Excellent, as always Chris. This stood out for me:
"(As an aside—if schools were to recognize this difference and publicly rebuke the kid who hit first, while openly praising the kid who hit back, it would stop bullying in its tracks. But that won’t happen because so many of the people running modern government schools are utterly morally retarded.)"
RETARDED is one of the finest descriptor words ever invented...It covers the entire government in one fell swoop. I used some CAPS and I am a BOOMER. Well not so much a boomer since I never went broke trying to keep up with the Jones's.
BAM!! I enjoy your consistent showcasing of why you were among my first subscriptions here and continue to be someone I cheer on!! GO, CC, go!! FAFO!! 🤍
I am with Jessica as I just copied that part as well….
“No, I’m not a Boomer, and yes, I used all caps. Deal with it.”
But, the energy of “Deal with it” if it was not based in humor, seems related. Force to me is telling anyone what to do. The words “should” and “need to” come to mind as current red flag triggering words for me when I hear them. It is easier to deflect or ignore words than physical force.
I hit my sister first when I was probably 7 or 8. It is the only time I ever remember hitting her. She followed me and made noises in my face. She would not stop when I asked her to. I tried to walk away and she followed. So I slapped her in the face. She ran to Mom smugly and “told on me”. I was punished. I feel shades of discernment are necessary in everything.
Discernment, yes. Though maybe it is even possible to do better and come up with a rule that, while still requiring discernment, might at least provide some more guidance.
So, you are, “queen” of the body you occupy. And that body occupies space. And you need to be able to occupy that space, and a small bubble around that space.
Your sister was invading that bubble, and then pursuing you when you tried to escape. Is suspect there is already something in common law about that. Pursuit. Harassment. Something. You were experiencing an invasion and pursuit, and you reacted. Common law would recognize that and take it into account.
One of the seven categories of wrong actions that no one has a right to do. The other six being assault, murder, rape, theft, coercion, and fraud/deceit.
What an excellent response. Thank you. Well, if the world evolves into decentralized communities and networks, as I hope and as you are showing me the possibility of…I wish to continue to be affiliated with yours 😉🙏.
Thank you friend. I only recently learned what FAFO means! Lol! I appreciate your logic and the way you write and tend to agree especially as I am an American and was raised with a firm belief in our Constitution. However, to me ( my thinking that is) this is not necessarily the way Christ approached oppression, coercive force or justice and I don’t know if it the way I myself am supposed to approach it, although every ounce of common sense tells me it’s only fair and right. I guess the older I get and see how fragile my physical life is I am just not willing to take a chance with my eternal life.
I understand. You raise interesting questions. Does one allow oneself to be beaten? Does a young person fight back because he has more lifespan to protect, whereas an older person has less, and thus can take eternal life into account? Is allowing oneself to be beaten, rather than fighting back, a requirement for eternal life?
I believe that protective force is justified, and engaging in it when appropriate is in no way an impediment to rewards in the hereafter. I do not believe God wants one to allow oneself to be beaten to death.
Yes, a good question Christopher. I think the answer is likely contained in the two prime directives given by the greatest of us to live on this earth: to "Love others as you love yourself" and to "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." If I love others I would protect them from unjust treatment even if it involved the danger of harm to myself, surely that is not something of which a just God would fail to approve. I at one point heard the cries of help from a young woman who was being dragged down a rail line to some trees to be violated. There were some hispanic men standing around and doing nothing. I intervened and prevented this from happening. I was able to do it only with direct force of personality and fearlessness, and without violence fortunately, but that would not have deterred me if it had been required. If I love myself as much as that dear young lady I would also not fail to protect my own self from being violated wouldn't I? On the other hand if I was out of my right mind wouldn't I be glad there was some brave soul who would stand up to me and prevent me from further staining my soul and conscience with something at some point in the future I would deeply regret doing? I have done some wrongs in the past when I was not in my right mind and I surely wish someone had intervened and stopped me from doing them. I paid a price for each of these and it has been very painful. I recently have received threatening letters from lawyers to take my home because I have not paid coercive property taxes which have been exceedingly increased, and from the property owners association who I believe are in breach of contract of their assumed adhesion type contract and have already used lawyers to cow another property owner into paying a large penalty in interest and lawyers fees. I do not plan on going to corrupt admiralty courts to fight this. Nor do I plan to use force against ignorant self deluded enforcement officers "just doing their job," as such an escalation does not seem loving to me. On the other hand if I did, I don't believe it would matter on an eternal scale, God is not the judgmental Being that so many suppose, and that false religion and a carefully edited and wrongly interpreted bible has told us to believe. We, like the prodigal son, are not judged for what happens in this world by any but our own higher self and the eternal principles that we crash ourselves painfully against in order to learn and grow as spiritual beings, a purpose for which this special place was made. Did his father in the parable punish him, judge him, condemn him? Turn him away? No, he received a ring, a lavish celebration of homecoming, and a loving reception from the father that adored him and was so glad to see that he had learned the hard lessons that making mistakes in this place will teach. I think this is what Jesus really taught.
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
—The golden rule is pretty good when it comes to personal interactions. But it's not great when it comes to an enforceable rule of society. The silver rule is better for that.
You were very brave to save that woman. Not easy to do!
Speaking of the golden rule, what about the morality of this: Do unto others as they have done unto you?
I know it sounds uncharitable at first blush, but I want to give it is due. If someone is really nice to you, you have an obligation (a moral obligation, not a legal one) to be nice to them. It helps spread niceness in the world. But what if someone uses force against you? You certainly have a right to defend yourself. Does turning the other cheek (as the concept is most commonly understood) really make the world a better place, though? After all, it sends a message to violent people that they will not be resisted. Doesn't that make future violence MORE likely, not less? Might it not be more moral to fight back, sending a message that initiating violence against innocent people never pays, and thus reducing the aggregate amount of violence against innocent people in the world?
