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Notes -
I’m curious, if you were to estimate the level of care you owe to the following people on a scale of 10 (as a brother) to -10 (omnicidal maniac), what would it be? (assuming you’re a white American)
Another white American
A white European living in Europe
A Hispanic mestizo legally living in the US
A Hispanic mestizo living in Mexico
An Ethiopian Christian
A Saudi Muslim
A black American who has been convicted of two counts of petty vandalism and one count of shoplifting
A white American who has been convicted of three counts of felony assault and one count of attempted murder
A Simbari tribesman who practices traditional pederasty rites
A black American pedophile with a preference for young white boys
That I am obligated to owe? 10. Always 10. God is pretty explicit about this.
That I am physically capable of owing without supernatural intervention?
... admittedly less than ten in all respects.
But I don't think ranking people by how much you "owe" them makes sense. If you're going to rank people, rank them by your ability to help them. If you have a glass of water and a man is about to die of heat stroke, you should give it to him regardless of which of these men he is. You should also take the chance to restrain him, if he is likely to harm innocents, but in any case should help him survive. If you have a glass of water and ten thirsty man, give it to the man for whom it maximizes the chance of survival (plus survival chance multiplied by net good the man will do over his life, to the best of your ability to estimate second-and-third-order effects.) You should help your wife, or a member of your community, over a total stranger, not because the stranger is a distinct, worse class of human, but because you are more capable of helping your wife or community member. Your help goes further, and does more good in the world. But again, that's a matter of maximizing good, not about people being entitled to different levels of brotherhood.
...and that's why I give some, but not all of the money I allocate for charity to the GiveWell foundation. It's a very cost-effective way to do lots of good, but I'm also uniquely capable of targeting "good" when it's aimed toward buying gifts for my family, or drinks for my friends, or donating to my own local parish.
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TIL. Also, WTF.
Though from what I can gather it's not strictly pederasty because the initiations rituals and the rites of passage don't involve an adult male. It's older boys abusing and raping younger boys.
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Assuming that these are all generic representations of people that I have not met personally and have no additional ties to:
The reason for the low valuations on the generic "these are all fine" groups at the top is that I just don't think I owe very much to distant countryman in general. My high levels of care are reserved for people that I have much closer ties to. I wish no ill on the Ethiopian Christian or Saudi Muslim, it's just not my problem how things work out for them in their faraway land.
The negative rankings are somewhat challenging owing to the fact that whatever anti-care is owed diminishes with distance, so some of these numbers reflect distaste rather than a willingness to do anything.
I don't put any meaningful emphasis on race as an element of care. Individual behavior exceeds racial preferences for me in effectively all cases.
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