FtttG
User ID: 1175
FtttG
4d ago
Can you articulate what you find morally wrong with slavery?
It is wrong for one human being to own another human being. That is, in fact, the central meaning of slavery, so I'm not committing the non-central fallacy as you claim. You brought up the comparison to plantation slavery in the antebellum South, not me.
If you refuse to acknowledge the difference between killing and not-killing, we’re at an impasse.
I acknowledge the difference between "killing" and "doing nothing to prevent a killing that you knew was going to happen". I do not think they are equally heinous, and neither does the law (accessory to murder before the fact will never be punished as harshly as murder).
I think you're using the word "slavery" in a nonstandard way. The fact that someone will be punished for inaction doesn't imply that they are therefore owned by another individual.
I don't understand why you're demanding that an actor must affirmatively agree to do something in order to face punishment for failing to do so. This isn't how we treat crimes of commission ("well we found Bob standing over Carol's corpse holding a bloody knife – but he never explicitly agreed not to murder anyone, so legally our hands are tied"), so why should it be the case for crimes of omission? This sounds like some sovereign citizen nonsense: the laws of the country in which you reside apply to you, whether you approve of them or not.
If Alice knows that Bob is planning to kill Carol and does nothing to prevent it (say, reporting him to the police), that obviously implies that Carol's murder could have been prevented had Alice acted. The fact that she didn't personally stab Carol doesn't make her any less party to the crime. The fact that she never explicitly agreed to report any instances in which she had foreknowledge of a murder doesn't either.
FtttG
4d ago
I actually met him while we were going out. As a middle-aged man he bore an uncanny resemblance to Séamus Heaney. When he was my age at the time we were going out, he did wear his hair long, but looked more like Rory Gallagher.
FtttG
4d ago
It should never be a crime to not act.
- If I'm a teacher, and one of my students confides in me that another adult has been sexually abusing him, I should not face legal repercussions if I fail to report it?
- If I'm in a room when two of my friends are plotting a murder, I don't bother to report it, and they succeed in killing their victim, then I shouldn't be charged with conspiracy or being an accessory before the fact?
- If I'm a doctor, I see one of my patients choking, and I don't bother to try to save his life, then I shouldn't be charged with gross negligence?
- If a lifeguard sees someone drowning but doesn't try to save his life because who is he to play God, he shouldn't be charged with gross negligence?
- If I work in a pharmaceutical company, I know that a specific batch of drugs my company has produced has been tainted, but I don't bother to call attention to it, I shouldn't be charged with gross negligence?
Moral philosophy draws a distinction between ethical actions which are expected of you (i.e. which you will be condemned for failing to carry out), and supererogatory actions, which are "beyond the call of duty" (i.e. you will be praised for carrying them out, but no one will blame you if you don't do so). Obviously, which category a given action falls into varies from person to person, depending on their skills and responsibilities. If someone suffers from a medical emergency in front of me, obviously I should put a sweater under their head and try to keep them comfortable, but it's not really expected of me to do more than that. But if I was a doctor, rendering proper medical assistance to that person is my responsibility, and failing to do would be a serious derelection of duty.
Likewise, if you're just a private citizen, an ordinary civilian, no one expects you to intervene in the event that an active shooter scenario erupts in your vicinity. Elisjsha Dicken deserves praise, commendation, every honour that his government can bestow on a civilian: his courage in the face of extreme danger is awe-inspiring, breathtaking. But I don't think anyone would have held it against him had he failed to intervene and ran for cover: he did more than could reasonably be expected of him, because it wasn't his responsibility.
It is a cop's responsibility. While police officers who intervene in active shooter scenarios will receive praise, this is really just a courtesy masking the fact that, for a police officer, intervening in situations like this is not a supererogatory action: they will be condemned for failing to do so, and deservedly so. Being a hero is the job you signed up for. If you weren't willing to put yourself in harm's way to protect vulnerable people, what the hell did you become a cop for?
(The same argument applies, obviously, to the Secret Service agents who could be seen cowering behind Trump while he was being fired upon. "Interposing the principal between an active shooter and yourself" is pretty much the exact opposite of a bodyguard's job.)
Maybe criminal conviction would be too harsh a punishment, although maybe not: imagine some other hypothetical in which 21 children were killed as a result of an adult's derelection of duty (e.g. a schoolbus driver who literally fell asleep at the wheel and survived a crash while 21 of his passengers were killed) – I find it hard to imagine no criminal convictions would be sought in such an instance.
Either way, none of these men are fit to be police officers, and should be forced to resign.
Still on XCOM 2: War of the Chosen. I have killed 2 out of 3 Chosen. Once I finish this playthrough, I am seriously considering playing the base game on Commander difficulty with Ironman enabled. Help, I've relapsed into my XCOM addiction.