Discernment must be used, there are times when 'turning the other cheek' can be a gracious and rewarding thing to do, but doesn't apply in all cases. When I look back I can only remember a couple of times when I was threatened with physical violence by ordinary people. Yet several times I have been threatened with physical violence or coercion by law enforcement men. On the beach in Malibu I and my two sons were parked near the beach and had a surf board on a rack on my station wagon. A big beefy young man who was built like Arnold Scharzeneggar came along and threatened me with violence for using "their beach" meaning the locals, though it was a public beach. He got in my face very angry and seeming under the influence of some drug or alcohol, and pushed me in the chest with his forefinger and I realized that I was about to get beaten to within an inch of my life. I knew I had no chance of coming out of such a contest with this young giant without serious injury and was at first somewhat afraid. Yet suddenly I knew that I could handle whatever the outcome might be and all fear left me. I looked him dead in the eye, and suddenly everything changed, he suddenly became hesitant and backed off, and while muttering some threats he left and walked away. Another time I was coerced into giving my finger prints against my will. According to Brown vs. Texas you are not required to give identification to an officer unless there is evidence of criminal activity, I was jailed for 'failure to identify' and the officer said, we will take your prints and then we will know who you are. I believe I would have been within my rights to resist with force this violation of a human right, however I did not, I did choose to comply. The ran me through the entire Homeland Security data base and were not able to come up with a match. They jailed me, I spent about three days in a small dingy holding cell before I was released. Resisting would have likely have been painful for both of us, but was pointless and unproductive. They would have justifed their actions and I had no desire for vengeance or spending time in their corrupt merchant law courts seeking redress.
Yes, because it is institutionalized and so many tend to unthinkingly support these injustices. Monopolies are never a good thing it seems, including that on the use of violence.
We are asked not to return evil for evil, and not to seek vengeance. Yet is it evil to make it unpleasant and even extremely painful to violate your rights with violence? No, I think failing to give an incentive not to do such things to others would be the real evil as it would, as you say, encourage or incentivize such behavior, and doing so may even cut short a possible career in crime. I did not use violence against the black man who was intent on abusing that young lady, but I did follow him and get his license number and went to court as a witness. It turned out he had a record of rape. He did not escape without some consequences for his mistake, whether it was enough to teach him that such actions are not profitable I don't know, but eventually in this life or another the lesson will be learned. The human tolerance for pain is great, but fortunately it is not infinite. Eventually, like the prodigal son, the lesson will sink in and repentance and healing will be sought.
I am interested in that word “profitable.” When I think of what the person did wrong, I solely think of their violation of the rights of the other. I do not generally consider the impact or lack of profit to the perpetrator. I am curious how you see this?
Do you not think that the immoral persons who run the corrupt pharmaceutical companies think they are "profiting" from the crimes they perpetrate? We were talking about incentives, what was the incentive for the person who attacked the young lady? Whether it be for cash, or sexual release or sense of power over another weaker person. I am not saying that there was a real profit, in any long term sense, that is why it is a mistake, but in the short term it very likely seems that way to the morally ignorant perpetrator.
i think you have to love others as you love yourself. i try to treat other people the way i want to be treated. a friend reminded me couple of weeks ago, that the person i was dealing with, isnt me nor even like me. boom!
i think it is both. do unto them as you would like done to you but always remembering they arent you. really see them and what they do and then you can make a choice to do unto you as you would like
i have been subject to physical violence as so very many others have whether in their own homes or on the streets or in institutions. for us these conversations are not hypothetical.
ours is a very violent society even in its nicety. i am a solo traveler and i carry my assortment of crowbars, big cats claw & machete, a tool in ever room. if they attempt or get in, i will not go down without a fight, unless they shoot me from the get go. then it wasnt about me. i will defend if they attempt to enter my space, & on my ground. i will not take it to them in usual life. i dont live in a war mentality.
I think others are really more like us than most of us would like to admit. There is not one of us who has not at times acted in uncharacteristically wrong ways at times in their lives, not all have loving rational parents. If those serious mistakes were not made in this life, I believe they were very likely made in another incarnation until the lesson was learned. We awakening ones are the beneficiaries of that. Where they are we were once I believe. Where we are now they will be, even for the recalcitrant ones. We each tend to justify our own "sins" and say, well they are not really so bad like that fellow's sins. However each of them is nothing more than a mistake, even though they may get a temporary seeming advantage by their selfish and thoughtless action. A mistake is to be corrected, and correction, though sometimes very painful, is not actually punishment so much as it is a valuable learning experience.
God wants peace, right? But pacifism is not the same thing. Pacifism says allow yourself to be destroyed rather then deploying protective force in your own defense. I think God wants peace, not destruction.
I think peace is in the heart of the soul that chooses it. It does not depend on external conditions, but is the result of knowing in your heart that you have chosen to do what your conscience and the Holy Spirit of Truth given to every man and woman quietly asks you to do.
In the situation where you saved that woman, you might have been called upon to use force in her defense, or yours, if they had forced your hand in that way. But if you fought back, that would be in keeping with good motivations of a good heart…
True, that's why rules are not to be written in stone, but in the human heart. There are times when to kill can be the most loving thing that can be done in the moment.
Thanks friend! My Mom 86, lives to read stories of the American Revolution and the men and women who risked their lives for freedom. Amazing how worldwide, many peoples have done so. I am no Martyr that’s for sure! I have read just some of the lives of the Saints and there is for sure a reason they are called Saints giving their lives for a cause
There is a fair amount to unpack here so I am going give it some more thought first; but a comment on your (completely reasonable) suggestion that bullying would just disappear if the kid who used protective force were praised for it: that's true but school itself, in its present form, represents coercive force more than anything else. Thus enforcement is all they really do; and the punishments that are dealt out have only to do with kids following "the rules." Thus the aggressor and the defender are treated as transgressors, equally. Or not equally, if one of them happens to also be entitled under the current order.
