Dr. Maddkap, WerepsychologistWhy are ethics questions always:
“Is it ethical to steal bread if your family is starving?”
And not:
“Is it ethical to hoard a million loaves of bread when other families are starving?”
Ophitoxaemia@drmaddkap That was exactly the lesson my mother meant when she told me her mother filled a giant warehouse full of food that rotted while people starved.
Andres Jalinton@drmaddkap
In a society where food (water, shelter and other basic needs) is a privilege instead of a human right, it's unethical to steal.
In a society where food (water, shelter and other basic needs) is a privilege instead of a human right, it's unethical to steal.
Tanith the Gay@Andres @drmaddkap I may be misunderstanding ur comment but I'd argue it's the other way round? 'f sth's a fundamental right n that right is also granted in practice (sth that's just a fundamental right on paper but not in reality's just a privilege after all), then stealing may be unethical, as the thing's already fairly distributed n ya would be making't less fair by stealing. But'f it's a privilege, then it's already not fairly distributed, so'f ur unprivileged, then stealing from the privileged's always ethical (as long as their privilege goes beyond their basic needs).
HighlandLawyer@Andres @drmaddkap
That confuses law with morality. A society which sets out that survival is a privilege is an unethical society, & there is an ethical imperative to oppose it, not to collude with it.
That confuses law with morality. A society which sets out that survival is a privilege is an unethical society, & there is an ethical imperative to oppose it, not to collude with it.
@Andres @drmaddkap
If the law is unethical, absolutely it is ethical to break it. That has been argued way back to the days of Augustine of Hippo & Thomas Aquinas, if not earlier.
Or as noted in more modern times:
"Those who hid Anne Frank were breaking the law; those who killed her were following the law"
If the law is unethical, absolutely it is ethical to break it. That has been argued way back to the days of Augustine of Hippo & Thomas Aquinas, if not earlier.
Or as noted in more modern times:
"Those who hid Anne Frank were breaking the law; those who killed her were following the law"
@HighlandLawyer @drmaddkap
I agree, more over the lawmakers who allowed food to be goods instead of rights should be prosecuted (legally).
I agree, more over the lawmakers who allowed food to be goods instead of rights should be prosecuted (legally).
Li ~ Crystal System@Li @Andres @drmaddkap
I would not agree with that, and would be interested to know which basis you are using for that position.
I would not agree with that, and would be interested to know which basis you are using for that position.
@HighlandLawyer @Andres @drmaddkap the fact there very existence is to try control people and that they function to cause harm to people on purpose and violate their rights but it’s “okay now” becuase you see it’s the law doing it, for a start — and that they create a culture of normalised dehumanization and othering towards people.. and that if you apply the stages of genocide to law enforcement it matches perfectly, including the murdering them in mass bit a lot of the time, but you see it’s the law so it’s totally fine now.
@Li @HighlandLawyer @drmaddkap
I clearly don't know enough about laws and ethics, but sounds to me that the existence (without an exception clause) of a "stealing food" law is unethical.
I clearly don't know enough about laws and ethics, but sounds to me that the existence (without an exception clause) of a "stealing food" law is unethical.
@Li @Andres @drmaddkap
"Rights" are a type of law. It seems that you are arguing against certain laws or types of law, rather than that the mere existence of any type of law is unethical.
"Rights" are a type of law. It seems that you are arguing against certain laws or types of law, rather than that the mere existence of any type of law is unethical.
@HighlandLawyer @Andres @drmaddkap human rights are not a “type of law” - fuck off with that shit,
it’s just people having autonomy over themselves, like its a ethics thing, this thing is universally bad,, and it pretty much all derived from agency;autonomy, etc
law is the blatant disregard for people’s rights, it’s coming up with excuses for violating them, setting up parts of the government with the express purpose of violating them,— if you make your rights about what “laws” say they are, then you don’t have rights. You have someone saying “no one can do this to you, also we do this to people all the time, but you see we decided it doesn’t count here, we’re allowed to!” — so you basically don’t have rights.
@Li @Andres @drmaddkap
I'm sorry but that doesn't seem to make any logical sense. According to your description a law saying "do not murder" disregards peoples rights - so that implies people have a right to murder. But any society needs restrictions on individuals absolute autonomy, even if only by mutual consent & to protect others autonomy.
And the last part describes rule by law (controls over you, but not to me) as opposed to rule of law (all are equally bound by the law).
