The '24' Embrace of Contemporary Politics

[Updates below.]

Class: please be seated. Today, our subject is reductio ad absurdum, Internet edition. Turn your books to page 2. Please read along with me:

Terrorists have acquired a nuclear weapon.

Someone seen among the terrorists has been caught.

Should the captured person be tortured if he won't divulge what it is we assume he knows?

You say hurting someone who hasn't hurt you is wrong. How far are you willing to defend that position?

Part of me always wondered if 24 would reach this point. From the standpoint of a television action-drama, each season must at least keep the heat up on the suspense. Each season of the show has managed to increase the stakes and in order for this one to continue propelling the series forward, it must continue to increase the shock value of the ongoing terrorist threat.

So why not have prominent CTU characters openly advocate the torture of a suspect? Why not have an "Amnesty Global" lawyer notified and enter with a court order demanding immediate release? Why not have Jack Bauer actively seek out ways to torture the suspect, up to and including the submission of his resignation in order to pursue the suspect once he is released from CTU custody?

I'm not particularly angry at this point. My anger crested several hours in the past of the show. The viewers have been led to this moment by the previous displays of torture. I actually chuckle because it reminds me of so many other times in the past where the mask is dropped and what lies beneath is revealed for an instant. For example, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's infamous 6/28/2004 statement in San Francisco quoted by Matt Drudge:

"We're saying that for America to get back on track, we're probably going to cut that short and not give it to you. We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good."

It is not as if either of these were sprung on anyone. Ignore the words and watch the actions. CTU has used coercion to get needed information in the past. Senator Clinton has voted for laws used to coerce people in order to accomplish socio-economic goals in the past. Both entities have their belief systems and are following them. They've made up their minds and the only real question is how to apply those choices.

One wonders what the director and the producers are thinking at this point. This is just about identical to every Doomsday Scenario that has been bitterly, bitterly argued over for nearly four years. I am imagining the various law-and-order tendencies within conservative fans of the show going immediately to war with the foreign policy hawk tendencies. Among the majority of these people and their fellow political travelers, the emotional reaction to seeing

1. an Arabic family terrorist cell conducting fatal operations on U.S. soil;
   
2. the kidnapping and attempted execution of the Secretary of Defense as a distraction;
   
3. the attempted meltdown of nuclear reactors and the actual meltdown of one in California as distractions;
   
4. the theft of an Air Force stealth fighter;
   
5. Air Force One shot down and the President seriously injured;
   
6. the loss of critical nuclear weapons information;
   
7. the loss of a nuclear weapon;
   
8. the detainment of a person who must know something to aid CTU;
   
9. an international human rights lawyer immediately and cynically retained to secure the release of the "suspect" because he hasn't formally broken a law and been charged with a crime;
   
10. the better than average performance of torture for CTU agents in the past;
    
11. and merely that lawyer, the U.S. Marshall, and a judge's order standing in the way to that information;

...that hawkish reaction has either met or exceeded something similar to this:

Jack Bauer is the most righteous, most badass guy in the American government. He has nothing - nothing - but the best interests of the United States and her citizens in his mind. He is the very embodiment of someone who we have hired to Do The Right Thing. The man has literally died for his flag. Why he hasn't simply buzzed through the Amnesty Glboal lawyer (a stand-in for Amnesty International?) and put the U.S. Marshall down is beyond me. He really is an admirable guy, respecting the Constitution like that in this most "extreme of circumstances."

And then I imagine them cheering, as my friends did, when Bauer Tazered the U.S. Marshall and then ruined Joe Prado's right thumb after lying about his knowledge of Marwan's whereabouts. The suspect wasn't able to endure much past a few seconds of Bauer putting pressure on the destroyed joint before telling him where Marwan was. I also imagine the even greater cheer going up after Bauer's parting knockout blow to the back of Prado's head. "This will help with the pain," as I paraphrase him sneering.

Honestly, I cheered along with my friends. We knew the guy was a liar and a direct conspirator in the terrorist plot and so did the appropriate agents of the state. I couldn't repress my instant agreement because I knew Bauer had treated the man to the very beginning of what he deserved. He was no mere man of knowledge who accidentally knew was what going on. According to the set-up by the episode, he was an important player with very serious information.

But there's the rub.

In real life, we aren't likely know these things so clearly and without doubt. In real life, there are few Jack Bauers indeed to act as the vigilante angel, saving the day because no one else understands the stakes. In real life, it takes time and evidence to conclude who did what at what level of knowing involvement. In real life, torture means putting society/results over the individual, the most important step towards the complete disregard of morality.

The inclusion of the Amnesty lawyer really does the trick, though. It exposes the craven cowardice of the CTU operation. It's personnel feel just fine torturing young adults, women, and men...as long as no one knows about it who might raise a legal stink. Really, does the libertarian view of government-as-criminal-aggressor have any greater power than when we are presented with a state agency that ignores The Law, treats humans as it's own property, and only stops the moment when bad press coverage by indignant civil libertarians start holding press conferences is possible? Wait hardly a news cycle these days and you'll hear about some arm of the state doing this. Commonplace in realms where the consequences are a few mere million tax payer dollars, this is the realm of direct human life. Nothing else is more serious.

Now Jack Bauer has resigned from CTU and the preview shows him getting into direct conflict with law enforcement over his treatment of Prado. Bauer, rather than violate the Constitution and get his co-workers in trouble, has fallen back on what he can rely on: himself, as an individual. For that tenacity of purpose and rugged pursuit of Evil, I commend him.

For his willingness to do use any means to satisfy his ends, I condemn him.

Previous posts on : 24 and Torture, Fox's '24': A Libertarian Nightmare, and The Jack Bauer Power Hour, Inner Outrage; The Enslavement of Behrooz Araz, and The Total Erosion of the Fourth Wall.

UPDATED 5/2/2005 10:56pm
Humanity Revealed in FOX's 24

UPDATED 5/17/2005 2:07pm
Quickie '24' Blog Items with an Emphasis on Richard Heller

UPDATED 3/13/2006 9:45am
My Take on FOX's '24' Ethics

Posted by Drizzten at April 18, 2005 10:52 PM