Enforcement of Morality
This topic is not about the ontological nature of morality. So Kant's metaphysics of morals, for example, has nothing to do with this. This is not about the objective or subjective nature of moral principles. Any argument or reasoning that cites this notion is irrelevant here. It is also irrelevant whether you use logic, math, symbols, or rational argument in whatever you want to say here. As I will explain below, it is about society, the majority, and the individual (the private individual) components of morality.
So, as we might frequently forget, a society apparently has a right to preserve its integrity. And by integrity, I mean the unwritten format that a human population adopts by creating regulations, institutions, establishing economic interests, religious beliefs, etc.
A society exists, but not by physical boundary, or by a government establishing its territory. You can't look at the map and point to a society -- if you tell me you could by looking at a map, then you're not understanding what a society is.
Then, what can threaten a society's integrity? As it turns out, it is not always the violence, explosion, combustion, and upheavals that can be blamed for a society's demise. (I agree that "demise" is suspect. Can a society actually die and be reduced to ashes?)
What holds together a society is the enforcement of morality through the use of force (the law). You get enough dissent and nonconformity to your society's morals, you kill your society. That's why a society has a right to defend itself from such nonconformity, according to the majority of the population. If you don't agree with this, continue reading below.
Some examples of crimes against society:
1. Abortion
2. Sexual deviance
3. Bigamy and polygamy
4. Disturbance of the peace
5. Violation of helmet and seat belt laws
6. Cruelty to animals
7. Domestic violence
8. Desecration of a flag and public monuments
9. Graffiti
10. Littering and loitering
So, as we might frequently forget, a society apparently has a right to preserve its integrity. And by integrity, I mean the unwritten format that a human population adopts by creating regulations, institutions, establishing economic interests, religious beliefs, etc.
A society exists, but not by physical boundary, or by a government establishing its territory. You can't look at the map and point to a society -- if you tell me you could by looking at a map, then you're not understanding what a society is.
Then, what can threaten a society's integrity? As it turns out, it is not always the violence, explosion, combustion, and upheavals that can be blamed for a society's demise. (I agree that "demise" is suspect. Can a society actually die and be reduced to ashes?)
What holds together a society is the enforcement of morality through the use of force (the law). You get enough dissent and nonconformity to your society's morals, you kill your society. That's why a society has a right to defend itself from such nonconformity, according to the majority of the population. If you don't agree with this, continue reading below.
Some examples of crimes against society:
1. Abortion
2. Sexual deviance
3. Bigamy and polygamy
4. Disturbance of the peace
5. Violation of helmet and seat belt laws
6. Cruelty to animals
7. Domestic violence
8. Desecration of a flag and public monuments
9. Graffiti
10. Littering and loitering
Comments (122)
I don't agree with that and I kept reading, below. Society is like culture: Yes, it can die. But it can also change. Societies change more often than not. Once they have changed, that does not mean they are dead. They are just different. And society does not have a right to defend itself from nonconformity, especially when society has a Bill of Rights protecting minorities from the tyranny of a majority.
Abortion may be a crime against *some* societies, but not all. In the U.S., for instance, it is not a crime against society.
And yet, the list of illegal activities is long.
It is, but in the U.S., none on the list can be enforced without due process of law. See Bill of Rights.
When you say:
Quoting L'éléphant
you forget that "unwritten format" must be written. Otherwise, it's not worth the paper it's not written on.
Quoting L'éléphant
So, when you say
Quoting L'éléphant
it means nothing. Laws change, cultures change, societies change.
I'm off to bed. See you mon yonna.
According to the penal code, which is designed to protect society.
A crime within some societies, yea, OK; but a crime against society? How so? Off the top of my head as source, the movie “Freakonomics” makes the case that having a pro-life-quality mentality (my term for freedom of choice to abort fetuses) leads to the improved quality of a society.
Quoting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freakonomics_(film)#Segments
And this turns the tables into something like, “the illegalization of abortion is detrimental to society and, thereby, a crime* against society’s wellbeing”.
* Crime as in “iniquity” rather than “violations of law”. To illustrate with a simplistic example, Nazis were law-abiding citizens within their own society, but their society's laws were often criminal … and violations of these criminal laws moral.
The question is, Did the Nazis have a society or something else?
A society.
No society had written a format, like a software program, where it mapped everything according to its needs and wants.
It was a military arrangement, not by the majority of the people, but by the Nazis. So, no it wasn't a society.
I'd like to take a moment to say that, I did cover my ass when I said in my OP that there's an unwritten format adopted by the population. Did the German society die, or the Nazi party died?
