People are starving, dying, and we eat, drink and are making merry
In recent times we have all seen of scenes of death and destruction. Apart from wars, the Covid 19 Pandemic and the simple fact of starvation all play their part.
Is it that people do not care, do not know or do not want to do anything about it?
I think it is called callousness, and is causing many many problems worldwide.
Is it that people do not care, do not know or do not want to do anything about it?
I think it is called callousness, and is causing many many problems worldwide.
"Famine, Affluence, and Morality" is an essay written by Peter Singer in 1971 and published in Philosophy & Public Affairs in 1972. It argues that affluent persons are morally obligated to donate far more resources to humanitarian causes than is considered normal in Western cultures. The essay was inspired by the starvation of Bangladesh Liberation War refugees, and uses their situation as an example, although Singer's argument is general in scope and not limited to the example of Bangladesh. The essay is anthologized widely as an example of Western ethical thinking.[1]
Comments (81)
Mostly, it is that it seems far away, and not quite real, and people are immersed in their own sets of concerns/pressures, and are themselves just trying their best to feel okay. Most are struggling on some level. And even if it is the case that people can send money to organizations that can effectively help, people feel helpless. When you just send money somewhere, it is hard to see that it actually does some good.
People also, I think, sadly, though they probably won't admit it to themselves, are a little bit glad to see bad things happening elsewhere, to other people, far away where it can't touch them. Comparatively, it makes them feel a little better about their own lot. It's like the Tool song: Vicarious
Surely you've watched something terrible on the news with someone else and have said something along the lines of, "That's terrible!", while at the same time feeling a subtle lift, a little thrill that you wouldn't dare acknowledge. And then you went about your day, cracked a beer, or whatever. I bet we've all done it.
We even get something, I think, out of looking at the bad things in the world and watching ourselves being concerned about it. It can be a kind of little performance we do for ourselves, so that we might consider ourselves good people, worthy of love ourselves. I remember Victor Frankl talking about this, how we cry for others and then cry a little extra for ourselves, while patting ourselves on the back for being such compassionate people. We probably also unconsciously perform our caring for others, so that they might see us as good people.
It's also a little hard to take it all in, to really appreciate what's going on around the world. It's hard to carry the weight of the world's suffering on your shoulders. Naturally, much of the time, we just want to shut it all out and pretend that this cute puppy in front of us is all there is.
For me, in my darker moments, there is also sometimes just the feeling that this is just how the world is. There is just a sense of looking at all the suffering out there, seeing it also in my own life in various forms, and just feeling depressed, just wanting to go to sleep and not see it anymore. There is a paralysis. Addressing it can seem like trying to mop up the ocean.
People are also suspicious, sometimes for bad reasons, sometimes for good reasons, of anyone asking for money. Even if they want to help, they aren't sure how best to do so or even how to find out how to best help. And they don't have a lot of spare time.
Such apathy is useless imo. I am not suggesting you are personally apathetic, as you have only typed about the way that many people do initially react to bad news stories.
Each of us can help change things. No-one is powerless, we can vote, we can protest, we can donate, we can pressurise, we can organise and unite in common cause, we can communicate/debate/discuss with each other, even on places like TPF. We can each do much, much more than say 'that's terrible' and feel secretly satisfied that what you saw in the news is not currently happening to you. Those who decide to become nihilistic, depressed, hermitical, pessimists, certainly won't change anything for the better for anyone, including themselves.
If you don't eat and drink, when others are starving and dying of hunger, thirst or any other cause, then you will be too busy dying yourself, to help stop them from dying.
And much more popular and clear -- listen to Bono's words
Here is a group I am a member of, which is well organised, and is doing a better form of politics than most, imo. It's only under 3 mins long and I suggest it, not as any kind of recommendation of the group, but merely just as an example of people working in common cause, to help (at least in my opinion) to improve the human experience.
I will pick a mod at random! Say @Baden, (just because I don't want to always burden Jamal!),
just to ask if posting such a wee vid is ok in the context I am using it here? If not then I will understand its removal. I don't want it to seem like I am on a recruitment drive, for any political group, including those very few, I am a member of.
On what basis? No 'nation' present in Africa, the Americas or Oceania is a natural society: all the borders have been drawn around displaced and dispossessed peoples by colonial powers who had no concern for the natives' relation to the land or one another. Of course such artificial states fail, and expecting the same colonizers to rebuild them into solid national structures is unrealistic, to say the least.
Self-determination and independent governance for individual ethnic groups would be a start - at least in ending the armed conflicts. However, the allocation of territory remains problematic, as the economics of the colonial and post-colonial periods has changed the landscape itself.
"We", by which posters usually mean prosperous western countries, on the government level have no diplomatic, strategic or financial interest in redistribution of land, resources, water rights, and certainly nothing to gain by intervention in foreign administrations. So, that's not going to happen until the UN assumes one-world government or hell freezes over, whichever comes last.
Individually, we can support organizations that make sensible contributions to local improvement: water, shelter, agricultural improvement, education, hunger relief, medical aid and micro loans. We can also vote for candidates who put forward benevolent and fair policies, instead of tax cuts and more military spending.
Quoting Tom Storm
Yes, children have an innate sense of justice, until it's beaten or bribed out of them.
I think the United Nations is not the solution either. It is a Western-like systematic structure which only roots for the USA or European values. I think that the future of Africa can be managed by the African Union. The problems of their continent being managed by themselves without the intervention of foreign nations, which are unknown about the real problems of Africa.
Who? How? With what available instrument?
Military occupation and colonial governance? Redrawing the borders and patrolling the new ones with peacekeeping forces? How are the western countries doing all this even to hold an alliance among themselves long enough to accomplish it?
Meanwhile, people suffer and die and are persecuted.
Quoting javi2541997
Sound good. If it has the means to stop arms coming in from greedy westerners and easterners, advisors coming in from westerners and easterners (not forgetting China's keen interest) seeking political advantage, essential resources flowing out to western and eastern buyers. I dunno! Clear out all the Europeans, Americans and Asians, then blockade the whole continent and let them figure it out like they used to? We can't *gasp* do that! It contains oily bits near the top! And where do you put all the Afrikaners?
