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You are falling victim to the moral illusion described by the article. Every case was an improvement upon the status quo, yet you criticize PETA and Uber as if

by ggreer 11y ago

You are falling victim to the moral illusion described by the article. Every case was an improvement upon the status quo, yet you criticize PETA and Uber as if they made things worse. Helping a little (even if you benefit) is better than not helping at all.

millstone 11y ago
Should we avoid criticizing brutal dictatorships because they are an improvement over anarchy? With 25 thousand facing water shutoffs, PETA offered help for up to ten people - technically an improvement on the status quo. But they also inserted their own agenda, diverting attention from Detroit's poverty and unemployment issues to the ethics of using animal products. This is definitely a worse outcome for the remaining 25k - 10 Detroit residents. It's fair to consider PETA's hijacking of the issue as a cost imposed on those affected by it.
- ggreer 11y ago
  > Should we avoid criticizing brutal dictatorships because they are an improvement over anarchy? No, and only an incredibly uncharitable reading of my comment could suggest otherwise. What is it about this topic that makes people go crazy? The examples in the article involved: donating to the homeless, paying people's water bills, and taxi pricing. The comments here have brought up slavery, selling drugs to addicts, and avoiding criticism of brutal dictatorships. Please, try to retain a sense of proportion. It could be argued that outrage over PETA brought more attention to the problems of Detroit. I didn't know about the water shutoff until my Facebook feed was full of PETA hate. But it doesn't matter. People didn't get angry at PETA for "diverting attention." They got angry at PETA because PETA only helped a little bit.
mercurial 11y ago
It's more complicated than that. If you look at the "local" outcome of the situation, both participants benefit. However, if this spreads and becomes the "new normal" (eg, zero-hour contracts), this can result in a net diminution of social good compared to alternative outcomes where employers would have offered better terms to their employees. I think that's the issue people have with this kind of "improvement".
- TheOtherHobbes 11y ago
  Exactly. This is a "thin end of the wedge" argument. If you agree that certain actions can be moral in limited circumstances, you also agree to support the moral logic they're based on, on principle - even if that moral logic does huge harm elsewhere. It's a superficially clever rhetorical argument, but it's not a very moral one. If you're a poor person, you don't want to be in situation where PETA are offering to interfere in your life to make a political point - you want to be in a situation where you're not poor in the first place. There's no point saying that bandaids can stop people bleeding and people who don't want to use them are bad, if you don't address why there are flesh wounds everywhere you look. Are bandaids better than nothing? They are. But there are still people trying to fix the flesh wounds. Does the author support them, or not?
  - golemotron 11y ago
    > There's no point saying that bandaids can stop people bleeding and people who don't want to use them are bad, if you don't address why there are flesh wounds everywhere you look. Yet poverty is improving globally ( http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/mar/17/aid-trade-reduce-acute-poverty http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/mar/17/aid-trade-red... ). Given that, no one should be faulted for doing what they can to help locally. > Are bandaids better than nothing? They are. But there are still people trying to fix the flesh wounds. Does the author support them, or not? It doesn't matter. The author presented an idea that is important in its own right. I don't think there's any moral authority anyone can draw upon to say that he or she needs to do more. Anyone who thinks there is is proving the author's point.
    - mercurial 11y ago
      It's not a problem of "doing more" or "doing less". It's that, based on the available choices the actor has ("aid"/"don't aid"/"aid conditionally"), the actor picks the outcome which disproportionately favours him, while the other actor has a limited range of strategy available. If your house is burning and the fire brigade is too busy to help, and your neighbour Bob comes with a fire extinguisher and a smile on his face, and proposes to give you the fire extinguisher in exchange for your new car, I sure hope there won't be any hard feelings next time Bob drives past your house.

by ggreer 11y ago

millstone 11y ago

Should we avoid criticizing brutal dictatorships because they are an improvement over anarchy? With 25 thousand facing water shutoffs, PETA offered help for up to ten people - technically an improvement on the status quo. But they also inserted their own agenda, diverting attention from Detroit's poverty and unemployment issues to the ethics of using animal products. This is definitely a worse outcome for the remaining 25k - 10 Detroit residents. It's fair to consider PETA's hijacking of the issue as a cost imposed on those affected by it.

ggreer 11y ago
> Should we avoid criticizing brutal dictatorships because they are an improvement over anarchy? No, and only an incredibly uncharitable reading of my comment could suggest otherwise. What is it about this topic that makes people go crazy? The examples in the article involved: donating to the homeless, paying people's water bills, and taxi pricing. The comments here have brought up slavery, selling drugs to addicts, and avoiding criticism of brutal dictatorships. Please, try to retain a sense of proportion. It could be argued that outrage over PETA brought more attention to the problems of Detroit. I didn't know about the water shutoff until my Facebook feed was full of PETA hate. But it doesn't matter. People didn't get angry at PETA for "diverting attention." They got angry at PETA because PETA only helped a little bit.

mercurial 11y ago

It's more complicated than that. If you look at the "local" outcome of the situation, both participants benefit. However, if this spreads and becomes the "new normal" (eg, zero-hour contracts), this can result in a net diminution of social good compared to alternative outcomes where employers would have offered better terms to their employees. I think that's the issue people have with this kind of "improvement".

TheOtherHobbes 11y ago
Exactly. This is a "thin end of the wedge" argument. If you agree that certain actions can be moral in limited circumstances, you also agree to support the moral logic they're based on, on principle - even if that moral logic does huge harm elsewhere. It's a superficially clever rhetorical argument, but it's not a very moral one. If you're a poor person, you don't want to be in situation where PETA are offering to interfere in your life to make a political point - you want to be in a situation where you're not poor in the first place. There's no point saying that bandaids can stop people bleeding and people who don't want to use them are bad, if you don't address why there are flesh wounds everywhere you look. Are bandaids better than nothing? They are. But there are still people trying to fix the flesh wounds. Does the author support them, or not?
- golemotron 11y ago
  > There's no point saying that bandaids can stop people bleeding and people who don't want to use them are bad, if you don't address why there are flesh wounds everywhere you look. Yet poverty is improving globally ( http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/mar/17/aid-trade-reduce-acute-poverty http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/mar/17/aid-trade-red... ). Given that, no one should be faulted for doing what they can to help locally. > Are bandaids better than nothing? They are. But there are still people trying to fix the flesh wounds. Does the author support them, or not? It doesn't matter. The author presented an idea that is important in its own right. I don't think there's any moral authority anyone can draw upon to say that he or she needs to do more. Anyone who thinks there is is proving the author's point.
  - mercurial 11y ago
    It's not a problem of "doing more" or "doing less". It's that, based on the available choices the actor has ("aid"/"don't aid"/"aid conditionally"), the actor picks the outcome which disproportionately favours him, while the other actor has a limited range of strategy available. If your house is burning and the fire brigade is too busy to help, and your neighbour Bob comes with a fire extinguisher and a smile on his face, and proposes to give you the fire extinguisher in exchange for your new car, I sure hope there won't be any hard feelings next time Bob drives past your house.