No, a duty is a sense of moral commitment, an obligation is a requirement to take a moral or legal action. I'm trying to amplify a very subtle distinction I'm trying to make that has, in my opinion, very different outcomes.
Yes, that's the premise of my post, but the conversation I'm trying to have is about whether or not the US should consider individuals outside of their own population when they act. I think the truth is self evident (boom tish) that if the values espoused in the constitution and other places that make up the US canon are to mean anything, then they have to apply to people outside the US. I'm not saying that it is therefore right for the US to force its values on others, but that when it acts it has to consider the consequences of its actions on others and apply their morality appropriately.
My point about that the US's power is through an act of free will is important. The US doesn't have to have the power it does especially when we consider the military. It's either there to enforce US interests or to act as the world police. So either you agree that it's a tool of colonialism or you have to agree that no one voted the US that power (quite the opposite) and that through excercising it you are doing so through a free choice that you could be making otherwise. Any denial of this is an act of bad faith and goes to the very core of my argument.
I'm trying really hard to make myself clear here. From what I know of you I don't think we'd necessarily be in too much disagreement over these points...
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Date: 18/11/10 07:38 (UTC)Yes, that's the premise of my post, but the conversation I'm trying to have is about whether or not the US should consider individuals outside of their own population when they act. I think the truth is self evident (boom tish) that if the values espoused in the constitution and other places that make up the US canon are to mean anything, then they have to apply to people outside the US. I'm not saying that it is therefore right for the US to force its values on others, but that when it acts it has to consider the consequences of its actions on others and apply their morality appropriately.
My point about that the US's power is through an act of free will is important. The US doesn't have to have the power it does especially when we consider the military. It's either there to enforce US interests or to act as the world police. So either you agree that it's a tool of colonialism or you have to agree that no one voted the US that power (quite the opposite) and that through excercising it you are doing so through a free choice that you could be making otherwise. Any denial of this is an act of bad faith and goes to the very core of my argument.
I'm trying really hard to make myself clear here. From what I know of you I don't think we'd necessarily be in too much disagreement over these points...