Is Hell getting any cooler yet?
Quoting Vera Mont
Why should they be removed from Africa? They can live together with the rest of the citizens, ethnics, tribes, people, etc.
Isn't that how the killing usually begins? Lots of people object to living together with certain other people.
Everyone seems to be failing in Africa, except maybe itinerant medics.
But why does this happen at all? It seems that you give up on the close up on the relationship between the Afrikaners and the original ethnics of Africa. It should not have to end badly.
I agree - it should not. Individually and in small groups, humans can work out all kinds of problems. In large numbers, we're crazy and it so often does.
There are several gripes I would have with that:
- How much should one donate? How often? To what causes?
- What if money can't solve the problem? Am I morally obligated to fly over there and start digging wells?
- What if I am a poor person living in a rich country? Am I obligated to donate? Or are people morally obligated to donate to me?
This idea of donating as a moral obligation raises way too much questions and makes little sense to me.
People aren't put on this Earth to make other people's problems their own, and it is generally a good thing that they don't, especially when it comes to problems they know little about.
I strongly believe in the idea that people should first 'get their own house in order', before moving on to other people's problems. The latter often becomes an excuse not to do the former, and as such few problems actually end up getting solved, the result being nothing but a misplaced sense of moral superiority.
If problems were easy to solve, people would have probably been able to solve them on their own. Hubris in this regard has a way of creating more problems, not less. So even when one is being charitable, one should be humble.
Lastly, I dislike the idea of donating money. Simply because sending money rarely solves problems, from both a practical and an economic point of view - it may even cause them. It feels more like an easy way to feel good about oneself, without actually doing much.
It becomes an excuse not to take on problems that are closer to home - problems which one might actually have a good understanding of and be able to solve.
All in all, I believe charity is a moral virtue, but it must be done wisely and humbly, and as such cannot simply be considered a 'moral obligation' - as something to be done without second thought.
Sometimes charity is paying one's lonely grandma a visit. Sometimes charity is telling someone a harsh truth. I don't think money has much to do with it.
The RCC, when it had a monopoly on charitable collecting, had that covered. Tithes were set according the parishioner's income and the current cause was named by the priest.
Not everyone feels obligated to share his good fortune with those whom fate or humankind have treated unfairly. Those who do are able to decide how much they can afford to donate and choose the causes they considers most worthwhile, as well as most likely to make good use of it. Some people, consider it a kind of moral duty - something akin to a debt of honour - to give back when society has been generous to them. Some are aware enough of the larger world to realize that their material comfort came about at the expense of many other people's - perhaps not directly, but through accidents of birth, history and nationality.
Quoting Tzeentch
No. Just make up a bundle of clothes for the local thrift store or a bag of groceries for the food bank or drive a disabled person to their physiotherapy session.
Quoting Tzeentch
No, but many poor people do anyway. If you want people to donate to you directly, ask them - some might feel obligated.
Quoting Tzeentch
Society's problems are everyone's problems. How it goes with eating cake when the people have no bread. It sometimes ends badly for the haves.
Quoting Tzeentch
Nobody's on their own. Problems don't just happen out of nowhere. Since people contribute to causing them for one another, they get better results when they co-operate on the solutions or, failing that, mitigation.
Some businesses and institutions make a serious effort to collect donations from their employees, but they can't legally force you to comply, any more than the church can.
Quoting Vera Mont
Quoting Vera Mont
I get that these are practical guidelines, but not quite the clear delineations one might expect when something is claimed to be a moral obligation.
A moral obligation means one ought to fulfill it always.
That becomes rather difficult without said delineations.
Quoting Vera Mont
I disagree. Societies don't have problems; people, individuals, have problems. Some problems are within one's power to solve, others not.
To take it upon oneself to solve everyone's problems, or the problems of abstract concepts like 'society', is foolish and an act of hubris. That's why much do-gooding ends up not helping anyone.
That isn't to say that charity cannot be good and moral. I believe it is a moral virtue. But sometimes (often?) it seems to turn into a crusade to solve 'the world's' problems while neglecting problems at home.
One doesn't need to travel to the third world to find misery. But many find it much easier to donate some cash to anonymous charities than to pay their lonely grandma a visit.
Most, if not all, problems are human problems, and require human solutions.
Arguing about charitable giving loses sight of the fact that by definition it is voluntary, that is free of moral obligation. If it was obligatory it wouldn't be a charity, it would be a tax.
I agree, however the reasons for failure need to be looked at separately. I think some reasons have been suggested.
Quoting Vera Mont
These are great ideas, but people are starving due to wars, and lack of giving. Is there something that can be done on to change the status quo?
If you feel that obligation, it does mean that. If you don't, you'd probably resent anyone trying to impose it on you. This is true of all moral strictures: unless you subscribe to the canon or ideology in which it is set out as law, you are not bound by them.
Quoting Tzeentch
I see. The 7-billion-islands school of social philosophy. In that case, moral standards do not apply to you, even though the legal ones still do.
Quoting Tzeentch
I have not seen this theory demonstrated.
Quoting Tzeentch
We can't all be everywhere, fighting every fight: we each choose our arena.
Quoting Tzeentch
Certainly. But in a monetized world, individuals can do very little without funding. You can volunteer to babysit for you next door neighbour or wash their windows. But if you grow vegetables for malnourished people in the inner city, how do you bring it to those people without transportation? Volunteers cannot develop vaccines or manufacture drugs, and there may not be local trees and vines to cut down to lash together a schoolhouse.
Quoting LuckyR
Part of it is. If you believe you have done enough by paying your taxes, your obligation ends there.
Quoting FreeEmotion
I doubt it, at this juncture. The world is daily more turbulent; the obscene profits of megabusiness keep sucking resources out of working people's reach; between climate and internecine conflict, more people keep being displaced and dispossessed. The need keeps growing, while the disposable income of compassionate people keeps shrinking.
