Searching for definitions of Torture

This was somewhat funny to me , hope someone else enjoys

What's wrong with Thanksgiving?

Thanksgiving in itself is not such a horrible idea. It would be great if people actually spent the holiday feeling thankful and fostering contentment. But we don't. We consume copious amounts of food, watch TV, and get up early the next day to spend extravagant amounts of money on things we don't need. The fact that Americans have a holiday surrounding eating way more food than we need to or should is completely ridiculous and even unjust.

Marx thought that distributive justice can exist only when material objects are distributed to each according to his needs and from each according to his ability. The average American eats twice his or her appropriate amount of calories on Thanksgiving. That exceeds one day's bodily need by an entire other day. According to Nozick, anything more than the minimal state is unjust. Rawls has a rule that says each person is to have an equal right to the most extensive basic liberty that is compatible with a similar liberty for others. Not everyone can afford to have a Thanksgiving dinner, not even everyone in America, much less in the rest of the world. If not everyone can have an extravagant dinner, then no one should. From Kelsen's point of view, would all men find happiness with some men feeding their families with copious amounts of food while another feeds his nothing? If the answer is no, then our social order is unjust. In fact, the idea of Thanksgiving is not compatible with the ideas of four separate philosophers. To what extent does that make Thanksgiving unjust? Food for thought.

Black Friday

So, watching the crazy footage of people on Black Friday and our recent symposium made me think of Marx again. While I never venture out because I am not a fan of shopping even under normal circumstances, many of my friends and family wouldn't miss it for the world. This year, things got particularly violent. A woman took a cue from police at UC-Davis and pepper sprayed her way to the center of a battle for an X-box. There were injuries at a Wal-mart where there were $2 waffle irons for sale. There were huge fights and police were present at a number of stores just in case.

http://jezebel.com/5862742/california-woman-who-pepper-sprayed-fifteen-people-on-black-friday-turned-herself-in-refuses-to-talk-about-it?autoplay

Black Friday represents consumerism at its peak. This woman is going to "bargain shop" for 11 hours. She's donating what she buys; the stockpile in her own house is to capacity.

http://jezebel.com/5862488/extreme-couponer-will-compulsively-bargain+shop-for-11-hours-tonight

Do you think our attitude toward each other and toward goods on Black Friday (and around this time of year in general) helps Marx's point about alienation or am I reading too much into it as a result of my own fear of massive shopping crowds? What does Black Friday say about us?

The Injustice of Violence Against Protesters

Toward the end of our symposium on Monday, Dr. Johnson mentioned that all four of the philosophers we were talking about seemed to be in opposition to the events at UC Davis, in one way or another. It doesn’t stop there, though; I can think of ways in which almost all of the philosophers we’ve covered would oppose those same events.

Beginning with the philosophers covered in the symposium, Kelsen would disagree with the UC Davis violence because it does not further discussion on what justice means to either party. Also, based upon the assumption that the police committing the assault are also part of the 99% (whether they like to admit it or not), the reasoning behind their actions, and thus their idea of what is just, appears questionable. If these officers weren’t busy pepper-spraying non-violent students, they could be having a rational discussion and possibly coming to some important conclusions. Nozick’s disapproval comes simply from his idea that anything more than the most minimal government is in violation of the people’s rights. It’s obvious that Rawls would not see the events as beneficial to the least advantaged, but rather the opposite. Using his concept of the veil of ignorance, his standing should become even more clear: no one would want a society in which he could prospectively become victim to police brutality. By Rawls’ thinking, this is an indicator of an unjust action. Marx would assuredly be in opposition also, as police violence visited upon peaceful protesters who are fighting against a capitalist system simply furthers the divide in an effort to prevent the system’s collapse.

Going back a bit to touch on previously covered teachings, I’d like to look first at Kant: he would automatically disagree with the police, as their actions could never be willed as a universal principle. In fact, he might even think that allowing for protest or peaceful assembly should be upheld as one such principle. Using Mill’s system of utilitarian justice wouldn’t promote the officers’ actions either, since they were physically and mentally damaging to countless people. As we have seen, these actions have become commonplace at (often peaceful) protests, furthering their continuance and their harmful effects on society. Even Plato and Aristotle would surely agree that the events at UC Davis were unjust. They were harmful, not beneficial, to the greater good. The officers committing the violence were not allowing reason to be in control, but were giving in to their appetites. Given Aristotle’s idea of justice being a mean between two extremes, we can ponder what those extremes would’ve been in this situation. To me, it seems that violent conflict (as we saw occur) and passive submission would be the extremes. Thus, the golden mean and justice were not achieved.

