Irredeemable
It's no secret that we live in a very divided atmosphere. This, the fueled tribalism we partake of, has began to not only label people as members of a creed, but to deem them irredeemable, not worth fixing, so to speak.
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What are we saying we utter those words? Have we truly given deep thought to the implications? Does it mean that a mistake cannot be corrected? Does it mean that someone can't outgrow their current position? Does it mean that if someone is wrong, that person must be wrong because they are evil?
You see, these are fair questions, and we don't truly think about them enough in my opinion. We have a system, a judicial system, that is not interested in redeeming anyone, just punishing those who've made mistakes. On top of that laws are not always ethical, as we know, and mistakes and punishments don't work the same for those who belong to the special club, the elites.
I submit to you that there's just very rare cases, and I do mean rare when referenced against the general population, where someone is actually irredeemable. A mass murderer is a hyperbolic example, but the point I'm trying to make is that if you believe there are thousands of people in your hometown who are idiots, horrible, or evil, then I think you've fallen victim to the othering propaganda.
If we are honest and we think about our own life's journey, the beliefs we once held and grew out of, the positions we spoused and argued for in public that now seem either ridiculous or immature, we would clearly see that we are always changing. I was not born believing in equality, I was taught to embrace it, and admitting so does not make me an ex-villain.
Morality, humans rights, and all that the topic encompasses, has always been fluid. What we call human rights today is vastly different from notions that just a couple of generations ago where believed to be common sense.
I guess this short post is just an invitation for thought. If you think there is such thing as irredeemable people, then maybe you've not considered that some see you in the same way, and that a bridge to heal that divide won't just appear if we get angry enough.
MenO
A word triage comes to mind. With limited time and resources, we have to prioritise who to save, sounds cold but I don't think there I any other way.
i won't disagree with that per say... but in my personal experience, most people are good. Key word here being most... they just might be confused or misinformed.. or even I may be the misinformed one...
I agree, Meno. Too often we treat people like monsters because they disagree with us or don't share our same morals, when, really, we are all just trying to make it through life the best way we know how. I do believe there are some evil people in the world, like truly evil, but I know there are more good people in the world than the bad. And the evil ones.. can they change? Of course. Will they? Doubtful. If you've murdered 25 people by noon on a Sunday and plan to do it again on Monday.. doesn't seem like you might be changing anytime soon, but maybe one day .. but the damage by that point has been done. Now I've gone out on a tangent. But then that is just what you do to me, you tangent invoker. ;)
Actually , I stopped myself from wandering off of the topic before I really did it. But I was about to go off into the discussion of what happens to the people who do redeem themselves in some way, but they will never be seen that way in the eyes of all the people they damaged along the way. How can you really be redeemed, if no one wants to redeem you? Maybe I might need to look up the actual definition of redeem. Anyway. Hope you are well, and having good luck with all the house stuff. : ) Hugs! ♥
You are always funny Serena... even when you don't try!
<3
I do not think morality is fluid and regardless of what people might have once believed to be 'common sense', there are things that have always been morally wrong and will always be wrong and at no time in the past or future could ever be right. Slavery is one example, murder another.
Am I misunderstanding what you are saying?
One would imagine so, but this is sadly not the case. Slavery, as you probably know well, was moral and legal for centuries. As a matter of fact, here in America, the Bible was used as a way to justify it's morality. (Bible has examples of slavery in the old testament)
Along the same lines, but much longer ago. Murder was completely Ok, as long as those being killed deserved it for not believing in the correct God. Now... today, with very little exceptions of course, humanity agrees Slavery is wrong and Murder is despicable... Even so, they are not completely abolished either.
It might have been legal and even accepted as normal by many but slavery has always been morally wrong. How could it have ever been right? How could any man ever have had the right to own another man? Who gave him that right? The same goes for murder. How could any man ever have the right to steal another mans life that did not belong to him? Who gave him that right? Can you think of a circumstance in which it would be morally right for someone to take your life from you when you were not harming them?
A right could be defined as any action that is taken that does not cause harm to another sensient being. If the action you take does cause harm to another being (that is not threatening or causing harm to you) then you do not have the right to take the action. It's that simple.
Moral relativism allows people to excuse whatever behavior or action they see fit as long as they believe in thier heads it is ok or that the people around them believe its ok.
but we don't disagree Jim... Knowing what we know today, we clearly see all these old practices as unacceptable... but we are living today, and that distinction is key.
It seems obvious now... I mean... I'm with you 100% but if we read some of the ideas being espoused by revered thinkers, political figures and leaders of years past, we might feel shocked and confused.
For example, Jefferson is remembered as a founding father, as our third president, as a man who helped lay the first bricks to create this great nation. But... he also owned slaves. In his day, nobody thought of him as a monster... and we try to be fair to the context of time.
It doesn't matter what we know today because slavery has always been wrong. By keeping slaves Jefferson was behaving immorally. He might have believed that he had a right to take away a mans freedom but how could he have ever actually had the right? The majority of people didn't think he was a monster but some forward and right thinking people did because there is no justification for keeping slaves just like there were forward thinking people in the deep south in the past who knew it was morally wrong to lynch a black man (or any man for that matter).
If there were 50 white men at a Klu Klux Clan meeting and a black man walked in, the majority of people at the meeting would agree that the black man had no rights and that they had the right to harm the black man but the black man would disagree. Who would actually be correct? Did the Klu Klux Clan actually have the right to harm the black man because the majority believed it and because there were racist laws in existence that allowed them to justify their actions in their heads?
Yes Jim, we don't disagree.
But again we know this today, they didn't know better back then.
Using a different example. If we judged let's say Socrates for thinking the earth is flat, we would be unfair. The knowledge of the time was what he had at his disposal. We would not call him crazy or delusional. We know the truth now.
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If you believe that at some point in the past or at some point in the future, slavery could/would be morally right simply because 'times change' or because the majority believe it to be so than we do not agree. Slavery has never been morally right, can never be morally right and will never be morally right, regardless of what you or anyone else believe and what laws might have been written by men to justify it. Nobody has the right to take another mans freedom from him because theft is wrong in all circumstances and at all times and places in the Universe. If you can think of an example of where slavery was actually morally right and not just percieved to be right I will be interested to know it and also how you came to the conclusion.
Socrates belief that the earth was flat did not cause him to take actions that harmed other people so he wasn't doing anything wrong by asserting that belief and aside from that how do you know it is true that it is round? I'm guessing you haven't personally verified it for yourself and depend on NASA and other sources to tell you what is true.
The idea of moral relativism along with the neo Darwinsim are both dangerous ideas that provide people with an excuse for immoral behaviour and I believe they have been pushed/encouraged deliberately to move humanity away from the truth that morality is fixed. Anyone who believes that they get to choose what is right or wrong has the potential to be a dangerous individual if they get into a position of power and couple that with the idea of 'survival of the fittest' and you have a recipe for disaster. It saddens me just how many moral relativists there are in the world but it goes some way to explain why the world is in the shit state it is.
I get your point, but I seem to fail to make mine clear.
Slavery was never ok, people were ignorant of that truth, period.
Who knows, a thousand years from now everyone might think that we were monsters in the 21st century, because we ate animals.
What you describe when you say relativism, is the parallel conversation that justifies regressive ideologies in the name of tolerance. The stoning of homosexuals for example by Islamic nations. Nobody in their right mind should tolerate barbarism.
I'm mostly referring to the constant shift in social norms that affect our moral glass minutely every generation.
Here's another example of recent times. In my grandpa's generation, women would get married commonly at 16 years old and start having children right away. Today, we would say that a couple who's still in their teens has no business getting married.
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