It's called government. Foreign aid is in the billions of dollars for most Western nations. Whenever the unfortunate ask for a dollar, you tell them the government has already confiscated your dollar for their benefit. Take it up with them.
The state is our collective organ of charity and good will, of peace of mind, and consequently, the source of individual inaction. So long have we relied on it for these purposes that we no longer need to be responsible for each other. There's your safety net; fall into it.
While not quite so dire as that, the situation is deteriorating.
However, volunteerism is alive and well:
People haven't become entirely callous.
This is, I believe a good description of what is happening.
I want to look at this from a personal angle.
As children we are taught to share. Sometimes each child is given the identical toy in order to be 'fair'.
We are told not to throw away food, because of starving children somewhere.
After several decades of seeing terrorism, civil war, financial crises and lock-downs, with people (in the Global South at least) finding it very difficult to live day to day, due to rising costs and fewer opportunities, with a war in Ukraine and in Gaza, the suffering continues.
We - and I mean this loosely - about immediate family - can go through an entire holiday eating, drinking, visiting resorts and watching dolphins, without one word, one word, mind you, about the starving people of the world. Give lip service at least. Think about them. At least Elon Musk tried, and he says 'its not the money - there are wars...'.
I seem to be the only one thinking about this.
I have a challenge: put aside 1 cent every time you have a meal, for the poor.
https://www.wvi.org/newsroom/hunger-crisis/humanitarian-organisations-estimate-one-person-dying-hunger-every-four
9 million people die every year from hunger.
https://www.actionagainsthunger.org/the-hunger-crisis/world-hunger-facts/
https://www.scu.edu/ethics/focus-areas/more-focus-areas/resources/world-hunger-a-moral-response/
And for others, it's an opportunity to be sanctimonious.
Providing the callous a reason to ignore their message.
A very sanctimonious response!
A very predictable one.
Well, don't be too hard on yourself.
Under most ethical theories (Kantianism, Utlitarianism, virtue ethics, most religious based ethical systems), providing some form of charity to others is obligatory. The fact that there is a broad area of choice doesn't diminish that obligation, and it need not be limited to giving money. That you acknowledge charity is ethical (although you think it super-ethical or heroic beyond the call of duty) is an indication that you understand what charity means. That you can't pinpoint the precise amount you might be required to love your neighbor as yourself doesn't mean you are fine to avoid it.
A common idea running throughout this thread is that charity doesn't work, so why give it at all if all you're doing is temporarily postponing the inevitable. I'd just say that because we can't cure the problem is not a reason not to reduce the problem. If we can reduce a person's suffering on Monday only for him to die on Tuesday, I'd think we would be obligated to do that, especially considering how precious and sacred that Monday was, it being his last day.
If one cannot pinpoint it (or at least give an exhaustive explanation), they have no business calling it a moral obligation. That was my point.
Quoting Hanover
I would fundamentally disagree with calling that an obligation.
A person has a right to remain uninvolved.
If not, how come you are here writing posts on a philosophy forum rather than fulfilling your moral obligation of helping people who are suffering? There's no shortage of the latter.
A standard of reasonableness is a standard even if it isn't quantifiable. That is, I have a moral obligation to care for the children I bring into this world, but because that obligation lacks a specific checklist doesn't allow me to walk away without effort. I must engage in reasonable efforts to fulfill that obligation.
Quoting Tzeentch
Again, that I can't quantify it doesn't mean I am free not to give to charity. Under Biblical law, there is the law of tithing, which is taken as an obligation that 1/10 of your income goes to charity. Since neither of us subscribe to a divine command theory that provides a diety as the basis for the percentage of charity we must give, we consider 1/10 arbitrary. If you're not going to rely upon God, you must rely upon man, speficially the reasonable man, the hypothetical being that does things in a tempered and thougtful way, for which he can give reasons for his behavior.
Those reasons to give to charity and the amounts considered reasonable can be based upon various logical structures, for example, those provided by the Utillitarians or those provided by the Kantians.
The point though is that we can all agree that moral behavior requires things like kindness, respect, and consideration to others. That my kindness, respect, and consideration of others might look differently than yours doesn't mean it doesn't exist or that I'm free not to be that way.
The person who does less good is worse than the person who does more good, with good and bad being understood in the moral sense. There is some level where we think the person good even if he doesn't give his every ounce of energy to others because he did give a reasonable enough amount of himself to be recognized as good.
On the other hand, should you see a child bobbing up and down in a pool crying out for help, but you don't want to get any water on your new pants, so you let him die, you are a bad person. You had a moral and you breached that moral duty.
Yes, so what worries me is that people are not true to their own religions or their own ethics. Of course one could give in secret.
Unless you're able to detail said obligations and duties, it follows that every moment you spend doing something else, you're neglecting them. I'm open to hearing why charity should be a moral obligation. By asking for details I'm trying to coax this thread into producing something worthy of discussion.
Personally, I don't believe a moral obligation for charity exists. Pursuing charity as an obligation simply encourages behavior that I would call 'naive do-goodery' - actions with the right intention but lacking wisdom.
Quoting Hanover
I'd agree with that, but the key word here is responsibility. One is responsible for bringing a child into this world, therefore moral obligations may follow from that, and I do believe we could come up with a pretty exhaustive checklist of what that obligation (parenthood) entails.
To loop it back to my first point, we have limited the moral obligation of 'saving children' to 'saving one's own children' - already a lot more reasonable.
None of this is to say that it cannot be moral to save children. If one is successful, then one has obviously done a good deed. It's the obligatory part that I take issue with.
And I also believe people have a right to remain uninvolved, which ultimately means that there is no obligation to save a stranger from drowning, but why one would do that is another question.
Now I remember why i've been sober for almost a year straight. Such thoughts are maddening and any attempt to satiate them is a pointless endeavour. . . including ignoring them. . . or attempting to satiate them through what are actually selfish actions that appear to be 'self-less'. I survive only by turning my gaze away into a kaleidoscope of distractions.
