It's impossible to tell who is for America and who is against it. However, it is divided into the two categories of who hates America and wishes to act against it, or those who sit and complain but do nothing.
Myself and Ant are taking a business ethics class at College, and it got me thinking. During the dicussions, almost everything we learn has mutliple answers, based on the morality of the topics.
An example: People who gain wealth off inheritance. At some point in the past, the original person who gained the wealth earned it through some means. Thus, by my opinion, he left it for future generations, and thus, they deserve it. Someone then brought up a Columbian Drug Lord (always Columbians...when will they learn). Despite his lack of morality in what he does, I think he deserves the money he got, because he earned it. Not necessarily honestly, and certainly not wholesomely, but he still earned it.
But digressing, that brings us to the question of ethics: Because of the difference in cultures, ethics and morals are incredibly hard to pinpoint. Certain tribes in Africa believe that eating their dead allows the souls of the deceased to live on forever, and they view our practices of burial as barbaric and disgraceful to the dead. We view them as cannibals. Ethics are, as it seems, relative.
Can morals be pinpointed? Is there actually such a thing as right, wrong, or true morality? Discuss.
In any given society there will be "set" moral and rules. They will, of course, differ slightly from person to person, but the boundaries are still the same.
But to say that there's one answer to whether something is moral is completely incorrect. So no, on a broad scale, you can't pinpoint morals. However, if you lessen the scale and focus on one city, chances are, you can pinpoint it to a degree.
It's just depends on who and how many people you're looking at.
Universal moral #1- Never question your country's morals.
Blind Patriotism engeders proper morality? I thought that was organized religions. [/political satire]
FBI kills all traitors?
Well, in a society like ours, it would be nigh impossible to determine who's a "traitor" to the cause of our country unless they directly acted against America. Being as there are anarchists:
It's impossible to tell who is for America and who is against it. However, it is divided into the two categories of who hates America and wishes to act against it, or those who sit and complain but do nothing.
Universal Moral #2- Attack every moral that is not identical with your own. Unless your morals are different than your country's morals.
See image above and then post a couple of American Flags and some pro-patriotism drivel.
GM pretty much ruined it. I mean, me and you, yeah, we had a pretty good discussion going.
But seriously, it's not impossible to determine who's against American. After all, won't the FBI or NSA have a pretty good guideline to what defines a traitor? I'm sure they do. And it's probably along the lines of assisting terrorist attacks, burning the American flag, and so on and so on.
It's far from impossible.
Burning the American Flag, though......it's a disgrace to the country, to be sure, but activists and such do it without intent of actually doing any real harm to our country. Does that make them a threat to our country? Free thinkers, in a sense, are exceedingly dangerous, but I think the fact that we engender such thoughts as a national norm sort of neutralizes the threat of such. I think free thinkers are more dangerous in places where there's less of them.
Much like religion, which can also be attributed to engendering the same wholesome (to a point) community in which a naturally chaotic people can live in an organized, peaceful fashion.
How the hell am I supposed to argue with you if you just agree with me?
Right, I've been thinking about these same things lately, and I'd say religion and laws are two groups of ideas that keep people together because bunches of people acting in the same manner are more easily kept in line. Politically we have figureheads(president, etc.), and religiously as well(duh).
The question about the existence of a "right" and "wrong"... It definitely depends on your culture. But then again I think it is extremely important to stick to your base beliefs of what is right and wrong, and not try to compromise them just because other beliefs exist. For instance, don't go rape and kill a kid because that's what's up in Africa.
Edit: LoS: Yeah! Someone start some controversy!! YEAH!!!
Burning the flag was just an example because I couldn't think of anything else.
I'm just saying, our government seems to take a policy that if it CAN be dangerous, to subdue the threat before it actually happens (see: War on Iraq/Terror/Middle Easterns/Whatever). Thus, I'm amazed we managed to retain our freedoms as it is, though the Patriot Act counteracts that one pretty well.
I don't believe the war on Iraq was a "get it before it gets you" sort of thing. It was probably one of the reasons, but not the only one.
Plus, it's pretty **** hard to take down freethinkers, in comparison to a fairly big country like Iraq. Just identifying a "freethinker" would be a difficult enough, not to mention finding out if it's a threat or not. Then actually subduing it and having to put up with massive amounts of negative feedback.
