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I'm more interested in hearing about the philosophy which comforted Vietnamese civilians who had to live their lives under constant American terror-bombing than

I'm more interested in hearing about the philosophy which comforted Vietnamese civilians who had to live their lives under constant American terror-bombing than I am in hearing about the philosophy which comforted the bombers.

stanrivers 6y ago
Slightly unfair, to discredit the suffering of either side, though, right? Regardless of whether your views on the U.S. involved (Stockdale, who this article is about, believes the US gave up its moral high ground amongst the nations of the world by participating, for what it is worth - so he wasn't a fan of being there) Human, generally, are really great at making people suffer. Was it right to be bombing North Vietnam? Was it right to be torturing people in prison camps? Overall, I do agree that it would be interesting to learn from an memoirs from North Vietnamese at this time. I have never thought to look for that. So thank you for highlighting.
nabla9 6y ago
"Grandstanding: The Use and Abuse of Moral Talk" https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/oso/9780190900151.001.0001/oso-9780190900151 https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/o... >People used to hold out great hope for a public square in which individuals put petty disputes aside and engage in rational discussion about important issues. Unfortunately, public discourse today—especially on the internet—is full of adults behaving like poorly socialized children, acting out to show off for people they want to impress. In short, they engage in moral grandstanding, or the use of moral talk for self-promotion. Drawing from work in psychology, economics, and political science, this book develops an explanation of why people grandstand when they talk about morality and politics. Using the tools of moral philosophy, it argues that grandstanding is not just annoying, but morally bad. And finally, it explains what we can do to encourage people to support a public square worth participating in, by avoiding grandstanding.
- kthxbye123 6y ago
  OP posted a dumb motivational essay based on a bullshit hagiography of a guy whose day job was to mass murder civilians. If you’re cool with that then your moral framework has a screw loose, sorry.
hindsightbias 6y ago
Vietnam appears to be philosophically mixed with Confuscianism as a base. Taoism, Buddhism, Catholic, French colonial and Marxism on top. But I’d suspect Cambodia, who we probably dropped even more bombs on, would be more strictly Buddhist. Eastern Philosophy on suffering and war would be an interesting topic.
- stanrivers 6y ago
  Do you have any suggested material on your first two sentences? Think beginner that has mainly focused on western ideas wanting to get a foundation in eastern philosophy and then go from there.
  - hindsightbias 6y ago
    Sorry, no. But it would be a good question for one of the reddit philosophy forums. There probably are comparative religion classes/books that discuss Eastern religion/philosophy from a western perspective. I would expect Vietnamese socially tied to different eras like Catholic, French colony and Marxist to have very different views. What they share in common must be pretty fascinating.
    - stanrivers 6y ago
      Interesting to think that Vietnam might have a mix of all those cultures. I guess the same can be said about Macao or Hong Kong - you had traditional east asian cultures mixed very recently with western culture. I wonder if there are any examples of the reverse?
- latchkey 6y ago
  Laos took the brunt of the bombing (it is next to northern Vietnam). https://www.history.com/news/laos-most-bombed-country-vietnam-war https://www.history.com/news/laos-most-bombed-country-vietna...
sigstoat 6y ago
> I'm more interested in hearing about [...] did... did you google that? could you share what you found? i don't see any relevant submissions in your history.
throwaway247212 6y ago
My family members have many story about this: The children were relocated to rural areas, bomb shelters were built on the pavements etc.. what seemed surreal to me was my uncle story, just as the B52 was bombing the Yen Phu power plant he was standing on the other side of the lake sipping tea and look at the explosion. That very same uncle survived through the famine which killed up to 2 millions of Vietnamese. So for him, having food to eat even under constant bombing is better already. So I don't think it's due to any kinds of philosophy, it's just that we never know that life could be better than that.

stanrivers 6y ago

Slightly unfair, to discredit the suffering of either side, though, right? Regardless of whether your views on the U.S. involved (Stockdale, who this article is about, believes the US gave up its moral high ground amongst the nations of the world by participating, for what it is worth - so he wasn't a fan of being there) Human, generally, are really great at making people suffer. Was it right to be bombing North Vietnam? Was it right to be torturing people in prison camps? Overall, I do agree that it would be interesting to learn from an memoirs from North Vietnamese at this time. I have never thought to look for that. So thank you for highlighting.

nabla9 6y ago

"Grandstanding: The Use and Abuse of Moral Talk" https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/oso/9780190900151.001.0001/oso-9780190900151 https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/o... >People used to hold out great hope for a public square in which individuals put petty disputes aside and engage in rational discussion about important issues. Unfortunately, public discourse today—especially on the internet—is full of adults behaving like poorly socialized children, acting out to show off for people they want to impress. In short, they engage in moral grandstanding, or the use of moral talk for self-promotion. Drawing from work in psychology, economics, and political science, this book develops an explanation of why people grandstand when they talk about morality and politics. Using the tools of moral philosophy, it argues that grandstanding is not just annoying, but morally bad. And finally, it explains what we can do to encourage people to support a public square worth participating in, by avoiding grandstanding.

kthxbye123 6y ago
OP posted a dumb motivational essay based on a bullshit hagiography of a guy whose day job was to mass murder civilians. If you’re cool with that then your moral framework has a screw loose, sorry.

hindsightbias 6y ago

Vietnam appears to be philosophically mixed with Confuscianism as a base. Taoism, Buddhism, Catholic, French colonial and Marxism on top. But I’d suspect Cambodia, who we probably dropped even more bombs on, would be more strictly Buddhist. Eastern Philosophy on suffering and war would be an interesting topic.

stanrivers 6y ago
Do you have any suggested material on your first two sentences? Think beginner that has mainly focused on western ideas wanting to get a foundation in eastern philosophy and then go from there.
- hindsightbias 6y ago
  Sorry, no. But it would be a good question for one of the reddit philosophy forums. There probably are comparative religion classes/books that discuss Eastern religion/philosophy from a western perspective. I would expect Vietnamese socially tied to different eras like Catholic, French colony and Marxist to have very different views. What they share in common must be pretty fascinating.
  - stanrivers 6y ago
    Interesting to think that Vietnam might have a mix of all those cultures. I guess the same can be said about Macao or Hong Kong - you had traditional east asian cultures mixed very recently with western culture. I wonder if there are any examples of the reverse?
latchkey 6y ago
Laos took the brunt of the bombing (it is next to northern Vietnam). https://www.history.com/news/laos-most-bombed-country-vietnam-war https://www.history.com/news/laos-most-bombed-country-vietna...

sigstoat 6y ago

> I'm more interested in hearing about [...] did... did you google that? could you share what you found? i don't see any relevant submissions in your history.

throwaway247212 6y ago

My family members have many story about this: The children were relocated to rural areas, bomb shelters were built on the pavements etc.. what seemed surreal to me was my uncle story, just as the B52 was bombing the Yen Phu power plant he was standing on the other side of the lake sipping tea and look at the explosion. That very same uncle survived through the famine which killed up to 2 millions of Vietnamese. So for him, having food to eat even under constant bombing is better already. So I don't think it's due to any kinds of philosophy, it's just that we never know that life could be better than that.