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> Please explain the difference, in terms of how it should affect my opinion of the person who carries out the act. Sure. > A factory boss decides to release

by edanm 2y ago

> Please explain the difference, in terms of how it should affect my opinion of the person who carries out the act. Sure. > A factory boss decides to release some toxic pollutant. They know that it will result in some number of deaths over the next years. They choose to go through with it anyway, because they make more profit than if they disposed of the stuff properly, and that money matters more to them than the lives they’re ending. This depends a lot on context you haven't provided. Most importantly - is this legal? If releasing this toxic pollutant is illegal, then they should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. For good reason, that is usually not a death sentence. But if you have an issue with how harsh or not the sentence is, that's a question to take up with the legal system, not with the individual. Either way, vigilante justice is not needed. If releasing this pollutant is legal, the question is different. Firstly, why is it legal? If it shouldn't be, then again - this is something to take up with the justice system. Sometimes it's legal for good reasons - it's not clear yet that it is truly toxic. That should definitely inform how we treat someone - releasing something that might be a pollutant is definitely different. There's just a lot of nuance to this question, it's not an easy soundbite, because the real world is complicated. > What’s the difference between that and some petty criminal shooting someone in the street so they can take the victim’s wallet? Let me make a very important point here. The legality of an action matters a lot more for society than the morality of an action. That's kind of the whole reason we have a legal system, and for good reason! And a pretty fundamental principle of the legal system is that intent matters a whole lot. Here's some of the differences of the two cases: - With a criminal shooting someone in the street to take their wallet, I am very scared that he will continue doing this - he will likely shoot more people to get their wallets, because he ignores the laws and morality. As opposed to the factory boss, who (assuming this is legal), would presumably not do something if it were illegal. So I don't have to worry about his actions - he's not likely to "kill" anyone else if it's against the law. - A criminal shooting someone is almost certainly trying to kill or at least harm them. The action is very direct. This matters a bunch, because we can be pretty certain of their intent, and therefore how they will act in the future. As opposed to a factory boss - where the indirectness of the action is far more ambiguous. Did he really know that this would cause deaths? Are there mitigating circumstances (like him being pretty sure it's far enough that it won't cause deaths because it's small amounts, or far from populations)? --- The biggest problem with your examples is that there are really two options here. You either agree with the legal system - in which case, there's a perfect remedy for actions like releasing toxic chemicals, which is using the legal system to prosecute such people. Or you don't agree with the legal system - you think some things should be illegal, but they aren't. And this is what is secretly (or not so secretly) motivating most of the pro-vigilante comments. They think that what they consider to be moral is good enough to use to enact justice - they don't need to actually convince their fellow citizens, or convince their lawmakers, to enact their ideas into law. It's enough for them to fervently be sure they are right - that's supposedly a good enough reason to inflict their morality on other people using violence. And that is a disgusting, anti-democratic worldview, that would leave society in tatters. Society can't function if everyone can just decide that their morality is the ultimate justice. We have to come together as a society and agree on rules. Because as everyone understands - 99% of people do something that someone else considers wrong. If our society functioned via "well I'm sure I'm right about what is moral, so I can execute people based on my morality", then pretty soon we'd have total anarchy. Do you think abortion is murder? Go ahead and kill some doctors. Do you think creating weapons should be illegal? Go ahead and kill the CEO of a weapons manufacturer. Do you think protesting war is terrible because it puts "our soldiers" in danger? Go and shoot up people leading protests. Perhaps you think that climate change will kill us and anyone who works in the car industry is therefore tainted? Go and blow up some car factory workers. I agree with some of the position above, disagree with some others, as I'm sure most people do. And that's fine! But decent people understand that disagreeing about things, even things that directly pertain to life and death - is not a good enough reason to start killing each other over. We all have to live together, so we all have to work together to agree on what is right or wrong, and to appoint people to collectively enact the will of society - not just have individual citizens run off and do what they want based on their ideas.

