4 ms·

Replace interracial marriage with something like abolish the police. Is the ethical/sane choice still clear cut?

KMag 5y ago
More importantly, most of us hold moral judgements that our grandchildren will find horrifying, and it's a tautology that we're unable to see our moral blind spots (or have a good guess where they are). I'm happily in an interracial marriage, but I'm not sure that I would have been in favor of (or even neutral toward) interracial marriage had I been a product of the culture a century earlier. I'm very glad we've made moral progress as a culture, and that progress has required some voices in the wilderness speaking out. History has shown that these moral errors aren't all attributable to one side of the political isle, either. We should have some humility in our policies. Almost all of us are on the wrong side of history in ways we are blind to. An absolute belief of being on the right side of history has lead to most of the major disasters of the last century.
- raffraffraff 5y ago
  I fheyly agree that we should have humility in our policies, but should also be aware that all "progress" is not positive. In fact, how is progress even defined in this case? Is all change progressive? Or is change that younger people agree with automatically positive? At some point before the Spanish Inquisition, one could have argued that this new idea of burning witches was "progress" because it reduced the evil in the world. Back in 1970s Iran, one could have argued that a law that forced women to cover their bodies from head to toe to stop tempting men into sin, as "progressive". In my own view, which I'm always willing to debate (and lose), a change isn't progressive if it cannot argue it's point using logic. If it silences dissent using threats of ostracism, job loss or ban from some ubiquitous online platform, it's not progress. If it presumes itself to be morally right without arguing it's case, and is happy to shut down any disagreement as (some)phobia, then it's not progress. If it denies science, it's not progress. And if it goes further than demand silence from dissenters, and actually demand that everyone agree (wear the colours, add the right signals to the Twitter bio, "you're with us or against us"), then it's not just "not progressive", it's regressive. It's dogmatic. It's a church full of people all changing a creed whether or not try believe.
  - raffraffraff 5y ago
    I love spotting predictive text mistakes after the edit timeout expires :/ WTF is "fheyly"?
    - KMag 5y ago
      > WTF is "fheyly"? It's the secret love child of "fully" and "covfefe".
    - gedy 5y ago
      Maybe it's someone's "personal pronoun"? /s
MisterBastahrd 5y ago
Abolish the police? No. Abolish the police as they currently exist? Absolutely. Nobody deserves to die because they were shot by a cop because they missed a payment on a fine.
pjc50 5y ago
Reminder that the UK did have to abolish (and reconstitute) a police force in order to end its civil war in 2001, and still has ongoing litigation about the legality of troops shooting civilians in the streets.
- yerwhat01010 5y ago
  That has absolutely nothing to do with modern "abolish the police" rhetoric. "Abolish the police" is a utopian Marxist fantasy that holds that in some hypothetical perfected society we won't need police because everyone will just get along, and that the only reason we currently "need" police is because capitalism/patriarchy/white supremacy/imperialism drive people to commit crime and violence, therefore all we have to is burn the existing system to the ground (no need to specify its replacement it in any detail) and utopia will emerge from the rubble. (Nevermind that the politicians who advocate this nonsense spend tens of thousands of dollars on private security while pretending that police are unnecessary.) It's no exaggeration to say that this is the same ideology ("society is imperfect, therefore burn everything to the ground with no plan to rebuild other than my being in charge") that got tens of millions of people killed in the twentieth century. It's insane, dangerous garbage and it should not be tolerated. None of the orchestrators of the Northern Ireland peace process held political views that are remotely similar to this.
  - pjc50 5y ago
    Upthread: "why won't people treat each other's political reviews with respect in the workplace" This comment: "insane, dangerous garbage and it should not be tolerated"
    - yerwhat01010 5y ago
      HN isn't the workplace.
      - krageon 5y ago
        No, but what was described is ironic.
M2Ys4U 5y ago
> Replace interracial marriage with something like abolish the police. Is the ethical/sane choice still clear cut? That's easy, if you don't elide meanings: Abolish marriage (as an institution that is only between two people of the same race) (and replace it with one that is between any two consenting people) Abolish the police (as an institution that is corrupt and excessively violent) (and replace it with an institution that is accountable and reduces crime with the minimum amount of force)

