Is it ok to kill babies?

[meus-ovatio.livejournal.com]

You have a choice. Before you stands a magical hermit with many powers, one of them being the ability to present you with a powerful choice. The magical hermit hands you a baby and says, "If you strangle this baby, you will free women from the oppressive Muslim hordes."

What would you do? Would you have the will to win? Would you have the mettle to pass this test? Would you steel yourself from the impending difficulties involving the unpleasant side-effects of liberating women? Side-effects may include: baby tears, broken bones, rag-doll appearance, guilt, self-loathing and suicide.

Remember, all that stands between you and being the greatest Hero To The Women of the World is one baby. One little baby. All you have to do is ignore the soft feeling of baby flesh bulging between your fingers for a few minutes to be the Greatest Hero on Earth.

Do you have the will?

Comments

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

An ethics puzzle.

[dv8nation.livejournal.com]

Remember to be sober when you post here, kids.

[sealwhiskers.livejournal.com]

oh, I think this is a very sober question, particularly if you get it.

[aunt-becca.livejournal.com]

what's the point of this post?

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

nope, it would take more at stake than just a certain religions situation to make me kill babby.

[geezer-also.livejournal.com]

Being as how that picture looks just like one of my grand-daughter at that age, I wouldn't do it to save the whole world, now that she's 7 there are times when I'd consider it for a buck and and a half ;)

(love that pic!!!!!)

[awdrey-gore.livejournal.com]

Magical hermit, eh? I'm pretty sure that magical hermits are always bad news and possibly don't exist. And even if they do, they are hermits so they are unlikely to venture out into the world to offer us a preposterous moral dilemma.

Could you rephrase this scenario with an armed Christopher Walken forcing us to make the choice between eating olives until we puke ten times in a row or watching reruns of Big Love dubbed into Farsi? Because that will probably happen to all of us at some time in the future.

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

Well, you can just rock me to sleep tonight.

[malasadas.livejournal.com]

Not only would I fail to strangle the baby, but I am pretty sure, I would kick the hermit so hard in the groin that his testicles would fly out of his mouth.

I realize that this makes me a terrible person and the women will remain unfree.

Damn me to Hell.

[sandwichwarrior.livejournal.com]

If you pass the buddha on the highway... ;)

[hey-its-michael.livejournal.com]

To be the greatest hero on Earth? Nah. Make it the galaxy, then let's talk.

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

You must kill the younglings!!!

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

I believe this may be Biblical:
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/You know, just to preserve our democracy and stuff
//Besides it's not like they really know what's going on around them anyway

[sophia-sadek.livejournal.com]

I like the way the Earth is depicted as flat and square.

[sealwhiskers.livejournal.com]

Let me guess, the hermit asked you if you could strangle the baby in a civilized way, in order to civilize the oppressive Muslim hordes and free the women.

[ddstory.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a civilized proposal!

[eracerhead.livejournal.com]

The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ones_Who_Walk_Away_from_Omelas) - Ursula LeGuin

It's really not much different from allowing Jesus to die for your sins.

BTW I wouldn't kill the baby which is consistent with my being one of those who walked away.

[enders-shadow.livejournal.com]

I know that story.

I'm surprised by our ethical differences sometimes.

[the-rukh.livejournal.com]

Does the baby taste good?

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

like a cigarette should!

[jonathankorman.livejournal.com]

Night falls; the traveler must pass down village streets, between the houses with yellow- lit windows, and on out into the darkness of the fields. Each alone, they go west or north, towards the mountains. They go on. They leave Omelas, they walk ahead into the darkness, and they do not come back. The place they go towards is a place even less imaginable to most of us than the city of happiness. I cannot describe it at all. It is possible that it does not exist. But they seem to know where they are going, the ones who walk away from Omelas (http://harelbarzilai.org/words/omelas.txt).

[rick-day.livejournal.com]

My dear, do you know,
How a long time ago,
Two poor little children,
Whose names I don't know,
Were stolen away
On a fine summer's day,
And left in a wood,
As I've heard people say.

Among the trees high
Beneath the blue sky
They plucked the bright flowers
And watched the birds fly;
Then on blackberries fed,
And strawberries red,
And when they were weary
'We'll go home,' they said.

And when it was night
So sad was their plight,
The sun it went down,
And the moon gave no light.
They sobbed and they sighed
And they bitterly cried,
And long before morning
They lay down and died.