(That's really the definition of "morally retarded," now that I think about it.)
Every body continues in its state of rest, or of uniform motion in a straight line, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed upon it.
Newton's Second Law of Motion
The acceleration produced by a particular force acting on a body is directly proportional to the magnitude of the force and inversely proportional to the mass of the body.
Newton's Third Law of Motion
To every action there is always opposed an equal reaction; or, the mutual actions of two bodies upon each other are always equal, and directed to contrary parts.
In one of the chapters of my (other) book, I talk about the relationship between the tendency in morality and the tendency in nature to seek equilibrium. I should have added this too!
"(As an aside—if schools were to recognize this difference and publicly rebuke the kid who hit first, while openly praising the kid who hit back, it would stop bullying in its tracks. But that won’t happen because so many of the people running modern government schools are utterly morally retarded.)" No, the majority of people running modern government schools are bullies themselves. Which is the reason they won't punish the bullies. They see them as equals and hope they will grow up to be psychopathic control freak PARASITES like they are.
Off on a bit of a tangent; Personal property, rights, wonder where copyrights & patents (Usually agreements among gentlemen often instantly modified by knaves.) fit in.
Hum, if you write a book, I buy a hardcopy I can do whatever I want with it, including passing it along to a friend or selling it.
Your showing your book here, basically hanging it in the public square. Seems to me, since it's hanging in the square, I can copy and share and still be ethically correct and morally pure of heart?
Above's hypothetical of course and intellectual property protection is painfully strange, bordered with rather convoluted case law under our present systems as it well will be in any future ones.
Do you cover intellectual property in future chapters or have I just added 9,999 pages you need write Christopher?
My default position is this: your ideas, your thoughts, your time and labor, etc. are all outgrowths of your self-ownership. I really just don’t get how some libertarians and anarchists hold the position that intellectual property does not exist or should not be defended.
How is there a difference between the thought and labor that goes into hand-crafting a table (which they say one must not steal) and the thought and labor that goes into writing a book or a screenplay or whatever (which some then say it is perfectly okay to steal)?
There are days when I think so hard that I sleep as deeply as I used to after karate test days. The mental exhaustion is that intense. What makes the difference? Is that mental outlay not a product of my self-ownership, every bit as if I carved a statue from a piece of wood? How is it not theft if someone takes my work, slaps their name on it, and sells it as their own?
I confess I probably have not heard every one of the other side’s arguments, but thus far, I not have not heard one that I have found convincing.
"A copyright is a grant by the state that permits the copyright holder to prevent others from using their own property — e.g., ink and paper [or computer] — in certain ways.
"...the state is assigning to A a right to control B’s property — A can tell B not to do certain things with B’s property. Since ownership is the right to control, IP grants to A co-ownership of B’s property. This clearly cannot be justified under libertarian principles."
If someone takes your work, slaps their name on it, and sells it as their own, you have every right to publicly shame them and ask others to join you in ostracizing them. But not to forcibly stop them from doing it.
** The second link above was in error in the original post. It was corrected the next day.
Almost. A property right is the exclusive right to control a scarce resource. Ideas are not scarce resources, so we cannot have property rights in them.
That’s not to say people don’t have new ideas and shouldn’t be given credit for them. It’s like using famous quotations. Most courteous people give attribution when using a quotation. When they don’t, we might criticize them for it, but we don’t attempt to forcibly stop them from doing it.
(NB: In my comment above, the second link was in error in the original post. I corrected it just now.)
Any one person’s idea is as scarce as they come. I cannot see how we can say that ideas are not scarce resources. There are many ideas in the world, yes, but there is also a lot of dirt. Yet I can still have property rights to my particular plot of dirt.
This is another one of those gaps that I just don’t get. If physical property is an outgrowth of one’s self ownership, then surely one’s intellectual products must be too!
Yes, this is quite a difficult one, probably one where I would say reasonable people could differ.
For me, objects in the physical world have fundamentally different properties than concepts in the intellectual world. If B tries to use A's piece of dirt (or paper or computer) then that obviously and definitely interferes with A's ability to use it.
Conversely, if B uses A's ideas, that does _not_ interfere with A's ability to use his ideas -- A is still able to write about them, give presentations and interviews and teach classes about them, regardless of what B is or is not doing with those same ideas.
this is excellent. as for Humes I am with you on this. when you stand in a courtroom facing charges for your actions, whether or not the story told about those actions is true as told by others, it is you & only you standing there.
you will answer for every action you do.
my analogy is i am chopping wood with an axe. rhythmn good, sweat, concentrating and a neighbor walks up & interrupts me. i am annoyed. i stop mid swing with the axe up and turn to look at her and she is snapping pics of me on her phone.
she runs off telling everybody i threatened her and has the pictures to prove it! she carefully chooses 1 or 2 or even crops them so the wood doesnt appear in the pic. i get charged becoz everybody knows we had issues & "what if"...i had been seen killing a rat once.
so i have to tell my story, account for my actions.
even if she was in my yard.
that, IS. what "ought" is merely wishful thinking.
this is why i oppose vigilante justice or tit for tat.
similar, close enough. at that time my reputation, demeanor saved me a couple of times. today, in this environment, im not so sure it would. the court of opinion hears no other voice & evidence is no longer needed or needed to be proved. the axe scenario is one most can picture, can see, imagery. so i stick with it.
did i understand your point about humes correctly?
Yes, justice seems worse now than it was in even recent years.
"did i understand your point about humes correctly?"
—I think so, but I am not entirely sure. Hume's point, as far as I can tell, is that moral principles cannot be derived and justified from observation of factual realities alone. You cannot get a normative statement from a purely descriptive statement. X happens in nature; therefore, Y is good/bad/etc.