So many of the philosophers we’ve covered would have most likely disapproved of the police actions, despite having lived centuries apart, in different countries, different eras, different forms of government. A vast portion of the general public is in an uproar about this particular incident and all of those that have come before it. So, when so many are able to find fault and injustice in these actions of police violence against protesters, why is it still ongoing? Why does it appear that it won’t stop anytime soon?

Finding the Middle Ground to have a Functioning Society

During Monday's class, we held our symposium with people being Nozick, Marx, Kelsen and Rawls. Due to the night's vigil, we ended up discussing the UC Davis pepperspray incident and what the different philosophers would say about the actions involved.

We know the base stances each man have on government (Nozick and Marx being the most polarized) but we came to the conclusion that every single one of them would agree the cop should not have sprayed the students. This is a contiunation of a question I keep having when we discuss ideas of justice: the common conclusions different people have and now that we have learned Kelsen, it really takes on a whole new meaning.

As we know, Kelsen's theory of relativism is based around different people having their sense of morality stem from a grounding principle that helps them derive the conclusions of what they ought to do. He argues, when one is a relativist, they are more aware of their actions because they admit, they are choosing everything they do instead of almost blaming their grounding philosophy. It is very different for someone to say, "I am a Christian and God condemns that action." than for them to say, "I condemn that action of my own volition." With the degree of separation the different grounding norms give someone, it makes them feel less personally culpable. Culpability aside, it explains how different people (with radically different beliefs) come to similar conclusions, and also how America's government can function.

People in America have different beleifs: politically, religiously, morally etc. This is not a shocking new concept. Posing questions like "What is justice?" "Ought one do that?" will come up with hundreds of different answers, all conclusions stemming from each person's grounding norm according to Kelsen. Even with the different beliefs though, normality can be found to make laws and hold society culpable for actions, as well as allow people to live together in a healthy and positive way. It is illegal to kill another human being. This is because regardless of grounding norm (Mills would say it would decrease utility and not benifit the most amount of people, Kant would say one wouldn't want to be killed themself thus one shouldn't kill another, different religions would have reasons why their God says it is wrong) everyone agrees this is a good law for a society to employ. And this idea is how humanity can continue thriving: regardless of the foundational principle we choose to live our lives, there seems to be common ground with every one.

The major issues do have debate, which is why we continue to argue over things like the personhood bills or whether or not capitol punishment is a just punishment. These issues come up because there are grounding norms with hugely different ideas, thus hugely different conclusions that can be found from them. But because our country is built on the idea of people having different beliefs, the arguments must happen to progress forward. These debates are not lazy relativism, an open discussion can be the best thing to settle conflict and help people involved.

This is sort of where I want to end with this idea of many different people being able to function together: we need open discussion. A professor mentioned this at the vigil Monday night, without discussion there is never real progress made or resolution to anything. The cops pepperspraying the students was wrong to each of these philosophers because it did not really do anything productive.
If Kelsen is wrong and there really is some universal truth, how do we explain how society works? If there is some universal truth, do each of these different philosophies somhow work within it?

Entitlement

So, today in class we brought up the violence at the UC-Davis protest. I stumbled into an article that states that John Pike, the police lieutenant shown pepper spraying students, makes over 100,000 dollars a year (http://chronicle.com/blogs/brainstorm/what-uc-davis-pays-for-top-talent/41422).

According to Nozick's first principle of entitlement, "A person who acquires a holding in accordance with the principle of justice in acquisition is entitled to that holding." As we established in class today, the police's actions were unjust. What does this mean of Pike's wages? Is he still entitled to them? One would hope a person being payed such an astronomical sum of money to do their job would be more cognizant of the history of police violence at college protests. I am of course, referring to the Kent State shootings during the Vietnam War. While the Kent State protests were closer to a riot by the time shots had been fired, the general public only remembers that students were shot by the National Guardsmen called in to quell the protest. Thankfully, the violence wasn't as severe at UC-Davis as it was at Kent State, but then again, the protest at UC-Davis seems to have been much more calm than that at Kent State. I have gotten away from my point slightly, but I just do not see how anyone could justify such a large amount of tax money going to a man who obviously failed his duties in such a public and abhorrent way. What would Nozick's solution to this be?

