Hatred: Debate

[Xar]

And it's "diagnosis" is made within a subjective, relative and contextual framework that can differ for every person.

Although it is true that certain forms of evil depend on the culture, rather than the person, and that some other concepts of evil might be common to most of humanity (save for some deeply disturbed individuals) and we don't have enough evidence to prove that they weren't the same for our ancestors.

[Avatar]

Not sure I follow you there Xar. Are you saying that we think the same things are evil as our ancestors did? Or that we think different things are evil? Or something else entirely?

--A

[Xar]

Not sure I follow you there Xar. Are you saying that we think the same things are evil as our ancestors did? Or that we think different things are evil? Or something else entirely?

--A

I'm saying that there are some "evils" that most societies - or even most of humankind - recognize as evil, save for some depraved individuals; but also that we cannot be sure that our ancestors didn't feel the same way about the same things, so we cannot say whether these evils have always been considered to be such. For instance, child abuse. Few would argue against its evil - save for pedophiles, of course; we do have historical records of people in the past abusing children, but was that commonly accepted, or were people horrified by it - and just didn't have the power to stop it?

[Avatar]

Hmmm, I think you're agreeing with me: That things now considered evil were once acceptable.

--A

[Xar]

Hmmm, I think you're agreeing with me: That things now considered evil were once acceptable.

No, I'm saying that we have no proof whether that is the case or not. While historical documents say that certain people in ancient times abused children, in most cases these documents speak of wealthy or important people who likely had enough power to avoid being persecuted, especially in those times; this does not mean, however, that other people did not look upon these actions with horror or disgust; it simply means we do not know that. So I'm saying that we cannot know for sure that what you say is correct - we cannot know for sure that things now considered evil were once acceptable.

[Avatar]

Perhaps not all things. I don't think itmakes a difference whether we can prove whether or not something which we hold as commonly "evil" were universally thought or not thought so.

Slavery is a fine example. It was certainly considered acceptable by a significant number of people. Today it is considered evil. I think that that is more than enough evidence to show that something currently evil was not always seen so, although certainly depending on culture, society, station etc.

The same applies today. There are cultures in which female circumscision is considered not only normal but desireable. Other cultures consider it evil or at least barbaric. The very fact that it is possible for both views to exist tells me that "evil" is as relative as almost anything else.

Perhaps our shared concept of it is even widely disseminated. But if an evil act cannot be universally described as evil, then evil can only be subjective.

--A

[Marv]

I HATE, HATE, HATE it when I turn the gas on for the stove and my match goes out.

But it's a positive hate because I'm very careful not to let it happen the next time.

[Holsety]

Not sure I follow you there Xar. Are you saying that we think the same things are evil as our ancestors did? Or that we think different things are evil? Or something else entirely?

--A

I'm saying that there are some "evils" that most societies - or even most of humankind - recognize as evil, save for some depraved individuals; but also that we cannot be sure that our ancestors didn't feel the same way about the same things, so we cannot say whether these evils have always been considered to be such. For instance, child abuse. Few would argue against its evil - save for pedophiles, of course; we do have historical records of people in the past abusing children, but was that commonly accepted, or were people horrified by it - and just didn't have the power to stop it?

Even in the case of something like child abuse, the groups which violate it may have a way of interpreting it to satisfy their own conscience. Some pedophiles argue that they love children, and that a true adult-child relationship runs both ways. A parent who beats their child may say it's "for their own good" and that not using harsh discipline would, in the end, be a failure on the part of the parent to improve the child.

I'm not saying these are right, but I think that because these justifications are present, we can say that hurting a child in and of itself is widely regarded as wrong, even by those who end up hurting children.

I HATE, HATE, HATE it when I turn the gas on for the stove and my match goes out.

But it's a positive hate because I'm very careful not to let it happen the next time.

Do you hate the stove, the match, or yourself?
EDIT-OOOHH DEEP ONE THERE!

[Tjol]

Just because an individual can conjure an excuse for why they committed evil does not necessarily take away from the qualitative nature of the evil performed.

i.e. self-delusion does not render the actions of one's hands innocent.

