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gnomes2169
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Duke of the Glade
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posted April 29, 2013 03:50 AM |
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Quote: What I am suggesting is objective moral standards based on whether someone/something is harmed and whether that someone/something has moral standing. Then, even if the majority disagrees, they are wrong, and if they act based on their incorrect beliefs, they are violating a being's rights.
I proposed a standard of rights earlier in this topic: If the kind of a being one is is one that is both capable of harming others and of agreeing not to harm, there is a reason to recognize it as having rights.
So then, in your system, who would be enforcing these "objective" moral standards? (The fact that they are moral standards, and thus based on morals, really sort of negates the objectivity, but we can ignore that for now) Creating these standards is good and all, but if no one cares then there is nothing gained by them.
As to the second part; Hiss! Lawyer talk! Purge it with fire and holy water! Again, who would be enforcing this standard? I agree that it is a fine code, but you still need to have a good number of people agree to it, not just some strange gnomes on the internet..
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Yeah in the 18th century, two inventions suggested a method of measurement. One won and the other stayed in America.
-Ghost destroying Fred
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mvassilev
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted April 29, 2013 04:52 AM |
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Morality is objective. We can talk about that in a different topic, if you want, but this isn't the best place for it.
Who would be enforcing the standard? The government, presumably. There has been cases in the history of the United States where the government stepped in to protect the rights of individuals, even though the majority was (and sometimes still is) opposed. Of course, it is more common for the government to do the opposite.
While rights would certainly be better defended if the majority were to be persuaded as to what they are, that is different from the majority deciding what they are, as they do under your system. I might as well ask who is going to enforce majority rule under your system, if there are powerful men with tanks who are willing to crush opposition. The answer to "who's going to enforce it" does not determine whether "it" is right or wrong.
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Eccentric Opinion
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted April 29, 2013 07:49 AM |
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Quote: @JJ
I assume you do not have sexual congress with animals. You are not a vegetarian by your own admission. Therefore you obviously draw a line of some sort between the two practices. Just wondering what the line is. Practicality? I don't think so. Maybe back in the day it was hard to be a vegetarian. But while I wouldn't say it's easy today, it's certainly possible because the lifestyle is more mainstream. So, what is it?
I'm not quite sure what you ask me? There are things the law allows I don't engage in. Smoking tobacco, for example. I have no problem with others smoking, though. Starting Wednesday in my state here in Germany, there will be a complete ban on smoking in pubs and restaurant - in my mind a clear breach of the individual and personal "house rights". My pub, my rules, and if a person has a problem with them, a pub is nothing someone is forced to enter (as opposed to a public building, for example). Now, this law will create a lot of trouble, because smokers will take their drinks and move outside with them to be able to drink and smoke, which means that it will get loud outside of the pub and the neighborhood will feel molested by it.
So I don't quite understand what line you mean that I draw. That we eat meat, that is, the fact that we industrially breed, kill and eat meat pretty obviously shows that animals are viewed as some kind of prey on one hand. On the other people and animals may have quite deep relationships, when it comes to dogs and horses, for examples, but while a lot of cat owners have a strong relationship to their animal as well, whether and how strong it's in return is not so clear. There seems to be a small minority that somehow engage in what might be called "alien sex", but I have absolutely no idea for what reason you should ban and punish that. There is no such thing as an "animal police", and the "cruelty against animals" thing is such an arbitrary thing - you'd first have to prove that WHAT EXACTLY IS in fact cruel against an animal (making it suffer), and then you would have to forbid everything that is cruel in a comparable way.
That's not going to happen, though, which means the law is not law, but simply injustice, which means I'm against it, because laws should be fair, and that one isn't.
For eating meat, I think that eating meat as such isn't the point. The point - or question - is, how is the killing done. We've industrialized the breeding and hunting and fishing and slaughtering, and I would think that people should be forced to at least SEE what is happening with an animal nowadays, of which part of will land on their plate eventually. Maybe it makes sense to let them try and kill an animal for themselves, before they eat it, I don't know. I've spent my childhood in the country, in a household with a pretty large garden, a lot of fruit and small animals, mainly chicken and rabbits. My grandpa would slaughter the chickens, by first catching the one that was due then wringing their necks, then beheading them and so on. Rabbits got killed by taking them by their long ears and hitting them with a short wooden cudgel. I didn't mind him wringing the chickens's necks - but the rabbits were a completely different thing.
