Pro choice, not pro abortion
April 25, 2016 § 155 Comments
It has been pointed out to me that in characterizing the public position of the mainstream pro-life movement as pro abortion, I am being unfair. Some go so far as to suggest, while bravely facing the applause, that this is outright calumny and rash judgment. The dispute is not over the moral status of abortion: it is over the legal status of abortion. The mainstream pro-life movement abhors abortion morally and wants to see the number of abortions dramatically reduced.
Pro-lifers are even willing to do whatever it takes legally to mete out punishment for all of the abortions caused by men who manipulate poor helpless women.
So lets define “pro choice” as the position that a woman ought to be able to choose abortion without any legal consequences to herself.
The mainstream pro-life movement’s position, then, is not pro abortion. It is pro choice.
Zippy Catholic 
This is the logical description of their position. The only thing distinguishing the “woman” (meaning mother) in the conspiracy is that she is the only one who can choose to abort the child. This is clearly what the “pro life” (really pro choice) movement wants to protect. The “pro life” argument basically boils down to “her body, her choice”. The rest of the actors are fair game, as it is not their body, and therefore not their choice to make.
[…] Source: Zippy Catholic […]
I thought this was somewhat timely:
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/europes-abortion-fight/abortion-europe-northern-ireland-conviction-inflames-debate-n559616
The act that made abortion legal in England, Scotland and Wales for women up to 24 weeks pregnant does not apply to another part of the U.K. — Northern Ireland.
That means that there is a near-total ban on abortion there, even in cases of rape, incest or fetal abnormalities. Terminations only are allowed under strict criteria: if the pregnancy threatens the mother’s life or would adversely affect her mental health.
Courts in Northern Ireland can inflict the harshest criminal penalties for abortion of anywhere in Europe — up to life imprisonment.
That’s how it came to pass that a 21-year-old woman was convicted this month of having an abortion. She was given a three-month suspended sentence.
Suspended sentence! Can you imagine the horror?
So lets define “pro choice” as the position that a woman ought to be able to choose abortion without any legal consequences to herself.
Let’s not.
Unless one’s main interest is in trashing the pro-life movement, which seems to be the case.
So lets define “pro choice” as the position that a woman ought to be able to choose abortion without any legal consequences to herself.
The reason I find this so repugnantis that the most likely effect of it is not to cause pro-lifers to examine their consciences and support legal sanctions against women procuring abortions, but (similar to the most likely effect of Vox Nova’s and Commonweal’s “helpful advice” for pro-lifers) is to provide moral cover for those who would prefer not to defend the unborn. Even those who claim to be pro-life are “pro-abortion” or “pro-choice” anyway. May as well remove abortion from my list of issues and support Trump…
If you’re happy with providing such cover, then enjoy it.
Your standard defense of “But, it’s true!” doesn’t even hold here, because this is not what the term “pro-choice” meant. Nobody who would accept the title of “pro-choice” would be willing to accept harsh (or even mild) penalties against those who perform abortions so long as women procuring abortions remain unpunished.
I was actually quite surprised to discover that the official positions of almost all mainstream pro life leaders and organizations is a species of pro choice. Legal restrictions on who is permitted to perform abortions without legal consequence is not the same thing as legal prohibition of abortion itself. Pro choice is essentially different from anti-abortion.
Playing with labels doesn’t alter the essential difference between pro choice and anti-abortion positions.
I’ve never met anyone who believes that anyone should be allowed to perform an abortion. Every pro-choicer (whether they called themselves that or not) I’ve ever met has supported limiting who can legally kill children in utero to a specific class of people (usually doctors and pregnant mothers, though some only want the latter to be legal).
So saying that someone isn’t pro-choice because they believe there should be some regulations is as absurd as saying that Obama isn’t.
Nobody who would accept the title of “pro-choice” would be willing to accept harsh (or even mild) penalties against those who perform abortions so long as women procuring abortions remain unpunished.
False. Look at late-term abortions: many of the pro-choice are fine with bringing charges against doctors who perform late-term abortions but not with charging the mothers involved.
Similarly, the mainstream pro-life leaders advocate the bringing of charges against doctors who perform all abortions while resisting any attempt to make mothers legally liable for some form of punishment.
I bet if we did a poll, you would find a strong overlap between these people and the sort of people who are fine with or even support the functional legal double standard for women who have sex with minors. Among the center-right there is a whole heck of a lot of “gender differences, duh!” on that issue. So if we really started taking a bigger picture view, I think we’d find that this goes into many other areas than just abortion.
