In the movie "The Recruit", Al Pacino's character has Colin Farrell's character captured and tortured. He does this to prove the point that "You should never get caught". Also, to prove that being close to someone can only give torturers leverage as something to hurt you with. The ethics behind this specific scene is "Utilitarianism". (He actually commits the act for another reason, but he pretends his ethics is based on utilitarianism, so without getting into the whole rest of the movie, that's what I will consider it to be based on.) He is teaching a very important lesson to the career trainees at the expense of one of their cohorts.
The men torturing him use "Ends versus Means" ethics. They are "trying" to get the name of some of his instructors at "The Farm". He insists for a while that he is not a trainee for the CIA. The men try starvation, cold showers and even electric shock. Finally, they throw his love interest's (captured with him) urine-soaked clothes at him. He breaks and calls out the name "Burke" (Al Pacino's character). The clothes were a very clever use of deception. The girlfriend was fine, but Farrell didn't know that. So when he thought they were torturing her as well, he told them what they wanted to know. There was also no free choice for Farrell's character in all of this. He had no idea those men worked for the CIA; he had no idea his girlfriend was behind his cage, watching him along with his other classmates. So when he thought she was being harmed, he felt as though he had no choice but to do all that he could to save her.
Both aspects of the persuasion used in this scene are unethical. An innocent man was tortured, physically and psychologically, only to show other people what could happen to them if they got caught. There was no real gain for the men torturing him, and the information they gained was coerced.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K8tuTxwswew
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