My point is that I don't get how that can possibility be. We obviously have morality. It came from somewhere. And at some point down the objectivity scale, everyone basically hold the same moral principles (most people believe it is objectively wrong to murder in cold blood). So if we cannot derive this very real understanding from real things, then we cannot really derive it from anywhere at all. Where else would we get it? It's an ongoing debate, with far smarter people than I taking both sides. I am content with my understanding of the matter and my ethical-naturalist position :-)
Hume’s guillotine is a bit of a red herring in this context. The so-called ‘is-ought gap’ is bridged by the value judgments of conscious beings. On the ‘is’ side of the connection, we can see from both history and current events that certain types of human behaviors lead to predictable outcomes. When we choose what outcomes we want to experience in our lives, we see what behaviors and actions ourselves and others ‘ought’ to do. It’s simply an understanding of cause and effect.
The Natural Laws governing the predictable consequences of human behavior are as Universal and Immutable as the natural laws of physics. The more people in a society act in violation of Natural Law (assault, murder, rape, theft, trespass, coercion, fraud/deceit), the more that society in the aggregate will experience war, enslavement, and poverty. The more people act in accordance with Natural Law (eschewing those seven categories of wrong actions), the more we will experience Peace, Freedom, and Prosperity. The so-called ‘is-ought gap’ is solved by our understanding of Natural Law and our corresponding value judgments.
I am right there with you. But I know smart people who feel powerfully, aggressively, that ethical naturalism is bunk. What seems to me to be as clear and crisp as the blue sky on an autumn day is, to them, nonsense. I don’t get it.
To elaborate on the above, the choice between peace, freedom and prosperity versus war, enslavement and poverty seems to most people like a no-brainer (Well, duh!). Unfortunately there are 2-4% of beings among us with significant sociopathic tendencies—they look like us on the surface, but are significantly lacking in the ability to empathize with others. Sometimes this is due to genetics or physical trauma, but often it is due to severe childhood trauma and abuse.
The worst of these *will* choose the opposite: they’ll choose slavery over freedom because they think they will be the master who enslaves others, they’ll choose war over peace because they want the ‘glory’ of victory even if they have to participate in mass murder to get it.
The global ruling ‘elite’ are chock full of the worst of these sociopaths. We need to learn to identify them, warn everyone about them, and be strong enough to not submit to their manipulations and attempts to enslave us.
got it. this answer gives me enough. you can spin enough scenarios & think it out to infinity. & beyond!😂😂
i like simple. foundational.
take the axe scenario...im working. interrupted. pause. look. neither good or bad. i intended good & respectful.
she perceives & interprets as bad. she perceives a threat.
she shows pictures...
there are a million oughts or as many viewers of that scenario depending on the perspective of the viewer.
every culture & society within it have had a basic code, belief system they adhered to traditionally. forever back as far as can be recorded & told.
7-9 virtues, 10 commandments, the emerald tablets, even hippocrates, etc. in some similar form and all were simple. they did not define specific behaviors or words but how u were to be or strive to be in all your dealings. honesty or integrity, respect, do no harm, etc.
it truly amazed me how they were all similar. these are as old as time. where did they come? God only knows.
there really is no thing that is good or bad of itself.
this is why we are not to judge... a book by its cover
that cold blooded murder may not be so cold blooded but then it might be sooo much more than simple cold blooded murder obscured.
Sasha L wrote a substack about government wanting more government. It has been that way since 1776 and still the beast isn't satisfied. That means it never will be and it is now feeding off of humanity...literally murdering us.
Your funny foot note made me think of something - Gen X is 13th generation (per Howe and Strauss) since the Constitution. Take that Jefferson quote- amending Constitution every generation and we are many Generations behind!! So why not revise Articles of Confederation Now, Avoid a Civil War and then let the states figure out whether market anarchy works for that state or not?
Excellent, as always Chris. This stood out for me:
"(As an aside—if schools were to recognize this difference and publicly rebuke the kid who hit first, while openly praising the kid who hit back, it would stop bullying in its tracks. But that won’t happen because so many of the people running modern government schools are utterly morally retarded.)"
Thanks!
I thought I might get in trouble for the use of the word “retarded,” in today’s PC environment…but that is the appropriate word in this case!
I applaud the use of the word "retarded" about things that are "retarded." Which, with soooo many things today, are. 😒
🤣💯
Retarded, Retarded, retarded. I said it. I’ll say it again.
That’s the spirit!!!
RETARDED is one of the finest descriptor words ever invented...It covers the entire government in one fell swoop. I used some CAPS and I am a BOOMER. Well not so much a boomer since I never went broke trying to keep up with the Jones's.
💪💛
Yes, I’ve worked with them so I know unfortunately
😢
Can’t get in trouble here, except with retards.
🤣😆🤣😆🤣😆
Coulda been utterly retarded or morally retarded. You really stepped over the line with utterly morally retarded. ☺️
🤣😁😆😂💜🩷❤️💙
"No, I’m not a Boomer, and yes, I used all caps. Deal with it." 👏🤣
Very well done. You have a great skill in articulating and defining things that are hard to explain.
Thank you, Boflys.
BAM!! I enjoy your consistent showcasing of why you were among my first subscriptions here and continue to be someone I cheer on!! GO, CC, go!! FAFO!! 🤍
That inspires and fuels me. Thank you!
Aww!! Happy to help in any way I can, my friend!! ❤️💥🔥
Beautiful and Brilliant!
I am with Jessica as I just copied that part as well….
“No, I’m not a Boomer, and yes, I used all caps. Deal with it.”
But, the energy of “Deal with it” if it was not based in humor, seems related. Force to me is telling anyone what to do. The words “should” and “need to” come to mind as current red flag triggering words for me when I hear them. It is easier to deflect or ignore words than physical force.
