OT: Insightful (re: Amish shooting)

[Xrati]

That's a good point Wenin.
"Freedom is a painful thing, because in order for you to have it... you have to allow others to have it as well."

Kind of an "Eye for an Eye" equation or variant of it. I guess we need to draw a line and define where we stand to that line with how much or how far we will let things go. When the line gets crossed do we sit and reason, when that person is not listening? Do we end a life when one is taken? Do we lock someone up for punishment and them give him all his rights? Makes no sense!

Many paths were taken by these pathetic people and maybe we should go back to the beginning to see where all the wrong paths were taken and see if we can prevent this from happening again and again. One ounce of prevention is worth more then a pound of cure.

[cshank2]

Hamurabi said it best. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.

Morality or not, sexually assaulting and killing little girls and then not even having the cajones to try and take out a police officer or two or face jail should be an insta-slag on the cop's part.

There's sick and then there's sick.

(Also, read Starship Troopers for a good definition of 'morals.')

[Atrocities]

"Hamurabi said it best. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. "

Great with that kind of philosphy the world will be filled with blind toothless *******s.

[cshank2]

Pretty much, yep. Sooner or later people will smarten up and realize that every action has a reaction.

[Renegade 13]

Personally, I'm all for the death penalty and think it should be used a lot more than it is (in the US, we unfortunately don't have it here in Canada...).

Any crime that results in the death of another should be punishable by death. If you're convicted of the crime, it's automatic. I bet violent crime rates would go way way down if that was the case. Something like sexual assault? Well, there's a simple answer to that one; sterilization. Cut off the bastards testicles. Bet you'd see sexual assault rates drop like a rock too.

If society and the justice system showed that there would be no tolerance for crap like that, and the punishment actually befitted the crime, crime wouldn't appear to be such an attractive thing.

[dmm]

Phoenix-D said: Hitler was..nominally Christian.

Nominally means "in name only." So I totally agree.

Phoenix-D said: When people start insinuating that I have no morals, ...I get just a little annoyed.

I assume that I am one of those people who has you annoyed, probably because you are an atheist. Let me just say that I know some atheists who are more moral than some others I know who claim to be Christians. However, although of course I commend the former and am disgusted by the latter, I would contend that both are thinking and behaving illogically, given their postulates. My point was not that all atheists are immoral, but rather that the logical consequence of atheism is amoralism -- the lack of any morality, good or bad.

Phoenix-D said: dmm: Some of the largest mass murders in recent years have been conducted by religious people, so I really don't see how that flies.

That is a good point; being religious in the wrong way can cause people to do despicable things. (Examples: Jim Jones and the Guyana mass suicide; the 9/11/01 murderers; the Oklahoma City murderers (Timothy McVeigh); pogroms by Christians against Jews.) But how do we judge these actions to be despicable? Another way to put the question is: are these actions TRULY despicable, or is that simply our opinion?

To go back to the original thread topic: Is violence against women WRONG (no excuses allowed)? Is objectification of women WRONG (even if the woman encourages it)? Is sexualization of children WRONG (even if the sexualizer is "made that way")? Is sexual harassment WRONG (even if all the guys at the stadium are participating, and the woman seems flattered as well as flustered)? For the record, there ARE correct answers, and they are yes, yes, yes, and yes. But when people are told, "There is no absolute morality," we should not be surprised when their answers come back wrong.

[Phoenix-D]

Who gets to decide what's WRONG?

You'd say "God." Problem- so did everyone you cited as being religious in the wrong way. So do the people that stone women to death for being raped. Etc.

Since God isn't in the habit of popping in and saying "hey, you're [censored] up", what you have one way or the other is the word of men. No more, no less.

You can get morality from that, in a roundabout and extremely complicated fashion.

I'm not actually an atheist, but I'm an agnostic, so most of the people that annoy me in that manner just lump me in.

[dmm]

Imperator Fyron said: Christian morality is just as much a matter of opinion as that of any other religion, or humanist moral systems.

You are not being logical. If ALL moral systems are simply opinion, then ALL are a load of crap. In that case, anyone who doesn't do whatever he can get away with is a fool. So Ted Bundy was smart to rape and kill little girls. Why not?

This argument does not prove that Christianity is true or that humanism is false, and this thread (forum?) is not the place to argue about that. Logically, you could claim, "Everyone is wrong." But you cannot logically say, "Everyone is equally right."

Imperator Fyron said: How can you rightfully assert that the moral system of one arbitrary religion is somehow the absolute truth? You can make such assertions about any religious moral system; it doesn't mean one is somehow more true or better than others.

I cannot, of course, PROVE that one belief system is THE TRUTH. I can, however, examine the logical and historical consequences of various belief systems. Just because some "nominal atheists" have good morals does not mean that atheism does not have logically and historically demonstrable consequences for society in the long term that I consider to be loathsome.

Imperator Fyron said: Morality does not derive from religion; religious doctrine generally mimics morality.

Every major religion I can think of has a lot of moral code in common. It is like descent with mutations from a common ancestor. If you believe that the common moral ancestor was God-given, then there is good reason to cling to it. If you believe that the common moral ancestor was an accident of evolution, then there is no logical reason to keep it around, other than situational convenience. It is not true, only utile. Therefore if I find it restrictive, I can just drop it, like junk DNA. It is vestigial, and those organisms no longer encumbered by it will prosper best (provided they don't advertise this to others).

[Elsemeravin]

dmm said:
You are not being logical. If ALL moral systems are simply opinion, then ALL are a load of crap.

If A > B then B < A : this is logic
ALL moral systems are simply opinion then ALL moral systems are load of crap : this is not logic

Reading Spinoza may help you formulate logical non-mathematic propositions.

[dmm]

Phoenix-D said:
Since God isn't in the habit of popping in and saying "hey, you're [censored] up", what you have one way or the other is the word of men. No more, no less.

At the risk of sermonizing even more than I have already, I would contend that God has in fact done just that, for the very reason that you give, and that the Bible contains a reliable record of it.

Phoenix-D said:
I'm not actually an atheist, but I'm an agnostic, so most of the people that annoy me in that manner just lump me in.

Well, I was trying to give you credit for making up your mind.