[…] can be sufficiently explained in more simple terms, Cane is definitely on to something here (as is Zippy). The Pro-Life movement very openly acts as if women are on a higher spiritual and moral plane, […]
I’m tempted to use an argument similar to one I use against those most pro-abortion: at which point is it not okay to kill the child? There are some “birth-canal”ers who are so pro-abortion that the baby isn’t free and clear until he’s out of the mother. So at what point can the mother be charged with having her child killed (or in an analogy to the self-administered pill, killing the child herself)? Must the child be completely outside of the birth canal for her to finally be responsible for taking his life?
At what point is a woman responsible for murdering her child (which incidentally is the same question one asks of the pro-abortion crowd)?
One other thought, those who oppose treating murder as murder in the case of abortion are just as confused about the personhood of the unborn child as…well, those who oppose treating murder as murder.
Swap “those who oppose treating murder as murder” with “pro-life” and “pro-choice” respectively.
Considering that Lydia opposes surgeries to end tubal ectopic pregnancies until the point of rupture, which is a huge gamble with the mother’s life, she isn’t in the pro-choice camp and I don’t care how big the supposed tent is.
I do care about knowing who among those commenting here have ever hosted an immigrant or foreign exchange student in their personal living quarters for an approximate period of nine months. Adoptions are of course an even better analogy.
I do care about knowing who among those commenting here have ever hosted an immigrant or foreign exchange student in their personal living quarters for an approximate period of nine months. Adoptions are of course an even better analogy.
I know what you’re doing here. It not only doesn’t work it is, bluntly, a non-starter “argument” that isn’t an argument at all but a pure, naked emotional entreaty.
Step2:
You are making a category error here. Pro choice is a legal position, not a moral position.
Many people who hold variants of the pro choice position do believe abortion to be morally wrong. They just don’t believe in criminalizing it.
This is similar to (e.g.) believing that selling pornography, prostitution, firing people because of their sexual preferences, racism, etc are morally wrong while simultaneously holding that these things should not be prosecutable crimes.
Lydia has averred that she would, in some rare and tricky extraordinary cases, consider the possibility of thinking about maybe prosecuting some small tiny subset of women who choose abortions. So her position is outside of the mainstream pro life position, which is that we shouldn’t even be talking about the possibility of prosecuting women who kill their unborn children let alone actually arguing in favor of it.
Pro choice is, in its essence, a legal position not a moral position. And the publicly asserted policies, positions, etc of mainstream pro-life leaders and institutions is pro choice.
[…] taken exception to my pronouncement that “Pro-Lifers” (who are really and essentially pro-choice) worship women. But I am just using the language we all accept because we all understand (even when […]
I’m going to take that as a no from Malcolm. I’m just trying to figure out who has, at least in some ways, walked the walk of what they are advocating for others.
Pro choice is a legal position, not a moral position.
I disagree, it’s both. Not making something immoral a crime doesn’t change it’s moral status, it only means that it is very difficult to enforce and prosecute or it isn’t severe enough to warrant punishment, for example the collapse of the prohibition movement. It is still evaluated at a moral level first, then come the other considerations. In this case I would guess the pro-life leaders are convinced with some justification (i.e. legal history) that charges against the woman for the abortion itself are both difficult to enforce for early term abortions because of lack of evidence and very difficult to prosecute for all abortions – although as mentioned earlier there was some legal success against soliciting an abortion.
Only murderers are in a position to condemn murder.
I’m going to take that as a no from Malcolm. I’m just trying to figure out who has, at least in some ways, walked the walk of what they are advocating for others.
Because the only people who can have an opinion on things must have undergone those specific events personally.
What does hosting a migrant have to do with this? Is this the “you’re a man therefore you can’t comment on abortion” argument I hear so often from pro-choicers? I had a human being live in my body for nine months and managed not to kill her; do I get to comment?
Step2, are you a woman?
Step2:
Then we are back to them not believing abortion is murder, and/or not believing that women are fully adult moral agents. Simply because some murders are difficult to prove does not mean that murder is not a crime.
In any event people give all sorts of reasons why they believe that abortion should not be be a prosecutable crime. What makes them pro choice is simply that they believe abortion should not be a prosecutable crime, not why they believe that.
Marissa:
If you haven’t murdered someone, or come really really close to doing so, you are in no position to condemn murder.