It means the whole world. Look what happened to Detroit, Michigan.
Quoting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_Germany#Nazi_seizure_of_power
They were still pretty popular among voters, though.
Quoting L'éléphant
"Died" doesn't seem to be an adequate term for the Nazis. There's quite the resurgence going on. In Germany, in the US, I'm sure in other places as well. And, among the resurgent neo-Nazi folk, there's a fairly strong societal bond.
How do you define society, exactly? I'm myself thinking of the typical dictionary senses when I use the term.
Loosely, a population or a group of people with structured or ordered existence bound by morality (whether religious or secular or both). Structured in the sense that they perform economic, educational, and social activities.
OK, Nazi Germany had the structure you speak of with the iffy point being that of "bounded by morality". The Nazis certainly viewed themselves as moral, noble even. So this will likely wind down into what the nature of morality actually consists of - thereby allowing some distinction between true morality and false notions of morality. Although I strongly lean on the objective morality side of things, this isn't something I'm currently interested in debating. The added caveat that a society is bounded by morality is new to me, though. Thanks for sharing.
Still, in ordinary understandings of "society", one could say that the German society underwent massive transitions from pre-WWII times, though WWII times, to post-WWII times .. all the while remaining "the German society". If I understand you correctly, you're saying that Germany lacked society during WWII times? What did they instead have during this time period?
That sounds rather like a prescription for reactionary authoritarianism.
Morality (reinforceable eusocial habits) and Law (enforceable contracts / regulations) are independent of one another because they are divergent as often as they are convergent depending upon the regime which makes the laws. There are countless historical examples of 'immoral laws' (e.g. slavery) and 'illegal morality' (e.g. abolition). On the contrary, L'éléphant, bottom-up morality usually holds a society together in spite of the top-down regime of laws (and law-enforcement).
Also known as "society".
Sure. But it's not the majority who has the say; it's those with power who have the say, and they can do that even if they are statistically a minority.
Those with power can also act directly against the principles of morality, and this will have no adverse effect on society and will not be considered a breach of moral principles.
Quoting 180 Proof
Nothing needs to "hold society together". Society just exists, or doesn't exist, depending on one's ideological outlook.
Great thread.
I would specify a bit further. Quoting L'éléphant
You do not kill your society if the laws of society are not followed. You disrupt those who are in POWER in society if the laws are disrupted.
The question is, who has power? Is it 1% of the population, and they oppress the other 99%? Is it 50%? 80%? In your case, we could break this down law by law. Perhaps a law protects the 80% of society, like the seat belt law. Perhaps a law protect 5% of society like the abortion law. And so and so forth.
In the end, it is about who holds power in a society. A better question is, who should hold the power in society? Intuitively, I believe those who allow the greatest protection and power to the safe people of society are those we should allow to have power. Giving anarchists power would hurt most of society for example. But enslaving a portion of society, who would do no harm on their own, for the benefit of another portion would be a poor society.
How about denying gay people weddings? Seems like that's a society that is oppressive. While power can be protective to those in charge, it can also enable those in charge to do evil as well. There is a joy in the black area of the human heart in holding power over another, just for the satisfaction of it after all.
That's.. interesting. Logically a democratic society is based on the logic of the majority, however unrefined, base, or simply counterproductive it is to said majority's own wants and needs. You say people do things not because they think they're the best course of action but simply because the guy next to them seems to think so. Kind of a "if all your friends jumped off a cliff" approach to society. It's a fair claim though one might (mistakenly) assume you state that an educated person would refuse to use that education (again no matter how poor, misguided, counterproductive or diametrically opposed to the advancement or placation of wants and needs. both personal and collective) .. even if one fully plans to expand and utilize on it later but simply can't at the moment due to again, being outvoted, and so to remain "in the game" as it were has to "just say OK" again simply for that moment. Is that right?
Or perhaps that people often use their emotions or their personal sense of "what feels right" or even just feels good, more so than what (they know?) logically is best, ie. smoking cigarettes or drinking regularly? A society of myopia, basically. Fair points either way. Plenty of evidence to back it up.
That means nothing.
You are conflating society with culture. Culture is language, tradition, religion, shared experience, etc. Society is glued together by laws. We have a Declaration of Independence, Constitution and all the laws stemming therefrom. We even had a societal/cultural common law. So yes, society does have a written format. But to use your software program analogy, ours is an AI format, changing and learning over time.