KMag 5y ago

More importantly, most of us hold moral judgements that our grandchildren will find horrifying, and it's a tautology that we're unable to see our moral blind spots (or have a good guess where they are). I'm happily in an interracial marriage, but I'm not sure that I would have been in favor of (or even neutral toward) interracial marriage had I been a product of the culture a century earlier. I'm very glad we've made moral progress as a culture, and that progress has required some voices in the wilderness speaking out. History has shown that these moral errors aren't all attributable to one side of the political isle, either. We should have some humility in our policies. Almost all of us are on the wrong side of history in ways we are blind to. An absolute belief of being on the right side of history has lead to most of the major disasters of the last century.

raffraffraff 5y ago
I fheyly agree that we should have humility in our policies, but should also be aware that all "progress" is not positive. In fact, how is progress even defined in this case? Is all change progressive? Or is change that younger people agree with automatically positive? At some point before the Spanish Inquisition, one could have argued that this new idea of burning witches was "progress" because it reduced the evil in the world. Back in 1970s Iran, one could have argued that a law that forced women to cover their bodies from head to toe to stop tempting men into sin, as "progressive". In my own view, which I'm always willing to debate (and lose), a change isn't progressive if it cannot argue it's point using logic. If it silences dissent using threats of ostracism, job loss or ban from some ubiquitous online platform, it's not progress. If it presumes itself to be morally right without arguing it's case, and is happy to shut down any disagreement as (some)phobia, then it's not progress. If it denies science, it's not progress. And if it goes further than demand silence from dissenters, and actually demand that everyone agree (wear the colours, add the right signals to the Twitter bio, "you're with us or against us"), then it's not just "not progressive", it's regressive. It's dogmatic. It's a church full of people all changing a creed whether or not try believe.
- raffraffraff 5y ago
  I love spotting predictive text mistakes after the edit timeout expires :/ WTF is "fheyly"?
  - KMag 5y ago
    > WTF is "fheyly"? It's the secret love child of "fully" and "covfefe".
  - gedy 5y ago
    Maybe it's someone's "personal pronoun"? /s

MisterBastahrd 5y ago

Abolish the police? No. Abolish the police as they currently exist? Absolutely. Nobody deserves to die because they were shot by a cop because they missed a payment on a fine.

pjc50 5y ago

Reminder that the UK did have to abolish (and reconstitute) a police force in order to end its civil war in 2001, and still has ongoing litigation about the legality of troops shooting civilians in the streets.

yerwhat01010 5y ago
That has absolutely nothing to do with modern "abolish the police" rhetoric. "Abolish the police" is a utopian Marxist fantasy that holds that in some hypothetical perfected society we won't need police because everyone will just get along, and that the only reason we currently "need" police is because capitalism/patriarchy/white supremacy/imperialism drive people to commit crime and violence, therefore all we have to is burn the existing system to the ground (no need to specify its replacement it in any detail) and utopia will emerge from the rubble. (Nevermind that the politicians who advocate this nonsense spend tens of thousands of dollars on private security while pretending that police are unnecessary.) It's no exaggeration to say that this is the same ideology ("society is imperfect, therefore burn everything to the ground with no plan to rebuild other than my being in charge") that got tens of millions of people killed in the twentieth century. It's insane, dangerous garbage and it should not be tolerated. None of the orchestrators of the Northern Ireland peace process held political views that are remotely similar to this.
- pjc50 5y ago
  Upthread: "why won't people treat each other's political reviews with respect in the workplace" This comment: "insane, dangerous garbage and it should not be tolerated"
  - yerwhat01010 5y ago
    HN isn't the workplace.
    - krageon 5y ago
      No, but what was described is ironic.

M2Ys4U 5y ago

> Replace interracial marriage with something like abolish the police. Is the ethical/sane choice still clear cut? That's easy, if you don't elide meanings: Abolish marriage (as an institution that is only between two people of the same race) (and replace it with one that is between any two consenting people) Abolish the police (as an institution that is corrupt and excessively violent) (and replace it with an institution that is accountable and reduces crime with the minimum amount of force)