Relativism vs Absolutism

Relativism is the concept that no point of view of has any absolute value. Values and norms are therefore relative to each person meaning that everyone has their own unique set of moral rules. According to Kelsen, although everyone has their own sets of morals and values, laws can still be created.
When someone disagrees with your value claim, you should not just settle with acknowledging that you all have differing opinions; instead, you should argue for your value claim. Not defending your claim is evidence that it is not something that you truly believe in. When you make an argument for your claim (beginning with the similarities between the two), the most reasonable claim will be adopted by both parties. When applied to societies, the claim that is reasonable to the most people become the basis for the creation of laws.
This idea is similar to a conclusion we reached previously in a discussion about human rights: if you're arguing with a rational being, you can prove rights universal. Both concepts agree that reasonable beings can come to a consensus that something is or is not right. If that is the case, then isn't there an absolute value that all rational agents share?

Just Some Thoughts...

My paper, as I have discussed before, relates to the healthcare issue as a human rights violation. I wanted to determine the arguments against universal healthcare and what our best options might be in such a sensitive issue. I think it is interesting that the Stop Snitching campaign was brought up to point out how choosing not to act in knowledge of the consequences relates to the train track dilemma. This is a point I brought up in my discussion as well. The government or anti-universal health care activists can deny that health care is a human right but in choosing not to treat sick people they are often sitting back and watching people suffer and even die. Maybe universal healthcare is not the answer, but one thing that is for certain is something needs to change with the healthcare industry. One used to consider America as the home of the free and the land of opportunity. It seems now that the cost of simply living is going up and seems like it will never come back down.

One article I read talked about how people’s health statuses are often determined by their personal choices which is true. However, there are also several diseases and disorders that are out of people’s control. People should not be punished because they are sick and by choosing not to treat these people is punishment for the victim of this healthcare crisis. The article also pointed out that for the government to allow healthcare to all people they would have to ban detrimental activities such as smoking, drinking, and unhealthy “junk” foods. I honestly feel like this does not sound like such a bad idea. The very people who put these items out on the market are aware of the side-effects, yet they don’t care. They attempt to make these things look as appetizing as possible and allow people to harm themselves. Maybe instead of promoting these harmful products, the government should spend more time, effort, and money to raise awareness about health and the importance of taking care of your body. I do not think it is necessary to ban any of these things because obviously that would never work in our society, but raising awareness and giving people a new perspective is worth a try in my opinion. The U.S. has a reputation now for high obesity rates, and we are falling further behind in education. I think based on these ideas alone we can see where we are headed and it is not a positive outlook.

Proof or Faith? What Do You Choose?

Following our class discussion about Kelsen, I was left wondering what my life would be like if I didn't have faith in my religion and simply viewed everything I've been shown to believe as only a normative claim. I realize and understand that religion as well as other concepts are examples of Grundnorms and can never truly be validated, but what kind of society would we live in if everything had to be validated?

There are so many things about life and nature that we know little to nothing about. Most of the things we know come from theories, which in actuality are supported assumptions or claims. A theory is never proven, but rather supported, because there is not a definitive answer or reason. We still do not even know everything about the human body itself let alone everything about the earth and universe. If we only relied on what can be validated or proven, many aspects of our lives would be nonexistent to us and not even worthy of discussion.

Religion, however, gives people a peace of mind and a sense of purpose to live and aspire to be an upstanding person, when the only thing constant in our lives is death. To only take life as it is at face value would lead to a very meek existence in my opinion. The only definite thing you would know in life is that you would eventually die, and the concepts of life after death or having morals would not be relevant to your existence.

Maybe I'm being too extreme here, but this was on my mind when I left class. I was left feeling that so many people try to prove or support claims that they will never really know and that maybe would be better off not knowing. Education is important, but some go through life only wanting hard factual knowledge, and miss out on so many other elements of life. Religion often answers the unknown so that we can live fulfilled lives, and whether it is based on invalidated or unproven points, I wholeheartedly do not care.

How do you all feel about grundnorms that are present in our society? What purpose do they serve and is it valid to have these grundnorms in place?