I already stipulated that the U.S. permitted abortion so the Freakonomics example does not apply. There might very well be other societies that would be destroyed if abortion was allowed. I don't know, I'm not a world societal expert. But I would suppose they might be Roman Catholic societies where abortion is anathema to their very being. In that case, abortion would be a crime against that society, even if it reduced crime. In fact, I've often argued that just how free a society is can be measured by the ability to get away with crime.
In any even, I think it is subjective to determine that eliminating crime (through abortion or otherwise) is entirely a pro-societal marker, and that increasing crime is de facto anti-societal. There are grey areas and we (individually) don't get to choose what is pro or anti-society. Society does that.
Well, let's see...
1. Abortion - Abortion is a bad thing. We should do what we can reasonably to reduce the numbers, but not by enacting legal restrictions. It is not a crime and it is not the problem. It should be legal.
2. Sexual deviance - I have a feeling that what you call sexual deviance and what I do are not the same. Be that as it may, sexual practices that don't harm others should not be illegal.
3. Bigamy and polygamy - I can see the value in having rules in this regard, but I don't see this as a crime against society.
4. Disturbance of the peace - Well, ok, it's annoying and worthy of restrictions, but is it really a crime against society?
5. Violation of helmet and seat belt laws - Sorry. No.
6. Cruelty to animals - Reasonable rules are good. On the other hand, I enjoy eating meat.
7. Domestic violence - Of course. And all the rest of the violence too.
8. Desecration of a flag and public monuments - There should be reasonable restrictions on damage to public or private property. Otherwise, it's none of society's business.
9. Graffiti - Ditto.
10. Littering and loitering - Ditto
You seem to have forgotten that society has methods of social control other than legal restrictions. The law should be the enforcement method of last resort.
Those who engage in your "crimes against society" are also a part of society. So, in truth, what is being proposed here is a far more ruinous crime, namely, a form of slavery: some members of society get to rule over the other members of society.
As a counter, if crime is injurious, and if the individuals that make up a society don't like getting injured, then reducing crime can only be pro-societal - i.e. pro the cohesion of individuals that make up the given society. Also, societies are nothing else but groups of individuals that voluntarily interrelate; so individuals, to me, do have their say; its in part how societies change over time.
But yea, I do agree its a murky area. As a topic related to the OP, there's such a thing as honor among thieves. Here, the thieves form a society within a larger society and perpetuate crime against the larger society but, within their own sub-society, live by often stringent moral codes. To ask, "are the thieves then moral" is, it seems, too simplistic a question.
To be transparent, though, in my previous post I was mainly intending to intimate that freedom of abortion cannot be an iniquity (a crime in this sense) against a society, though it can be a violation of the society's laws (a crime in this sense) if the society does outlaw abortion. But I gather there's other threads for this were I to care to debate it.
Societies get to decided which violations of what laws present an existential threat to the society. Homicide is usually a no-go. But we have exceptions, where the right to life is forfeit, or fails to vest, or where the taking thereof is subject to different levels of punishment. Society let's it's members, and non-members, know the general essence of itself through it's laws and punishment.
I know where the U.S. stands (or doesn't stand) but I'm not willing to say it is impossible for another society to feel an existential threat from abortion.
I don't know how you got that from what I said. Individuals have lots of choice. They can choose to commit crimes. They can vote. They have a right to speak (and supposedly to be heard (HA!). etc.
Quoting javra
Yes, and when they decide something is an existential threat to their society, then carrying out that threat can be a crime against that society. That's all I'm saying. My contention that something could be a threat against society was challenged with an argument that such could only occur "within" a society. I think there is here, an unnecessary tripping-up over terminology. Potayto-potahto.
Could be.
Quoting L'éléphant
Law can "force" morality up to a certain extent. To the extent that it harms others. And even that cannot be always applied. For example, hurting ones feelings, in various ways, cannot be forbidden by law,
(There’s a very good article in the Internet on the subject: "Legal Enforcement of Morality" (
https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199756162.001.0001/acprof-9780199756162-chapter-9). It is quite short and it is worth reading.)
To my opinion, morality cannot be forced. It can only be encouraged, its value and purpose explained, etc. Morality exists only if it comes naturally from or is determined by oneself. If one behaves morally but he is forced to in any way, we can't say that he does so because he is a moral person.
Quoting L'éléphant
OK, now you passed to crime. This has very little to do --if anything at all-- with morality. It is a pure legal subject.
And the 10 examples you mention are relative: they depend on each society's morals and laws.
Tell that to @L'éléphant ...
