But that’s exactly the point. You SHOULD care why someone wants to kill you.
And if you have the courage to look into the REASON people do the things they do, you’ll find it is indeed possible to (far from a sure thing, but POSSIBLE) to resolve any conflict nonviolently.
I’d rather live.
What makes your life more important than anyone elses?
It’s mine. They don’t respect my right to life why should I respect theirs?
Why should you respect their right to life? For the same reason they should respect your right to life. Even if they don’t, that doesn’t change the fact that they SHOULD, and it doesn’t change the fact that YOU SHOULD respect their right to live as well.
It’s a shame if they don’t respect your right to live, but violence cannot change that.
What you do have the ability to control however is wether or not you respect their rights. Which you should.
I’d rather live. I’m more important because I don’t go around killing innocent people. I won’t be a coward like you.
Once again, it’s all too easy to condemn others for their failings. All too easy to pretend that you are more important. But the pain and suffering of others (even the worst of criminals) is as real as your own.
None of us are perfect, if you allow the failings of others to be an excuse to mistreat them, then your failings are an excuse to mistreat you as well. It’s a vicious cycle which makes the entire world a worse place to live. We are all in it together and the world can only improve if we focus our efforts on making things better for everybody, instead of making things wose for those we deem unworthy.
Wait, it’s not the person who’s afraid to die, and who *isn’t *prepared to suffer hurt or death for their moral principles, who is the coward now? You have no idea what the word means.
**MrDibble **& others: I have just opened this thread about pacifism in GD, if any of you are interested and wish to discuss the issue without reference to personalities.
Because you aspire to be a better person than they are. Don’t you?
Being better than them doesn’t mean much if I’m dead.
Very well said. Thank you.
As I said above, while EJ knows damned well that murder is wrong AND against the law ( 
), he would indeed kill the murderer of his child (we are talking murder here, not vehicular manslaughter or something). Understanding consequences and making choices…
Well said. I too wrote upthread that I would likely murder anyone who murdered my wife, and I too acknowledge that this reaction would be a moral failing.
She endangered innocent people. :dubious:
Wow, I thought this thread was only one page long… sorry. Probably already pointed out
At least one person managed to keep the sunny side up in this thread.
My life is valuable in direct proportion to my ability on how hard it is to take from me.
The pacifist philosophies expressed here may effect a change in the self aware animal’s behavior in 50,000 years — just a little I suppose.
I pose no threat to MrDibble nor him to me so that is cool. We both continue to live in peace and harmony…
MrDibble said:
That his animal reaction could lead to death if it was totally a reaction without any chance of thought is implied? If that is incorrect MrDibble please explain how you have overcome your instinctive reactions?
I maintain that any animal can cause death to another animal through instinctual response. So, without a lot of practice, you will that 1 in 4 billion to be able to overcome this instinct without practice. You are gonna have to have a lot of lives to lose ion practice before you will become a complete pacifist. Unless you claim to be able to ‘under no circumstance’ ever be surprised.
Just a side opinion of mine. I do not believe in complete and absolute … anything.
I really believe that the instinct to survive is good over all and only in the context of survival will we be able to slow our world growth rate and pollution rate to be able to survive as a species in the long term. (of course if you (generic) don’t think that is important either, then we really will never hear each other)
A long time ago, I made the conscious decision that I would kill to protect my family and I think of that every time I pick up that responsibility with any weapon or mental state I’m in when I hear an intruder in or attempting to get in to my family. I do not take it lightly, but I will take your life before I just give you the life of one of mine. What I do in regards to my own life depends on a lot of things also, like for instance, sacrificing your own life to save another life. Which I see on the news and what not and which impresses me ever so much more than monks standing like weeds while they are killed. YNNV
My excuse?
I went to Catholic school for 12 years.
What’s yours?
This.
You aren’t adding violence if your act prevents 10 million times more violence. MrDibble said he wouldn’t have killed even to PREVENT the holocaust. Not, “I wouldn’t kill to fight the Nazis and try to prevent them from killing people,” but “I wouldn’t kill to prevent the Holocaust.” To take it to a hypothetical extreme, say you had a chance to kill Hitler, and you could thereby have prevented the murder of 10 million people, how are you ADDING to the violence? Seems to me you just reduced it by 9,999,999.
You’re a clueless fool if you think nothing happens to parents/family of murder victims, especially children, and most especially when the legal system doesn’t result in justice. :rolleyes:
*Gasp! *
Next thing you will say is that *Weekly World News is pure rubbish![/size]