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> Because I don’t really care about someone’s moral belief in what’s right or wrong as long as it doesn’t effect anyone else. Moral beliefs tend to eventually

by jimmy1 8y ago

> Because I don’t really care about someone’s moral belief in what’s right or wrong as long as it doesn’t effect anyone else. Moral beliefs tend to eventually end up externalized in some form or fashion. What then? What if I told you that everything we do affects someone else? This post-modernist idea that you can do whatever you want as long as it doesn't affect someone else is a fallacy. Unless you live in an isolated, self sustaining biodome in Antartica, chances are you are impacting at least one other life in extreme cases, if not more. The "Desert Fathers" of the ancient Church, of whom left the holy cities with the extent purpose of leaving the world to not impact others (or be bothered by the cares of the world) ironically, impacted millions.

scarface74 8y ago
Yes and someone else’s moral belief led to miscegenation (interracial marriage) being illegal into the late 60s, Jim Crow laws, laws against homosexuality, and the War on Drugs. Let’s not forget if those preaching “morality” had their way they would also ban birth control. You’ll have to excuse me if I don’t pay too much credence to the “moral majority”.
- jimmy1 8y ago
  This is flawed perspective and your three examples are a very mixed bag of unequal occurrences. All three of those situations are unlike the other. Jim Crow laws were very much not due to a "majority" -- if you remember, the country went into civil war over the issue of slavery, and the North has always been the more populous part of the country. Laws against Homosexuality were part of the fabric of pretty much most of the world (still so in 72 countries, as well as 70% of the commonwealth states), so not sure you can attribute that to any one particular moral majority, it was more of a global majority, so there goes that comparison out the window. And finally, the War on Drugs had nothing to do with morality, but basically one man's smart campaign to manipulate the public so that he could target minorities and anti-war protestors (later -- the CIA learned you could make a nice dime, so they continued it in the name of "national security" -- wonder where we heard that before) And finally, your argument is very flawed because systems of morality are what have lead to the greatest human progress for thousands of years, and you are invalidating all of that on some unfortunate decade-long (strong emphasis on decade long, not millennium long) effects of fundamentalists and charlatans who, as history has already judged, were on the wrong side of things? You must have a very bleak outlook on humanity.
  - scarface74 8y ago
    As far as US history. Should I start with the mass slaughter of native Americans, slavery, Japanese internment camps, etc? All the while the “good Christians” either actively took part or looked the other way?

by jimmy1 8y ago

scarface74 8y ago

Yes and someone else’s moral belief led to miscegenation (interracial marriage) being illegal into the late 60s, Jim Crow laws, laws against homosexuality, and the War on Drugs. Let’s not forget if those preaching “morality” had their way they would also ban birth control. You’ll have to excuse me if I don’t pay too much credence to the “moral majority”.

jimmy1 8y ago
This is flawed perspective and your three examples are a very mixed bag of unequal occurrences. All three of those situations are unlike the other. Jim Crow laws were very much not due to a "majority" -- if you remember, the country went into civil war over the issue of slavery, and the North has always been the more populous part of the country. Laws against Homosexuality were part of the fabric of pretty much most of the world (still so in 72 countries, as well as 70% of the commonwealth states), so not sure you can attribute that to any one particular moral majority, it was more of a global majority, so there goes that comparison out the window. And finally, the War on Drugs had nothing to do with morality, but basically one man's smart campaign to manipulate the public so that he could target minorities and anti-war protestors (later -- the CIA learned you could make a nice dime, so they continued it in the name of "national security" -- wonder where we heard that before) And finally, your argument is very flawed because systems of morality are what have lead to the greatest human progress for thousands of years, and you are invalidating all of that on some unfortunate decade-long (strong emphasis on decade long, not millennium long) effects of fundamentalists and charlatans who, as history has already judged, were on the wrong side of things? You must have a very bleak outlook on humanity.
- scarface74 8y ago
  As far as US history. Should I start with the mass slaughter of native Americans, slavery, Japanese internment camps, etc? All the while the “good Christians” either actively took part or looked the other way?