world works."