You've changed your objection. Your objection was that there was no obligation to help others because I couldn't quantify the extent of that obligation. Here you say my lack of obligation to others is limited to children other than my own, based I suppose on the fact I caused my children to exist. That is, moral obligation at first hinged upon whether that obligation could be quantified, but here it hinges upon one's duty to resolve issues they have personally created.
Your original objection then sort of flutters away and then for some reason becomes easily resolvable. You now claim there will be no difficulty in quantifying one's obligations to one's own children because, well, that's just easily done.
My response is that it is no harder or easier to quantify one's obligations to one's own children as it is to others. In either instance you're going to have to set out what you believe the minimal reasonable requirements are that one has to his own children versus other children, with likely greater responsibility toward one's own than others Since you've now said I do have an obligation to my own children, I suppose I'm immoral because right this second, I'm doing nothing for them. Surely there is some wisdom I might be able to impart that I'm not doing, but yet I fail.
The way out of the quandary for my own children is the same way out for other people's children. I simply come up with what I think is reasonable for the respective children. That you think I have an obligation to persons A, B, and C and not X, Y, and Z is based upon some theory you've not identified, but it is, as I have said, inconsistent with most, if not all, major secular ethical systems and religiously based ones. That is, you stand within a very small group of people who beleive that ethical duty to others ends at the four walls of your house.
You may wish to say that the person who passes by the drowning child without simply bending down to lift him up is ethically neutral, but I don't. I think that person sucks as a human being and is unethical. I recall a case where a man heard a child being raped in the bathroom stall next to him and insisted he was under no duty to do anything at all. Maybe you would see a horrible wreck on an otherwise deserted road and feel no obligation to make an emergency call and then drive home and snuggle up in your bed without any worry about your ethical decision. If that is you, and I really doubt it is, then you are an unethical person.
The best I can discern from what you've written is that you want to limit communal concern to the greatest extent possible and insist that each family unit is entirely responsible for their existence without any expectation from anyone not within their direct blood line. It has this hyper-tribal Randian feel to it, but it's too unworkable to be taken seriously.
A very clear and thorough explanation!
I simply asked you to quantify the obligation, which you couldn't. Your defense was, 'just because I cannot quantify it, doesn't mean it's not a moral obligation'. Well, if you cannot quantify what you consider to be moral obligations, then I cannot take them seriously.
Quoting Hanover
I never said it was easily done, but in the case of parenthood I think it's quite realistic.
Quoting Hanover
I disagree. Since one's children are born of one's own actions, one is responsible for them. Responsibility, in my view, is a critical component for moral obligations, I'd say almost obviously so.
Quoting Hanover
I wouldn't suppose that. It's quite possible for one to do their moral duties in regards to their children without being occupied 100% of the time.
I highly doubt it would be possible for one to fulfill their moral duties to all children without being occupied 100% of the time. In fact, it's clearly impossible to fulfill such a supposed moral duty.
Quoting Hanover
Yes, as does everyone. But what you think is reasonable is not a basis for a moral obligation, assuming you mean with moral obligation something along the lines of 'something everybody should always adhere to'.
Quoting Hanover
What this seems to imply is that awareness of some perceived harm produces a moral duty to alleviate said harm. This produces once again a supposed moral duty that's impossible to fulfill.
You are aware of a lot of harm being done right now, so why aren't you doing your moral duty? Every moment that goes by, you are the person who is passing the drowning child and refusing to undertake the actions required to stop them from drowning.
All you're doing is pointing at a specific instance of refusing to get involved and calling it unethical, when in fact one is doing the exact same thing in less obvious ways.
Perhaps a fair question one could ask the person who refuses to do good when it seems 'easy' is why one would pass up on such a great opportunity to do a good deed.
Quoting Hanover
I guess you'll have to try harder then, because I see nothing in this paragraph that remotely connects to my views.
Lastly, I'd like to mention a comment made earlier, which I believe gets at a crucial difference between charity and moral obligation:
Quoting LuckyR
When I undertake an act of charity, I do so out of a desire to do good. Not out of fear of being unethical.
Quoting Tzeentch
You can offer specific criteria for what makes a parent a "good" parent to a child, but you can't offer specific criteria for what makes a neighbor a "good" neighbor to a child. Why is that? What is it about parental duty that makes it subject to a differing sort of analysis than neighborly duty? My answer is that there is none. Each is subject to the same sort of analysis, which is a combination of objective factors, probably none of which is absolutely essential, coupled with certain subjective evaluations. That's how we always measure quality. Quality is not reducible to quantitfication, which is precisely what you're attempting to do here. There is not a single set of criteria that assures one they are a good parent or a good neighbor, but there all sorts of variables involved, many of which are subjectively evaluated.
Quoting Tzeentch
And the same towards one's duties towards other children. If a parent can satisfy his duty to his own children by spending only a small amount of time doing that, and that parent has a higher duty to his own children than to his neighbor's children, then it follows he could also satisfy his duty to his neighbor's children by only spending a small amount of time doing that.
Quoting Tzeentch
My question is whether you have a moral duty to do anything at all when you hear a child being raped in the bathroom stall next to you. Yes or no? Quoting Tzeentch
This does not draw a distinction between charity and moral obligation. This draws a distinction between voluntary/discretionary and coerced.
If I perform an ethical act, like telling the truth, that act is ethical if it is "voluntary," but the opposite of voluntary is "coerced." The opposite of coerced is discretionary. So, if I tell the truth with a gun to my head and under such duress that it can be said that I have been relinquished of my free will, so much so that the act is no longer something you will judge me moral or not, then I cannot be said to be moral when I told the truth. The opposite holds true as well, meaning if I lie under the same sort of duress, I would be morally excused from that conduct because it was not the result of my free will.
That I am "obligated" to do something does not mean I have been coerced into doing it. I am obligated to stop at stop signs, but maybe sometimes I don't. When I don't, it has nothing to do with my being coerced to run the stop sign. It might just be that sometimes I choose to be disobedient. The point being, I have the discretion to run the stop sign or not, but I am obligated to stop there, but when I do stop, it is not the result from a loss of free will coercing me to do as I must. That is, an obligation can be accepted or rejected by the person.