Four years ago I passed my ex in the street, who was walking with her current boyfriend. She was my first serious girlfriend, and we lost our virginities to each other. Her current boyfriend looked, not to put to fine a point on it, pretty much exactly like I did when we started going out: hairstyle (significant as I wore my hair quite long at the time), fashion sense, skin tone, eye colour, the whole lot.
My immediate thought was "wow, either she has a very specific type, or I imprinted on her real good".
FtttG
4d ago
Homosexuality happens when natural mechanisms of sexual attraction do not work as they should for the purposes they were intended - namely, reproducing the species and propagate the genes.
However, as even Freud realised, this argument proves too much, as it implies that any sexual activity not carried out for purposes of procreation is just as "perverted" as homosexual intercourse. This includes numerous heterosexual activities which are widely considered "vanilla" (PiV sex with condoms, sex then pulling out, fellatio to the point of orgasm and so on).
Anyway, I don't engage with people engage in "strawmanning," which means ascribing exaggerated positions to others as a way of making them seem less reasonable.
The nerve of you. On the basis of my using a photo of Good which had already been used by numerous outlets beforehand, you made a snap decision about what my opinions of this case were and what I was attempting to do by using said photo. When in reality, I suspect that our opinions of this case are quite similar. And you dare to accuse me of misrepresenting and strawmanning you?
And, of course, no comment on the fact that that notorious bastion of open borders propaganda, FOX News, used exactly the same photo of Good in their coverage. Because that would explode your preposterous claim that anyone using this photo for illustrative purposes is trying to make Good look as sympathetic as possible.
Looks to me like you are experiencing cognitive dissonance
No, I'm not. You're being obnoxious, condescending, hostile, and ascribing intentions and ulterior motives that I don't possess. And now armchair psychologising me to boot.
you wrote a blog post complaining about irrelevant and unflattering evidence regarding Renee Good while at the same time pushing irrelevant evidence that does the opposite.
No, I didn't. I used the first photo of Good that Google images returned. I didn't spend paragraph after paragraph gushing about the poetry she'd composed or what a good mother she was. I used a photo of her which was already in widespread circulation.
No jury is going to be on the fence about whether to convict Ross, see this photo, and immediately think "oh my God! I didn't know Renee Good once set foot on a beach! Send him to the chair!" I cannot believe you are getting this bent out of shape and ascribing such sinister Machiavellian intent about my choice to use a mildly flattering photo of the deceased, up to and including demanding that I change it because my choice of photo might hypothetically bias some prospective jurors ruling on Ross's case who are reading my blog post for some reason. Prospective jurors who have doubtless already seen this photo, because it's already been used in much higher-profile articles by numerous media outlets, including a conservative outlet which is supportive of ICE's mission and unsympathetic to Good and her fellow activists.
I suppose next you'll tell me that FOX News used this photo to curry favour for Good, and cast Ross and ICE in as negative a light as possible?
Seriously, dude, give it a rest. This jumping at shadows is tiresome.
FtttG
5d ago
Why? I mean, you say that you don't think there's a big difference. If there's not a big difference, you shouldn't have a problem substituting one for the other.
I don't have a problem with substituting the photo because I think there's a big difference between the two photos. I have a problem with it because it's my blog, and you don't get to dictate what I post on it, especially not when you don't even claim that I made a factual error, especially not when you're going about it in such an obnoxious and condescending manner.
I find your hostility all the more baffling because, to me, the video evidence strongly suggests that Good did strike Ross with her car, and that the shooting was justified. A few days ago I posted a comment to that effect on Substack (also pointing out that just because Ross walked away from the incident, doesn't mean he wasn't injured, citing several anecdotal examples of people I know who were severely injured but didn't notice because of shock and adrenaline), and several people quickly accused me of being an ICE apologist. I guess if I'm simultaneously being accused of being an ICE apologist and an anti-ICE apologist, I've done a decent job of being even-handed.
Regardless, this sort of paranoid mind-reading:
We both know why you (and the mainstream media) are using the smiling femme beach photo of Renee Good
is not why I come to this space, and I don't think it's in keeping with the established ethos.
What about the Floyd situation did I misunderstand?
Chauvin got railroaded on vibes for performing a maneuver that was expressly taught to him by the police force, and one that doesn't lead to positional asphyxiation unless the victim happens to be having a drug overdose despite having horrible optics.
Given that Floyd was having a drug overdose, you realize you basically just admitted that Chauvin shouldn't have used that manoeuvre, and hence that the jury of his peers was right to convict him of murder? That's one hell of a "railroading".
