Do Christian Parents Abuse their Children?

[vulcanlogician]

An authoritarian's rhetoric can cause violence and death among his people all by itself.

Edit: oh, thoughts, not words. I'm going to agree with LP and say that the thought leads to the action. To say it has no role would just be semantics

I see your point. But it confuses the question "Are one person's thoughts unethical?" when you begin speaking of dictators whose actions and decrees represent a collective effort. I also agree with the Buddhist notion that one ought to cultivate benevolent thinking in order to improve one's moral character.

Bad thoughts may lead to bad actions. But I still assert that the thoughts themselves are not unethical. After all, one cannot have bad thoughts unless one has a beating heart and functioning brain, but we don't call healthy organs "unethical" even though they are instrumental in the performance of unethical thoughts and actions. It reminds me of Jesus' assertion that anyone who hates his brother is guilty of murder. I think it's perfectly natural to occasionally have a thought of hurting someone. To me, a person who has a violent thought and does not act on it has demonstrated that he/she is an ethical person... a person who is committed to acting morally.

How about a thought experiment? Suppose you were going to be locked in a room with one of two people. Would you rather be in the room with Person A (who has many violent thoughts but NEVER acts on them) or Person B (who has very few violent thoughts but ALWAYS acts on them). Person B, despite his better thinking, poses a real danger to you. Person A does not.

Hopefully, as I have presented it, you will see that my argument is not one of semantics, but rather of discernment of where the locus of ethics really lies.