As it pertains to morality, I am morally obligated to tell the truth. That is what I must do to be a moral person. It is no coincidence that the ten commandments are commandments, meaning they are obligatory. They are not general guidelines to think about. Kant refers to his standard as the catagorical imparitive. That is, it is what must be done. This is not to say you lack the ability and discretion to do otherwise. In fact, the ability to do otherwise is what makes matters subject to ethical evaluation. If I had no ability but to tell the truth, then I would not be ethical when I told the truth. I'd just be a machine.
One carries responsibility for their child. Not for their neighbor, at least not by default.
Quoting Hanover
Other children are not one's responsibility, unless one has voluntarily taken up responsibility to care for them.
In other words, voluntarily taking up responsibilities might incur moral obligations.
Quoting Hanover
No. It might be a moral good, but it is not a moral obligation. I have already given my objections for why I believe that is.
You are currently aware that many people are suffering in the world, yet you choose inaction towards the vast majority of them. Now you point at a specific instance of suffering and claim that inaction is impermissible. I don't see the basis for it. It seems hypocritical.
Quoting Hanover
Obligation clearly implies coercion - the threat is that of not being an ethical person, which to a lot of people matters a great deal.
Morality is not coerced, unless specific aspects of it are enacted as law. E.g. driving a car on public roads, only if competent to do so; keeping one's house and environs free of potential hazards to passers-by; telling the truth to the best of one's knowledge when testifying in court; refraining from sexual congress with a minor. These are social obligations written into the legal code and enforceable under threat of punishment.
The difference between moral obligation and legal obligation is precisely that the former is not coerced and the latter is. Hence, mandatory payment of taxes by all citizens, so that government can aid and protect all citizens. Any giving beyond that is voluntary; how much one is able and moved to contribute is left to the individual.
Moral obligation is part of the unwritten social contract, according to which the citizen has a stake and a can reasonably expect to be rescued by his neighbours, with the corresponding obligation to rescue them. Such civic duty is usually performed voluntarily by good citizens, but can also be enforced by law, if public opinions leans heavily enough in that direction. In common law, there is a "duty to rescue" , which is not generally written into law - coerced - in the United States, except in particular circumstances, but it is in other countries.
As to whether that obligation extends to people other than one's own family, community or nation, that is a matter of individual world-view. One may feel an interdependence with all of humankind, or life, or the planet - or one may feel that he is not even his own brother's keeper. If that sense of obligation is absent from one's personal morality, it cannot be imposed or instilled by suasion or compulsion.
What is your basis for this rule you just made up?
If you'd like a Utilitarian, Kantian, Biblical, or virtue ethics basis for why I find your rule wrong, I can provide it if you're interested in a philosophical debate.Quoting Tzeentch
Again, you're just making up rules. Quoting Tzeentch
No you didn't. You just stated people don't have duties outside their own children, which is just a restatement of your thesis, not a basis for your position.Quoting Tzeentch
That I can't do everything doesn't mean I am free to do nothing. Again, we all have limitations and all sorts of competing interests, meaning we have to divide our attention among the millions of things that comprise our lives and we can provide reasonable limitations upon what we do.
The ethic you're advancing, which is that we must do everything we can to eliminate all suffering to the greatest extent humanely possible, is not an ethic I subscribe to, nor one that anyone I know does. That is to say, you're presenting a strawman.Quoting Tzeentch
No it doesn't. Obligation and coercion are different concepts even if you don't want to recognize the distinction I drew. I am obligated to tell the truth, but nothing forces me to, so I can lie, oftentimes with impunity. If I am coerced to tell the truth, I am not ethical, even though it was my obligation.
People are responsible for their actions, so they are responsible for their children, so they have moral obligations towards their children.
Quoting Hanover
I believe people have a right not to get involved, because without such a right a system of morality simply cannot make sense.
Quoting Hanover
Quoting Hanover
You believe it is unacceptable to let a drowning man drown. Why do you believe it is acceptable to let people in the third world starve?
This cherry-picking is inherent to your view. You find inaction in one instance abhorrent, and don't bat an eye at the second. It's inconsistent, and your indignation hypocritical.
My view accounts for this, by allowing one to freely choose what acts of charity one does and doesn't get involved in.
Charity is a free and selfless act. A moral obligation is not.
Quoting Hanover
I'm assuming you meant 'unethical'?
Quoting Vera Mont
I disagree.
As I said to Hanover, there is something at stake when we speak of moral obligations: one's moral integrity. To many people that matters a great deal, otherwise we wouldn't be having this conversation.
The threat is clearly there - the threat of being judged an immoral person.
In case one's moral system is derived from religion, the threat is even more overt - the threat of divine punishment.
Quoting Vera Mont
In that case 'moral obligation' would be little more than a fancy term for social custom, to make it sound more authoritative.
Personally, I think social customs tell us very little about morality.
Quoting Vera Mont
Well, no.
One may believe they have all sorts of moral obligations to their nation, or even the entire world. But this is nonsensical, because such obligations one cannot fulfill.
People who claim they have moral obligations and subsequently are not making every effort to fulfill them are just fooling themselves, in my opinion.
Maybe it makes them feel good about themselves to claim they have such lofty ambitions towards the Good, but I view it as empty virtue-signaling. Even worse when they use such so-called "obligations" to judge others.
You have no moral obligation to me to tell the truth? You didn't create me.
The vast majority of ethical conduct occurs outside family members and it relates to social obligations because you are a social creature living in a social community. Quoting Tzeentch
You have a right to do whatever you want, but the fact you have the right doesn't mean your decision will be moral. I have the right to decide whether to lie or tell the truth to you, but my moral obligation is to tell the truth, and the consequence of my lie is that I will be unethical if I do.
Of course, our use of the term "right" here is not at all the way "right" is typically used when referencing civil rights and things like that.
