dsayers

Do you maintain this position even after I offered empirical evidence to the contrary? Congress has the power to declare war is not opposing totalitarianism or attempting to prevent it. I also pointed out that even if your claim was true, it is meaningless if they arrived at those conclusions by accident. A monkey that slaps a bowl of alphabet soup doesn't win the spelling bee.

No. I'm taking you at your word that you find value in self-knowledge and offering a viewpoint that casts light on what I feel to be a blind spot for you. I accept that I may be completely in the wrong as well as the fact that you are free to reject my observation even if I'm totally right. I think that if somebody places you in a box without your informed consent and you are harmed in that box, the people who chose to put you there are accountable. This is especially true when you are dependent on those people and they voluntarily chose to take on the responsibility of NOT allowing you to be in harm's way for as long as you were incapable of providing that for yourself.

I don't think so, no. In fact, we don't even have to guess. Seeing the way the government it created played out is proof of my theory that their unprincipled approach undermined the the things they guessed right. They just won an armed rebellion, so they put in something about private armament. Great! If only they didn't create this mythical creature that had powers people don't have AND simultaneously pretend to be able to control/limit the imagination of others subscribing to that power.

A bit sinister, don't you think? I would suspect that anybody that had such a story to share would share it because it's worth sharing. Not taunt the community and then condemn them for not dignifying the taunt.

I disagree too, but for different reasons. First of all, I don't see tyranny as a grade. Either coercion is used to control a large amount of people or it is not. You could argue that Americans aren't being rounded up and put into gas chambers, but it is "law" that they can be killed based on suspicion alone at the whim of a madman. Where's the distinction? Also, I strongly disagree about the foresight of the founding fathers. Particularly because they may have guessed a few things right, but their methodology wasn't a principled one. That's why they went from fighting coercion straight to implementing it. From "all [humans] are created equal" to "Congress has the power to [do things individuals cannot do]." There is nothing admirable in making stuff up for the purpose of controlling other people. Saying a rape victim needs to fight against their rapists from time to time is not the same as saying we shouldn't give rape a green light.

Can a belief be genuine if no effort is made to substantiate it? Belief is a very VERY brief term. I believe X, so I test/research it to either assimilate it as proven fact or discard it as not being true. When belief is used on a more permanent scale, it's an admission of ignorance. To pass off an uncertainty as fact is lying.

Wow! I feel as if you trusted the intelligence of your audience, so I thank you for that. I had to study it for a couple minutes before I made the entire connection. Very powerful, yet subtle. Thank you very much for sharing.

How much effort did they put into learning whether or not something is "bad" or "for the best"? Was "everyone else did" their only criteria? That strikes me as incompetent and irresponsible no matter what you're talking about. Can you imagine somebody getting behind the wheel of a car and plowing into a crowd? Would "everybody else drives cars" be sufficient? Would believing one's actions to not be bad suffice? Or would you agree that getting behind the wheel of a car is an enormous responsibility that should only be undertaken by somebody who has familiarized themselves with the reality of their undertaking, its potential for catastrophe, how to prevent such things, etc?

Did you mean to say that you have formulated your conclusions of life? Philosophy is objective and isn't something that can be possessed or tailored.

Pardon my bias, but this seems like effort to avoid self-knowledge. I interpret what you're saying as they didn't endanger you, they were just incompetent in being able to prevent you from being endangered. I can't force you into self-knowledge. I was asking because you spoke as if that was something you were interested in. Just be warned that whatever excuses you make for them, you'll allow for yourself with your own children.

So leave Finland? So take action when you find out your child is in harm's way? I disagree with your conclusion that your parents were helpless to protect you when that is explicitly their obligation.

You've mentioned school twice and in a negative way. Do you view schooling as abusive? Are you arbitrarily angry at school itself or do you feel that anger towards the people that put you there? You spoke of fear of failure (in the context of being paralyzing) as if it's normal. I think this is something that somebody who was into self-knowledge wouldn't say.

They also call them laws instead of legislation. I think this invalidates the State as a source for term definitions. I think this begs the question of whether "legal right" and "right" are the same word. If it were, they wouldn't need the "legal" qualifier out front. I would argue the fact that it's called LEGAL right indicates they're not talking about rights at all.

How abstract. Maybe if the individual offenders expressed remorse and made restitution, that individual offender would be ELIGIBLE for forgiveness by his VICTIM. Otherwise, this is simply saying, "Please regard us as if these things hadn't happened."