Please read this:
-- Guttmacher Institute, An Overview of Abortion Laws
Quoting javra
No. This is not what I'm saying at all. You cited Nazi as an example. I said it's not a society.
Quoting Outlander
"Outrage" is the term. "Outcry" is another. When the majority of the population have expressed an outrage or outcry, they represent the whole of their society. And the society acts to remedy this public outcry by means of creating a law.
Pointy finials killing wild life when they try to jump over the fence? There's a law now
banning pointy finials around your property.
Second hand smoke more poisonous than smoke? There's a law now banning smoking in common use areas.
Quoting James Riley
No I'm not. Unless you mean humans are automatons glued together by laws. Apply culture to these automatons and you get society.
The majority of the members of society has the power. So long as they don't use logic, but public outcry and outrage. This so-called power has nothing to do with the 1% or the 99%. It's about what morality is being undermined.
Quoting T Clark
And yet the reasoning behind the penal code is the viability of the fetus. If there's a heartbeat, the doctor can decide not to perform an abortion -- yeah this! even if the life of the mother is clearly at stake. The doctor who refuses to perform an abortion is not prosecuted. The law protects the doctor's psychic pain and liberty to decide not to participate in that decision. Oh wait! Are you really just thinking about the person getting an abortion and no one else? That's immoral.
Then why can a bigamist be prosecuted even if the other party is a consenting adult? What's the rational behind the law? You married a married person, that bigamist could be charged with a crime even if you didn't file a complaint.
Quoting T Clark
Annoying? Disturbance of the peace can include a rocket-propelled grenade fired towards a peaceful celebration of people having a good time.
Quoting T Clark
Sorry. Yes.
Quoting T Clark
Nice try. Good on paper. Are you saying that laws should only be an option, not the rule? On what undiscovered planet it exists? Please invite us.
Okay, I'm going to break my rule in the OP by mentioning a venn diagram. (Yes, I know I promised no use of other means) But here's the thing -- the majority of the member of society dictate the morality of that society. There are the minority, which include the dissenters, those who engage in crimes against society. And yes they are part of the society. And what did we just accomplish by stating the obvious that they are part of society? We've accomplished saying more words that don't add to this discussion.
Untrue. In every government, someone has power over someone else. The state does not dictate morality, they dictate who holds power. Different states around the world allow more people to have influence than other countries. In the United States, a larger swath of people have a say then in many other places in the world. Gays for example, were able to get others to relinquish their power over them, and not be outlawed or denied state marriages.
I didn't know that exists. Thanks.
Quoting Alkis Piskas
When morality is a voluntary act, you foster irresponsible members of society. When this happens you get a monster dictator. Evil thrives in chaos, monsters in diplomacy.
See my post above, to @Alkis Piskas.
Incorrect. The gays got what they wanted because the public outrage of the majority diminished. Careful now.
Arguably.
I do mean it.
You go first. Read my own remarks, if you haven't.
Actually, yes, you are. And no, I don't mean humans are automatons glued together by laws. You don't apply culture to your straw man automatons to get society. Culture is independent of society. You need to study your civics, sociology, poly sci, etc.
I know how hard it is for you to be wrong, but you should be used to it by now. Your OP was an abomination (and no, I'm not talking about your caveats and exceptions; I'm talking about the internal inconsistencies between written (regulation) and unwritten (culture)) but I tried to give you the benefit of the doubt and teach you. But you refuse the education and go for the Jello-on-the-wall routine. Sad, really. When you find yourself in a hole, you should really quit digging.
I don't gain anything by pretending to be right. That's bullshit.
Quoting James Riley
News to me.
Mmm. Name calling. No need to lose your cool. You could file a complaint to the moderators.
Careful now? Is this a discussion or an ego trip for you? Just make your points without snark. Prior to the legalization of gay marriage, homosexuality was a crime in many states. The power of the state controlled held a sword over their lives. Fortunately in America, we have an educated society, and people began to question whether it should be a crime. Amazingly, America decided to relinquish power over gays, and let them be free to be who they are.
That required changes and limitations of the law, not just moral outrage. In other countries, moral outrage does not necessarily change the law, and the majority can easily be oppressed by a minority. Do you think North Korea is a country run by morality? No. It is state power over individuals to benefit a minority.
You said:
Quoting L'éléphant
But I've given examples of societies where this isn't the case. If you can explain to me how North Korea and China are enforcing morality, you'll have a point. Otherwise, you don't.
Sure you do. It a narcissist/ego thing. Otherwise you just admit you were wrong.
