Home Politics & Debate
If you need urgent support, call 999 or go to your nearest A&E. To contact our Crisis Messenger (open 24/7) text THEMIX to 85258.
Read the community guidelines before posting ✨

Legal

Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
Can some of you help me please?

I think killing people, kidnapping them, stealing from them is wrong.

However there is obviously a sense that if it's "legal" then those things are suddenly ok.

Can anyone enlighten me as to why writing an opinion down on a piece of paper makes theft, murder etc ok?

Comments

  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Depends what piece of paper you are talking about, really.

    i mean, let us say you have a man who is an ambassador and he is also a member of the royal family that runs a nation. Hypothetically speaking of course!
    Let us also say this nation has strong anti-western attitudes and this man in question is a strong hater of the West and you get intelligence saying that using his nations embassy, he is arming extremists and is threatening to kill innocents. Not him personally, but men who share his views he arms.

    Well in that situation, having him assassinated and making it look like an accident in my opinion is acceptable, it stops him, who is the man responsible for illegal weapons entering your country.

    That is one example i can see killing as been justified.

    As for theft...hmmm, is it ever right to steal? Well maybe if you are starving and your family is starving and you live on the street. In tha case stealing bread to feed your family might be ok.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Depends what piece of paper you are talking about, really.

    You are seriously claiming that there is a special magical type of paper somewhere?
    Let us also say this nation has strong anti-western attitudes and this man in question is a strong hater of the West and you get intelligence saying that using his nations embassy, he is arming extremists and is threatening to kill innocents

    So it would be fine for me to go and kill any western leader who has sent soldiers into another area and is killing innocents?

    i.e. most of them.
    That is one example i can see killing as been justified.

    See, this is the weird thing, that one set of murders is wrong and another is right vased purely on writing something down on paper.
    As for theft...hmmm, is it ever right to steal? Well maybe if you are starving and your family is starving and you live on the street. In tha case stealing bread to feed your family might be ok.

    Well, yes, I can see that but why would that be wrong (which it would) because of the legality of it?

    Again, the actual rights and wrongs of situations gets subsumed because of legality, which is merely writing down on paper an opinion. So legal is more important than moral or something....?
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    klintock wrote:
    See, this is the weird thing, that one set of murders is wrong and another is right vased purely on writing something down on paper.
    No it's not right, it's just less wrong. :D
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    No it's not right, it's just less wrong :D

    Oh yeah. :D

    What I am puzzled with is that you can make right wrong and wrong right just by saying it's "legal." Which is a ittle strange, isn't it.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    klintock wrote:
    Oh yeah. :D

    What I am puzzled with is that you can make right wrong and wrong right just by saying it's "legal." Which is a ittle strange, isn't it.
    Well I don't think that's true. Though, generally speaking most of what is 'legal' is what most people consider either moral or the best of two bad options. For example, it's legal to experiment on animals, not because people think that's a moral thing to do, but because the majority of people think it would be worse to stop trying to develop drugs that save people's lives.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Well I don't think that's true. Though, generally speaking most of what is 'legal' is what most people consider either moral or the best of two bad options. For example, it's legal to experiment on animals, not because people think that's a moral thing to do, but because the majority of people think it would be worse to stop trying to develop drugs that save people's lives.

    That sounds good, but it has absolutely no relation to reality whatsoever.

    "The majority" decide nothing. it's one guy with the backing of lots of armed men. There are plenty of things in the law that people automatically and always find to be reprehensible - theft being one example.

    And those armed men only back him because "it's legal".

    By changing the name of theft to taxation and hence making it legal, the perception of it changes for most people. I am finding this aspect a little strange.

    Blowing up someone you think might injure you in future or who has injured you in the past is widely and rightly seen as being evil. Unless it's legal. And so on.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    klintock wrote:
    Can some of you help me please?

    I think killing people, kidnapping them, stealing from them is wrong.

    However there is obviously a sense that if it's "legal" then those things are suddenly ok.

    Can anyone enlighten me as to why writing an opinion down on a piece of paper makes theft, murder etc ok?

    Would it not depend on why the muder or theft was commited? For exmaple if the murder wasn't intentional? (Which I believe is known as 'manslaughter?)
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    klintock wrote:
    By changing the name of theft to taxation and hence making it legal, the perception of it changes for most people. I am finding this aspect a little strange.
    It just comes down to the old question "is it wrong to steal to feed your starving family?" Both are wrong, which is worse? The theory behind taxation is that everyone gets a bit 'stolen' from them, to help those less fortunate (whether it is practically implimented in this way is another thing). The question is which is worse? Stealing something from everyone in order to benefit all of the contributors, or letting those without a certain quality of life go without?
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Would it not depend on why the muder or theft was commited? For exmaple if the murder wasn't intentional? (Which I believe is known as 'manslaughter?)

    I can see that, kinda makes sense. Thsi sin't what happens though, is it. You slap the label "legal" onto obviously immoral acts and normal, otherwise rational people will stand behind them. Everything Hitler did was legal.
    The theory behind taxation is that everyone gets a bit 'stolen' from them, to help those less fortunate

    But as that isn't what happens (in fact exactly the opposite is true) and most people happily help those les fortunate than themselves in any event doesn't it seem a bit like a lie?
    The question is which is worse? Stealing something from everyone in order to benefit all of the contributors, or letting those without a certain quality of life go without?

    I can see the argument for the rationalisation of theft - after all if you don't pay people with nothing benefits or whatever they will come and steal directly from you.

    I can't see the argument for taking from all to help the less fortunate, firstly it only benefits those who don't need help, and secondly it provides a massive incentive for the true problems to go unresolved.

    After all if the "government" was to find workable solutions to all the problems it claims to want to solve, there would be no use for it after those solutions had been found.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    i thought i saw you before making the arguement that people don't care about laws, they only follow their morals which tend to comply with the laws... or was that blagsta?
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    i used to be good at stealing ...robin hood was my hero when i was wee boy.
Sign In or Register to comment.