(no subject)

[bloodygranuaile]

Finally got around to reading Jack's Useless-Knowledge articles today. Was very impressed, as while I have classes with him and have known him forever I rarely talk to him about anything particularly serious. I especially like his commentaries on our generation and morality--it seems worryingly rare to find young people that actually think in terms of right and wrong, and unfortunately also rare to find people that retain a real sense of basic morality once they've gotten rid of the BS false morality that we are constantly bombarded with by hypocritical elders and religion. Unfortunately, when people realize that the people/institutions teaching them things are essentially hypocritical and not particularly credible, they often seem to discredit everything that the hypocrite has told them, even when some of it is obviously correct.

This, I realize, is a sweeping generalization. There are lots of unreligious people who are perfectly decent people. However, they often seem outnumbered by people that are just plain selfish and no longer have any force compelling them to pretend not to be, so it is still somewhat reassuring to find one more atheist who still believes that stealing, cheating and lying are wrong.

It's also just a nice counterweight to the rather worrying discussion I had during physics lab yesterday, in which one of the girls in my physics class was arguing that stealing from people isn't wrong because if they're getting stolen from, they probably deserve it, because of karma. Exhibit A of not believing in anything except your own immediate convenience. She might say she believes in karma; this is BS. If you believe in karma you probably also realize that stealing from other people is BAD BLOODY KARMA.

And people tell me I'm fucking cynical. Can you please explain how I'm supposed to be anything else?

Comments

Another moral Atheist

[transientangent.livejournal.com]

There's a quote from a signature on another forum that I'd like to mention.

"Setting people on fire is wrong."

There are some things that are wrong because they hurt other people. In fact, this is basically what morality boils down to, minding one's own business and not setting others on fire or stealing from them, because both are hurtful actions, and we don't like people to set us on fire, or steal from us.

Re: Another moral Atheist

[agentclaudia.livejournal.com]

That quote is *awesome*.

I realize there are such things as Tricky Moral Questions, but some things seem bloody basic. I can understand how people can have debates over whether or not we are "our brother's keeper," but you'd think it wouldn't be that hard to grasp that we should refrain from being what our brothers end up needing to be kept *from*.

Re: Another moral Atheist

[fachidiot.livejournal.com]

I think the girl would have argued that by stealing she may have actually been HELPING the girl, by teaching her to be more careful with her stuff.

*shrug* my mother uses the same argument to defend sex changes being wrong...they hurt people by "using their tax money." It's still all in the eye of the beholder.

Re: Another moral Atheist

[transientangent.livejournal.com]

I just mean to say that some things are definitely wrong. If someone doesn't want to be set on fire, it is wrong to set them on fire. I suppose there would be cases where people willingly get set on fire, but that is by request.

One could argue that consent to government is consent to taxes. One gets into a political science debate though, not a moral one.

Re: Another moral Atheist

[agentclaudia.livejournal.com]

The idea that any act is justifiable if it has some random even remotely positive impact on something-or-other somewhere down the line, which somehow removes personal responsibility from the perpetrator of the crime, is one that almost makes me reconsider the wrongness of setting people on fire. As does "if I didn't get to them someone else would so I'm doing them a favor by getting to them first so the other person can't." The end result from the POV of the victim is different *how*, exactly?