[telemann.livejournal.com]

Off topic: but breaking news:

Richard G. Lugar Loses Republican Senate Primary in Indiana


Richard G. Lugar, a six-term Republican senator from Indiana, lost his bid to stay in office after his Tea Party-backed rival questioned his conservative credentials and accused Mr. Lugar of losing touch with Indiana and its voters. Richard E. Mourdock, the state’s treasurer, defeated Mr. Lugar in the Republican primary on Tuesday, according to The Associated Press. Mr. Mourdock will face Joe Donnelly, a Democratic member of the House, in November.

[dwer.livejournal.com]

oh, wow.

[policraticus.livejournal.com]

The will I have would be used to reject this evil offer.

[terminator44.livejournal.com]

Be a hero? I'd kill it just to stop that annoying crying.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

No, I don't think I have the moral authority to decide such things.

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

This is probably the right answer

[mikeyxw.livejournal.com]

I would assume that, like most people who use the "I killed this baby because a magical hermit told me it was the only way to free humanity" defense, that I am delusional and seek help.

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

This gives me the rather alarming idea that ovatio in hands right this moment and there's a magical hermit in his head...

[vehemencet-t.livejournal.com]

Is this some kind of polemic mocking the oft-repeated claim by pro-choice women that abortion is necessary to give them freedom over their bodies and liberate them from male dominance and slavery to childbearing?

[fizzyland.livejournal.com]

Short answer: No.

[mrbogey.livejournal.com]

I don't like ethical scenarios that are seemingly designed to serve as analogies.

[kayjayuu.livejournal.com]

Women are adults and can eventually CHOOSE to overcome the Muslim hordes. It's been done, and it takes self-sacrifice instead of sacrificing someone else.

If I free them all, they have no dog in the fight. They're just free to complain that I dissed their religion and they were happy being mutilated and covered and stoned and shit.

They don't like it? THEY can work on changing it, and ask me for help. Then I'll do what I can. And the magical hermit can go fuck himself.

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

That magical hermit is an ass, that's all I have to say.

[johnny9fingers.livejournal.com]

Tell that to Abraham and Isaac.

[harry-beast.livejournal.com]

I think that it is possible that, of the people who support greater freedoms and human rights for women living in oppressive cultural and political situations, at least a few do so out of sincere and genuine concern for women.

An interesting question might have been, to free women from oppression, would you be willing to examine your own attitudes and actions toward women, to make changes on a personal level, to support initiatives to liberate and empower women with your time and effort and money? Or does that all amount to nothing more virtuous than killing babies?

Anyway, good luck with being the greatest hero to the women of the world. I think that a lot of them would find baby murder to be a turn off.

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

They'd probably find a male "greatest hero" to be even greater a turn off...

[rimpala.livejournal.com]

Are Muslim hordes so oppressive and hordish that it takes the sacrifice of an infant to the dubious magical hermit that maybe knows a few card tricks to cause some change?

[mahnmut.livejournal.com]

I've been wondering for years if they're more oppressive or more hordish. These are philosophical conundrums that've kept bumping inside my head ever since I graduated from the School of Philosophy and became a hermit Philosopher.

[di-glossia.livejournal.com]

I would really like to know more about these "oppressive Muslim hordes". I don't know nearly enough about them to make any sort of decision. Are they even Muslim? Oppressive? Hordes? Are those words carefully chosen to influence my decision?

Also, how does this oppression work that one act would free all women from the oppressive Muslim hordes? What about the women who don't believe they are oppressed or the women who don't want to stop being oppressed? I've been told several times by feminists that Western society oppresses me, my opinion notwithstanding. Do the women want an outsider to free them by killing a child, thereby making their freedom bloody? Are they willing to live with that burden?

Essentially, no, I would not kill the child because 1) I don't believe the magical hermit's not trying to mislead me; 2) I would have to speak with these "oppressed" women to see if they want me to intervene at all; and 3) because I object to your leading words. Not to mention this is entirely farcical and exists in some time when the word "horde" is still used in any seriousness.

[peamasii.livejournal.com]

"I would really like to know more"

you won't learn it here

"What about the women who don't believe they are oppressed"

they remain oppressed, by their own choice. you can also choose to be my slave and that doesn't justify slavery.

"I've been told several times by feminists"

oh godz. so this is about you!

"Essentially, no, I would not kill the child"

neither would I, nor would I risk any life for any cause.

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

Are you kidding? Give me 100 babies.

[kylinrouge.livejournal.com]

Hell forget the Muslim hordes, I'll do it for free.