I found both the class and the lecture with Antjie Krog to be very compelling. There are a few things she said that I found particularly interesting. I liked the story she told about spreading the guilt. I never would have thought to take that story about people passing the guilt along for anything more than just people trying to avoid blame. It makes sense though to want to spread the blame. It is more beneficial for everyone to feel guilty and responsible in some way because then they are more likely to change and less likely to just forget about it. If everyone shares the blame there is no one person for everyone to point at or hide behind. I like that the amnesty aspect of the truth commission corresponds to this taking responsibility and accepting blame. Krog explained the difference between amnesty and the court system by saying that in the courts you begin by pleading not guilty but with amnesty you stand and say "I have done wrong and I want to change". I think that beginning with the acceptance and acknowledgement of fault and blame is a more effective place to start. I also liked the idea of forgiveness having the power to restore humanity. It is incredible that all the people involved in the truth commission had the capacity to forgive and the willingness to change and move forward. I knew little about this subject before and I am really glad that I got to learn more about it from such a knowledgeable and eloquent source.

Stop Snitchin'

The lead in to my paper on racial profiling discusses the Stop Snitchin' movement, specifically Cam'Ron's famous "60 Minutes" interview. Here is a video, I'd recommend watching it if only for the pure entertainment value.

In my paper, I discuss why the movement exists (hint: racial profiling -> pressure in minority neighborhoods -> distrust of police), but I was not able to go on at length about the justness/unjustness of the Anti-Snitching movement. It would seem as if the sense of humanity that Antjie Krog talked to us about is ignored by Cam'Ron and those who agree with his philosophy. From the side of the Anti-Snitchers, it seems as if the priority is dissent from the police, a reasonable thing considering that racial profiling has pretty much stripped the police of all respect among low-income minority neighborhoods. Another defense would be "it's none of my business," again ignoring the humanity and brotherhood that is preached by Krog and documents like the UDHR.

The people behind Stop Snitchin' are no different than the man who lets the train kill the 5 people on the track (from the problem where one must choose between actively killing one person or letting multiple die with the train track-changing lever) just because they are trying to prove a point. That being said, there is an almost utilitarian principle behind the whole movement. Consider that Stop Snitchin' could easily have just been a way to bring attention to racial profiling in the U.S. With the serious possibility that it could indirectly help lessen the strain of racial profiling in the country, can the Stop Snitchin' movement be justified? Can it be justified regardless? Tell me what you think.

Relativism

Kelsen's theory represents the most accurate representation of what most developed countries in effect do and are, indeed forced to do by virtue of the fact that they are not monarchies. Since the rebirth of democracy in the eighteenth century, developed western civilizations began to develop constitutional democracies. If I understand Kelsen correctly, then this would be the example of a grundnorm. The rest of society is based upon this very norm, i.e. that a government ought to be a constitutional democracy. From this, at least in the United States (I can only raise conjecture about others as I have not studied them with any depth), we observe that throughout the ages legislature does not reflect any one ideology of the times, but rather a mixture of both of the two main ideologies of the times. To paraphrase Benjamin Franklin regarding American democracy, we must respect the opinions of one another enough to come to a reasonable compromise. All of the individual norms that groups of people, or even individuals (although individuals alone will not get much done without a group backing them in a democracy), are debated in the legislature and the hope is that the compromise created will be a mean between the two extremes in which people sometimes generalize their arguments into. I think this is what Dr. J was saying during class today. Moral relativism seems to be exactly what we have been searching for in the other theories of justice we have studied--a PRACTICAL analysis of the way things ACTUALLY work. In its formalization, I agree with Kelsen that the main reason people dislike his theory is that it gives them too much responsibility. We all know how much people hate responsibility. Now that I have been given an accurate representation of moral relativism, rather than the lazy one as our professor put it, I pretty much completely agree and find myself baffled at the fact. The idea definitely merits further study.

Of the impossibility of purely rational decisions and the consequences of Kelsen's assumptions

Writing the précis for tomorrow about Kelsen’s essay “What is Justice”, I had to think about several assumptions, he makes, as well as consequences, his theory would necessarily have.

I find it very interesting to think about justice in the way he did it, i.e. justice as the satisfaction of basic needs. That reminded me a lot of Marx’ “each according to his needs”, although it is derived from a different approach. So far, I totally agree with Kelsen. It is indeed very just if everybody has a kind of guarantee for his survival. This is exactly what welfare systems try to provide. Also, I really do like his statement that judgments about justice, just as every other decision, cannot be made purely rational for every reason we might have for making a decision, it is also emotional. In order to make this clearer, I’d like to use one of Kant’s famous examples of irrational decisions. Kant says that if somebody wants to commit suicide, it is immoral, because it is irrational to want to better your life by ending it. If you have ended your life, your situation won’t be better. Personally, I can feel a sense of anxiety behind this argument, because it is relatively easy to foil. Indeed, it is not irrational if somebody wants to better his situation by committing suicide, because it is a ration decision, similar to the Utilitarian Calculus. So, why does Kant see a contradiction here? Or even in a wider sense, why do people always look for rational arguments that support their attitude, although their decision is most-likely already made. Of course, if we sit down and have philosophical discussion, we can expect people to be as neutral as possible and only build their opinion after the conversation. But in the daily life, we always have opinions and can reasons for them. We call this arguing, but what is there first: Rational argument or emotion? In any way, emotions are included. How do you “feel” about that?

