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"[...] but in the real world, you sometimes have to employ extreme and extralegal methods to preserve the very system whose laws you’re violating." This is wha

"[...] but in the real world, you sometimes have to employ extreme and extralegal methods to preserve the very system whose laws you’re violating." This is what everyone tells themselves when they flip on their own morals, or "it's for the greater good" with the trolley problem.

tabtab 4y ago
Indeed. "Ends justify the means" is one of the biggest mis-rationalizations used by people in power. "We have to be devious to protect our people, culture, religion, system, etc." Often with a dose of "the other side probably cheats also".
- Gibbon1 4y ago
  We covered the prince in high school civics. It took me too decades to come up with an answer to the Ends Justify the Means. The objection is that The means are an end. How you do things is important in and of itself. And more important than just one particular thing at the moment.
  - epicureanideal 4y ago
    I recommend reading The Anti-Machiavel by Frederick the Great as a counter-argument to The Prince.
jfengel 4y ago
I honestly don't expect people to have a consistent moral code. We never really know all of the ends, so we're just guessing anyway. I'm just as suspicious of "I'm going to do this obviously horrendous thing because my moral code says I have to." The ends do, sometimes, justify the means -- as best we can understand the ends and the means. And Richard Nixon was just a violent asshole, using the thinnest pretext of "the greater good" for his own short-term and selfish purposes. All I can hope for, morally, is for people do at least try not to be deliberately cruel to each other. Even that seems too much to ask a lot of the time.
- flandish 4y ago
  > people And that’s key - if people can’t have consistency, a system of government never can. Therefore all governments have a nonzero chance of “evil” and should be, at all levels, distrusted and where appropriate, dismantled.
  - drewcoo 4y ago
    > if people can’t have consistency, a system of government never can There's this concept called "emergence" that doesn't agree with that reasoning.
    - flandish 4y ago
      Link?
      - wahern 4y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence > In philosophy, systems theory, science, and art, emergence occurs when an entity is observed to have properties its parts do not have on their own, properties or behaviors that emerge only when the parts interact in a wider whole. It's sort of a corollary[1] to the Fallacy of Composition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_composition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_composition [1] There's probably a better word here; emergence isn't necessarily true given the fallacy of composition.
        flandish 4y ago
        Thanks!
mc32 4y ago
[flagged]
- wpietri 4y ago
  What's your source for this claim?
  - mikeyouse 4y ago
    It's a popular right-wing conspiracy theory based on a completely unsubstantiated claim by an anonymous blog poster.
    - belorn 4y ago
      "In September 2021, Yahoo! News reported that in 2017 in the wake of the Vault 7 leaks, the CIA discussed plans to kidnap or assassinate Julian Assange. They also planned to spy on associates of WikiLeaks, sow discord among its members, and steal their electronic devices. "[T]op intelligence officials lobbied the White House" to designate Wikileaks as an "information broker" to allow for more investigative tools against it, "potentially paving the way" for its prosecution. Laura Poitras described attempts to classify herself and Assange as "information brokers" rather than journalists as "bone-chilling and a threat to journalists worldwide".[380] Former CIA Director Mike Pompeo stated that the US officials who had spoken to Yahoo should be prosecuted for exposing CIA activities." Why are Former CIA Director Mike Pompeo saying that officials who had spoken to Yahoo should be prosecuted for exposing CIA activities, if it all is just a conspiracy theory based on a anonymous blog poster?
      - mikeyouse 4y ago
        Thats a different instance — the drone strike reference was to an anonymous blog post lying about how Hillary Clinton had wanted to drone strike Assange. It’s frequently trotted out to “both sides” actual conspiracies like Nixons war crimes or Trump and Pompeo plotting things like what you've linked there.

tabtab 4y ago

Indeed. "Ends justify the means" is one of the biggest mis-rationalizations used by people in power. "We have to be devious to protect our people, culture, religion, system, etc." Often with a dose of "the other side probably cheats also".

Gibbon1 4y ago
We covered the prince in high school civics. It took me too decades to come up with an answer to the Ends Justify the Means. The objection is that The means are an end. How you do things is important in and of itself. And more important than just one particular thing at the moment.
- epicureanideal 4y ago
  I recommend reading The Anti-Machiavel by Frederick the Great as a counter-argument to The Prince.

jfengel 4y ago

I honestly don't expect people to have a consistent moral code. We never really know all of the ends, so we're just guessing anyway. I'm just as suspicious of "I'm going to do this obviously horrendous thing because my moral code says I have to." The ends do, sometimes, justify the means -- as best we can understand the ends and the means. And Richard Nixon was just a violent asshole, using the thinnest pretext of "the greater good" for his own short-term and selfish purposes. All I can hope for, morally, is for people do at least try not to be deliberately cruel to each other. Even that seems too much to ask a lot of the time.

flandish 4y ago
> people And that’s key - if people can’t have consistency, a system of government never can. Therefore all governments have a nonzero chance of “evil” and should be, at all levels, distrusted and where appropriate, dismantled.
- drewcoo 4y ago
  > if people can’t have consistency, a system of government never can There's this concept called "emergence" that doesn't agree with that reasoning.
  - flandish 4y ago
    Link?
    - wahern 4y ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emergence > In philosophy, systems theory, science, and art, emergence occurs when an entity is observed to have properties its parts do not have on their own, properties or behaviors that emerge only when the parts interact in a wider whole. It's sort of a corollary[1] to the Fallacy of Composition: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_composition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallacy_of_composition [1] There's probably a better word here; emergence isn't necessarily true given the fallacy of composition.
      - flandish 4y ago
        Thanks!

mc32 4y ago

[flagged]

wpietri 4y ago
What's your source for this claim?
- mikeyouse 4y ago
  It's a popular right-wing conspiracy theory based on a completely unsubstantiated claim by an anonymous blog poster.
  - belorn 4y ago
    "In September 2021, Yahoo! News reported that in 2017 in the wake of the Vault 7 leaks, the CIA discussed plans to kidnap or assassinate Julian Assange. They also planned to spy on associates of WikiLeaks, sow discord among its members, and steal their electronic devices. "[T]op intelligence officials lobbied the White House" to designate Wikileaks as an "information broker" to allow for more investigative tools against it, "potentially paving the way" for its prosecution. Laura Poitras described attempts to classify herself and Assange as "information brokers" rather than journalists as "bone-chilling and a threat to journalists worldwide".[380] Former CIA Director Mike Pompeo stated that the US officials who had spoken to Yahoo should be prosecuted for exposing CIA activities." Why are Former CIA Director Mike Pompeo saying that officials who had spoken to Yahoo should be prosecuted for exposing CIA activities, if it all is just a conspiracy theory based on a anonymous blog poster?
    - mikeyouse 4y ago
      Thats a different instance — the drone strike reference was to an anonymous blog post lying about how Hillary Clinton had wanted to drone strike Assange. It’s frequently trotted out to “both sides” actual conspiracies like Nixons war crimes or Trump and Pompeo plotting things like what you've linked there.