29% of the world think that torture is acceptable

So, almost a third of the worlds population believe that torture is okay. Israel tops the list of folk who want their fellow human beings to suffer unbearably to gain a little security for themselves, closely followed by Iraq, the Phillipines and Indonesia.

It is noticeable, however, that only 16% of Israeli Muslims are pro torture, right down there with the Spanish and the French. The only country better than this is Italy, our overall loser in the pulling peoples toenails out stakes. Salute Italia! Hurrah for Italy and La Dolce Vita!.

There's also a surprising degree of woolly-mindedness about this, especially in India,where 45% of the population couldn't make up their collective minds about whether to waterboard people on spec. Come on chaps, electrodes to the testicles - good or bad?

And what of the British? Only about 1 in 4 of my fellow countrymen like the idea of stress positions and beatings, which I suppose is a good thing, although I find it rather depressing that about 10 million of my neighbours would happily torment me on the off-chance that I might have a bit of useful information.

Still, at least we're not as bad as the Americans, who have recently legalized the use of serious pain in interrogations (although not Extreme pain, of course) , with a 36% approval rating.

What they were specifically asked was:

Most countries have agreed to rules prohibiting torturing prisoners. Which position is closer to yours?

1. Terrorists pose such an extreme threat that governments should now be allowed to use some degree of torture if it may gain information that saves innocent lives
   
2. Clear rules against torture should be maintained because any use of torture is immoral and will weaken international human rights

This post falls into the Death camp, I think.