It wouldn't appear that the initial post was an important inquiry. It's the person's only post and his profile says he hasn't been active since he asked it.

One of the unfortunate side effects of our world full of propaganda is that there's this myth flying around that honesty is virtuous, necessary, noble, etc. But your honesty is like any other property of yours in that nobody is entitled to it that you don't voluntarily share it with. It sounds as if you will be emotionally and/or psychologically harmed if you were honest. So I would recommend simply not being forthcoming about this information. If your contact is intermittent, it might be easier to deal with the effects of them not knowing of your decision. Of course I'm only going by what you're describing; If I'm way off base or misunderstood, I apologize. The important thing is that whatever you decide, you are aware of your decision and WHY you made it. If you don't, then you may just feel as tortured by not telling them. Which could be an indication of them being residual in you, torturing you for not being honest. Abusers isolate their victims to enhance their ability to abuse and continue abuse. Such as telling them to always be honest while themselves not being honest (such as in not actually caring about you enough to give your experiences validity). Does that make sense? I'm really sorry you've been placed in a situation where you have to make such difficult decisions. Lean on this community for any help you might need.

In a game of chess, unless you break their chess set, nothing about the game relates to behavior AND the property of another person. Playing/winning/losing chess would therefore be amoral.

I dig it. I remember when I first watched his An Introduction to Philosophy series. He covered that and a bunch of other stuff I never noticed despite being raised Christian. Just goes to show a willingness for them to oversell in an attempt to preempt skepticism.

Like managing is so simple. Provide for me please one example of a company where the lowest rung are slaves and the upper rungs serve nobody.

But learning that you're making progress in this area might make her happier. Or it might encourage her to process the damage done to her that could be getting masked by her appearance of happiness. I don't think it's fair to make this decision for her without her. If you try to talk to her and she's not interested, then that's her deciding she doesn't want to talk about it. I never patched things up with my sister. She had a kid at one point and as I began to have nothing to do with my mother, she used the child as a power play to cause a rift in the family. From what I hear from very limited second-hand accounts, she's become obsessed with me. There was one time I made contact with her for other reasons and she made it clear she wanted nothing to do with me. At this point, it would be wrong for me to approach her. Also, I don't want to, nor do I view it as necessary. She's damaged me just as much and has no interest in reconnecting.

No more than their employers have to bend to the will of their customers. That you don't address this point kind of indicates a lack of integrity. I don't make a million dollars a year. It's because I haven't invested in my human capital to be worth a million dollars a year. That's not my employer's fault or responsibility.

I think you are exaggerating. Making an informed decision doesn't require you to be an expert. Going back to my car example, if you're going to shell out for a car, why am I more responsible for what you buy than you are? It's YOUR money.

No, right to life means if my kidney fails, you owe me yours. You cannot kill me would indicate a right to not be murdered. Not the same.

I won't watch the video. I would've loved as a child for ANYBODY to behave as if my parents' abuse wasn't normal or righteous. I'm really sorry that that kid was subjected to this, but I'm very glad he gets to see that it is considered to be atrocious.

Sounds like we had similar histories. Part of the reason that I explored the possibility of your act of coercion not being sexual in terms of your accountability was because I too was introduced to penis contact through a boy who was sleeping over. Even though I'm certain the root of his knowledge was abusive, I certainly didn't view the act at the time as sexual or wrong. What's the difference? Well obviously making your sister do anything she doesn't want to do is wrong. Apologizing for that in general would be fine. If you introduced the mechanically sexual nature of the act itself, even though sex wasn't your intent and it being sexual would make her hearing about it that much more uncomfortable if not frightening. Like I don't know if the case could be made that you'd be doing her more harm in bringing it up than leaving her memory (assuming she even remembers it) alone. I wish I could say with greater certainty. Both approaches seem plausible to me with the latter very possibly being an excuse to not do the right thing. Is it possible to approach the subject in an exploratory fashion? Like apologize to her for dominating her as a child and ask her if there's anything specific that stands out in her mind as a truly horrible experience for her? Again, I have no idea if this is good advice. You didn't mention if this was an ongoing thing with her, just that one time, etc. Like with my sister, yeah, there was a couple sexual and/or coercive encounters, but even outside those, I was generally horrible to her. I don't know if that's how it was for you also.