Quoting Tzeentch
If you see no difference between me sitting on a chair eating popcorn while watching a child slowly die from a fall off a swing and me not flying to Ethiopia to make a meal for a starving child in terms of ethical analysis, then I can't help you.
I also don't think anyone within your community will find your response to watching the baby slowly die very persusive when you tell them they are just as bad as you are because they haven't solved the world hunger problem. The reason they will think you are an unethical person is because you would be, regardless of how blue in the face you argue that they are confused about what makes a person moral and immoral.
Quoting Tzeentch
A custom and contract are different.
Quoting Tzeentch
Unless the moral obligation is does not include the requirement we must "make every effort to fulfill them." No one has ever said that other than you (over and over in fact). The rule that I must give to charity can be qualified howerver we determine that moral rule to be, which might be 10%, it might be a certain percentage of discretionary income, it might be limited to helping others after other duties (including those to one's self) are fulfilled.
Your approach to append an impossible standard on the rule is what makes it impossible, but that's only because that's how you've decided to do it. Your system does provide you a convenient way to absolve yourself of all societal responsiblity and to live as selfishly as possible, so it does have that advantage, although your society might fall short of maximizing happiness.
Since you don't think you have a duty to interfere in a child rapist's activities in the bathroom stall next to you, does anyone other than that child's parents have that right? I mean, why should society provide police and prosecutors to interfere in such conduct and impose upon themselves the rights and duties associated with that?
Given the limited access people have to 'the truth', what would such a moral obligation even look like? Does answering "I don't know" to every question fulfill the obligation? It would be truthful.
But keep in mind that 'telling the truth' is an action one undertakes, and as I said one bears responsibility for their own actions.
Quoting Hanover
There's a difference. It's just not a relevant one.
Quoting Hanover
I don't see how people's opinions are all that relevant to a discussion about morality. People used to believe witch hunts were moral.
I'm also not sure why you are so keen on making this personal. The question isn't about what I would do, but about how I would judge someone who chooses not to get involved.
Quoting Hanover
Sure. That's the point of a moral obligation. Shouldn't I make every effort to fulfill your supposed moral obligation of having to save the drowning man?
Or do I get to choose how much effort I put in, and am I free to choose no effort at all?
Quoting Hanover
"Morality is whatever we want it to be." - I'm not convinced.
Quoting Hanover
The impossible standard is inherent to the moral obligation(s) you're proposing. That's what I am objecting to.
Your proposed solution is cherry-picking. Not very convincing either.
Quoting Hanover
Why would that be an advantage?
It's rather typical that you've been trying to frame me as being selfish when nothing we've discussed has anything to do with how I conduct myself.
Maintain a bit of class. Assuming the other side is morally bankrupt is intellectual poverty.
Quoting Hanover
Individuals who join the police force accept the responsibility that comes with that. So I'd say they can no longer choose not to get involved.
Why society should provide police forces and prosecutors? Your guess is as good as mine. I don't really care either way.
That 'threat' is ever present. Unless you are a hermit in a remote cave, people will judge whatever actions you take or fail to take or refuse to take.
Quoting Tzeentch
It's not a question of authority but of interdependence. Customs arise from what works in a society.
Quoting Tzeentch
What one believes is the deciding factor in what one does. One certainly can fulfill a sense of obligation by giving what they can, doing what they can. Obligation can never extend beyond ability.
Quoting Tzeentch
So you do. That odious phrase is a dead giveaway. Expressing any opinion about right and good is automatically bad and dishonest. Only callous people are truly virtuous; compassionate ones are just pretending. What a complete stinker Plato must have been!
Responsible to whom?
This comment makes me regret ever having begun this conversation with you. You now don't know what a lie is. Super. I can't be sure there are other minds than mine either. This isn't a profound observation. It's just nonsense.
Quoting Tzeentch
Your sentence could end with the words "to others," meaning how you treat others matters for ethical analysis, including whether you watch them suffer while you stand idly by.Quoting Tzeentch
You said there is no ethical problem with watching a child get raped while eating a bowl of popcorn. If you do that from time to time, you would only be ethically bankrupt if that was unethical, but you've told me it's not.
The truth is I don't think you think that, which means I don't take your position seriously. It's nonsense. Quoting Tzeentch
It's not a guess. It has to do with providing public safety. I also don't believe you don't care if your community has law enforcement.
Your arguments aren't persuasive, believable, or even intriguing.
If you're going to argue a moral obligation exists to tell the truth, you had better be able to delineate exactly what truth is. And obviously you can't - no one can.
That's not nonsense. That's a massive hole in your argument which you're trying to disguise by posturing and indignation. Seen it all before.
Quoting Hanover
This is an inaccurate representation of cause and effect.
When a man drowns, it is not the uninvolved person who remains uninvolved that made him drown.
Quoting Hanover
Yet here you are, doing the equivalent of eating popcorn while people are starving.
You've yet to give me any reasoning for why that would be ok, other than alluding to there being some fundamental difference which you have yet to present.
Also, what is with the preoccupation with children being harmed? Having to resort to extremes doesn't speak in favor of your argument, and it's unsavory.
Like I said, maintain some class. It's possible for people to disagree and remain civil.
Quoting Hanover
Oh?
Quoting Hanover
Quoting Hanover
Quoting Hanover
Yet here you are.
The truth is, I think you're trying to find excuses not to deal with the problems in your reasoning as I have pointed them out, and you are now clutching at straws.
Quoting Vera Mont
Sure. I don't see how that is remotely connected to questions about morality, though.
People have silly ideas about what makes their society 'work' all the time.
Quoting Vera Mont
That sounds reasonable on the surface, but I think people take up responsibilities that they cannot fulfill all the time. Taking up responsibilities (and thus moral obligations) that exceed one's ability is just a terribly unwise thing to do.
Imagine I were to find a job as a lifeguard, but I myself am unable to swim. Obviously I have taken upon myself a moral obligation to save people from drowning, yet fulfilling it is something I can never do.
Quoting Vera Mont
Well no, that's obviously not what I meant.