Step2 unholstering the “you haven’t walked a mile in his shoes” pseudoargument was a transparent act of argumentative desperation.
@Step2
What a serpentine statement. It is a lie wrapped up in a passive-aggressive charge of hypocrisy; the liberal’s favorite play.
@Zippy
Yes, but it is a canard. That is what she says to someone who has already wholly objected to the notion of attempting to punish women who abort their child. Whenever someone (even someone sympathetic to her position) poses a hypothetical situation in which perhaps punishment should be considered, then she responds with a whirlwind of reasons why it would not apply. I say she is just playing a game to maintain the appearance of “reasonableness”, “evenhandedness”, “clear-headedness”, etc. within Social Conservative groups.
Step2, it seems to me, is in on the gag.
Cane:
Step2 and Lydia are long time argumentative foes over many years of comment threads, he arguing the liberal/secular side of things and she arguing the “conservative”/religious side. That he is taking her side in this particular clash kind of adds to the irony of the whole situation. Although perhaps a more accurate characterization is that she is taking his side.
As for my comment which you cite, I hope the ironic tone was clear. Maybe, just maybe, after a thousand years of cultural change and when all swans have become black, it might be time to think about the remote possibility that just maybe a woman who is caught on video having deliberately aborted her child just might be subject to a legal slap on the wrist. Etc, etc.
Marissa:
Is this the “you’re a man therefore you can’t comment on abortion” argument I hear so often from pro-choicers?
A pro-choicer uses a favorite pro-choice tactic. Surprise!
I had a human being live in my body for nine months and managed not to kill her; do I get to comment?
Sure, was that your comment?
I’m also taking his response as a resounding no from Cane Caldo.
Nobody who would accept the title of “pro-choice” would be willing to accept harsh (or even mild) penalties against those who perform abortions so long as women procuring abortions remain unpunished.
So what. The issue is not what some self-identified “pro-choicer” would accept. The issue is what is the substance of the position of those who believe that abortion should not incur a legal sanction. The principle is the same, so-called pro-lifers are only haggling over the price.
Step2, I have made several comments on this thread you’ve seen fit to ignore. Are you a woman?
Step2 – have you had children?
I’m also taking his response as a resounding no from Cane Caldo.
T-R-O-L-L
If you haven’t invited someone into your home and then murdered her, you have no standing to say anything about abortion.
You smug bastards. I’d like to know how many of you have hosted your biological children in your home for nine months without stabbing them in the brain with a pair of scissors? Nobody? That’s what I thought.
So lets define “pro choice” as the position that a woman ought to be able to choose abortion without any legal consequences to herself.
The key difference is that the “pro-life” movement seems to aim at taking away the easy paths to get an abortion. They are mostly correct that if they get rid of the clinics and some other measures, most abortion will be impossible to have so the problem will solve itself in most cases. However, they lack imagination on how easily some of the things can be circumvented. Women living anywhere near Mexico or Canada will find the law trivial to evade; Canada’s system will help them get a facility and Mexican pharmacies will most likely have no problem selling RU-486 at OTC prices. That is of course assuming that someone doesn’t invent a DIY RU-486 that someone with at least a 12th grade education could cook up in the kitchen. Betting against biohacking, like any form of hacking, is often a bad bet in the long run.
Ignorance about technology is probably at least a factor, Mike T. I can make things (electrical, mechanical, chemical, etc) in my workshop for costs on the order of $100 today that just 10-15 years ago would have required an investment of $500k minimum, or would have simply been impossible with any budget. Hackable equivalents to medical equipment that costs a fortune are as cheap as dirt — not FDA approved of course, but who cares about that?
So yeah, a kind of precious ignorance about tech is a factor, as if 18th century style laws can work in a world of hackable drones, home gene splicing, and destroyed patriarchy. (This also plays into the “how hard is it to prove” factor: think of how tech has changed murder trials in general in the last five minutes of history, to wit, DNA testing and other forensic tech).
But I don’t think tech ignorance is a primary factor. I think, just listening to the pro life rhetoric following the Trump gaffe – this was truly, genuinely shocking to me, and I am not easy to surprise – that most of the pro life movement just is pro choice when it comes to the woman who is choosing to abort herself. They may not agree with her choice and they may be against everyone who is facilitating it, but they are against legally punishing her for making it. Heck, they are against even talking about legally punishing her for making it.
