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I'm flabbergasted by how some western societies have become willing to debate torture during the last decade. > as if torturing a person would still be okay if

I'm flabbergasted by how some western societies have become willing to debate torture during the last decade. > as if torturing a person would still be okay if worked Spot on. "I was trying to save million of lives" is not a valid excuse for committing atrocities. Especially given how easy it is to construct such narrative and use it to justify anything.

Chris2048 9y ago
> "I was trying to save million of lives" is not a valid excuse for committing atrocities Why not? If good men forfeit their lives to fight evil, why can't evil men be forced to forfeit their lives for the same? > use it to justify anything Then the issue is the "narrative" is false. We just have to improve standards of proof - if there is legitimate reason to believe lives would be saved, why not?
- che_shirecat 9y ago
  by committing atrocities, you become the evil, even if you have an utilitarian excuse. saving more lives is ultimately meaningless as evil will always exist and people will always die as a result of it but the one thing we have complete agency in is our own actions and that will ultimately be what we will be held accountable for
  - Chris2048 9y ago
    I'm not religious, I only care about concepts such as "evil" so far as they are semantically useful lingual constructs. > we have complete agency in is our own actions and that will ultimately be what we will be held accountable for By who, and for what; consequence or intention? A utilitarian justification seems to me as good as any.
    - che_shirecat 9y ago
      Was my comment religious in any way? There's multiple ways that one could be held accountable for crimes against humanity, either by your government and laws or by the international community. There's really no point considering the issue from a nakedly utilitarian justification - why would you care about how many people you save then? If it's for their economic output or because of economic damage, why not just kill the poor or enslave the populace? Your stance is pure sociopathy and as such we obviously have no room for a reasoned discussion.
- banku_brougham 9y ago
  “We had to destroy the village in order to save it,” is a justification that rings hollow.
  - Chris2048 9y ago
    Depends what that means, it sounds like it's meant to sound hollow.

Chris2048 9y ago

> "I was trying to save million of lives" is not a valid excuse for committing atrocities Why not? If good men forfeit their lives to fight evil, why can't evil men be forced to forfeit their lives for the same? > use it to justify anything Then the issue is the "narrative" is false. We just have to improve standards of proof - if there is legitimate reason to believe lives would be saved, why not?

che_shirecat 9y ago
by committing atrocities, you become the evil, even if you have an utilitarian excuse. saving more lives is ultimately meaningless as evil will always exist and people will always die as a result of it but the one thing we have complete agency in is our own actions and that will ultimately be what we will be held accountable for
- Chris2048 9y ago
  I'm not religious, I only care about concepts such as "evil" so far as they are semantically useful lingual constructs. > we have complete agency in is our own actions and that will ultimately be what we will be held accountable for By who, and for what; consequence or intention? A utilitarian justification seems to me as good as any.
  - che_shirecat 9y ago
    Was my comment religious in any way? There's multiple ways that one could be held accountable for crimes against humanity, either by your government and laws or by the international community. There's really no point considering the issue from a nakedly utilitarian justification - why would you care about how many people you save then? If it's for their economic output or because of economic damage, why not just kill the poor or enslave the populace? Your stance is pure sociopathy and as such we obviously have no room for a reasoned discussion.
banku_brougham 9y ago
“We had to destroy the village in order to save it,” is a justification that rings hollow.
- Chris2048 9y ago
  Depends what that means, it sounds like it's meant to sound hollow.