RE: Litmus test
December 3, 2012 at 7:59 am
(This post was last modified: December 3, 2012 at 8:03 am by worldslaziestbusker.)
(December 2, 2012 at 11:11 pm)Daniel Wrote: ^ Yep to both of you. My post was entirely on-topic, if he didn't want to acknowledge it he could have just ignored it as if I hadn't posted. I didn't read Lion's post or WLB's response to him earlier, I totally agree that he baited Lion. I'm not interested in what went on on some other internet forum, none of us are. Why even bother talking about it in this thread WLB? It might be appropriate to link to another forum on an on-topic matter, but I can't see how it is productive linking to your alleged past grievances on another forum in a thread where that would be off-topic! There is a PM function in this forum you know.
I have been trying to examine an ethical issue from as near to first principles as possible. Bringing existing legislation to the table is inappropriate because there is no guarantee that it was formulated from a sound ethical footing. If you would conflate morality with ethics, you could claim that slavery was ethical was it was moral in biblical times in the middle east, so your example was off topic and your demands that I examine the failure of the USA to be punished for failing to adhere to that legislation, while valid on its own merits, was a non sequitur in this context.
If you think only material from within this forum can be discussed within this forum, then every example you've brought up from outside is equally invalid.
(December 2, 2012 at 11:29 pm)thesummerqueen Wrote: First, it sounds like you're giving a less-charming version of Phil Plait's Don't Be a Dick speech. We've been through it before.
Phil Plait didn't offer any mechanism by which to measure dickishness, allowing people to draw their own lines in the sand and bicker about the matter endlessly. Perhaps he didn't think it through, perhaps it was a dickish move in itself.
I have done my best to articulate what abuse is and why it is always wrong in an attempt to encourage people to think harder about their actions and avoid being assholes as often as possible, partly because hypocrisy takes the wind out of the sails of anyone trying to diminish abuse from religious quarters, partly because abuse is abuse and always wrong.