FtttG
5d ago
So you concede it's totally irrelevant to Ross' guilt or innocence?
I don't understand the question you're asking me. "Is this photo of Good irrelevant to her guilt or innocence?" Yes, did I ever suggest otherwise?
In your view, is there a big difference between the two photos?
No, I don't think there's a big difference between the two. I used the photo I did because numerous news outlets were using that photo.
If you think there isn't a big difference, would you mind swapping in the second photo on your blog post?
Yes, I would mind.
FtttG
5d ago
you simultaneously include pro-Good evidence which would likely be inadmissible at trial. One example is the photo at the top. Another example is Good's intentions. (" if so, did she do so intentionally, or through negligence? ")
I'm open to the idea that the photo of Good used by many publications wouldn't be admissible in a criminal trial, although I think you're being a bit melodramatic regarding how "flattering" the photo in question is. It's just a photo of her standing on a beach and smiling: it's not like she's volunteering at a soup kitchen or treating malarial children or something. And please explain to me how the question "if Good struck Ross, did she do so intentionally or through negligence?" would be inadmissible in a criminal trial. By definition, a question is not "evidence".
FtttG
5d ago
Yes, I agree that in the second photo she looks more like a stereotypical angry aggressive lesbian. But she doesn't look much like a stereotypical angry aggressive lesbian, and I think your phrasing was a bit weaselly. For any two photos of Beyoncé, she will look "more" like a stereotypical angry aggressive lesbian in one of them than the other: that doesn't imply that she particularly looks like a stereotypical angry aggressive lesbian in either of them.
Which of the two pictures is more flattering? Which of the two pictures is more relevant to the subject matter under discussion?
Of course the first one is more flattering. But I don't think it's remotely indicative of media bias that most outlets chose to use a nice photo of Good when reporting about her, rather than a still frame extracted from a video taken seconds before her death. Even the New York Times used a very flattering photo of Charlie Kirk in their obituary for him, and not, say a photo of him immediately after or immediately prior to him being shot, which would have been "more relevant to the subject matter under discussion".
FtttG
5d ago
If the cops unjustifiably kill some random law-abiding productive citizen with a family and community, that's much worse.
Agreed, but that wasn't the comparison I was making. I was comparing an unjustified killing of someone with forty previous felonies with a justified killing of an erstwhile law-abiding citizen.
FtttG
6d ago
On the day of the shooting, she looked much more like a stereotypical angry aggressive lesbian.
At this point, I have to ask if we watched the same video. Good's partner was the one loudly berating and mocking the ICE agents, while Good herself was, for the most part, sitting in her car and smirking. She was being obnoxious, but I can't say I saw anything "aggressive" in her demeanour, prior to her pressing the accelerator.
As to "looking" like a lesbian: she was dressed appropriately for the Minnesota climate.
FtttG
6d ago
I'll admit that I may have phrased my argument poorly (as I said in the wellness thread, I was under pressure to meet my self-imposed deadline). The argument I was trying to make is that, in the hypothetical world in which it could be established that Ross's shooting was justified beyond reasonable doubt, it wouldn't matter if Good had been a scrupulously law-abiding citizen prior to the altercation. Conversely, in the hypothetical world in which it could be established that Ross's shooting wasn't justified, it wouldn't matter if Good had had numerous criminal convictions beforehand. I probably shouldn't have bothered getting into the weeds of what either of these hypothetical worlds might look like, as they weren't relevant to my argument.
What is your objection to slavery then, if not the ownership of one man by another?
And what is so hard to understand about the fact that harm can result from action and inaction, and hence that knowingly permitting harm to occur is a crime just as much as causing harm oneself? This isn't pathos, this isn't appeal to emotion, this isn't even an argument from legality, this is just – physics, really. If you concede that punishing evildoers (by which I mean people who commit crimes of commission) is a good idea because it incentivises people not to do evil, that logically implies that it's also a good idea to punish people who commit crimes of omission, for exactly the same reason.
You seem to be operating from some kind of bizarre slave morality perspective, in which harm can only result because of action, whereas people who do nothing are morally pure. This is, to put it mildly, bollocks. Failing to toss a rope to a drowning child is almost as much of a moral indictment of you as pushing her in to the water.
You're saying that my argument "implies criminality of inaction" in what I assume is meant to be a derisive tone, like that's a facially absurd claim to make. But it's factually true that certain kinds of inaction are criminal offenses in many jurisdictions, and your refusal to recognise this doesn't make it any less true, or doesn't mean it doesn't apply to you. If you think these kinds of inactions shouldn't be considered crimes, fair enough, but don't pretend they aren't and scoff at me for pointing out that they are.
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