My problem is when people put forward standards for moral behavior with which they judge others, while simultaneously refusing to walk the talk themselves. That's hypocritical, and usually little more than empty virtue-signaling, ergo stroking of the ego.
Quoting Vera Mont
I like Plato. :blush:
Pity!
Depends on perspective.
Legally? To the state.
Morally? To yourself.
Ethically? To your "community" (depending on whose standard you are referring to).
According to 's ethical code, a veteran with two missing limbs and a sick wife is just as responsible for the care and protection of his children as a stock-broker with a young, healthy wife and a staff of seven domestics.
And if a boat capsizes and ten injured people fall into the water, since you can't possibly save them all, you have no moral obligation to rescue even one, but should you jump in to attempt it, calling on other bystanders for help is empty virtue-signalling.
I agree with that.
I think we can remove the problem of difficulty by framing the question like this:
If you could provide a meal to a hungry child by pressing a button, would it be unethical not to do so?
This is almost cost-free. Would you be morally obligated to do so? Is there a difference?
If you do so, then you have to look at your motivation: is it an inner feeling that you have, based on your
social programming, or your internal impulses?
Any reason it can't be both? It's not so unusual, in my experience, for a society or community to reflect the personal attitude of its members.
This is a subjective ethic though, meaning that you're willing to concede it's ethical to ignore others if that happens to be your own personal viewpoint. If that is the case, I see no reason not to attach that subjectivism to everything, meaning if I personally don't believe caring for my own children is necessary, I don't mind murdering, and I think lying is perfectly fine, then so it is.
My position is that if you are ethically obligated to help others regardless of your worldview.
How this is sorted out will require you adopt some sort of ethical theory. If you're faced with the question of watching a child drown in the pool or bending down to lift him out, some responses might be:
Which response would result in the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number of people? (Utilitarianism).
Which response should I choose if I were to will it to be a universal law? (Kantianism)
Which response would be most promoting of personal virtue (like courage, kindness, and charity) (Virtue ethics).
Which response would I choose to be most consistent with traditional religious teachings (love thy neighbor, do unto others, etc. (Divine Command theory).
What I'm willing to concede is irrelevant. My whole point was that none of us have the authority or power to impose our moral outlook on people who don't share it.
Governments and churches can levy taxes and tithes on their membership, and pass laws for minimum civil behaviour. Beyond that, we are pretty much free to decide our degree of participation in the human race.
Quoting Hanover
Those are exactly the situations in which the state and the community intervene, because collectively, we have decided such an attitude is unacceptable.
Quoting Hanover
And you are entitled to that opinion, as am I, since I happen to share it. Sure, the world would be better if we all cared for one another. The fact remains that neither of us is in a position to impose it on others.
I didn't make any reference to imposing anything on anyone. I indicated what would and would not be ethical. If you lie, you are unethical. That doesn't mean I have the power to stop you from lying.
Quoting Vera Mont
And we are free to disobey our governments and our churches and endure whatever consequences result from that. Sometimes we even have to endure penalties from our governments when we've been ethical because our governments are unethical. Quoting Vera Mont
Intervention might or might not have anything to do with morality. It might just be a rule of covention, like we drive on the right side of the road and not the left. None of this has anything to do with what is demanded us of in order to be ethical people, and none of this is what provides the basis for legitimate governmental authority.Quoting Vera Mont
I'm not sure where we're disagreeing if you're acknowledging that we should help others in need, with "should" designating that which is ethically demanded of us. I've not suggested that a person who watches a child drown ought be arrested. I just think he sucks. Any by "sucks," I mean he's unethical.
At some point this conversation turned from "what is ethical" to "when is authority properly exercised"? I'm just talking about who are good people and who are bad people. Bad people listen idly by while children are raped in adjacent bathroom stalls.
I'm not disagreeing. I simply stated some facts around the issue. Yes, it's wrong for them to do the wrong thing or not do the right thing. I do judge them, just as others of their fellow humans judge them. And there is nothing we can do about their seeing it otherwise.
Yes, it can be both.
I want to discuss the idea of control here, though. Given either the moral obligation or the voluntary act, why are ordinary citizens so powerless to prevent mass suffering or other people?
The conflicts raging around the world are a case in point. Did any of you vote for these wars?
I was shocked to realize that the total number of civilians dead in Syria is over 500,000. That is half a million people. No - one is morally obligated to start and fuel conflicts.
Quoting Crisis Group
So they manufacture consent. The WMD fiasco, for example was widely opposed. While ordinary citizens live and work for the well being of their families and themselves, what are those in control doing? Is there no antidote?
It sometimes seems that people have a better chance of removing Stalin from power, and he is dead.
https://www.aljazeera.com/gallery/2023/3/19/photos-millions-protested-against-invasion-of-iraq
https://theconversation.com/israel-hamas-war-will-the-murder-of-peace-activists-mean-the-end-of-the-peace-movement-215973
The peace movement - the powerless
Several reasons.
They are actually powerless. Decisions about foreign affairs are made in secret at the highest levels of government - no referendum, no public discussion, often not even a debate in the house of representatives.
They are ignorant. Issues of "National Security" are never aired in the public broadcasting media. Information, such as it is, is released in dribs and drabs at the discretion of the relevant government organs and officials.
They are partisan. Told that they themselves may be in danger, any issue becomes a matter of us vs them - them being, presumedly, the designated other. They'll approve whatever action the leadership deems appropriate to protect them from than nebulous other. And if that danger is demonstrated by a violent attack, they not merely approve but actively and enthusiastically support countermeasures by their government. Even if those measures infringe on their own civil rights.
They are misdirected and trained to respond to misdirection. The organs of propaganda give plausible (more or less) explanations for the troubles of other people (poor life choices, lack of moral fibre, laziness, irresponsibility) and far more abstruse ones for the troubles of other countries: why shit-holes like Haiti fail is too complicated to follow, but it's all their own fault.
