Quote:
Originally posted by Encard:
Hierophant, if a means to an end were all that mattered, we'd likely all be dead. A means to an end can include such great things as nuclear genocide, and that's not good for anyone. Particularly when whoever you attacked striked back. And then of course both sides' allies, and so on. If all that mattered were winning the fight of the moment, the end result would be failure for everyone.
Not to mention, the hostage-takers were incompetent anyway. All they've gotten themselves now is a great deal of animosity from the rest of the world. Congratulations, now the country will be free! Hmm... No, somehow I doubt it.
And, not to derail the discussion, but as a side note... Acting on total subjective morality doesn't work if one wishes to preserve society. Think about it a bit more, I'm fairly sure you'll see why I say that. As such, attempting to excuse atrocities based on that argument doesn't work unless you're also willing to excuse anything and everything else.
EDIT: Oh, and DBear... yeah, terrorists are bad. But so is killing random people in a huge explosion that's not likely to bring much benefit, and so is nuclear fallout.
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Ah, nice words, it's just a pity that you completely misunderstand me.
Means to an end is again a subjective concept. The people that died at that school are not the important matter (in my eyes), neither is the hostage-taker's 'cause', nor the political or military reaction of their supposed opponents in the 'Russian' government. What matters is the expression of power, the primal display of conflict, and the method of its psychological justification. What strikes my eye is the exertion of dominance, and the way in which a group collectively validates its wrath through its conventional morality. Russian, Chechnyan, Kazak, American, Muslim, Christian, Capitalist, Communist.... they are all definitions of varying psychological blueprints. How do these blueprints interact? That's what I observe.
The ideology of identity. How does it work? Emotions certainly come into play, but these in turn are governed by one's chosen, and trained identity.
Society is preserved when servants and masters recognise who and what they are, and relegate themselves into their subsequent positions in their social hierarchies. The will to power is, and always has been, the binding force of life itself. Morality, subjective as it is, wraps itself around this principle, varying from person to person, time to time, place to place.
But that's just my subjective opinion
[ 09-07-2004, 11:18 PM: Message edited by: The Hierophant ]