Lately I’ve seen far too many posts where people sit in judgement of others. They filter the experiences of others through their own morality and feel that they can judge who is right and who is wrong.
In both cases, posters put things through their own tired and restrictive morality and could not even be bothered to extend their pointed little worldview to encompass that the areas of the United States or other parts of the world that these events were occurring in were different and subject to different laws and mores.
So, to those who feel that they have the right to place themselves in the lofty realms that allow themselves to force their narrow views and judgement on others:
FUCK YOU.
You have no right or place forcing your pathetically narrow little views on such things. If you cannot allow yourselves to realize that laws and mores change from place to place, that’s fine. But in that event, you show yourself to be the narrow uninformed prigs that you are. This is a board for dispelling ignorance, not for lighting torches and getting the villagers to follow you to destroy the next great evil that you feel is infecting the area.
Your narrow minded attacks and hostile diatribes only derail intelligent conversation and slow down the process of understanding. You should be ashamed of yourselves, and perhaps your ignorant selves would be better off were you to just read rather than post. You surely weren’t adding anything this time.
Well, in that the first thread you linked to seemed to be a debate about whether or not the guy was a child molestor if his wife was 11 when she was pregnant, it’s kind of hard to avoid a discussion of morality. The second thread is a GQ, and doesn’t neccesarily have to lead to one, but there are people who seem to have concerns about a person with HIV having sex with a minor child, and I can understand that.
I’m sure after reading your profound thoughts on the matter they will go and sin no more. In any case, out of curiosity having read the first thread you reference re Danny Almonte’s mother and father with respect to the possible impregnation his mother as an 11 year old girl by his father as an 19 year old and seeing that the extent of harsh “judgement” expressed in the thread is that 11 year olds having babies not a good thing, I really have to ask… What the hell are you talking about?
I know this is the pit but you can’t be suggesting that deploring the impregnation of an 11 year old is narrow minded judgementalism? Please tell me this not the point of your rant.
Eleven year olds having babies in the u.s.a is a “bad thing”. Thats the way we americans see it. Yes its sad to hear of an 11 year old who’s pregnant because she never knew exactly what was involved in sex and how you could get pregnant. I’ve heard lots of stories. My mom used to work for a county hospital. But for people to judge is wrong. Not everyone was raised as perfectly as you. Things are different in different countries. Many marry at the age of 13. Kids can drive at 12 in some countries. But we’re saying its bad for them to get pregnant? People were given freedom to choose for a reason.
On the second thread it annoyed me that certain people were calling an 18 year old a creep and pervert because he was HIV positive and wanted to screw his 15 year old boyfriend. BIG WHOOP. At least the 15 year old was smart enough to ask advice on the safest way to have sex. Being 3 years apart is not that bad. I lost my virginity when i was 16 to a 20 yr old. Was he a creep? Fuck no. Hell I was almost to the point of raping him because of all my hormones. He kept telling me no because of diseases, pregnancy, etc. I got responsible, got on the the pill, and bought a shitload of condoms. Thus he was ready.
I’m bothered by people judging but I take comfort that one day this shit will happen to someone in their family. Maybe even their children and it’ll be a big slap in the face. Thank gods for Karma.
The point is, we all judge each other, all the time. We all have our own sense of morality (even if it is “not judging” - that’s a judgment choice too). We expose others to our sense of morality. That’s what this thread was doing, just as much as any other thread. We ALL judge. It’s impossible not to. How far that goes is another matter. And up to each of us to…JUDGE.
Different laws, mores, and standards. Much different than the United States.
Yes, we all judge, but we need to extend ourselves past our own experience and local laws and mores to consider the laws and mores of others. We are not absolute arbiters of right and wrong, and in those threads, people were behaving as if they were.
Further, morality is worthless, IMHO.
Morality is a personal version of right and wrong based on religious training and convention. Ethics is the knowledge of right and wrong based on love and compassion for your fellow human beings. Ethics are liberating and permitting, and morality is restricting and enslaving.
The Salem Witch Trials were based on morality. All major persecutions were based on morality. Even the failed ideas about prohibition, keeping women from voting, and retaining the Jim Crow laws were all based on morality.
Stopping these things required ethics and people willing to fight and die for those ethics.
Thus, I believe in ethics. Morality has no value to me.
Well… in the context of your considered opinion that people are given “freedom to choose for a reason” and that we should not presume to negatively “judge” the impregnation of an 11 year old girl in the Dominican Republic lest we be guilty of some variety of narrow minded, culturally bound prejudice let me reciprocate and render the opinion that your common sense would not fit in a mouse’s thimble.
Your post drips with such arrogance and idiocy it’s almost beyond comprehension. Here’s a clue. 11 year olds should not be sexual objects in any culture. Should we not pass judgement on cannibalism or incest or slavery or foot binding or clitorectomies because of the dictates of cultural relativism and that these practices are “business as usual” in those cultures?
Clitordectomies, foot binding, incest, and cannibalism are far different things than an 11 year old having a baby.