I hit my sister first when I was probably 7 or 8. It is the only time I ever remember hitting her. She followed me and made noises in my face. She would not stop when I asked her to. I tried to walk away and she followed. So I slapped her in the face. She ran to Mom smugly and “told on me”. I was punished. I feel shades of discernment are necessary in everything.
Discernment, yes. Though maybe it is even possible to do better and come up with a rule that, while still requiring discernment, might at least provide some more guidance.
So, you are, “queen” of the body you occupy. And that body occupies space. And you need to be able to occupy that space, and a small bubble around that space.
Your sister was invading that bubble, and then pursuing you when you tried to escape. Is suspect there is already something in common law about that. Pursuit. Harassment. Something. You were experiencing an invasion and pursuit, and you reacted. Common law would recognize that and take it into account.
Trespass.
One of the seven categories of wrong actions that no one has a right to do. The other six being assault, murder, rape, theft, coercion, and fraud/deceit.
Thanks! Can you link me to the primary proponent of this seven-category ethos?
Yes of course! That would be Mark Passio, probably the foremost teacher of Natural Law today.
WhatOnEarthIsHappening.com
Ah yes—I should have realized that! Thanks :-)
What an excellent response. Thank you. Well, if the world evolves into decentralized communities and networks, as I hope and as you are showing me the possibility of…I wish to continue to be affiliated with yours 😉🙏.
Let's make it happen!
That leaves me with a happy feeling in my heart before I head off to bed.
🔥🧡🔥
Thank you friend. I only recently learned what FAFO means! Lol! I appreciate your logic and the way you write and tend to agree especially as I am an American and was raised with a firm belief in our Constitution. However, to me ( my thinking that is) this is not necessarily the way Christ approached oppression, coercive force or justice and I don’t know if it the way I myself am supposed to approach it, although every ounce of common sense tells me it’s only fair and right. I guess the older I get and see how fragile my physical life is I am just not willing to take a chance with my eternal life.
I understand. You raise interesting questions. Does one allow oneself to be beaten? Does a young person fight back because he has more lifespan to protect, whereas an older person has less, and thus can take eternal life into account? Is allowing oneself to be beaten, rather than fighting back, a requirement for eternal life?
I believe that protective force is justified, and engaging in it when appropriate is in no way an impediment to rewards in the hereafter. I do not believe God wants one to allow oneself to be beaten to death.
Yes, a good question Christopher. I think the answer is likely contained in the two prime directives given by the greatest of us to live on this earth: to "Love others as you love yourself" and to "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." If I love others I would protect them from unjust treatment even if it involved the danger of harm to myself, surely that is not something of which a just God would fail to approve. I at one point heard the cries of help from a young woman who was being dragged down a rail line to some trees to be violated. There were some hispanic men standing around and doing nothing. I intervened and prevented this from happening. I was able to do it only with direct force of personality and fearlessness, and without violence fortunately, but that would not have deterred me if it had been required. If I love myself as much as that dear young lady I would also not fail to protect my own self from being violated wouldn't I? On the other hand if I was out of my right mind wouldn't I be glad there was some brave soul who would stand up to me and prevent me from further staining my soul and conscience with something at some point in the future I would deeply regret doing? I have done some wrongs in the past when I was not in my right mind and I surely wish someone had intervened and stopped me from doing them. I paid a price for each of these and it has been very painful. I recently have received threatening letters from lawyers to take my home because I have not paid coercive property taxes which have been exceedingly increased, and from the property owners association who I believe are in breach of contract of their assumed adhesion type contract and have already used lawyers to cow another property owner into paying a large penalty in interest and lawyers fees. I do not plan on going to corrupt admiralty courts to fight this. Nor do I plan to use force against ignorant self deluded enforcement officers "just doing their job," as such an escalation does not seem loving to me. On the other hand if I did, I don't believe it would matter on an eternal scale, God is not the judgmental Being that so many suppose, and that false religion and a carefully edited and wrongly interpreted bible has told us to believe. We, like the prodigal son, are not judged for what happens in this world by any but our own higher self and the eternal principles that we crash ourselves painfully against in order to learn and grow as spiritual beings, a purpose for which this special place was made. Did his father in the parable punish him, judge him, condemn him? Turn him away? No, he received a ring, a lavish celebration of homecoming, and a loving reception from the father that adored him and was so glad to see that he had learned the hard lessons that making mistakes in this place will teach. I think this is what Jesus really taught.
Lots to think about in there!
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
—The golden rule is pretty good when it comes to personal interactions. But it's not great when it comes to an enforceable rule of society. The silver rule is better for that.
You were very brave to save that woman. Not easy to do!
Speaking of the golden rule, what about the morality of this: Do unto others as they have done unto you?
I know it sounds uncharitable at first blush, but I want to give it is due. If someone is really nice to you, you have an obligation (a moral obligation, not a legal one) to be nice to them. It helps spread niceness in the world. But what if someone uses force against you? You certainly have a right to defend yourself. Does turning the other cheek (as the concept is most commonly understood) really make the world a better place, though? After all, it sends a message to violent people that they will not be resisted. Doesn't that make future violence MORE likely, not less? Might it not be more moral to fight back, sending a message that initiating violence against innocent people never pays, and thus reducing the aggregate amount of violence against innocent people in the world?