Quoting L'éléphant
I know. That's why I'm trying to teach you.
Relinquish power over gays? Listen to yourself. Do not talk to me about ego trip while talking nonsense like this, please. Gays were not out to get power from others. They wanted to be treated as equals.
Okay, I'll level with you then. What is that reference that undercuts what claim?
And that first quote, sir, is to point out to you that it required a life or safety of the person seeking abortion (I try to avoid using "woman" here as I think maybe men could be pregnant seeking abortion as well) in order for the state to loosen the restriction on abortion. What would it take for a state to allow some form of abortion? It has to be equally painful -- the life of the abortion-seeker. And mind you, there are pro-abortion who believes that it doesn't have to reach that point where a person's life is in danger for the state to allow the abortion without condition.
The fact that the state had to put a condition for a legal abortion means it is still restrictive.
A legal abortion is not a crime against society. You should also distinguish a "crime" from a "crime against society." The former is, quite simply, a crime. Whereas the latter can be interpreted as a "crime" or more generally as "an affront to society." Based upon all the limits you put in your OP it is reasonable to believe you meant the latter. (Or, more particularly, an affront to or a crime against a cultural norm.)
Personally I have partaken in 4, 5, 8, 9 and 10 at various times. Sexual deviancy is meaningless - in many parts of the world many natural acts are classified this way. Part of the problem is getting agreement as to what constitutes a social crime here. What kind of society are you advocating for. I would rate tax evasion higher than all but 6 and 7.
It makes zero sense, causally.
Vide Self-serving bias.
(Errata (in my message): "we can't say that he does so because he is a moral person")
In your statement "When morality is a voluntary act, you foster irresponsible members of society" the two santences are incongruent/incompatible with each other. (They cannot be connected grammatically.) Please check that.
Quoting L'éléphant
How can you get a monster, or any, dictator when morality is a voluntary act??? It doesn't make sense. Please check that too.
Quoting L'éléphant
What does all this have to do with anything in here?
I'm surprised by this statement! There are a lot of things that hold a society together: collective consciousness, morals, traditions, laws ... And morality certainly holds society together, united. If there were no common morals and each one followed his/her own morals, tradition, etc. there would exist just a group of individuals and much disorder. That could not be called a community or society, could it?
There are many cases of morality, eight in total, beginning with pure morality, middling with non biased morality, ending with concise morality. Pure morality is where good and evil are opposite and integer, non biased morality is where good and evil are analytical and precise, and finally concise morality is where good and evil are concise and enforced by intellectuals (do not consider enforcement to be physical).
I don't agree morality should be enforced, the police or the mercenaries who enforce, should only enforce laws written by men, not laws written by gods. Hypothetically in the meta of this topic, godlessness is better, and morality can only be godless if thought paroptic(made up word, to mean ~ in the theoretical realm of experience).
Last time I ask you to just address the points and avoid the personal. If you want people in your thread discussing with you, and possibly persuading them to your view point, keep to the topic.
The word "relinquish" means "to let go". I did not say gays were out to get power from others. I stated they wanted the power that others held over them to be let go. To be able to marry, and to be able to sleep with who they want without risk of criminal prosecution.
The examples with China and North Korea still stand. If you don't address them, then I'm going to assume they adequately demonstrate the OP does not stand.
This is true, especially for those on the outside looking in. But it's true even from the inside. Your analysis can also apply to cultures. If a society is made up of many different cultures (which creates it's own culture of diversity), it can be said that bad culture can taint the house. Trying to get them to all get along can create issues on the inside and the outside. Sometimes those on the outside benefit from a house in discord.
Bingo! :100: Those seeking equal rights are not trying to take rights away from others, unless those others think they have a right to deprive others of the rights they enjoy. But such thinking is patently wrong.
As a digression, those who deprive others of equal rights would do well to remember that the longer you keep a man down, the more he's going to push-back when he gets up. Best to apologize and give him a hand up. And the sooner the better.
I believe your facts are wrong. I don't think any doctor is required to perform an abortion anywhere in the US. It certainly wouldn't be a criminal offense. Beyond that, rules vary from state to state. That will become even more true if Roe vs. Wade is overturned.
Quoting L'éléphant
Says you.
I responded to your previous post to me, but I'm not going to respond to this one. It's clear to me you are just trying to rile things up without putting significant effort or thought into your post. You haven't adequately defined your terms. Your facts are often wrong. You spout your opinions but don't provide any factual, logical, or moral justification. Your spelling and grammar are often incorrect.
