Originally Posted by Squiziph
If someone justifies his/her own actions by their own morals and principles and kills a pup, and if someone else justifies his/her own a actions by their own morals and principles its somehow not the same to end a life?
Both would end lives, i don't deny that.
It all comes down to trust in my own judgment. In my eyes, me killing them would be more of an execution than murder. I frankly doubt they thought of their pathetic act as execution. On the contrary, I'm pretty sure that their motivation was to destroy innocence -- which i find disturbing.
Now it's all a matter of opinion. Either you think my action are justified or not.
Please note that we kill people all the time. The government kills people and justifies it by citing the lines in the long list of laws, which in turn are based on average principles and morals of our society.
Expecting the thug to have exsactely thesame emotional,or rational capabillity as yourself. If that thug would experience thesame emotions you have with that pup, he wouldnt stomp it in the first place, because then he would throw-up and start crying or stuff like that. Maybe you dont understand what the pup represents to the thug and what the thug represents to yourself.
Not the necessarily the same, but ones that are usually deemed as 'healthy'.
There are so many people who would walk by that puppy and smile, or want to pet it, or not pay attention. From different age groups and walks of life. Only a few broken sociopaths would try to stomp it to death, and i would gladly take on the role of a judge and crack their empty skulls on concrete.
I'm sorry if i trust my own reasoning and don't consider myself incabale of making such decisions
Would you kill a cat to avenge a mouse? would you try to save the mouse by slightly beating the cat? would you just try and save the mouse without harming the cat ( very difficult but possible :P )
My expectations for a cat's behavior are quite different from that for an adult homo sapiens. I'm sure you can imagine why....
I think its in our humanity to fear or be groced out by stuff we dont understand, stuff we dont have in ourselves, or we do, but dont want to see. Its easy to choose to kill, the thugs already proved it. Its harder to try and fix things instead of just destroying.
I would be the first to say "fix them" if there was a reliable method of making sociopaths into 'normal' citizens. But at this moment, there are none.
Just saying if you would stand in the line of sight of eachother while selfrighteously murdering eachother this planet would see bodies fall like a trail of dominos stacked in a line. Killing a killer doesnt make the killing go away, it just creates a new killer one who obviously thinks he's better, smarter and just superior to the one he just killed.
This is kind of stawman-ish as it doesn't take any circumstances into account
Let me ask: would you kill Hitler? I would.
Choosing "the lesser evil" can result in less evil in the world.
Also doesnt it give a twist like if you would see this perspective'?:
You are 40 years old and you have a son, he's 16 now and allways in trouble. You live together but you cant reach him, he's been depressed for 5 years 3 of them on medication with doesnt seem to make him happy either.
On one day he comes home and you see him crying for the first time in 8 years? you dont understand but you hope its a breaktrough, he tells you he was acting tough for his buddies, they drank some beers, they walked down an alley and this girl was walking with her pup, he suddenly felt all this rage come up and wanted to show the world his pain, before he knew it he stomped the pups head in, he scared himself shitless and got sick to his stomach, his friends looked at him with scared eyes, those were the eyes he wanted to see for a long time, just as scared as he felt himself for a long long time, he was no longer alone, but felt even worse now. He went home and broke down, understanding all along this anger had never been anger, but actually pain and grief.
You ( as his dad ) see all this happen, you watched him grow up, you tought him to do allmost everything, now you pick up a knife and stab him in the eyeball repeatedly because he deserves it. *or any of the other ways presented in this thread*
Wow, that seemed very....uhhh...heart-felt?
If there was no real means of repairing him, i would indeed think of him like a hazard and a broken cog. I can't say there wouldn't be heavy bias and pity from my side though, seeing how it's my son. I wouldn't kill him, BUT if i saw someone do it when he was stomping another puppy to death, i wouldn't stop them.
Last edited by Odlov; Nov 10, 2009 at 03:08 AM.
Originally Posted by Squiziph
Please note that "we" can choose for ourselves, our judgement doesnt have to be based on the masses you can live your life as an individual developing your own morals and values. The collective opinion of the mass doesnt make it the best way to go. But you contradict yourself again, because you state: ( correct me if im wrong ) that killing by law is normal because the law is based on average priciples and morals of our society.
Well the law also says you cant kill anyone.. so that must be based on these same average priciples and morals of our society. If you say you agree with the rules of our society and you dont want any maniacs in, then dont start justifying your own way of breaking the rules.
In my previous posts i explicitly stated that I don't agree with all the laws.
The remark i made about government killing criminals was to highlight that killing in itself is not necessarily bad if you look at it from perspective of society. It all depends on the circumstance.
I think a man who kills Hitler knowing the atrocities he's committed is not detrimental, as opposed to a man who kills some random woman walking in the park.
Not all 'murders' are the same.
maybe it is an opinion if you are able to justify or not, but when you look at the facts, one stomps a pup's head in, and one kills that guy. Both motivated by what they themselves think is right or wrong. Both justifying there own actions in their own ways. Both resulting in murder. Murder without a trial being a thing the guy who stomps the thug doestn aprove of because of average priciples and morals of our society.
Show me where i said i don't approve of execution without a trial.