[…] it seems most conservatives as well as pro-life folks are taking. See the examples on Cane’s, Zippy’s and Dalrock’s. As Zippy notes, these folks are not pro-life but in fact […]
Zippy,
I never said you weren’t entitled to give an opinion, but constantly ignoring the fact you are trying to legally coerce* a woman into some sort of labor, and frankly my analogy is about as mild as it gets in that respect, you are looking at it in a really biased fashion that ignores reality.
*That you believe she can be legally coerced also points out the weakness of the arguments that friends and relatives can’t coerce her actions.
To be honest I wasn’t sure you would let me make a stronger pro-choice argument seeing as how you want to criminalize all pro-choice political speech. Since that category apparently covers 99% of the pro-life movement maybe I will get right to it and mention that delayed ensoulment as a metaphysical fact is still a valid and disputed theological position in the Church, meaning that treating early term abortion as if it is murder is a blatant attempt to settle the dispute by fiat instead of logic or argument.
I would also appreciate it if you would decide if you only want a “slap on the wrist” or if you are actually going to try these women for murder, murder for hire, and typically first degree murder with aggravating factors. If we are going to complain about each others arguments it is very disingenuous for you to say you only want a mild punishment.
Marissa,
I thought you might have wanted to add more to your most recent comment, that is why I asked. No, I’m not a woman but I would be happy to let only women politically decide this debate.
If you believe murder should be prohibited by law, then you can’t hold murderers responsible for their own actions.
Step2:
I am not ignoring anything. I am unapologetically authoritarian and have been openly so for many decades now. I have no problem acknowledging that murderers ought to be legally forced to do whatever labor is required, or make any and all other sacrifices which are necessary, in order to not commit murder.
Where did I say that? It was pro-life leaders who objected, in response to the Blurting Hairpiece, to even discussing any punishment at all.
As for my own views, there is a range of punishment for homicide, even negligent homicide let alone deliberate and premeditated. Abortion should certainly not be treated any less severely than homicide while driving drunk, or killing a baby by shaking her.
I am unapologetically authoritarian and have been openly so for many decades now.
I haven’t forgotten. After the first few times we interacted I told my friends I had argued against a British ultra-conservative because who has ever heard of an American monarchist? It’s rarer than a unicorn.
I have no problem acknowledging that murderers ought to be legally forced to do whatever labor is required, or make any and all other sacrifices which are necessary, in order to not commit murder.
All I can say is your rhetoric doesn’t reflect that acknowledgement very well. To be fair, my rhetoric doesn’t reflect my acknowledgment that a killing of a human does take place.
Where did I say that?
The comment where you mentioned “slap on the wrist” but upon re-reading it you were using it against the pro-life response so I retract my claim.
Zippy,
I don’t think ignorance of technology is a driving factor, but it is a major influence on their thinking. One of their biggest blinders is in not noticing that prior to the 20th century, abortion was very dangerous and thus there was a strong incentive to not try to have one. Society didn’t need to place strong sanctions on it because the odds of the mother ending up dead were non-trivial. It is only now that “safe, legal and rare” abortion is even technologically possible and thus something society must act upon.
I’m sure plenty of pro-lifers would tut tut me for that talking about perforated uteri, that girl they heard about who died from a bad RU-486 reaction or whatever. Sure, I can find that guy who witnessed his kid spasm and contort and go brain dead after a MMR shot, but so what? On average, the risk ain’t there. This is like the time where Lydia trotted out how she heard of some woman or two who got screwed by the family law courts as some retort to the general trend that men overwhelmingly get screwed by the same (to the extent that no, we aren’t “in this together;” women have if very easy)
What the pro-life movement hasn’t to come grips with is that if people are willing to cook something as dangerous as crystal meth in their kitchens, eventually they’ll find a way to produce something like RU-486 as the biohacking movement moves along.
Step2:
You can’t throw a rock without hitting an authoritarian.
What is rare as hen’s teeth is an authoritarian who admits to himself and others that he is an authoritarian.
Trump has brought to the fore an inconvenient topic. Who was having this discussion before Trump spoke without knowing the correct line of pro-life rhetoric? It wasn’t happening in Right to Life, an organization I’ve spent some time with (albeit was never a member of). I have to admit I’m a little astonished at how pervasive the view is that women shouldn’t be punished for an action the pro-lifers believe should be illegal. Trump was merely stating cause and effect: yes, if it’s illegal, there should be a punishment for it. The concept of only prosecuting the accessory or co-conspirator is strange to my thinking. If the woman is bringing others into her crime, she is yet more heinous than the person who commits her own crime. She is causing others to be complicit. (This is a repeat of a comment I made yesterday, which either disappeared into cyberspace or was moderated out; if the latter, I apologize for the repeat.)