Quoting L'éléphant
Then it says this of morality:
Quoting L'éléphant
Then you say:
Quoting L'éléphant
I think you tried to create a box in your OP, a box from which no one could escape an inevitable conclusion in accord with your feelings. As one who has failed to properly think through an OP, I learned how quickly the topic can get away from me. People will run off in all kinds of directions, while others will flail about in a struggle to understand what is being asked of them.
My recommendation is this: rearticulate your question from a point of sincere intellectual curiosity. Spend some time with it, in anticipatory argument in your own head, refining and winnowing and re-wording until such time as you find a concise question that will elicit responsive answers (and, to the extent an answer is off-base, everyone else will know to ignore it as "not getting" what you clearly asked). Even then you will find perceptions and angles that you never anticipated. That is a good thing, and a learning opportunity.
There is nothing wrong with trying to create the box, but you must be aware there is no box from which a philosopher cannot escape.
The morality of any group of individuals in society is the morality of any group of individuals in society, but not of society itself. By stating the obvious we make clear that we are not talking about society’s right to defend itself, but of a group of people’s right to enforce their morality on others, thereby fracturing society and putting it against itself.
If the morality of any group of individuals is not the morality of society itself, then how is a group of people enforcing their morality on others putting society against itself? The reason I ask is, it seems like in the first instance you are divorcing society from the individual/group (in the same way, say, that we might divorce a corporation from a blood-pumping human shareholder), but in the second instance, you have reanimated society into something that can be against itself.
If society is not imbued with a collective morality of it's constituents, then it would not be a society, would it? Even if they are agreeing to disagree, they still have a bond of agreement (i.e. not civil war).
I’m not fond of speaking in such groups and groupthink, but I am capable of it. At any rate, I do not believe such groups have moralities or a collective conscience and are nothing more than loose aggregates of individuals.
Good to know we agree.
Quoting NOS4A2
And put it into the context of this:
Quoting NOS4A2
Then I think we might have found a point of agreement. It seems you are saying that society is really just an inanimate tool used by one individual/group or another to enforce their morality on another.
But I'm not sure. Could you clarify your last sentence? Are you saying a loose aggregate of individuals does *not* have moralities or a collective conscience to enforce on others?
Do you know any place where there is just a number of individuals who follow their own morals, tradition etc.?
The United States versus John Doe.
Kahler versus Kansas
I wonder why titles of court cases read like that?
Give me something to bite on here. I can't work with these questions. I mean, where do I begin? Please rephrase your questions. Thanks.
Quoting Philosophim
Oh no don't mind me. I'm not the one whose belief is being challenged here. Our society backs me up on this. I don't even have to lift a finger. It's there for your pleasurable viewing.
Quoting Philosophim
I ignored this part because I didn't understand it. Could you explain why you are bringing this up? Somehow when @javra brought up the Nazis, that wasn't surprising to me, or confusing.
So are you saying there's no such thing as society? Yet philosophers refer to "society" all the time.
Truth doesn't need a lot of effort. I mean, like, it's the truth -- why I need to exert too much effort when talking about society baffles me. And yes, I have adequately defined my terms in the OP and throughout this thread. Would you like a very long tirade, or short, sweet responses that accomplish the same goal?
I will do no such thing. I know exactly what I'm doing. It's not scattered thinking. Just try to catch up with what's happening.
I ask you again, why do court cases have titles like People versus John Doe? Or The United States versus John Doe? Or Alabama versus John Doe?
Quoting James Riley
What's wrong with pointing out that all parties involved in an abortion deserve
mention in morality.
I didn't think you would. Remember what I taught you about ego? No? Didn't think so.
Quoting L'éléphant
No, actually, you don't. You've had your ass handed to you, repeatedly, and yet you keep digging. :rofl:
Quoting L'éléphant
Those are the parties to the case, DOH!
Quoting L'éléphant
Your OP telling us that morality was not part of your consideration in the OP. DOH! That's what's wrong with it. No law, then law; no morality, then morality. Culture = Society. You are all over the place. Not all who wander are lost, but you clearly are.
Hell, just look at your responses to others. Forget me. :roll:
So people can tell who the parties are. People name cases like they name cities, people, animals, etc. It's a form of identification.
This tells me you're averse to pondering.
More nonsense.
You should quit digging.
Personally I have partaken in 5 and 10.
I was only saying I don’t think you were necessarily speaking about defending society, but another group, the State.