We don’t know for sure that she was 11 when she had her first child. There has been no proof, and others in the thread referenced suggested that she was shaving off years to seem younger. In that desire to seem younger, which is also culturally based, I am sure she did not think that it would look as if she was having children so young.
To compare her having a child at 11 to such things as incest and clitordectomies is disingenous and is meant to bias debate. I do not advocate people having children at such a young age, but it is also not my place to lay judgement, especially when all the facts are not present.
You are posing things in a moral way rather than in an ethical manner. Yes, we do have a responsibility to others. We do not have a right to dictate our views on others though. When others ask for help, help should be given. When help is not asked for, you are infringing on the free will of others, which is a heinous crime.
It’s rare that I get to hear an adult in the SDMB express a system of moral philosophy that sounds like it came off a bumper sticker or the pages of a 12 year old’s personal diary. Your distinctions between ethics and morality are simplistic to the point of being non-sensical especially with respect to first thread you referenced.
I am simply stunned that a grown man with a reasonable education can hold that it’s OK for an 11 year to be a sexual object because it’s potentially within the normative boundaries for that culture. As I asked another poster holding roughly the same perspective… Where does your slippery slope of cultural relativism begin and end? At slavery? Clitorectomies? Cannibalism? Executing homosexuals?
At some point a demarcation line between something being “good” or “bad” beyond the bounds of cultural relativism needs to be maintained. If that falls into your category of being “judgemental” I’ll get my powdered wig post haste.
Perhaps you failed to read my previous post where I explained my view in relation to personal responsibility versus forcing one’s will upon those who do not want it.
You have been insulting in this post as well as your previous post. This does not engender debate and does breed hostility and the degredation of discussion. I will not join you at that level.
I did address your remarks as they related to clitordectomies. You should read that and then respond. I also addressed the problems as I’ve seen them with whether the woman was really 11 when she had her first child.
I question that you really want debate and discussion when you belittle the philosophy of others so easily and rely on such things to win. I shall look forward to your response.
Well, but in the first thread, the people who said that the guy was wrong to have sex with her did so with the presumption that she was 11. If she wasn’t, if she shaved some years off her age and was, say, 16, then that substantially changes the situation. As for your distinction between ethics and morality, to paraphrase Ingo Montoya, “I do not think those words mean what you think they mean.” Generally, morality is defined as a general philosophy of right and wrong (i.e.: It’s moral to respect others, it’s immoral to hurt someone) and ethics has to do the rules governing individuals (The company president acted unethically when he engaged in insider trading)
We all have a sense of morals, or ethics, or values, or right and wrong, or whatever you want to call it. For example, you said:
That, in itself, is expressing a set of values. You’ve stated that people have a responsibility to others, they shouldn’t dictate their views to others, they should offer help if it’s asked for, and that they shouldn’t voilate another’s free will.
I don’t think there’s anything intrinsically bad about saying, “This is a good act” and “This is a bad act”, and in saying, “It’s bad to have sex with an 11 year old” or, “It’s bad for someone with HIV to risk infecting others”, no one is infringing on anyone’s free will. Stating an opinion doesn’t, except to the extent that a person hearing that opinion might find it good and change their behavior or views.
It is expressing an ethical value rather than a moral one. That is a large difference. Everyone has a right to an opinion, but there is also responsibility inherent in that right.
So why is saying, “It’s bad to have sex with 11 year olds” or “It’s bad for people with HIV to risk infecting others” not expressing ethical values? I think the distinction you’re making between morals and ethics is artificial. You don’t know how the people in the threads you linked to came to their views, whether it was through religious teaching or through love and compassion for other human beings. I don’t know that the two are mutually exclusive, either. I’m sure a lot of people who were brought up by their religion to believe certain things are right or wrong also believe that because they care about other people. You’re right. There is a responsibility in stating a certain value. At the least, you should try to live up to the values you espouse.
Ethics are far more grey than morals. Ethics are not absolutes.
It is not bad for people with HIV to be with others as long as they are honest and prevent risk to their partner. It is the choice of the person they are with, who do deserve to be presented with the truth. It is a descison to be made between two people and no more. Everything in love and sex is a risk. If you and others do not choose to have sex with someone HIV positive, that is your right. It is not acceptable to make the honest man seem like a criminal. Everyone deserves to be loved and to love in return.
I do not believe it is right for someone of the age of eleven to be having sex with anyone more than a year older than they are. At the core, I do not think it is right to have sex until one is ready emotionally for it. There are some people who feel emotionally ready at a very early age. I would question it, and were they my charge, I would discourage it for all the potential emotional and physical ramifications that exist. I would also teach them about what sex is about from a scientific aspect as well as an emotional one. I would have them know how to be safe as well as what risks exist. But at that point I would trust their good judgement and be there to watch over them.
But, there are power issues in age difference, and I do not believe that an 11 year old should be having sex with anyone older than they. The greater the age difference, the greater the power wielded over the younger, and thus the greater potential for abuse.
The distinction I make between morals and ethics is quite clear and quite real. There is no dogma in ethics, while the dogma in morality is quite omnipresent and oppressive.