tristor 2y ago
> This depends a lot on context you haven't provided. Most importantly - is this legal? Whether it is legal or not is irrelevant. You are entering into a conversation about morality. The law does not dictate morality, as much as it can morality dictates the law. The entire point of the person you are replying to is that acts with moral equivalence are treated differently by the law because of the social and economic status of those likely to commit those acts. A very real example of this from American history is that crack cocaine and powder cocaine had different mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines for charges of simple possession as well as charges of possession with intent to distribute. Both are effectively the same drug, but one version of this drug is more commonly use by poor and non-white people, and the other version used by rich white people, and so we ended up with a gross disparity in the law over exactly morally equivalent acts. You are not actually engaging with the argument that the person you are replying to is making. Nobody gives a shit what the law says, they care about what is right and what is wrong. Then we mold the law to match.
- edanm 2y ago
  > Whether it is legal or not is irrelevant. You are entering into a conversation about morality. The law does not dictate morality, as much as it can morality dictates the law. There are various ideas about morality. But I think even in the most common-sense interpretation of morality, most people agree that there are things that are legal, but immoral, things that are perfectly moral but illegal, and that respecting the law is a meta-rule that is important regardless of morality. Simple example: Most people agree that cheating on a spouse is wrong and immoral. Not illegal though. Do you think it makes any sense to suggest that the only options are either we change the law to make adultery criminal, or we take vigilante justice on adulterers? Or is it just possible that some things might be immoral (to some people) but should be legal? > A very real example of this from American history is that crack cocaine and powder cocaine had different mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines [...] Yes, and I think the law was wrong in this case, like it's been wrong many times in history (slavery was once legal too). The correct thing to do was to try and change it, which is what eventually happened. An incorrect option would've been to jailbreak prisoners because you disagree with the law, despite lots of people being imprisoned for longer than they should've been. > You are not actually engaging with the argument that the person you are replying to is making. Nobody gives a shit what the law says, they care about what is right and what is wrong. Then we mold the law to match. I am engaging, because I disagree with this idea. The law and morality are connected, but distinct things, as I've shown above. We have to have legal systems in place to make broad decisions - we can't go based off of people's personal moral ideas. Explain to me how you would like things to work and still be compatible with that idea, given the above examples I've given. And I think the idea that "nobody gives a shit what the law says" is a statement that is... very, very incorrect.

by edanm 2y ago

tristor 2y ago

> This depends a lot on context you haven't provided. Most importantly - is this legal? Whether it is legal or not is irrelevant. You are entering into a conversation about morality. The law does not dictate morality, as much as it can morality dictates the law. The entire point of the person you are replying to is that acts with moral equivalence are treated differently by the law because of the social and economic status of those likely to commit those acts. A very real example of this from American history is that crack cocaine and powder cocaine had different mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines for charges of simple possession as well as charges of possession with intent to distribute. Both are effectively the same drug, but one version of this drug is more commonly use by poor and non-white people, and the other version used by rich white people, and so we ended up with a gross disparity in the law over exactly morally equivalent acts. You are not actually engaging with the argument that the person you are replying to is making. Nobody gives a shit what the law says, they care about what is right and what is wrong. Then we mold the law to match.

edanm 2y ago
> Whether it is legal or not is irrelevant. You are entering into a conversation about morality. The law does not dictate morality, as much as it can morality dictates the law. There are various ideas about morality. But I think even in the most common-sense interpretation of morality, most people agree that there are things that are legal, but immoral, things that are perfectly moral but illegal, and that respecting the law is a meta-rule that is important regardless of morality. Simple example: Most people agree that cheating on a spouse is wrong and immoral. Not illegal though. Do you think it makes any sense to suggest that the only options are either we change the law to make adultery criminal, or we take vigilante justice on adulterers? Or is it just possible that some things might be immoral (to some people) but should be legal? > A very real example of this from American history is that crack cocaine and powder cocaine had different mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines [...] Yes, and I think the law was wrong in this case, like it's been wrong many times in history (slavery was once legal too). The correct thing to do was to try and change it, which is what eventually happened. An incorrect option would've been to jailbreak prisoners because you disagree with the law, despite lots of people being imprisoned for longer than they should've been. > You are not actually engaging with the argument that the person you are replying to is making. Nobody gives a shit what the law says, they care about what is right and what is wrong. Then we mold the law to match. I am engaging, because I disagree with this idea. The law and morality are connected, but distinct things, as I've shown above. We have to have legal systems in place to make broad decisions - we can't go based off of people's personal moral ideas. Explain to me how you would like things to work and still be compatible with that idea, given the above examples I've given. And I think the idea that "nobody gives a shit what the law says" is a statement that is... very, very incorrect.