I'm sorry but that doesn't seem to make any logical sense. According to your description a law saying "do not murder" disregards peoples rights - so that implies people have a right to murder. But any society needs restrictions on individuals absolute autonomy, even if only by mutual consent & to protect others autonomy.
And the last part describes rule by law (controls over you, but not to me) as opposed to rule of law (all are equally bound by the law).
@HighlandLawyer @Andres @drmaddkap
they just say that people’s rights are “part of it” so they can claim it doesn’t count when it’s them doing it, as they define what does and doesn’t count; they can also claim that it doesn’t count if they call you a criminal first, (for example)
There less“gov says you can’t do this but then also does them anyway” — which just means they can be taken away whenever, and are basically backdoored from the start,
and more “this is like the things that just are bad to do to people ever in any situation, so don’t do these”
like Laws are unethical, because they violate people’s rights, i.e because they intentionally hurt people and violate their autonomy/agency, and result in a soceity where lots are convinced everyone that’s somehow fine, where dehumanization is rampant — this is not a ‘type of law’ it’s the exact fucking purpose of laws,
Please fuck off with this bullshit
@HighlandLawyer @Andres @drmaddkap If you support laws your a horrible person, you support systemic oppression are fundamentally opposed to human rights, its not them “applied badly” it’s there explicit purpose, you just only care when it’s targeting those you’d deem as the “wrong people”.
Please never talk to me or anyone my system ever again, please be a better person, thanks!
@HighlandLawyer @Andres @drmaddkap it doesn’t imply people have a “right to murder” don’t pull shit I never said out of thin air please
it implies some entity calling itself the “ state “ or otherwise does not have a ‘right’ to murder people itself either, even if it declares it does, even if it puts them through a rights stripping ceremony first, and call it something else,
Same goes for kidnapping and every other attrocious thing that gets done to people all the time becuase the law said it’s okay ^^
Hope this fucking helps,
@HighlandLawyer @Andres @drmaddkap “no one is above the law” except yes they are; you’ll never see an executioner be charged with murder or a jailer be charged with kidnapping, a cop with assault, despite them doing it on the daily, despite it being their fucking profession,
Because “laws” allow this they fucking codify it and demand it happen to people,
the Stripey Goodness@Andres @HighlandLawyer @drmaddkap absolutely.
An example is the law in Germany in 1940 which required citizens to report the whereabouts of their Jewish neighbors.
If your internal barometer for what is just miscalibrates "just" as "legal," you will always be incorrect.
Octavia Con Amore 
Succubard's Library@Andres @HighlandLawyer @drmaddkap in many cases, yes, and even a cursory reading of history will bring up plenty of cases where atrocities were the legal thing 
Mr BThe first is a situation that an ethical person is likely enough to face down.
If you've got the opportunity to create the second situation you've likely got no scruples anyhow.
Jay@matt5sean3 @drmaddkap Posing the second question to a group that is expecting the first gets them thinking about fairness in ways that can lead to such hoarding being penalized or made more difficult to achieve.
You’re right that people need to shed several layers of morals until their greed is naked to get to that point, but the good news is that they number far fewer than an activated public.
Yeah, I get that. I was mostly making a joke.
Bjørn Bäuchle@WhiteCatTamer @matt5sean3 @drmaddkap Sure, but then it is no longer an ethical question (how should you behave and why?) but a societal question. Which is important, no question about that, but a different realm.
David Mitchell 
Sorry, but collectively North America *is* the second situation to the rest of the world… and I don’t see a successful outbreak of scruples on the horizon.
cafkafk@drmaddkap (also the answer to “is it ethical to steal bread from companies that throw out truckloads daily” for your starving family is basically always yes, that is perfectly ethical, and it’s unethical to be a mall cop if you see someone do that)
Clover@cafkafk @drmaddkap I actually disagree
also the answer to “is it ethical to steal bread from companies that throw out truckloads daily” for your starving family is basically always yes
the reason I disagree is because it is always ethical to steal bread from companies that throw out truckloads daily, even if your family isn’t starving.
@Clover @drmaddkap had me in the first half ngl
The Doctor@cafkafk @drmaddkap But it's it ethical to be a mall cop who covers for people who do?
PhDogBecause that second one is supposed to be easy.
AlinskyDidNothingWrong@drmaddkap because the answer is obvious.
StarkRG@drmaddkap Because philosophical questions are usually difficult and subjective. If the answer to a question is that clear-cut, it's barely worth thinking about.