Presuming that dissent and nonconformity will be punished, this necessarily leads to the censorship and punishment of some members of society, probably a minority, for the benefit of another. If the minority is a part of society, their suppression will only serve to suppress a part of society rather than defend the whole of it. It reminds me of the expression “Cutting off one's nose to spite one's face”.
As such, far from a society adopting the unwritten format, it will need to be perpetually forced. How a society should force such a format on itself is not made clear but we do know we have tried to change man with law, compulsion, and religions of various kinds throughout history, and the result is nothing to be proud of.
I don't know what do you mean exactly by "place" (it's too general) but the following may qualify:
Criminals, anarchists, hermits, savages, ... Also, any informal and/or temporary group (persons garthered together): a group of boys, students, demonstrators, spectators in theaters, madmen in asylums, and so on.
You can't reply to all questions in a single answer of course! :smile: But TPF offers a great method of tackling each question/point on its own: You highlight one question/point, click on "Quote" and answer that question/point. Then you highlight another question/point, click on "Quote" and answer that question/point. And so on.
But you said,
Quoting L'éléphant
A society, does not mean our society alone. If you would like to change your viewpoint to being only our society, that's fine, but that is not what your original topic implied. If that is so, I'll drop the China and North Korean comparisons.
Quoting L'éléphant
Your entire premise is that our society, (I'm assuming America now) creates laws to enforce morality. Who's morality? It can't be Christian morality, because Jesus stated you should sell everything you have and follow him. A morality based on Christianity would eliminate poverty and channel the extra wealth to keeping society free from degradation or sin. That is clearly not what American law does.
Many laws, tax laws for example, benefit the wealthy over the less wealthy. Is that moral, even apart from Christianity? Or how about a law against smoking marijuana that can get you put in jail for holding a few grams (and disproportionately puts blacks in jail), when speeding at a potentially lethal level for both you and those around you is just a fine?
The nature of Democracy is that plenty of people get a say. And it turns out that while many people have different views of morality, very few people seem to want to sacrifice their own comfort and money to help those who could really use a hand. Many laws are about preserving power over other people, and in a Democracy, that is much more difficult to do.
So you have a problem with your premise. You've stated the entire premise of now, our society, is to enforce morality. And yet, I can see several instances of laws that do not appear moral to me. It does not deny that there are certainly some laws that are in place due to some cultures or universal morality, but you cannot state it is the primary reason for laws, when the law is cluttered with so many instances in which morality does not matter.
Well, not having a religion is not a crime against society. But if you actively sabotage the peaceful congregation of religious people -- you know, vandalizing churches and harassing church goers, you deserve to be punished.
Quoting Alkis Piskas
I tried. The result is that I was still confused by your question. I just don't know how to answer it. Apparently, the ability to follow a technical procedure doesn't equate to correct understanding of the question.
Quoting Philosophim
Yes, there is absolutely a great disparity of wealth in our society. Where is the outrage? I don't see the majority being outraged about it. In 2020 and 2021, the wealthy got wealthier, and the low income got the stimulus checks to make them happy for a few months and not realize that business owners, shareholders, partners got wealthier as a result of loan that turned into nontaxable income. Why is everybody so busy with covid when there's protest that should be done about being poor or low income? Oh yeah, because they were happy to collect unemployment twice what they were used to getting without working for a year. They shouldn't settle for that pittance.
Quoting Philosophim
I think you should say, so many people are willing to settle for a lot less and avoid doing anything about it. They don't want to sacrifice their own comfort -- and what's that comfort? The comfort of being ignorant about why wealth creation is skewed one direction only. Do you know you don't create wealth by receiving a salary. You're being paid for the work you do, per hour. Creating wealth is making your money work for you, while you screw around town or around the world.
The first time you talked about "too many questions" that you cannot answer. I then told you how.
Now you talk about my "question". What question?
You can't make up your mind. I think the ball is lost. We can quit this game now.
I'm intrigued by this symbol.
Could you explain what is this for?
My mind is made up. And this is not a game. If this is the best of your argument you can make, please quit now.
I find the above quote as strongly supportive of enforcement of morality by legislation, but also a concession that not all moral beliefs should be this way.
So, in fairness to all in this thread, not all moral principles are subject to societal enforcement -- which, by the way, I mentioned in passing. But some morals are.
Look for a pattern! :grin:
heart
We're, in short, slaves to our nature (inherently bad/if you prefer, naughty) and to that extent, we're not free. Morality exists not to curtail our freedom but to aid us in resisting, put up a good fight against, that base nature and through that claim our liberty. Enforcement of Morality? Nah! More like Emancipation by Morality!