I have explicitly stated (i think even in first post) that i agree with the laws for the most part, but by far not all of them.
I dont think someone who contradicts himself is capable to judge/kill anyone..
I think its in human nature to be judging all the time, its your own choice if you kill over it.
I don't contradict myself.
Execution i think is a nasty camouflaged word that still just represents ending a life on purpose, but somehow it makes it sound like you are more human then a murderer, is that because of the "average principles and morals of our society"?
No, it's because the thug is guilty of murder, and the puppy is not.
I think it's a big enough difference.
Why is this? I am also sure i can "imagine" why. But the point is why feel groced out by one and okay with another, its just a way to show how ontrustworthy our priciples and morals can be sometimes. Thats why i think it isnt a good idea to start ending some lives over it.
Listen.....Morals are subjective. Ultimately they only exist in our heads, okay?
It's not objectively right or wrong to do anything. What do you mean by "untrustworthy"?
A cat's brain is many times smaller than that of a human. Thus the behavior and judgment expectations for it are completely different, as far as I (and im sure most other people) are concerned. With intelligence comes power, and (i think) responsibility.
You are not really helping with a way to fix them. So you can scratch "i would be the "first" to say fix them, its actually very weird you say that while you also blatantly say you would end their lives. Im starting to fear your way of "fixing" people.If the methods are missing and you really want to fix them, turn them in for psychological evaluation or something like that, they cant contribute to that noble cause ... when they are dead.
I'd rather end their lives than risk a repeat offense on their part.
If there was already a known method available (through brain surgery or whatnot) to reduce the violent tendencies i would gladly drive them to the clinic instead. IF no such method is available, c est la vie...
I would not kill Hitler, i would try and reason ( im allmost afraid to say it ) i am also not a racist, neo-nazi or extremist in any way. But the point is that you know what he is going to do, so you kill him, and save hundreds of thousands of lives with it in the proces, well good for you. Just one question how do you obtain the knowledge of someones guilt in the future, its clearly a reference to the thug being able to do more things like that in the future and thats why he must die, this however also whipes away the chance of him being threated succesfully eventually, and doing allot of good for this world, or his children doing allot of good. It is not applyable if you ask me. Because you dont know the future, and thats another reason not to judge to rapidly.
And you think it's worth the risk aye? :|
I imagine you'd be deeply sorry if you later found out that your little therapist talk didn't help and he still ended up murdering millions.
I think further then what i see or what is presented allot, that way i do not jump to any conclusions to later find out i was being controlled by my own bias ( and still i many times do ). It looks somewhat deminishing the way you put heart-felt there :P. That is the way i try and live my life, trying to understand things instead of breaking what i dont understand. Having less judgement has stretched my perspective of things allot. And im happy i dont feel like i have to kill anyone. Would like it if some more people would lose that kind of attitude. Like the murderers and the murderers of the murderers murderers.
Okay, let's say you talk to the thugs and they tell you they murdered the dog because they love the exhilarating feel of absolute dominance over something living, and enjoyed delivering pain. What then? A pat on the back?
A heart-felt lecture about morality which they have likely heard 10000 times?
They are broken people, Squiziph.
Last edited by Odlov; Nov 10, 2009 at 06:05 PM.
Originally Posted by hydrotoxin
I hope you don't mind me changing the scenario a bit to make things interesting Odlov-
You see these three thugs stomping a puppy and you walk over with intent to kill them all. Then you realize- one of the thugs is your son. What then?
Squiziph had just asked a very similar question. Look at my reply.
Originally Posted by SmileyJones
I'm wondering, what about killing Hitler not knowing about the atrocities he's committed? Say, before he became a Nazi leader.
Well that changes things entirely.
Then you wouldn't have a solid enough reason to justify your acts with.
At least nowhere near as solid as millions of corpses brought about by Nazi party.
Of course, unbeknown to yourself and everyone else you'd still probably be saving millions of people by killing him prior to his rise to power. But as they say; innocent until proven guilty.
I'm afraid I don't know much about Hitler's life, but I assume at one point in time he was still capable of leading a better life. What's to say some minor unpredictable event couldn't influence his life in a way that eventually leads to a different outcome?
Ah, the butterfly effect....
Quite possible - if such a thing was possible.
As far as i know there is no time travel, though, so....Things have gone the only way they could have gone.
We have no way of predicting these thugs' futures, what's to say some amount of punishment either through your own hands or through the law wouldn't keep them from committing more crimes?
It's possible. And it's also very possible that they would stomp and torture many many more animals before they are either brought to justice or somehow abandon their demented and detrimental urges.
I'm one of those people who prefers not to give people like them a benefit of doubt.
PS: if i (hypothetically) was to jump on someone's dog and stomp it's brains onto concrete, i would expect very bad things in response. When you do something like that you sort of abolish your own rights, as far as i am concerned. If i did that and the owner took out a knife or tire iron, it wouldn't be something i didn't expect or foresee. I certainly wouldn't go "woah man, chill out there. All i did was stomp your animal.....Why all the knives...?"
Last edited by Odlov; Nov 12, 2009 at 01:33 AM.
) but i actually think there are more plausible cases one could make for killing another human than one could make for killing a pet. 