So, what would is the consequence of what Kelsen describes? He says that the term “justice” is never absolute but always relative. What are we going to do with our justice system? How can we create punishment and reward in our society, if just actions are relative and subjective? Somebody who is accused of for example raping a woman can always refer to his own system of justice in which it is not unjust what he did. Does the term “justice” not automatically come with the assumption that everybody has to share these values and therefore obey them?

Western Perspectives

Monday Mrs. Krog spoke to our class about Restorative justice and Truth Commissions. What many of us may have been thinking, and Tommy articulated, was the question of whether this type of justice could be effective in a society like the one in which we all thrive. Could we have, as Americans in the truest sense of the word, seen ourselves allowing our country to rehabilitate Osama bin Ladin ? I thought back to post September 11, when Wal-Mart had "Made in America" sections, and any little statement had to be carefully articulated as to not be interpreted as anti-American. The policeman I knew spoke of revenge and violence daily, the soldiers spoke of murder. Never, and still not to this day, have I come across someone who was willing to work with the perpertrators in an attempt to rehabilitate them. When addressed with the question as to why these concepts could not function in a Western culture, Mrs Krog focused in on the African philosophy of interconnectedness and humanity. Initially I thought, in the aftermath of September 11, we could not have been a more united front, so we could adapt this idea again. But then I remembered that with that interconnectedness, there also came the alienation of those who "looked" or "acted" like terrorists. There was the mistreatment of those who grew up in the "melting pot" just like the ideal American. There was the problem. Not only did the American sense of interconnectedness lack real interaction, but it lacked the essential  sense of humanity. In the wake of death and turmoil, we as a country, mustered up enough spirit to simultaneously mourn a inhumane act and dehumanized many of our fellow countrymen. My questions to you all are: Is it possible for America to have a sense of interconnectedness and humanity?What would it take to get to that point? Another tragedy?  A revolution? If we were to reach this point, would we allow restorative justice or are we too set in the ways we have?

Avatar and Apartheid

During the class today with guest speaker Antjie Krog, I had blast from the past when the idea of interconnectedness was displayed as part of restorative justice. As much as I would not like to admit it, I definitely am a representative of a Christian ontology- if something goes wrong, I definitely start pointing my finger into the opposite direction to relay the attacks addressed to me (of course this hardly ever occurs). Therefore, when the idea where everything is connected and everything has a specific relationship to one another, the image of little blue people from the movie “Avatar” immediately came into my mind.

In this movie, an obvious distinction between the two different cultures of the Na’vi people (the blue people) and the humans from earth is apparent. Our culture (Earth) acts almost in an imperialistic way, harming the balance of the Na’vi peoples’ land in order to obtain natural resources. However, to obtain the resources would be to damage the land and further cause the disruption of the interconnectedness of life (this sounds like a slippery slope in a justified “manner”). At the heart of Na’vi culture is the idea that all aspects of life are in some way connected. In the beginning of this movie, the government announced the initial purpose of the Avatar program was to create a relationship between the two cultures; however, hidden agendas compromised the seemingly innocent operation into a hostile situation in which a war resulted between the two groups. Essentially, my question is how do you have restorative justice when there is an inconsistency between the two parties of a situation? How can you trust the same group of individuals that initially harmed you? The interconnectedness relies on all aspects of life, but is the attempt to restore justice only a superficial mask that covers only the feelings on the surface? Can lifetime hatred and differences in cultured be settled in a lifetime, or does it require time for the entire situation to be forgotten within the depths of time?

Similarly, the Apartheid in South Africa was between two groups of individuals with physical distinctions between the groups: black and white. The blacks have an interconnectedness view point on life; whereas, whites have a Christian ontology on life. Usually, people hold similar viewpoints that are in agreement to what your parents have taught you- do you believe that it is possible to change these viewpoints in order to achieve restorative justice?