Vide Free Won't for context.
No. Incorrect attribution.
Why split hairs when you don't need to to understand the point? Anyway, corrections made.
No society has a complete buy-in by all of its citizens. In fact, most laws, directives, decrees and executive decisions by any government encounters more resistance than not.
Whether it was a military regime, a communist regime, or a democracy, you can't say that the arrangement was not society.
Majority of the people also want abortions, or don't want abortions; it is a military regime that enforces it either way.
In fact, all those who break the law are punsihed by a "miliatary regime", the state's law.
Your logic keeps biting itself in the tail, and tries to swallow itself. Each of your arguments so far can be turned against your own arguments. This is tiresome that you don't see that.
this is good.
What you say here is true, but I'd go further and say all crimes are crimes against society. Should I assault you, the court caption would not read "Caldwell v. Hanover," but it would read "The State v. Hanover." If a federal offense, "The US v. Hanover." My lawyer would be whoever I hired, but you wouldn't have one because you're not a party. The state would be represented by a prosecutor.
That's not to say you wouldn't have a private right to sue as well, but that would be a civil action and not a criminal one.
Society has the right to enforce its laws is, I agree, a basic and fundamental notion for the preservation of that society.
The tension to these assertions arises when an unjust law is passed. The idea arises that the law itself must answer to a higher authority to be considered just, but injustice alone will not unravel a society. What will unravel it is the loss of power of the government over the governed. Injustice alone in free societies offers a basis for enough pushback by the public to change the laws. That isn't so in less free societies, where only forceful overthrow would be effective.
I have no contention with this. Unjust laws have existed. That's why laws are in constant review, like a trial and error, to make sure that what worked in the past is still fit today, or what didn't work in the past could actually work today, justly.
Quoting NOS4A2
We can't help but have a name to this society -- state, town, territory, a whole country.
But the essence is the same.
Agreed. Getting an education and a job would be a decent start.
Did I not repeatedly say in the beginning of this thread that the majority is what makes the decision of society? Even the supreme court decide by majority votes. A society's laws do not have to be 100% approved by all of its members.
Quoting Book273
I concur.
If morality is always about what should or should not be done in some particular situation or another, and a society is a group of individuals that have commonly shared values and beliefs, then what makes a society what it is are commonly held/shared moral beliefs (that which is considered to be acceptable/unacceptable behaviour by enough of the members as to maintain stability). Morality, then, amounts to the codified rules of societal behaviour. We could call these laws without issue. So, if an individual breaks the law, it is a crime against the moral/ethical code (one of which presumably most members agree).
I'm still not at all confident in calling all law breaking "crimes against society" for the simple reason that there ought be a distinction drawn between the amount of injury that the crime results in addition to who exactly is injured. For instance, there's quite a bit of difference, one would think, between the harm that jaywalking causes and say the amount of harm that defrauding the American people about the integrity of the 2020 election causes. Placing these two crimes on the same level trivializes the severity of injury that the latter has caused, while elevating the severity of the former by association alone.
So, while I generally agree with what I think your saying, I suspect that there's some much needed refinement so as to avoid painting the picture with too broad a brushstroke. There are also very different kinds of societies where the majority do not have much say in the laws.
And society's answer to the severity of crimes is appropriate punishment. Obviously, not wearing a seat belt, you get a ticket. You get more tickets and they suspend your right to drive on public roads.
Quoting creativesoul
Yes, tyranny of the minority exists. It's been addressed by many political scientists.
We agree that morality is enforced. What next?
:brow:
Therefore, talks about objective or subjective or relative morality is moot.
Well, that doesn't follow from what's written, but I do agree. Such discussions are a waste of time.
What doesn't follow? Does anything at all follow from a morality by reason of majority?
Quoting creativesoul
Quoting L'éléphant
See where you began with "therefore"? We use that term to indicate that a logical conclusion comes next. What you wrote after "therefore" did not follow from what I said and you agreed to.
Quoting L'éléphant
We've already established that it is not always a majority's morality that is enforced. So, the above question is moot.
You're free to commit a crime. You'll have to pay for that -10 years in the slammer or the gallows!
This is where we are. We're not free to commit a crime.
Quoting creativesoul
Did you really not read my OP where I said logical argument on this thread is irrelevant? It is irrelevant because the rule is, society dictates morality, which is enforced by the law.
One method of preventing crime is to increase police presence (the threat of capture deters).
I second the motion! The threat of capture is scarier than being already inside a prison.