Something to think about, anyway…
Discernment must be used, there are times when 'turning the other cheek' can be a gracious and rewarding thing to do, but doesn't apply in all cases. When I look back I can only remember a couple of times when I was threatened with physical violence by ordinary people. Yet several times I have been threatened with physical violence or coercion by law enforcement men. On the beach in Malibu I and my two sons were parked near the beach and had a surf board on a rack on my station wagon. A big beefy young man who was built like Arnold Scharzeneggar came along and threatened me with violence for using "their beach" meaning the locals, though it was a public beach. He got in my face very angry and seeming under the influence of some drug or alcohol, and pushed me in the chest with his forefinger and I realized that I was about to get beaten to within an inch of my life. I knew I had no chance of coming out of such a contest with this young giant without serious injury and was at first somewhat afraid. Yet suddenly I knew that I could handle whatever the outcome might be and all fear left me. I looked him dead in the eye, and suddenly everything changed, he suddenly became hesitant and backed off, and while muttering some threats he left and walked away. Another time I was coerced into giving my finger prints against my will. According to Brown vs. Texas you are not required to give identification to an officer unless there is evidence of criminal activity, I was jailed for 'failure to identify' and the officer said, we will take your prints and then we will know who you are. I believe I would have been within my rights to resist with force this violation of a human right, however I did not, I did choose to comply. The ran me through the entire Homeland Security data base and were not able to come up with a match. They jailed me, I spent about three days in a small dingy holding cell before I was released. Resisting would have likely have been painful for both of us, but was pointless and unproductive. They would have justifed their actions and I had no desire for vengeance or spending time in their corrupt merchant law courts seeking redress.
Very interesting stories!
But, as you might imagine, my biggest takeaway is that government poses the greatest threat in our lives!
Yes, because it is institutionalized and so many tend to unthinkingly support these injustices. Monopolies are never a good thing it seems, including that on the use of violence.
We are asked not to return evil for evil, and not to seek vengeance. Yet is it evil to make it unpleasant and even extremely painful to violate your rights with violence? No, I think failing to give an incentive not to do such things to others would be the real evil as it would, as you say, encourage or incentivize such behavior, and doing so may even cut short a possible career in crime. I did not use violence against the black man who was intent on abusing that young lady, but I did follow him and get his license number and went to court as a witness. It turned out he had a record of rape. He did not escape without some consequences for his mistake, whether it was enough to teach him that such actions are not profitable I don't know, but eventually in this life or another the lesson will be learned. The human tolerance for pain is great, but fortunately it is not infinite. Eventually, like the prodigal son, the lesson will sink in and repentance and healing will be sought.
I am interested in that word “profitable.” When I think of what the person did wrong, I solely think of their violation of the rights of the other. I do not generally consider the impact or lack of profit to the perpetrator. I am curious how you see this?
Do you not think that the immoral persons who run the corrupt pharmaceutical companies think they are "profiting" from the crimes they perpetrate? We were talking about incentives, what was the incentive for the person who attacked the young lady? Whether it be for cash, or sexual release or sense of power over another weaker person. I am not saying that there was a real profit, in any long term sense, that is why it is a mistake, but in the short term it very likely seems that way to the morally ignorant perpetrator.
i think you have to love others as you love yourself. i try to treat other people the way i want to be treated. a friend reminded me couple of weeks ago, that the person i was dealing with, isnt me nor even like me. boom!
i think it is both. do unto them as you would like done to you but always remembering they arent you. really see them and what they do and then you can make a choice to do unto you as you would like
I understand.
What if they subject you to physical violence, though?
i have been subject to physical violence as so very many others have whether in their own homes or on the streets or in institutions. for us these conversations are not hypothetical.
ours is a very violent society even in its nicety. i am a solo traveler and i carry my assortment of crowbars, big cats claw & machete, a tool in ever room. if they attempt or get in, i will not go down without a fight, unless they shoot me from the get go. then it wasnt about me. i will defend if they attempt to enter my space, & on my ground. i will not take it to them in usual life. i dont live in a war mentality.
I think others are really more like us than most of us would like to admit. There is not one of us who has not at times acted in uncharacteristically wrong ways at times in their lives, not all have loving rational parents. If those serious mistakes were not made in this life, I believe they were very likely made in another incarnation until the lesson was learned. We awakening ones are the beneficiaries of that. Where they are we were once I believe. Where we are now they will be, even for the recalcitrant ones. We each tend to justify our own "sins" and say, well they are not really so bad like that fellow's sins. However each of them is nothing more than a mistake, even though they may get a temporary seeming advantage by their selfish and thoughtless action. A mistake is to be corrected, and correction, though sometimes very painful, is not actually punishment so much as it is a valuable learning experience.
absolutely agree!
Thank you for this astute response. I believe that GOD respects LAW & ORDER. We should not and cannot survive if the BULLY RETARDS HAVE CONTROL.
I think that is a reasonable way to put it.
God wants peace, right? But pacifism is not the same thing. Pacifism says allow yourself to be destroyed rather then deploying protective force in your own defense. I think God wants peace, not destruction.
I think peace is in the heart of the soul that chooses it. It does not depend on external conditions, but is the result of knowing in your heart that you have chosen to do what your conscience and the Holy Spirit of Truth given to every man and woman quietly asks you to do.
In the situation where you saved that woman, you might have been called upon to use force in her defense, or yours, if they had forced your hand in that way. But if you fought back, that would be in keeping with good motivations of a good heart…
Exactly my point Christopher.
There is a time to kill…
Ecclesiastes 3:3
Good point. That covers a lot of options. I think God requires us to use our heads when choosing these "times."
True, that's why rules are not to be written in stone, but in the human heart. There are times when to kill can be the most loving thing that can be done in the moment.
Thanks friend! My Mom 86, lives to read stories of the American Revolution and the men and women who risked their lives for freedom. Amazing how worldwide, many peoples have done so. I am no Martyr that’s for sure! I have read just some of the lives of the Saints and there is for sure a reason they are called Saints giving their lives for a cause
Life is precious and wonderful. It is terrifying to think of giving that up, even for a cause. Yet sometimes, it must be so.
Maccabees has a great story about that. As well as the accounts of St Sophia and her daughters Faith, Hope and Charity
There is a fair amount to unpack here so I am going give it some more thought first; but a comment on your (completely reasonable) suggestion that bullying would just disappear if the kid who used protective force were praised for it: that's true but school itself, in its present form, represents coercive force more than anything else. Thus enforcement is all they really do; and the punishments that are dealt out have only to do with kids following "the rules." Thus the aggressor and the defender are treated as transgressors, equally. Or not equally, if one of them happens to also be entitled under the current order.