Hein Ragas@drmaddkap @KraftTea That is because the answer to that second question is obvious and doesn't require any debate or deep thought.
Tea time.@heinragas @drmaddkap (Sure, but that's also where most of the problem is.)
🟥 Eveline Sulman 🇳🇱🇪🇺🇺🇦@drmaddkap 👆 this is great! Thinking differently!
Gurre Vildskägg@drmaddkap
Because B is blatantly unethical and thus not very interesting from an ethics debate perspective?
Because B is blatantly unethical and thus not very interesting from an ethics debate perspective?
Will Tuladhar-DouglasThey're not. I get that you're asking a rhetorical question, but I used to teach university ethics classes, including a wonderful class called Radical Practical Ethics. Lots of educators, mentors, and usefully difficult people do indeed challenge us.
The question might better be phrased,
Why would any teacher use their position of power and authority to distract their students with artificially individualised moral riddles rather than analyse the structures and processes of collective oppression and inequality in play at this very moment - and how to dismantle them?
...which is another rhetorical question, I suppose, but it does get us closer to answering the original question.
When life gives you a platform for suffering beings, you can crave the audience and imagine you are helping, or work together to tear down the stage and the walls that keep all of you in the theatre.
Bjornsdottirs@drmaddkap because the former is an even more obvious yes than is the latter an obvious no
tuban_muzuru
Phil Thane ✅@drmaddkap
When I was a teen in the 60s some smart arse in my class raised that with our religious studies teacher and his response was that in the UK the question didn't arise because we had a welfare state. Which made sense at the time. These days however...
@Maker_of_Things
When I was a teen in the 60s some smart arse in my class raised that with our religious studies teacher and his response was that in the UK the question didn't arise because we had a welfare state. Which made sense at the time. These days however...
@Maker_of_Things
Lacewindu (she/her)@drmaddkap I have worked in ethics for years, and those are both ethics questions. I suspect the reason you see the first one more often is because the lesson is trying to get at complexity in your value conflicts, not societal values. Depending on your value system, you can make arguments for and against both sides of each question. A hard line objectivist would answer yes to both questions. Depending on the particulars, a deontologist might say no to both.
Nyargalrohan
David Löwenstein@antars @drmaddkap Many ethics questions are of the second form. The first kind often appears in an attempt to isolate some aspects rather than others for discussion. But questions of the latter kind are often discussed, as well. They are the politically much more important ones, obviously.
Jonah Gibberish@drmaddkap Ethics classes are generally an elective nobody takes...
Aquarius@drmaddkap
21st Century Capitalism is Survival of the Fattest
Discard 2 day old bread into the trash bin, because giving it away would stop the indigent from scraping their last dollar to buy bread in the store
This is Hell
Daughter of Discord@drmaddkap Isn't this a quote from existential comics?
Gigsim@drmaddkap damn that good
orleansfietser@drmaddkap Same reason that the trolley problem is not "Do you turn on the trolley that will kill 10 people for $500?".
Leather Cub Andrew Aû@drmaddkap the thing that really crosses my mind with the original one is that it's an actual test regarding hard choices.
1) electing to let your family starve because you can't afford it and letting a bad system dictate what you will and won't do
2) risking the consequences imposed by an unjust system to feed your family
Versus the obvious don't hoard...
I mean isn't the first question supposed to be thought provoking?
@drmaddkap since the first question is philosophical in nature about what is "more wrong".
I'd argue that the most ethical person would say it is ethical to steal the loaf of bread to feed their family when they have no choice.
Then again, forcing people to have to make such decisions in the first place is even more unethical... that speaks to lawmakers, food providers, and others tied to that being in the wrong.
The later question doesn't need any analysis, it's just plain wrong to hoard
Sjaak K. 🇳🇱🇪🇺🍋@drmaddkap
“The ethics of ethics”
“The ethics of ethics”
@drmaddkap because ethics questions are about trying to make doing horrible things to people seem “okay” rather than actually wanting to do good things to people.
JJ Krawczyk@drmaddkap mostly because moral philosophers have not specifically had to wrestle with that question, both because the probability that any single given human is that shit is vanishingly small, and because those shit humans tend not to be philosophers.
King Naga Calyo Lucere-Delphi@stripey @drmaddkap The profundity of this response is incredible.
I love it.
@dragonarchitect every so often, I took a toot that makes me worth knowing. ;)
Slatian@drmaddkap Because the second one isn’t interesting, the answer is obviously “no” and there are people who care about that being unethical and then there are those that do the hoarding.