Thanks this was really helpful in seeing what was really happening. Yes so we indeed only consider the perpendicular component of the force which is accounted for in the cross product formula. There's no way it can be a linear relationship.
Thanks again :).
Examine T= r x F (cross product),
where |T|=|r||F| sin t, where t is the angle between r and F
The intuitive idea of torque (let's only consider torque about the pivot for now) is that the stronger the force or the further away you are from the pivot point, the more the object will TEND to...