(That's really the definition of "morally retarded," now that I think about it.)
Entirely agree!!
It's Physics.
Newton's First Law of Motion
Every body continues in its state of rest, or of uniform motion in a straight line, unless it is compelled to change that state by forces impressed upon it.
Newton's Second Law of Motion
The acceleration produced by a particular force acting on a body is directly proportional to the magnitude of the force and inversely proportional to the mass of the body.
Newton's Third Law of Motion
To every action there is always opposed an equal reaction; or, the mutual actions of two bodies upon each other are always equal, and directed to contrary parts.
In one of the chapters of my (other) book, I talk about the relationship between the tendency in morality and the tendency in nature to seek equilibrium. I should have added this too!
"(As an aside—if schools were to recognize this difference and publicly rebuke the kid who hit first, while openly praising the kid who hit back, it would stop bullying in its tracks. But that won’t happen because so many of the people running modern government schools are utterly morally retarded.)" No, the majority of people running modern government schools are bullies themselves. Which is the reason they won't punish the bullies. They see them as equals and hope they will grow up to be psychopathic control freak PARASITES like they are.
Off on a bit of a tangent; Personal property, rights, wonder where copyrights & patents (Usually agreements among gentlemen often instantly modified by knaves.) fit in.
Hum, if you write a book, I buy a hardcopy I can do whatever I want with it, including passing it along to a friend or selling it.
Your showing your book here, basically hanging it in the public square. Seems to me, since it's hanging in the square, I can copy and share and still be ethically correct and morally pure of heart?
Above's hypothetical of course and intellectual property protection is painfully strange, bordered with rather convoluted case law under our present systems as it well will be in any future ones.
Do you cover intellectual property in future chapters or have I just added 9,999 pages you need write Christopher?
GRIN
My default position is this: your ideas, your thoughts, your time and labor, etc. are all outgrowths of your self-ownership. I really just don’t get how some libertarians and anarchists hold the position that intellectual property does not exist or should not be defended.
How is there a difference between the thought and labor that goes into hand-crafting a table (which they say one must not steal) and the thought and labor that goes into writing a book or a screenplay or whatever (which some then say it is perfectly okay to steal)?
There are days when I think so hard that I sleep as deeply as I used to after karate test days. The mental exhaustion is that intense. What makes the difference? Is that mental outlay not a product of my self-ownership, every bit as if I carved a statue from a piece of wood? How is it not theft if someone takes my work, slaps their name on it, and sells it as their own?
I confess I probably have not heard every one of the other side’s arguments, but thus far, I not have not heard one that I have found convincing.
The prime reference would be Stephan Kinsella's 'Against Intellectual Property' available free at https://mises.org/library/book/against-intellectual-property.
https://substack.com/@kinsella
A more concise summary (https://mises.org/mises-daily/case-against-ip-concise-guide) contains this money quote:
"A copyright is a grant by the state that permits the copyright holder to prevent others from using their own property — e.g., ink and paper [or computer] — in certain ways.
"...the state is assigning to A a right to control B’s property — A can tell B not to do certain things with B’s property. Since ownership is the right to control, IP grants to A co-ownership of B’s property. This clearly cannot be justified under libertarian principles."
If someone takes your work, slaps their name on it, and sells it as their own, you have every right to publicly shame them and ask others to join you in ostracizing them. But not to forcibly stop them from doing it.
** The second link above was in error in the original post. It was corrected the next day.
If I am getting this right, the argument is that B's paper or computer are B's property, but A's ideas are not A's property. Is that correct?
Almost. A property right is the exclusive right to control a scarce resource. Ideas are not scarce resources, so we cannot have property rights in them.
That’s not to say people don’t have new ideas and shouldn’t be given credit for them. It’s like using famous quotations. Most courteous people give attribution when using a quotation. When they don’t, we might criticize them for it, but we don’t attempt to forcibly stop them from doing it.
(NB: In my comment above, the second link was in error in the original post. I corrected it just now.)
Any one person’s idea is as scarce as they come. I cannot see how we can say that ideas are not scarce resources. There are many ideas in the world, yes, but there is also a lot of dirt. Yet I can still have property rights to my particular plot of dirt.
This is another one of those gaps that I just don’t get. If physical property is an outgrowth of one’s self ownership, then surely one’s intellectual products must be too!
Yes, this is quite a difficult one, probably one where I would say reasonable people could differ.
For me, objects in the physical world have fundamentally different properties than concepts in the intellectual world. If B tries to use A's piece of dirt (or paper or computer) then that obviously and definitely interferes with A's ability to use it.
Conversely, if B uses A's ideas, that does _not_ interfere with A's ability to use his ideas -- A is still able to write about them, give presentations and interviews and teach classes about them, regardless of what B is or is not doing with those same ideas.
this is excellent. as for Humes I am with you on this. when you stand in a courtroom facing charges for your actions, whether or not the story told about those actions is true as told by others, it is you & only you standing there.
you will answer for every action you do.
my analogy is i am chopping wood with an axe. rhythmn good, sweat, concentrating and a neighbor walks up & interrupts me. i am annoyed. i stop mid swing with the axe up and turn to look at her and she is snapping pics of me on her phone.
she runs off telling everybody i threatened her and has the pictures to prove it! she carefully chooses 1 or 2 or even crops them so the wood doesnt appear in the pic. i get charged becoz everybody knows we had issues & "what if"...i had been seen killing a rat once.
so i have to tell my story, account for my actions.
even if she was in my yard.
that, IS. what "ought" is merely wishful thinking.
this is why i oppose vigilante justice or tit for tat.
