Adventures in My Mind
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Sep 21, 2001
William Saletan, writing for Slate.com and MSNBC, makes the perfect case for refuting consequentialism in the aftermath of last week's tragedies.
Superficially, it’s empowering to analyze every situation in terms of the consequences of our own acts. Understanding how we can change the enemy’s behavior by changing our own appears to put control in our hands. It also gratifies our egos by preserving our sense of free will while interpreting the enemy’s conduct as causally determined. We’re the subjects; they’re the objects. But the empowerment and the ego gratification are illusory. By accepting as a mechanical fact the enemy’s aggressive response to our offending behavior, we surrender control of the most important part of the sequence.Whether you agree with U.S. foreign policy or not, the planners and organizers, including foreign governments who harbor and sponsor them, of last week's terror attack must be punished. To ignore that fact and take their violence as a sign for the U.S. to change its ways creates a power dynamic that implies that the 6,000 dead are deserved victims. Making apologies for ruthless thugs and perverters of Islam gives creedance to their dispicable acts.
0 Comments | Link to this post posted by Teddy 10:36 AM