It's just not plausible, nor a good idea.
You could resort to martial law.
Actually, back on ethics, what about being in the military? Is killing right if it's for your country?
If you win, then yes.
What about conquest? Are we morally supposed to be content with what we have even though we naturally want more?
Look at history books. Notice how we're always on the good side?
Winners of wars write the history of said war. If Germany had won WW2, history books would talk about how the Glorius Fuhrer drove the weak, non-Aryan peoples from the world and such other nonesense. But it didnt, and the books dont say that.
As long as you win, you get to dictate the light in which your actions are viewed. So no matter how harsh and terrible you are, if you win it was the right thing to do.
In before BJ.
I do not understand how morality can be seen as objective. The fact that the world isn't always in complete agreement immediately shows it is not.
[quote=The Judge]What about conquest? Are we morally supposed to be content with what we have even though we naturally want more?
*refers to universal morals 1 and 2*
Yes.
Here's a good question: If you are given falsified information and therefor act in an immoral manor... say shooting and killing people... which, in and of itself is a generaly "bad" thing, I'm sure we can all agree. Now, you do it because you think you have a reason, but you actualy don't because the information was false. Have you therefor done an immoral thing, or are you clear of blame?
You dont ever have to do anything, so your entire arguement is faulty.
Immoral and clear of blame are not opposites.
I disagree with both.
Alright, bad wording. I'll try to rephrase then.
If you act on information thinking it is the right thing to do, but really isn't, was it immoral of you or not.
Either way you are at fault in some way, sorry for bad wording.
I was going on the assumption that murder without reason is bad. I'm pretty sure most places on Earth agree... Anyway since I seem to have made a fool of myself, I think i'll drop the entire line of questioning.
Dont get down, its just that you cant always assume such a thing. Like i said, the rulers of a society deem its accepted values. In parts of Africa, people get killed all the time for no reason with the acceptance of their governments. I dont like it, and you might now, but in that country, its legally acceptible.
If there is any one, rock-solid point of morality, I believe it to be that everyone should have the right to live happily and healthily. Any concept of "morality" has been born from what is just, what is right, what will result in happiness. The problem sometimes is when people try to create intricate guidelines to morality that can ultimately destroy the one truth of preserving happiness.
It is understood that laws are made to uphold morality in a society; in a situation like the beginning of Les Miserables, however, the law says not to steal bread. Without the bread, Jean's family would've starved to death. According to the one truth, it was right for him to take a bit of bread... the store owner would not have been worse off and the family would live another day.
Contrariwisely, the designs of law on the basis of morality cannot be ignored. What if, instead of bread, it was a plasma TV and videogames? What if some dead-end family had enough to eat, but lived in misery and could be cheered up by such technology? As much as it would help, it is not moral. These stolen items are not a necessity, so in theory, everyone would be able to help themselves... and then those in control of the business would be ruined. It would not be moral to leave the poor family in misery, however. the ethical solution would be give of one's self to such people in need. If everyone acted this way, doing what they could to make all those they met happy, it would be a perfect world.
Obviously, such a thing cannot be achievable. There will be always those who will not help, and you can't exactly blame them. Even worse, there are those who will destroy the happiness of others through a variety of possible means as domestic as insult and scorn or as outragious as torture or death. Though it violates the one truth to stop these people from deriving whatever happiness they do out of their actions, it is most moral to choose the greater good, the lesser of two evils. People who can only be happy through the suffering of others do not deserve to be happy... it's an ugly thought, but it is what's ethical.
One blatently obvious topic in the question of morality is war. In a war, it is arguable that you can't choose one as the "hero" nation, as both hold their cause to be most moral. But in the case of WWII, for instance, I really do think the text books are right to say that the Allies were the ethically justified ones to fight against a man who would destroy a living, breathing, thinking, feeling portion of mankind because of his own silly drive to color code the human race.
Ethics can be a difficult question, but I cannot think of an occasion in which the one truth of morality cannot be applied.
The greater good is such bull**** that its not even funny. Go, and watch Swordfish. If you can A)not vomit at Halle Barry's gross saggy boobs and B) still think that the greater good is a valid excuse, then you have no logic in you.
Hitler was a utilitarianist. Sometimes the ends do justify the means, though. Can't think of a situation off the top of my head but I'm positive there is something.