Hi david, platt, erin et all,
david said:
-> Its immoral to stand by and allow anyone to be murdered,
> especially if its you that's being murdered. Its not a right, its a duty
> and a moral obligation.
Elliot:
It's your moral obligation to murder someone who's trying to murder you?
I'm sure many people agree with you but i dont believe pirsig ever says
this, nor is it even implied. infact, i think the MoQ morality says it's
immoral to ever kill another individual (possesor of wisedom and
individuality). I dont see anything in the MoQ that says you are better
than the attempting murderer and that he deserves to die and that you don't.
Platt said:
Maybe if we identify the rights we, as individuals, would be willing to
fight and die for, it would be a start.
Elliot:
Freedoms are not won from the state, conssesions of freedom are given to
it. I see no reason for anyone to die for a right. I also see no reason
to submit to immoral social control. If society decides to take your life,
maybe you'll be a martyr or something, but the point is that society is the
one that erred and not you, because it would be silly i think to take up
arms against the society you live in and die in the process (or even kill
others who dissagree with you and live yourself). And i also dissagree
with David who says "To fight and die as an individual, even if the cause
is noble, is to
abandon civilization and society" and that is bad he says. If society is
enslaving you then dont stand for it. We can never go back to sharpening
sticks in caves, its way to late for that, and submitting to the dominant
paradigm and giving up your ideas is an immoral act according to Pirsig.
"It is more moral for an idea to kill society than for society ro kill an
idea", however it is equally immoral for an idea to kill a system of ideas
(an individual, a conduit for dynamic quality).
To me this comes down to the question of how moral human beings behave in
an immoral society. Most people today (or atlest leftists today) think
that it takes individual participation inside the system to reform the
institutions. I disagree entirely. This tends to form lots of people to
get this crazy idea in their head that whats wrong is "Society" and not
individuals, and they end up trying to impose morality on people through
political action. Rather than liberating people thins further integrates
them into the immoral system. Dont get this crazy idea that this society
is some fragile flower that needs to be taken care of and that if to many
people dissent and live morally outside the constitution and laws that
we'll all go back to sharpening sticks. Society simply cannot be killed as
long as there are people, human society dies when the second to last human
dies. I advocate behaving the way you see moral and leaving the Gov't to
itself. the institutions will change to be more moral and more supportive
of intellect when all the individuals who live in it do the same. Change
through example rather than "fighting and dying" because none of us are
perfect enough to know what is best for the ones we're fighting and dying
for or against. Just live.
Elliot
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