Vindictiveness. People are quite easy to rile up against any person, group or entity that has harmed or slighted them in some way or damaged their self-image. They may not know or care what actions on the part of their government and its agents may have precipitated a blow against their nation or its citizens, what caused the other to lash out, but they care very much about the injury or insult itself.
Self-interest. If it costs themselves any risk, loss or inconvenience, they simply prefer not to know.
They may be generous and kind to someone whose suffering they understand, but the big issues in the world are just too much work to unravel.
I object to describe a country like you describe Haiti.
I think that governments represent their people in the sense that they care for their own well being more than any causes overseas, for example the wars that are currently ongoing, or global warming for that matter. When something shocks the moral conscience of people then maybe people think. The Pandemic for example, and the wars that are going on. Maybe that is the way it has to be. People respond to violence one way or another, either to prevent it or continue the cycle.
The question of agency is an interesting one: I would think that course of a nation is determined by a series of historical accidents, rather than the will of personalities. This makes it more difficult to blame nations or leaders. Of course attempts can be made to change the course of history but these are hit and miss. Protests, elections, what happens? Transnational actors?
See this:
It was a reference to a comment by then-president DJT. There were a couple of other sardonic references in my post, and you're quite right to object to all of them, if you didn't understand my intent.
So, like, nobody's in control, except possibly megacorporations. Does not bide well.
Yes, the rationalization that the materially deprived (globally) are such is their own fault due to personal flaws is easy to understand psychologically as it serves both the purpose of making the wealthy feel superior and absolved from needing to address the issue.
Really described in detail in Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel.
I do not hold anything against them, charity must be voluntary, not under compulsion. Some day they might decide to do more but maybe they may be doing enough already. Who knows?
What about the rest of us, whose day and night is haunted by the reprehensible wars and famines, the sufferings that are currently going on, what can we do? Is raising awareness enough?
At the reception of the hotel we stayed in, I saw a box with a picture of a child - it was a box for contributions for a day out at a resort for children from 'child care centre'
The box was not even half full.
What does it cost?
Update: So between 50% and 65% donate money, worldwide
https://www.cafonline.org/about-us/publications/2022-publications/caf-world-giving-index-2022
Luke 18:11
It is an unlikely argument that Pacifists start wars and get millions killed. Of course, everyone must be Pacificist, it does not make sense to fill a cage with lions and sheep and expect them to get on.
I have a more appropriate verse: Romans 11: 1-4. I was wrong, there must be at least 7,000 we need some sort of asymmetric response then.
Why We Fight. Interesting ideas: If it is true that people make mistakes, then we can be assured that some wars are mistakes. Which ones?
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2022/4/28/23041726/chris-blattman-why-we-fight-war-peace
This is one view. Let's look at countries that have not been involved in a war since 1945
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars:_1945%E2%80%931989
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars:_1990%E2%80%932002
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars:_2003%E2%80%93present
Why? Many who openly state they hate violence are quite quick to inspire violence in others by way of their self-righteous nonsense. A world full of pacifists would be a miserable world lacking in drive, ambition and emotion.
Do you mean that violence is the only appropriate response to all stimuli?
Well, that would solve the human problem.
Pacificists starting violence is an absurd self contradiction of pacifism.
I knew it: there are those who support war, violent resistance, I have come across these people in real life, not any particular war also, but war is progress.
I am shocked by the continuing ongoing wars, ignored by the news media, that are causing untold human suffering.
Enjoy your war-torn world while it lasts.
And thank you that nuclear war has been avoided so far by accident as well as design.
If I tell you to shut up and you ignore me then I break legs and threaten to break the legs of everyone you know a love you would do what. If you resist I just up the stakes and threaten murder.
War and Violence are necessary to dispose of unwanted and hostile threats. It is not really that complicated. That is my point. The pacifist will sit idle in the midst of rape and murder trying to talk the perpetrator down instead of taking them out.
It is unjustifiable to adhere to pacifism in all circumstances. It is laughable that someone even thought I wanted non-stop violence and war. It is clear to all violence and war should be viewed as last resorts, it is not so clear that pacifism can be equally as destructive if adhered to rigorously.
This is incorrect in that it assumes that laws will not be enforced. I am not calling for defunding the police. I am not calling for letting the perpetrators go unpunished.
How about this equally violent argument? Since Hamas terrorists comitted 'rape and murder' then why not:
Execute all Hamas fighter in captivity.
Embark on a campaign to 'kill every last Hamas fighter' take no prisoners
Somehow this course of action has very few supporters, and it is due to some hidden motives which I can only guess at. In any case the IDF 'killed 1,400 Hamas fighters' so an eye for an eye I think the number of eyes closed here is equal. What do you think? Or are there other considerations that I need to hear?
Quoting I like sushi
We need to distinguish between wars of aggression (Nazis) and wars of defense (Israel 1948). So I am not sure what you mean by last resort. As an argument, if Hitler got struck in the head and became a pacifist, there would be no WW2. Of course someone would have taken his place, ad infinitum, until you get to the people who were supporting his goals.
Who were they, and why? Were they Pacifist?
There is a lecture of pacifism here: it contains information.
https://www.c-span.org/video/?434330-4/anti-war-movements-world-war-present
We are all learning here. You have encouraged me to read up more on Pacifism and what it actually means. I could be mistaken.
I have to really think about what actions will be the most effective.
The glass box with a few bank notes in it, at a luxury resort tells me I should give. The question is how much.
I have to really think about what actions will be the most effective.
The glass box with a few bank notes in it, at a luxury resort tells me I should give. The question is how much.
Subjective. My point is that committing a violent act against someone (striking first) is not what a pacifist would do. Some people cannot be negotiated with (and say so). Such positions can require someone to act violently as a preventative measure.
I do not believe in some one rule fits all. Pacifism has its limitations but sounds fluffier than it can be if taken too far.
Quoting Wikipedia - Pacifism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacifism
I fear some wars are caused out of lack of intelligence or poor diplomacy. That is the concern.
The video on Pacifism I was watching will not show up in the desktop browser search. Why?
I had to get it from my view history.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wk1YhjSxmAE&t=779s