Jill:
FYI I did not moderate your comment. It is possible that it is in the spam folder, which I go through now and then but not every day.
Zippy:
You can’t throw a rock without hitting an authoritarian.
What is rare as hen’s teeth is an authoritarian who admits to himself and others that he is an authoritarian.
Precisely, and Step2’s comments here are a perfect example of that very liberal sociopathy:
Having ruled himself, a non-woman, out of the legitimate exercise of both power and moral authority in abortion discussions, he yet wants to exercise both to exclude certain voices. So this manifests in sociopathy: insinuations, duplicity, passive-aggressiveness; all these to exercise power without appearing to do so.
[…] like Zippy and GKC, was surprised at the scorn which was poured on Donald Trump by Pro-Life groups and […]
Zippy,
I was noting how unusual your particular brand of authoritarianism is given American history. I’m abstaining from throwing rocks.
Abortion pills by drone: http://www.fisheaters.com/forums/index.php?topic=3471331.0
Has anyone seen the judgment for this case?:
Colorado woman sentenced to 100 years for cutting fetus from woman
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-colorado-stabbing-idUSKCN0XQ2GQ
That’ll teach her to practice surgery without a medical license!
[…] Zippy Catholic noted how shocking it was to see how vehemently the pro choice movement opposes holding women […]
Oh, after the child is old enough to walk and talk then a female starts to be held responsible for murdering her child. Before that, it’s not considered murder–it’s infanticide, something for which the sentences are rather light because female! And before the infant is cleaned and swaddled, it’s not even considered infanticide but abortion on demand.
Really, it’s as if most men and women expect females (of whatever age) to be treated like children before the age of reason–unless the females want privileges. If it weren’t for double standards, there’d be no standards for females at all!
As far as responsibility goes, another data point. They also oppose allowing the military to prosecute female service members who get pregnant out of regulations and rendering themselves unfit for duty. Because female imperative. Because gender differences.
My husband, a former infantryman, reports that nearly half an auxiliary unit that was supposed to deploy to Iraq got pregnant before the deployment. It put his own unit in a lot of danger because all these trained personnel were suddenly out of commission. It’s another reason women don’t belong anywhere near the military. Unfortunately the understanding of the military is any cog can fit into another gear type of bureaucracy instead of an organic brotherhood of men. It is clear dereliction of duty, but of course, the “pro life” crowd has sold out in cringing terror of the hosrage taking pregnant woman.
Marissa:
I was going to edit “hosrage” to “hostage”, but the presumed typo struck me as kind of poetic.
Prosecuting (married) people for having kids is perverse (as is having women in the military at all).
Prosecuting people who murder their kids is not perverse.
Mike T, I’m trying to think your proposal through and imagine what would happen if true equality was enforced re women in the military. Would it end conscription because women will play the victim card, thereby leaving us again with the status quo of double standards? Or might it become quasi-permanent and yet another means to destroy family, marriage, children and ultimately society? To my Swiftian mind, I find both of these imaginings to be true at the same time. But one doesn’t have to project into the future to imagine that your method will only demonstrate the irony and stupidity of everything. Apologies to Zippy ahead of time for my inexact language. As I’ve read through his posts, I’ve noted that he attempts to be very logical and exact.
Jill:
Your Swiftian vision of the multivocal implications of ‘true equality’ is perhaps more rigorously logical than you might think, because the concept of equal rights is intrinsically incoherent or self-contradictory in the first place.
I’ve explained why this is the case in many different ways, but if you’ll simply grant the incoherence of the concept for the sake of argument and then consider the principle of explosion, a multivocal Swiftian outcome follows logically.
As a logical matter the assertion ‘A and not-A’ implies anything you want it to imply, and its opposite, all at once. Drop this into a context and there are often extrinsic limits on what A and not-A can come to imply in that context.
But extrinsic constraints don’t imply a single logical outcome. What different people make of equal rights as a principle will depend upon the extrinsic constraints implied by their own unexamined metaphysical presumptions. (This post and thread may also be of interest).