[Avatar]

Just because an individual can conjure an excuse for why they committed evil does not necessarily take away from the qualitative nature of the evil performed.

i.e. self-delusion does not render the actions of one's hands innocent.

But if a person doesn't think he's being evil, can you accuse him of it? The result of his action might have been "qualitatively" evil, (whatever we decide that is), but if he thought he was doing good, is he actually himself/i] evil?

--A

[Marv]

I HATE, HATE, HATE it when I turn the gas on for the stove and my match goes out.

But it's a positive hate because I'm very careful not to let it happen the next time.

Do you hate the stove, the match, or yourself?
EDIT-OOOHH DEEP ONE THERE!

Hmmm...I don't hate the match, I hate the company that makes matches. I don't hate the stove cos' it's only fulfilling it's stated purpose and can't be blamed for the matches' inadequacies. I have a mild hatred towards myself for letting such things get to me. I aim most of my hate towards the significant lack of technological advances in the heating-of-food industry over the last 15 years. Microwaves ruin food!!! WHERE ARE THE STAR-TREK REPLICATORS I WAS PROMISED!!? And the only alternative to cold food is to use the bloody stove which opens up the peviously stated can of worms.

Don't even get me started on the bloody toaster!

[emotional leper]

Just because an individual can conjure an excuse for why they committed evil does not necessarily take away from the qualitative nature of the evil performed.

i.e. self-delusion does not render the actions of one's hands innocent.

But if a person doesn't think he's being evil, can you accuse him of it? The result of his action might have been "qualitatively" evil, (whatever we decide that is), but if he thought he was doing good, is he actually himself/i] evil?

--A

I'll refrain from Godwining this thread, but this is the crux of the problem. Ethnocentrism. The idea that the standards of your society, and your morals, customs, et cetera, are the ones from which all should be judged. In our society, suicide is never acceptable, under any circumstances. In others, it's a moral requirement.

There is no such thing as absolute morals. All people and all societies in every age and generation define them as they will. In my view, all successful and correct systems of morals are based on reducing inter-personal friction. Not systems of legality, but systems of morals. Polyamory is something I dislike in general, though I don't think it should be banned or stopped, because in general, people aren't able to swing it. Humans are, by and large, jealous beings. Monogamy exists (culturally) because it's a way of reducing interpersonal conflict. ( It also exists, and existed, for many other reasons. Surety of the parenthood of children, which in the past came up to pretty much property rights, religious reasons, and due to the fact that it's easier for a couple to raise a child than it is for an individual to do the same, which ties in heavily with sexual selection in the human population. Quality of Children over Quantity.)

In re: Child Abuse, when I was younger my father regularly disciplined me in manners that are legally considered child abuse. He even got into trouble for it once or twice. I'm glad he did. The reason one disciplines children is because they are too mentally immature to understand the reasons for (or for not doing) certain things, or they cannot fully appreciate the consequences of their actions. However, one thing that all children understand is pain, and fear of pain. If a child does something considered by the parents as inappropriate and is disciplined (spanked, switched or something painful but not damaging), they will correlate their behaviour with a consequence, and in the future will either not do it, out of fear or punishment, or will do it and try not to get caught, out of fear of punishment. If the child then discovers that commiting the act clandestinely is too risky (via getting caught and punished) they will stop doing it. If my father had disciplined physically me when he found out I smoked, instead of restorting to 'modern' means of parenting, the odds are that I would have done it, but secretly (as I did anyway). I did so, and he found out many times. If when found out, I had been further punished, I possibly would have assumed that the benefit was not worth the risk.

I am one who is in favour of bringing back older forms of punishment, such as public execution and flogging. Commit Criminal Sexual Assault in the First Degree (Premediated and/or Violent Rape, atleast in SC)? Off with your head in a public square. Caught drunk driving? 10 lashes in a public square. Of course, you probably will not be concious after three or four lashes, from what I understand of it, but you will by God think twice before doing it again, and it relieves us of the problem of incarcerating you for years. Prison sentancing is a vague, far away punishment that most people have trouble relating to. It also removes one from society, so one cannot contribute to it, and also, prison is likely to permanantly render one at a distance from society.

