Support for Things That Harm Others

[Fool]

I’m sure I’m misunderstanding you here but just to be on safe-side: are you saying that you consider us to have the authority to label women (all women [generally/ categorically, that is]) as being called to serve humanity through their wombs?

You may be saying that. Some people really do think like this. I stay away from them.

We are always either a host or a guest. Men too

 

[Left Coast]

If God knows you, you are a person.

God supposedly knows all things, even non- existent potentialities.

 

[Revoltingest]

Technically that's not true.

Exhibit A. 22 cal. Concrete driver.

Reminds me of The Wire.
Snoop & Chris used those to seal victims'
bodies inside abandoned row houses.

 

[Altfish]

Wrong. Every participant in a capitalist system is a volunteer. Customers, investors, employees, suppliers all choose to participate and are free not to participate.

Capitalism is freedom.

But women in (say) Texas are no longer free - so is Texas a Communist state?

 

[Fool]

If God knows you, you are a person.

Killing an innocent person on purpose is murder.

Fetuses aren't persons. The Bible doesn't acknowledge fetuses as viable, living humans

 

[Stevicus]

Wrong. Every participant in a capitalist system is a volunteer. Customers, investors, employees, suppliers all choose to participate and are free not to participate.

Capitalism is freedom.

That's your story. Written history tells a different story about capitalists and what they do - from sweatshops to slavery to robber barons to mafiosi. Stories of exploitation, beatings, murder, strikebreaking, colonialism, imperialism, racism - all in the name of making higher profits.

Are you still going to try to convince me that capitalists truly care about the value of human life? Seriously?

 

[Viker]

It's worth considering the similarities more than the differences.
Consider that both are dangerous, & both are regulated.
Clearly, the regulation is inadequate to the task.

You're looking at the end result of dangerous.

I'm looking at the purpose of design and intention. Yes, they can be considered tools. One made for travel one made to harm/injure/kill. One is not as regulated as the other. Regulation is a tool and it requires care and maintenance as well. Regulation is not designed to impede use, it may actually improve the quality of what is intended to regulate. Regulation is also not for elimination of but reduction of malfeasance or neglect. If regulation is inadequate then it needs review and refinement. We need rules and standards. It's just a fact of life. We also need penalties for disregard.

 

[Left Coast]

Exposure to people of various religious and cultural backgrounds online was also why I started questioning my former beliefs about them. Talking to LGBT people and realizing the abstract notions of them I had in mind were false and exaggerated also certainly set off a chain reaction of doubt and reconsideration in my mind.

Interestingly, it was definitely internet exposure that started changing both my political and religious views when I was younger. Without it, I would've surely remained much longer in my rather sheltered bubble with a much narrower exposure to views and people.

 

[Yerda]

The abortion industry is a billion dollar death cult.

It's actually a medical procedure carried out by trained professionals. But don't let me interrupt your deranged howling with facts.

 

[Hermit Philosopher]

We are always either a host or a guest. Men too

Just leave out the [spiritual] “calling” bit. That can only come from within.

 

[Nakosis]

This question is not just about abortion but also any other freedom that considerably affects specific groups' well-being, health, or safety.

If you are a conservative, liberal, or otherwise and you oppose, say, the legalization of elective abortion, right to proselytize or openly practice one's religion (which is banned in some countries, such as Saudi Arabia, for all but the majority religion), or same-sex marriage, how do you square that with having friends who may be negatively affected by such legislation?

For example, I have conservative friends who have told me that knowing me has changed their views on apostasy: whereas they previously believed that apostates should face capital punishment, knowing one on a personal level has added a layer to their views on the issue that they didn't consider before. They changed their mind when the issue no longer became a mere distant abstraction to them.

So, if you support or oppose certain things such as the above and know someone who falls into a category of people who will be affected by them, do you take into consideration the effects of said views or a vote based on them on your friend, acquaintance, etc.? How do you address the knowledge that they may be harmed by something you endorse?

Harm is relative. We see differently what is the greater harm. Maybe a shock to some but we don't all share the same moral values.
What you see as the greater harm maybe different from what someone else sees.
I don't see my morals as better than yours, just different.

With democracy, we all get a voice to decide for the group which moral values to enforce. Democracy doesn't guarantee that my personal moral values will be enforced.
In the US we have a political system we can work with to change our laws. Sometimes it aligns with out personal moral values and sometimes it doesn't.
Got to accept what feels good for us personally may not be what the majority feels is good.

 

[KW]

Free access to guns kills the innocent.

It is part of the culture of death pushed on us by the right.

