tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20704380.post6448595613282821675..comments2024-03-22T17:35:52.045-04:00Comments on Extra Thoughts: Words are deedsLydia McGrewhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00423567323116960820noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20704380.post-77331521916268879042017-03-29T20:51:02.434-04:002017-03-29T20:51:02.434-04:00I'm also inclined to think that any distinctio...I'm also inclined to think that any distinction between advocating the goodness of something and inciting to that act either disappears or becomes morally insignificant if the act is truly heinous, and disappears faster the more heinous the act. Compare:<br /><br />John tried to incite people to kill and eat two-year-olds,<br /><br />and<br /><br />John made a ten-minute Youtube video talking about the great goodness of killing and eating two-year-olds.Lydia McGrewhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00423567323116960820noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20704380.post-67839583557657482152017-03-29T20:05:44.053-04:002017-03-29T20:05:44.053-04:00Thanks for your very interesting comment. If I'...Thanks for your very interesting comment. If I'm brief in reply, it's merely because I'm on my way to do something else, not because I don't appreciate your thoughtful ideas.<br /><br />In brief, then: Legally, I think the distinction between inciting X and asserting the good of X probably needs to be retained for important prudential reasons. And it should be a very bright line: Explicit words of incitement or something of that kind.<br /><br />*Morally* matters are, ISTM, less cut-and-dried. When does asserting the good of X shade into inciting to X? Some factors that, to my mind, make this person's act of asserting the good of X more like inciting are these:<br /><br />1) He asserts the good of X qua person who has been involved in X, even, supposedly, as the more vulnerable person. Hence, his words will carry more weight in making others think well of doing X, and he knows this. (I'm thinking here in the particular case of hephebophilia relationships with older young men.)<br /><br />2) He asserts the good of X in over-the-top language, even attributing it to saving people from committing suicide, calling it life-affirming, etc.<br /><br />3) He asserts the good of X even in the context of apologizing for (he says) having mistakenly given the impression that he asserted the good of Y, which is (arguably) worse than X. This makes his comments (to some) appear particularly thoughtful and his endorsement of X even more effective.<br /><br />4) He is himself right now in a position where he might very well decide to do X himself, and apparently wouldn't think it wrong.<br /><br />5) He has followers who hang on his every word, and he knows that his assertion of the good of X will be influential in normalizing X among them.<br /><br />And so forth.<br /><br />We human beings are so tied up with one another that getting out there and acting as a kind of missionary for X, from a position of "public pundit," becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish from inciting to X.<br /><br />But as you'll notice, you and I are having an interesting discussion of this matter and of the details of what made these public comments bad. The offhand meme in question about Dunham, and the attempt to defend it just by referring repeatedly to the words/deeds distinction, didn't get into any of this, which is what makes it a lazy substitute for tough moral thought and argument about the concrete situation.Lydia McGrewhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00423567323116960820noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20704380.post-37169621346900295462017-03-29T18:58:47.607-04:002017-03-29T18:58:47.607-04:00>"...this was much, much less bad than the...>"<i>...this was much, much less bad than the actions of a left-wing figure (Lena Dunham) who by her own statement did actually sexually touch her little sister. Dunham engaged in acts, you see, while M.Y., even at the worst interpretation of what he was advocating, engaged only in words. See? See? Well, no, I don't see. ... <b>There is no general ethical principle that non-verbal deeds are worse than verbal deeds.</b></i><br /><br />True enough, but surely your opponents don't need anything as broad as that. Can't they appeal to the principle: "For any specific evil deed X, asserting that X is good is not as bad as doing X"? This is different from the broader principle in two ways: first, the non-verbal act in question is matched up specifically with the content of the verbal act. Second, the nature of the verbal act is restricted to asserting, as distinct from inciting. <br /><br />To the extent that one incites someone else to a particular deed, it seems to me that the inciter participates at least in part in the guilt of the deed to which he incites. So that whatever guilt his verbal act bore, merely as such, the inciter also bears the further guilt arising from the deed being done, which would not have arisen if the deed had not been done. I agree with you that in some cases the inciter may be more culpable than the trigger-man. But I claim that the plausibility of this depends on attributing to the inciter at least partial agency in regard to X, the deed itself. If the deed X is not done, then that additional guilt is not there. Or do you wish to claim that even a failed attempt to incite to an evil act X could be just as bad as performing an evil act of that very type? That seems a more dubious claim. And since one who merely asserts that X is good is less guilty than one who incites (successfully or not) to X, the principle seems secure. I take it that a distinguishing feature of asserting, as distinct from inciting, is that the asserter cannot be regarded as in any way an agent of the deed that someone else does, even if the someone else believed X was good because he was persuaded by the asserter. His decision actually to do the deed was entirely his own, and the asserter cannot be held responsible for it, specifically, though he can be held responsible for the evil of the distinct act of persuading him that X was good. The verbal act of asserting, to be sure, is evil partly because of the role it plays in a possible causal history leading up to the non-verbal act. But playing a role like that in such a causal history is not sufficient to render the asserter a partial agent of the evil deed. A case where something does render the asserter a partial agent would seem to be one in which, ipso facto, he is not merely asserting but inciting.<br /><br />I feel it might be worthwile to mention that this is a mere dialectical point which should not be taken as opposition to your general stance on the public person whose verbal act occasioned your post. At the very least I agree that that verbal act was sufficiently bad that conservatives shouldn't be giving him speaking invitations, which anyway they shouldn't be giving a flagrant homosexual in the first place.<br /><br />But I can still use that same type of verbal act to make my point: Suppose a sexually normal woman, whose father is homosexual (and has lately been discovered to have been in just such a twisted relationship with a young man) motivated by her affection for her dad, asserts in public that what he did was good. She had nothing to do with the relationship; her assertion came after the fact. Surely her verbal act isn't as evil as what he did to the young man. And hence not as evil as the act of sexually abusing a child, which is what your opponents are attributing to Dunham. <br /><br />It seems to me your opponents are guilty of a red herring, there, rather than the mistake you charge them with.Chris McCartneyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04229474918154303571noreply@blogger.com