On Wed, 14 Jun 2000 02:35:08 EDT, you wrote:
>Hi All
>
>IAN:
><some snipped>
>If we really only have three-score years and ten who
>the hell wants to spend that much of it greasy, sweaty and pissing
>everyone around them off?
>
>JON:
>
>I'm unclear what you mean by this. Nobody really wants to spend their life
>greasy, sweaty, and pissing everyone around them off. But look at history.
>Certain people at certain times have felt morally compelled to go through
>life unpleasantly in order to put a stop to some immoral aspect of their
>society. The usual examples: Jesus, Martin Luther King, etc. If the Nazi's
>had conquered the world, would it be right for the average citizen to ignore
>the abundant immorality, to keep from getting sweaty or pissing anybody off?
>And what if slavery was still legal in America (and not only legal, but
>considered acceptable by the majority of the populace)? Should the person in
>this hypothetical society just be good and not risk a lifetime of pissing
>people off?
It's the whole quality/morality/effect schema. Or more relevantly to
where I am now could we/can we/should we...
I actually agree with you assesment above of the morality of these
events. Yet it is evident that anything can be done with quality. This
does not mean that it should be done.
My point was that the damage Phaedrus causes (as told by the narrator)
is warranted. The narrator causes more damage and there is no value to
it other than getting out of the glass door... Phaedrus wishes to do
something and will sweat to this end. The Narrator espouses this a
worthy goal in and of itself. He's WRONG.
"Wax on Wax off Daniel san"
There was a pattern to what occured in Germany during the national
socialist period. It starts with elevating animals to having the same
rights as humans. Once you have made this IMMORAL (IMO) step the
action of treating people as animals becomes a much smaller step.
Human life is SACRED.
Animal life is not SACRED.
>
>Everything is sacred. Morality has everything. That does NOT mean everything
>has equal value, or zero value.
This is a nonsense. In a language sense. What you are effectively
saying is that the word sacred is meaningless and therefore you can
insert your own definition.
My dictionary gives several definitions all of which relate
exclusively to a deity or a religious act. It is obviously nonsensical
to suggest that *everything* fits the meaning of this word.
I'm not merely being pedantic. To suggest that because you can make
anything sacred, everything is sacred is to debase the very concept of
something being sacred. It's a heresy in most western religions. In
fact as I recall most of the Buddist texts I have read had words about
not profaining the texts with association with more mundane
materials...
Because I can love ANY person does not mean that EVERY person is
loved. It's a non sequitur.
>Of course, we must consider certain aspects
>of life more important than others. That's common sense. Depends on who you
>are and where you are. But no matter who you are, or where you are, Morality
>has you, and it has where.
Well I'm reading Huck Finn at the moment. There is a passage in it
where Twain writes of the moral dilema faced by Huck when the slave he
is running with nears his goal. Huck's dilema is that it's wrong for
him to be involved in separating someone from their rightful property
(namely a slave.) I hadn't read anything written in this perspective
before and found it somewhat illuminating. Even for your most belicose
racist the idea that it is morally *correct* to own another human
being is now *seen* as utterly insuportable. Certainly I have never
met anybody who would suggest that they had a right to own someone
else as "property" (though I have met many who treat those they love
with much the same effect.)
regards,
Ian
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
MD Queries - horse@wasted.demon.nl
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Sat Aug 17 2002 - 16:00:44 BST