Still, I like to eat them occasionally, because they are tasty.
So - I'm still not sure what you want to hear from me?
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Seraphim
Supreme Hero
Knowledge Reaper
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posted April 30, 2013 12:15 AM |
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Edited by Seraphim at 00:19, 30 Apr 2013.
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So I found something funny about hitler, stalin, polpot and atheism.
According to some theists in this thread, hitler,staling and co were evil because of atheism or because they lacked real christian valies and therefore atheism is bad.
Thats as far as I understood it.
Now the funny part:
Quote:
Hitler has gained the reputation for being the very embodiment of darkest evil, who oozed "pure liquid malevolence" right out of his pores. So, he supposedly would only do/like/own things that are as evil as him. Things like wearing clothes, eating, taking a walk, and breathing. Hitler did those things, but that doesn't make them bad. Hitler is not a reason things are bad.
We don't think mass murder is bad because Hitler, Stalin, or other bad people did them. We think those people are bad because they committed mass murder. In other words, this trope is backwards. A thing being bad stands on its own as bad. It would be like...
Bob: I want to commit genocide.
Alice: The Nazis committed genocide.
Bob: Really? What was I thinking? I can't believe I was going to do something the Nazis did.
This is also one of the reasons why we are often loath to admit that a person who we generally always disagree with may actually be right for once. Someone intimidated by this "argument" may invoke No True Scotsman as a "rebuttal". ("Hitler wasn't a REAL vegetarian.")
No true scotsman
Quote:
Angus: No Scotsman puts sugar in his porridge!
Bonnie: But my uncle Scotty MacScotscot does just that!
Angus: Weel, then he's no' a true Scotsman.
And another great phenomenon in the HC, especially by some pesudo-theist members:
Quote:
If you can prove the other side wrong, it makes you right. See False Dichotomy.
If you can word your statements and arguments in a way that is too confusing, intelligent-sounding, or nonsensical for the opponent to respond to, it makes them wrong and it makes you right. See Insane Troll Logic.
If you can shock or confuse your opponent and make them think you are a lost cause and not worth arguing with, you've won. See Argumentum Ad Nauseam.
If you can make an opponent look bad, their logic must be equally as bad, and therefore you are right (see also: Godwin's Law, Ad Hominem, Straw Man). In real life, this one has long been discredited among people with common sense, so it usually won't work.
If you are more popular than your opponent, it makes them wrong and it makes you right.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/HitlerAteSugar
So why I did add this, it is to show and maybe hope that some people should adhere to "Not" using logical fallacies to make a point.
maybe I should make a thread in the WV for this.
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"Science is not fun without cyanide"
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Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
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posted April 30, 2013 03:04 AM |
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Edited by Corribus at 03:04, 30 Apr 2013.
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@JJ
You come down quite aggressively on meat-eating people who talk of animal rights because you view it as a hypocritical position. Yet you eat meat; and I'm pretty sure you don't go out and torture or have sex with animals. So you pretty much behave like everyone else. So what I want to know is: What exactly is the problem and what is the ideal solution, in your mind, to whatever is the problem?
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I'm sick of following my dreams. I'm just going to ask them where they're goin', and hook up with them later. -Mitch Hedberg
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted April 30, 2013 08:52 AM |
bonus applied by Corribus on 01 May 2013. |
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The problem is, that this is a typical case of finding convenient scapegoat for a royal mess-up to have something to show.
Animal lovers are an extremely small group of people who, IF ANYTHING, will hurt an animal once in a while (although that's not a fact - it would have to be proven first), however, doing something icky for most.
The ACTUAL case was against the muslim way of slaughtering animals, which is, without any kind of pain-killing or something. Now the thing is, that meat producers adopt the practice to kill all their animals that way, because it's cheaper that way (for a number of reasons), but marking only a certain percentage. The German government wanted to make a law against that practice of painful animal slaughtering, but got called back by our Supreme Court that ruled, religious freedom would trump the cruelty against animals stuff.
That has been the actual situation.
To make up for that defeat and loss of face they decided to pick on a minority of around 1000 people in Germany and criminalize them, by going back to the time before the 70s, when this was part of the criminalizing of gays.
Now take this, and consider the REAL problems, when you ARE in favor of animal rights: you see how whales suffering and dying from sonar is ignored; you see how, after the all-time of low of fur demand (when Benetton made their shocking anti-fur campaigns), the demand is steeply rising again; you see how everything concerning the oceans and their animals is a big mess; you see, how poorly animals are treated in the food industry; you see, how they are kept as entertainment slaves in zoos; you see how painfully they are killed by certain religions ...
