- cross-posted to:
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- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
A woman who mailed then-President Trump a threatening letter that contained ricin weeks before the 2020 election was sentenced to 262 months in prison on Thursday, the Department of Justice announced.
Good men have to do bad things to make the world a better place.
Every time I come upon that dynamic in real life, it’s always turned out to be the wrong decision. The ends may justify the means, but the means defines the ends.
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I would, many of them are my ancestors (both sides of the conflict, and some freed by it). And the results were horrifying, even if the means were justified by the evil of slavery (which was a far greater evil than what was inflicted on the Confederates).
Sherman’s march made martyrs of the Confederate cause, and those that weren’t martyrs turned around and started the KKK, using Union brutality as a rallying cry, and the political backlash derailed Reconstruction with Jim Crow laws.
The means defined the end result, which we’re still dealing with today in the form of MAGA.
This is the dynamic I speak of. I don’t believe fighting evil is the wrong decision, but per Sun Tzu:
Had a peaceful solution been worked out, or a surrender negotiated before the razing of the Georgia countryside, I believe that Reconstruction would have been a success. Needless to say, those were unrealistic options at the time, so I do not fault my ancestors (those that fought on the winning side) for the choices they had to make. But those destructive actions led to more evil - driven underground - hiding until recent years, and still potent enough to affect our political discourse today.
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Wow, you’re actually unhinged with the personal attacks. They never said burning the South wasn’t justified at the time (they said the opposite). They pretty much only pointed out that certain means may carry unintended consequences to be aware of before engaging in such means. They ain’t blaming anyone. Where’s the racism/fascism in that?
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You are never going to have a meaningful conversation with anyone if you can’t accept that people with different opinions are just that: People with opinions. Most of them aren’t evil. Not deceitful. Just humans who’ve had different experiences than you.
If you label all these people as evil then indeed, violence against them is the only option you have. You create a world as radical, judgmental, and toxic as the sad history you’re trying to rectify by insulting and shutting up people who just express honest and valid concerns.
You really need to work on your reading comprehension skills. You just demonstrated the same unreasonable hate as the woman in the article, and it’s led you to completely misinterpret what I’m saying, as other commenters have pointed out.
Because you let your hate drive this misinterpretation, none of your points were valid, and you come off looking like an idiot who can’t read.
On top of which, attacking my race and my family’s personal experience is the worst kind of straw man gatekeeping possible. Normally I wouldn’t downvote someone disagreeing with me, but straight up fuck off - you have no idea who I am or what my experience is. I engaged your comment in good faith, and you decided throw insults. Grow up and learn to act like an adult.
I know you’re running hot after that one, but - didn’t you mean “we reject … ends
neverjustify the means”?Wait no, I just read back the thread again. You’re saying that Sherman’s march was justified, because it was pivotal in ending the Civil War with a Union win, and by extension, ending slavery in the US.
No. Sherman’s march was not justified. It was horrible and cruel. When he decided to do it, and continue it, he lacked the hindsight that we enjoy. He could make some shorter term predictions, but nothing like being certain that it was necessary to end the war.
“But if it hadn’t happened, or had failed, then the war may have turned out another way.” That’s an absurd thought experiment, because it didn’t happen any other way. There is no “if.”
The march happened, it was bad, historians now (with the benefit of hindsight) can point to the effects it did have (and historians don’t always agree on everything or have complete and accurate information), the North won, slavery ended, which was good.
If the future ends justify the present means, that is license for anyone to do anything, with a clear conscience. And you never ever have to get to the stated end, even if it is your sincere belief, and even if your belief is in an empirically good thing.
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That first part, before “Wait no,” was the entirety of my initial comment. I was trying to be kind with what I thought was a correction.
And then I realized you actually meant that - that the ends justify the means. Which I firmly and wholly disagree with, for the reasons I explained above.
You are arguing with someone who by all outward appearances is psychotic.
No, absolutely fucking no. The ends do not and cannot justify the means.
Hate to do Godwins Law but the Allies brought death and destruction to destroy the reign of the Third Reich and I believe that we all know that was a good outcome.
See my comment here for why the ends can never justify the means. I’m happy to discuss at any length, but that’s where I would start.
That’s not a case of the ends justifying the means. Allied, offensive, strategic bombing was itself just, not because of what came after, but because of what came before.
Killing a bunch of staffers with ricin in an envelope that would never have gotten to Trump is not making the world a better place.
Funny, that’s exactly what they say
Who watches the watchmen?
Doing bad things to make the world a better place is an oxymoronic sentence.
I hate to do the Godwins Law but the Allies have brought down death and destruction to the reign of the Third Reich. Sherman let loose the dogs of war on the South to bring freedom to the slaves. I believe we all know that they brought good outcomes.
Who started those conflicts? Cause it wasn’t the allies or Sherman. Reacting to bad is not the same as doing bad.
But doing bad things as a reaction is what I’m getting at.
In what world is preventing authoritarian governments from expanding their power and committing genocides, or fighting to free slaves, doing bad things? Those conflicts were started by someone else doing bad things, and the reaction was to stop those people from continuing to do bad things.
And just regular moronic.