Now, some would say this violates the 8th Amendment protection against 'Cruel and Unusual Punishment.' Firstly, at the time the Bill of Rights was written, such punishments as Hanging, Shooting, Decapitation, Tar and Feathering, Flogging, Stockades, and many others, were considered neither cruel, nor unusual. Secondly, punishment is only effective when it is cruel and unusual. Cruel, because it must inflict a sufficient pain, in relation to the crime, to stop the person from ever committing it again (death for murder, flogging for drunken driving, would be the example used above), and unusual, because unless punishment is unusual then it will not be remembered. People tend to remember experiences that happen infrequently. I don't remember most of the days of my life (not getting into exact reasons why), but I do remember certain unusual days: The day I moved to my last place, the day I had a threesome, the day someone nearly beat me to death, the day of my grandpa's funeral. There are others, but what all connects them is that they are unusual (infrequent) events.

I'm afraid I've rambled. Let me sum this up by saying that I think Robert Anson Heinlein and I would get along famously, and that 'next to me Ayn Rand looks like a fucking socialist,'* and that the two most important books for forming my moral conscience were Starship Troopers and Stranger in a Strange Land.

[Avatar]

...Ethnocentrism. The idea that the standards of your society, and your morals, customs, et cetera, are the ones from which all should be judged...

...There is no such thing as absolute morals....In my view, all successful and correct systems of morals...

Pretty much agree with all of that, (I'm a fan of Heinlein myself ) except for that last.

Take out the "correct" though and I'm pretty much with that too though.

Morality is a social construct that reinforces the behaviour that any given society deems to be beneficial to it, and discourage behaviour detrimental to it.

Therefore it's perfectly possible to be committing an "evil" by the standards of one society, which is a "good" by the standards of another. (Society, viewpoint, position, group, whatever.)

Now we can qualify and justify whatever we percieve to be moral on that basis. But it doesn't obviate the fact that the morals / whatever are being justified (or negated) by our norms.

Which makes them pretty arbitrary.

This doesn't mean that we should ignore them, or that they are not good working rules for societies, it just means that we must recognise that they bear only the value we ascribe to them.

--A

[Linna Heartbooger]

Now, of course, one of the things I came to realise long ago is that in hating other people, I'm really only hating myself. I don't hate that person, so much as I hate aspects of myself I see in them. Or aspects I see in them that reflect capacities I have in myself that I do not like. I hated my father for a long time for being an emotionaly unreachable bastard because I was one, too. However, once I came to understand the basis for the hatred, it stopped being irrational, and as it was no longer irrational, could be dissected and destroyed.

Hate shall make me strong.

Hate makes me strong by letting me know that there is something I need to work on. When I see someone doing something, and that something makes me hate them, that is a huge signal to myself that I need to sit down and seriously think, and try to understand, that person, and why they do what they do, because it says something about me, and what I do.

So many people, I deem, are inclined to hate so easily, because it is easier to vent anger and rage at a foreign body, and feel satisfaction in the release of the anger, than it is to turn that anger inward and find the cause of it, and correct it.

That and there is a very, very large trend in American Culture to deny the possibility that there can be anything wrong with the self. That all problems are external ones. This is endemic from personal to government levels, I think. But that's a whole other series of discussions.

EL spoke a heck of a lot of sense... I've been thinking about this thread for quite some time.

Hrmm. Well, the thing that's been on my mind is that when we admit we have problems and confront them and work on them, we find out JUST HOW HARD IT IS to change. And then we become more sympathetic to others' weaknesses.

The house-cleaning discussions brought it up. One of the most inspiring things that a friend spoke to me about this was:

It is hard.

When she said that, and illusion was shattered; see I'd been going along with this assumption that it was supposed to somehow be easy, and what was wrong with me that it wasn't?

Well how's that for disrespecting the "debate" intention of this thread. Not really arguing (yet), am I?