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In this NYT article, race isn't mentioned, so I assumed it was either a black-on-black or black-on-white killing, but apparently it was white-on-black! It's unusual for the NYT to not mention race in such a situation. Could it be that they're finally downplaying all races in their
crime reporting, and not just the ones that it's offensive to speak negatively about? That sounds too good to be true, but I want to believe.
Seems like at least two guys, maybe three restraining the one dude. https://twitter.com/_barringtonii/status/1653941898023665665
Everyones only focusing on that shot with just the marine and the guy, probably taken later than the above pic
Not everyone, Black Lives Matter thinks all three should be prosecuted. Because the mentally ill homeless are ordinary people's social and moral superiors and raising a hand against them, regardless of provocation, is verboten -- and black homeless especially so, of course.
If you choked a non-homeless person to death after they verbally insulted you should you face no penalty? The article says he yelled but hadn't physically assaulted anyone yet. Should the law be that if someone makes a verbal threat someone else is allowed to murder them in response?
I'd really like to discuss this sentiment. I see this kind of hyperbolic statement expressed all the time, often in the form of "There shouldn't be a death penalty for X" or "Doing X doesn't mean they deserve death". Where action X provoked response P which lead to the person's death.
If this isn't just a rhetorical sleight of hand, I really don't get it.
Let's say somebody decides to take a stroll on the Autobahn. I approach him at 200 km/h. Instead of swerving off the road, likely killing me and my passengers, I instead hit the brakes, and subsequently, him. He dies. Would people now come out and say "There shouldn't be a death penalty for people strolling on the Autobahn" or "Taking a stroll doesn't mean he deserves death". No, but he risks justifiable reactions by others that could lead to his demise.
What kind of logic is this?
This case might be different from the usual 'Is it really ethical to MURDER* someone just for being poor? (*murder: n. not provide $100k worth of state of the art medical treatment to prolong someone's life by a few months)'.
If you haven't put yourself in danger or created a situation where self-defense is justified or ..., nobody else has the right to intentionally or negligently cause your death. If a homeless guy is screaming at someone or throwing hamburger wrappers at someone, you can't take out a gun and shoot them. And you can't choke the homeless guy out and 'accidentally' kill them. (And if you could, that'd be a way to get away with intentionally killing them!).
If this guy was actively physically attacking someone or something similar, restraining the person could be justified, and then the killing would - maybe still be prosecutable (as minor fights happen a lot more than killings, and escalating them to killings can still be bad), but maybe not be. But if the guy was just being disruptive or screaming, the legal system shouldn't (according to today's ethics) allow that to escalate to a killing - it's disproportionate, it takes the 'monopoly over violence' away from the state and its adversarial legal system, etc.
One response is "the state isn't dealing with this guy and he was a danger, so it's good a vigilante dealt with him". Another response is "this guy doesn't contribute to society or his own life, and shouldn't be alive anyway". I'm sympathetic, but generally allowing random killings of people you judge in the moment to be bad has spillover effects outside cleaning out undesirables.
I get you, but these people aren't making a legal argument or an argument based on rule utilitarianism. They are making either a deontological argument or a virtue ethics argument that boils down to "always take it on the chin". Because any response whatsoever contains the possibility of escalation and that might get somebody killed in the end. Curiosly, it completely strips the attacker of agency and places all the responsibility on part of the bullied.
"The wiser head gives in" was the principle I was raised with. It took a lot of beatings for me to realise that the only way to stop a bully is to fight back. There seem to be people who never had to make that experience.
Turning the other cheek might work for sons of gods but it creates terrible incentive structures for everybody else.
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