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Is this really about people unwilling to get their hands dirty or is this about those same people acting sanctimonious when faced with the consequences of their bidding?
I think it's quite fucking obvious why you wouldn't want to murder somebody yourself or why you would network yourself in a manner to have others do favours and such for you.
However, I can see why you would detest people who keep themselves out of law's reach yet are quite responsible nevertheless. And then how these same people could conceivably act as though their hands are clean, that they've done nothing 'wrong' and that distance from actionable minions is all they need to feel absolved. These people are obviously lying to themselves before others.
But on that same note, why despise the authority when there are obviously individuals willing to carry out orders? Where is the line drawn between consequence and responsibility when people bungle up intentions with notions that individuals can merely be the hand of another? 'He was just doing his job' etc. What somebody's 'job' is can be a dicey concept as broad strokes would indicate that it's simply whatever you get paid for. There exists consequence in a legal sense, of course, for the dirty hands of outlawed authority, but what sort of world would we live in if this same authority were not held responsible for the actions of individuals?
Jennypie, I think you're a Rand fan, no? Rand was very much about personal accountability and individualism. Well here's a proposition: is there ever an exception to people who are 'just doing their job'? Why would this be an excuse for anything people are doing? Why is wearing a uniform or being paid to do something suddenly grounds for your actions to be referred to an authority for permission, moral and legal? There are numerous examples in our society and most of them have to do with men who carry guns.
We speak so highly of our own ethical concepts, but in practice, I don't think they hold much water. Why are policemen allowed to pursue a criminal at high speeds, clearly putting a lot of people in danger as well as violating numerous laws he, himself, would reprimand and punish other citizens for? Why are soldiers allowed to fire their weapons at other people in foreign lands? It's not ok to open fire on people under most circumstances, so why is it an accepted exception if there is an authority involved to refer responsibility and protection to? These are rhetorical questions obviously: police allow their own agents the power to break laws when it is necessary and handled with discretion; soldiers are merely the tools of international disputes, pawns in the distress of politics and the imagined civility we have assigned ourselves with.
But I believe this calls to question: If people are so willing to submit themselves to a cause or agenda, to do whatever is necessary to uphold the governed laws of a particular order, all the while participating in the exceptions we trade for the illusion of security and the integrity of order, then where do we draw the line with respect to their humanity? It seems to me that if police or soldiers are the volunteer tools of their nation or government, then there is no use mourning their loss, that they are not people, that they are simply items who have forfeited their individuality for the sake of some 'greater good'. But I do not actually believe this in practice. Cops and soldiers are human beings, despite the wrongs they have done or the laws they have trespassed. I could not possibly look someone in the eyes who is 'just doing their job' and think of them as any less human as the next person. So why are moral exceptions made when lawful permission is the only thing between some agents and the responsibility of some actions we would, under most circumstances, consider reprehensible? It seems nothing more than an excuse to me, and one that is allowed to perpetuate due to little more than people's sanctimonious sensibilities as well as [understandable] fear of reprise - after all, when the definition of 'crime' no longer excludes those hiding under adjudicative authority, we'll suddenly have far more murderers, liars, and all-around hypocrites among us.
//I'm a man of words, if you couldn't tell. 
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There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
Last edited by Halcyon+On+On on Oct-29-2008 at 17:23
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