This axe scenario never actually happened to you, though, right?
similar, close enough. at that time my reputation, demeanor saved me a couple of times. today, in this environment, im not so sure it would. the court of opinion hears no other voice & evidence is no longer needed or needed to be proved. the axe scenario is one most can picture, can see, imagery. so i stick with it.
did i understand your point about humes correctly?
Yes, justice seems worse now than it was in even recent years.
"did i understand your point about humes correctly?"
—I think so, but I am not entirely sure. Hume's point, as far as I can tell, is that moral principles cannot be derived and justified from observation of factual realities alone. You cannot get a normative statement from a purely descriptive statement. X happens in nature; therefore, Y is good/bad/etc.
My point is that I don't get how that can possibility be. We obviously have morality. It came from somewhere. And at some point down the objectivity scale, everyone basically hold the same moral principles (most people believe it is objectively wrong to murder in cold blood). So if we cannot derive this very real understanding from real things, then we cannot really derive it from anywhere at all. Where else would we get it? It's an ongoing debate, with far smarter people than I taking both sides. I am content with my understanding of the matter and my ethical-naturalist position :-)
Hume’s guillotine is a bit of a red herring in this context. The so-called ‘is-ought gap’ is bridged by the value judgments of conscious beings. On the ‘is’ side of the connection, we can see from both history and current events that certain types of human behaviors lead to predictable outcomes. When we choose what outcomes we want to experience in our lives, we see what behaviors and actions ourselves and others ‘ought’ to do. It’s simply an understanding of cause and effect.
The Natural Laws governing the predictable consequences of human behavior are as Universal and Immutable as the natural laws of physics. The more people in a society act in violation of Natural Law (assault, murder, rape, theft, trespass, coercion, fraud/deceit), the more that society in the aggregate will experience war, enslavement, and poverty. The more people act in accordance with Natural Law (eschewing those seven categories of wrong actions), the more we will experience Peace, Freedom, and Prosperity. The so-called ‘is-ought gap’ is solved by our understanding of Natural Law and our corresponding value judgments.
I am right there with you. But I know smart people who feel powerfully, aggressively, that ethical naturalism is bunk. What seems to me to be as clear and crisp as the blue sky on an autumn day is, to them, nonsense. I don’t get it.
To elaborate on the above, the choice between peace, freedom and prosperity versus war, enslavement and poverty seems to most people like a no-brainer (Well, duh!). Unfortunately there are 2-4% of beings among us with significant sociopathic tendencies—they look like us on the surface, but are significantly lacking in the ability to empathize with others. Sometimes this is due to genetics or physical trauma, but often it is due to severe childhood trauma and abuse.
The worst of these *will* choose the opposite: they’ll choose slavery over freedom because they think they will be the master who enslaves others, they’ll choose war over peace because they want the ‘glory’ of victory even if they have to participate in mass murder to get it.
The global ruling ‘elite’ are chock full of the worst of these sociopaths. We need to learn to identify them, warn everyone about them, and be strong enough to not submit to their manipulations and attempts to enslave us.
Absolutely. They are the bad apples that spoil the barrel. They are the reason we can’t have nice things.
But I know people who are on OUR SIDE who believe in rights, but not natural rights. It boggles my mind.
got it. this answer gives me enough. you can spin enough scenarios & think it out to infinity. & beyond!😂😂
i like simple. foundational.
take the axe scenario...im working. interrupted. pause. look. neither good or bad. i intended good & respectful.
she perceives & interprets as bad. she perceives a threat.
she shows pictures...
there are a million oughts or as many viewers of that scenario depending on the perspective of the viewer.
every culture & society within it have had a basic code, belief system they adhered to traditionally. forever back as far as can be recorded & told.
7-9 virtues, 10 commandments, the emerald tablets, even hippocrates, etc. in some similar form and all were simple. they did not define specific behaviors or words but how u were to be or strive to be in all your dealings. honesty or integrity, respect, do no harm, etc.
it truly amazed me how they were all similar. these are as old as time. where did they come? God only knows.
there really is no thing that is good or bad of itself.
this is why we are not to judge... a book by its cover
that cold blooded murder may not be so cold blooded but then it might be sooo much more than simple cold blooded murder obscured.
🔥🧠🔥
the thing is this...every action, IS.
especially today where every action can & often is, interpreted, judged according to others "oughts". is this what you were speaking to?
i dont know Humes.
Sasha L wrote a substack about government wanting more government. It has been that way since 1776 and still the beast isn't satisfied. That means it never will be and it is now feeding off of humanity...literally murdering us.
It's what it does!
With You 99.99999%! Why not 100%? It is My "pet peeve" that People call children "kids." And here is why:
Our Children Are Not Kids! (article): https://amaterasusolar.substack.com/p/our-children-are-not-kids
Yes, I am a boomer who consciously chooses to capitalize Human pronouns out of respect for Humanity...
The GentleOne’s Solution (article): https://odysee.com/@amaterasusolar:8/The-GentleOnes-Solution:c
That is some food for thought re: kids. YIKES!
And the gentle one's solution—I will read it later, but a quick scan indicates a lot of overlap in our thinking. Thanks!
Looking forward!!!
Your funny foot note made me think of something - Gen X is 13th generation (per Howe and Strauss) since the Constitution. Take that Jefferson quote- amending Constitution every generation and we are many Generations behind!! So why not revise Articles of Confederation Now, Avoid a Civil War and then let the states figure out whether market anarchy works for that state or not?
That sounds good to me!
Please forgive my memory—have you read my constitution?
No I have not.
It's 5K words, so make a sandwich! But I think you will like it…
https://christophercook.substack.com/p/human-constitution
Ok, will do! Thank you!
I look forward to your thoughts :-)
Excellent Chris. Another mentally enriching piece of writing.
Thank you. We have a lot of work to do together!