It treats human beings as pop-up targets to be slaughtered.

Idiocy on the left is relentless.

 

[Fool]

Interestingly, it was definitely internet exposure that started changing both my political and religious views when I was younger. Without it, I would've surely remained much longer in my rather sheltered bubble with a much narrower exposure to views and people.

This site in particular has been instrumental in helping me grow and realize thar everyone deserves love and autonomy. Not to be treated like an object of hate and desire

 

[Saint Frankenstein]

This question is not just about abortion but also any other freedom that considerably affects specific groups' well-being, health, or safety.

If you are a conservative, liberal, or otherwise and you oppose, say, the legalization of elective abortion, right to proselytize or openly practice one's religion (which is banned in some countries, such as Saudi Arabia, for all but the majority religion), or same-sex marriage, how do you square that with having friends who may be negatively affected by such legislation?

For example, I have conservative friends who have told me that knowing me has changed their views on apostasy: whereas they previously believed that apostates should face capital punishment, knowing one on a personal level has added a layer to their views on the issue that they didn't consider before. They changed their mind when the issue no longer became a mere distant abstraction to them.

So, if you support or oppose certain things such as the above and know someone who falls into a category of people who will be affected by them, do you take into consideration the effects of said views or a vote based on them on your friend, acquaintance, etc.? How do you address the knowledge that they may be harmed by something you endorse?

I've known multiple women who have had abortions (for some reason, women like to tell me such secrets, when they haven't told anyone else), including relatives. I was almost aborted, myself. Of course I think of other people. I don't know what bubbles you people have lived in, but I was never sheltered from the world.

I disagree with the premise that my views harm anyone.

 

[Fool]

Just leave out the [spiritual] “calling” bit. That can only come from within.

An answering is a call back. Can be internal or external.

 

[LuisDantas]

So, if you support or oppose certain things such as the above and know someone who falls into a category of people who will be affected by them, do you take into consideration the effects of said views or a vote based on them on your friend, acquaintance, etc.? How do you address the knowledge that they may be harmed by something you endorse?

In these days of rising fascism here in Brazil, I have pretty much had to accept that there is no way around it.

Fascism - and the far-right and the alt-right in general - are pretty much built on the need to choose between them and the general good. In a very real sense, they make hostages of both themselves and their opponents.

I have decided that I can't feel responsible for other people's decisions to tie their well being to promises of hatred, dishonesty and predation. It is bad enough that they actually did that. My hesitation to call them up for their mistakes would not help any.

 

[Debater Slayer]

Harm is relative. We see differently what is the greater harm. Maybe a shock to some but we don't all share the same moral values.
What you see as the greater harm maybe different from what someone else sees.
I don't see my morals as better than yours, just different.

With democracy, we all get a voice to decide for the group which moral values to enforce. Democracy doesn't guarantee that my personal moral values will be enforced.
In the US we have a political system we can work with to change our laws. Sometimes it aligns with out personal moral values and sometimes it doesn't.
Got to accept what feels good for us personally may not be what the majority feels is good.

An extension of arguing for relativism of harm in a legal context is that we end up with situations where someone may argue that, say, blasphemy is more harmful than murder (and this is an argument I have heard from a lot of people where I live).

In such cases, should a legal or political power give their view of harm as much consideration as something like a medical threat to life? At what point does relativism become secondary to practical outcomes and effects?

 

[ChristineM]

More idiocy.

You answer my hypotheticals with what i consider an idiotic answer.

And I don't to idiocy, hence my last comment

 

[Revoltingest]

You're looking at the end result of dangerous.

It's not the only way to see things.
But it's a useful one when designing public policy.

I'm looking at the purpose of design and intention.

There is no singular design or intention.
The target rifles I shot back in the day
are less deadly than a baseball bat.

Yes, they can be considered tools. One made for travel one made to harm/injure/kill. One is not as regulated as the other. Regulation is a tool and it requires care and maintenance as well. Regulation is not designed to impede use, it may actually improve the quality of what is intended to regulate. Regulation is also not for elimination of but reduction of malfeasance or neglect. If regulation is inadequate then it needs review and refinement. We need rules and standards. It's just a fact of life. We also need penalties for disregard.

Design to kill is often criticized, but this is facile.
Sometimes guns should kill, eg, war, self defense, hunting.

 

[Twilight Hue]

You know of course what i was talking about, this is a new(ish) invention based on tools that were designed to kill. Even though its general use has changed gor this device it is still capable of taking life.

So is a sledgehammer to the head. Come to think of it, are hammers tools, or weapons of war?

Guns can be seen in the same light.