thread: 2005-06-06 : Happenings
On 2005-06-06, The Metallian wrote:
"I'm concerned about how any set of principles becomes, so easily, a salve for your conscience when you do something inhumane. Are (say) Richard Dawkins and James Randi guilty of this? Almost certainly! Are they as guilty of it as 2000 years' worth of Christianity?"
I feel like the really tough problem is more along the lines of "truly believing that an action is humane despite the protests of the objects of your actions and the lack of evidence that it has worked in the past." If it was simply a shallow self-justification for cruelty or greed, then you'd have a shot at leveraging the actor's guilt to change their behavior. But if they're 100% convinced that they're doing the right thing in the (really, really) long run...it seems like that's a very difficult kind of person to be at odds with.