And people have nothing better to do than defend this nonsense against people who may or may not "hurt" animals by having any kind of weird sex with them, but are known to treat the objects of their desire like humans, that is, more than decent apart from that.
Which means, my problem is, that the law is a case of hypocrisy of the worst kind, designed to salvage something out of a clear political mess-up, and everyone actually applauding that, is not only falling for it, but is only - yet again - supporting to hit on the defenseless.
It's like the government wanted to cut down on tax evasion - say, they wanted to make a harsh law against money transfer to tax-free accounts, got a bloody nose with that one and decided to make a harsh law against people living in Alaska who try to buy their gas over the border in Canada, because in Canada they have less tax on it and the gas is a little bit cheaper (hypothetically spoken).
That is my problem. If your house is near collapsing, you don't start repairs with the tap in the kitchen, your wife tells you is dripping. And IF you buy a new tap, there is no reason to party because of that.
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Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
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posted April 30, 2013 02:24 PM |
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I think I understand. Thanks for the explanation.
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I'm sick of following my dreams. I'm just going to ask them where they're goin', and hook up with them later. -Mitch Hedberg
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Elodin
Promising
Legendary Hero
Free Thinker
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posted May 01, 2013 02:43 AM |
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Quote: So I found something funny about hitler, stalin, polpot and atheism.
According to some theists in this thread, hitler,staling and co were evil because of atheism or because they lacked real christian valies and therefore atheism is bad.
Thats as far as I understood it.
If you are referring to me, get your facts straight. When certain anti-theist members of the forum point their bony fingers at theism and start ranting (with spittle flying everywhere) about how religion is responsible for all the bad stuff that happens in the world I like to remind them of all the skeletons in the atheist family closet.
If anti-theists hold the irrational position that Christianity, which teaches to love everyone, do good to everyone and pray for everyone is responsible for liars who claim to follow those teachings but who do evil stuff directly in opposition to Christian teaching then surely they must wholeheartedly embrace responsibility for Lenin, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao, ect who murdered far, far more people than all other religions combined for all of recorded history.
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Drakon-Deus
Undefeatable Hero
Qapla'
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posted May 01, 2013 04:33 AM |
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They weren't evil because they were atheists, but they were atheists and evil. I don't think anyone could deny that.
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Horses don't die on a dog's wish.
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Corribus
Hero of Order
The Abyss Staring Back at You
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posted May 01, 2013 05:19 AM |
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Off topic. This is not the place for (yet another) atheist tyrant pissing contest.
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted July 30, 2013 06:00 PM |
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Mvass, your worst nightmares came through:
In India dolphins are legally declared non-human persons with rights:
Link
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mvassilev
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 30, 2013 06:24 PM |
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted July 30, 2013 06:30 PM |
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The dolphins disagree. (And of course they thank for all the fish).
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OhforfSake
Promising
Legendary Hero
Initiate
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posted September 21, 2013 05:27 PM |
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JollyJoker said: The German government wanted to make a law against that practice of painful animal slaughtering, but got called back by our Supreme Court that ruled, religious freedom would trump the cruelty against animals stuff.
That has been the actual situation.
Wow.. thank you. I just wanted to note the strangeness of how this wasn't generally disallowed on the same token as underage people are disallowed so many thing (unless you're Mvass and see animals as items (sorry)). But this is really unpleasant to read, that what a group of people want can over triumph what an animal does not want, to me it's similar to when democracy says death penalty, despite the person found guilty and sentenced does not want to die.
I otherwise thought Germany was one of the more sensible countries, but I guess not in this regard at least.
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xerox
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 21, 2013 05:31 PM |
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Quote: an animal does not want
How do we know what an animal wants or does not want? Is it even possible to know?
Honestly, I can't make up my mind if animals have rights or not.
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Over himself, over his own
body and
mind, the individual is
sovereign.
- John Stuart Mill
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OhforfSake
Promising
Legendary Hero
Initiate
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posted September 21, 2013 06:53 PM |
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The only way I imagine is in the same sense we can say evolution has a "purpose", which is doesn't really have, it's merely the rules that those which survives continues, so those which survives tries to continue, without necessarily having a free will to decide to do so.
That's the reason I think one can claim something like that.
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Living time backwards
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