So equal rights, even within some ‘limited’ context, means many different and contradictory things; because the unexamined metaphysical baggage in the minds of the different individuals who are committed to it is disparate and often contradictory.
AR,
Prosecuting (married) people for having kids is perverse (as is having women in the military at all).
Bear in mind that her position effectively came down to opposition to the idea that the military can prosecute women for having children in a way that they knew would interfere with their military duties, without getting permission from their command. That’s akin to telling the military that if a man knows he’s going to be deployed, he can have an elective medical operation that will prevent him from doing is duties.
IMO, holding women accountable like this is actually our only resort at this point. They want equality? They can have it good and hard in the form of receiving the identical expectations and consequences as men.
FWIW, AR, I don’t support having women in the military aside from a very limited, auxiliary role with no meaningful command authority over men. With that said, I think the only way to ride the zeitgeist into the ground is to uphold the standards for men and apply them to women also to use as a cudgel on the equalitarians.
Bear in mind that her position effectively came down to opposition to the idea that the military can prosecute women for having children in a way that they knew would interfere with their military duties, without getting permission from their command.
And she is unequivocally correct. Prosecuting married people for having kids is a perverse inversion of the proper order of things.
That’s akin to telling the military that if a man knows he’s going to be deployed, he can have an elective medical operation that will prevent him from doing is duties.
Pregnancy is self-harm. Up is down. Good is evil. When equality is your doctrine, every day is opposite day.
They want equality? They can have it
Yes, let’s do evil to get revenge on the girls. And then we can have an awesome sixth birthday party.
And she is unequivocally correct. Prosecuting married people for having kids is a perverse inversion of the proper order of things.
You’re exactly right. That’s one of many reasons women shouldn’t be in the military. But they are and the fact is that being a pregnant soldier is a liability. You don’t need to like it, but it’s the truth.
Yes, let’s do evil to get revenge on the girls. And then we can have an awesome sixth birthday party.
Nonsense. You want to have female soldiers, you can’t lower standards. That harms everybody. If women are in the military, they’re in the military.
And if they’re allowed in the military, they need to be a part of the draft. No double standards means no double standards. This has nothing to do with revenge, but only with the logical consequences of actions.
If a person is committing a crime, it’s very important for people who are against crime to encourage him to complete it.
Prosecuting married people for having kids is a perverse inversion of the proper order of things.
What about the unmarried?
If a man lusts after a woman in his heart, he ought to actually fornicate with her, since that’s the logical conclusion of lust.
Making fornication illegal is unproblematic. Making uncontracepted fornication illegal specifically (while allowing contracepted fornication), is problematic, albeit less so than outlawing the marital act.
Since Anarcho-Tyranny is the logical conclusion of liberalism, antiliberals should support Anarcho-Tyranny.
Pregnancy is self-harm. Up is down. Good is evil. When equality is your doctrine, every day is opposite day.
If women want to serve in the military, they have to subordinate their fertility to the mission. Men have to subordinate their duties as fathers to military necessity. If women want equality, then they should be held to the same standard.
Yes, let’s do evil to get revenge on the girls. And then we can have an awesome sixth birthday party.
Yes, let’s call it evil so we can avoid the whole issue. Why don’t you go full on mainstream conservative and wrap yourself up in the flag too since you’re already groping for the cross like a woman clutching her pearls.
The idea behind “black knighting” is to encourage and bring about the bad consequences of liberal policies as a way of discrediting those policies.
The idea seems to be that if we can be even more stupid and immoral than the current state of mainstream liberalism, that will somehow discredit liberalism in a way in which it is not being discredited without our help.
Black knighting is the underpants gnome playground reasoning of (some of the) alt right. Maybe if we just give liberals wedgies that will prove our worthiness to rule.
AR,
Let’s start a little further back on this. The conservative approach of standing athwart history, shouting “stop!” has been a comprehensive failure. In fact, the conservative attempts to let people have their cake and eat it too have been quite possibly some of the best acts of enabling liberalism to date because they soften the blows.
So how about conservatives for once say “you want equality, you can have equality good and hard. You will face the full measure of equality, including consequences.”
The un-PC truth is that women tend to like consequences even less than men. I don’t think it would take very long before women would abandon equalitarianism in droves if men insisted on women getting the full measure of equal standards.
The fact is that there are women in the main bodies of the armed forces. They are there because they want to be there. Women overwhelmingly insist that they have a right to choose military service. So if that is where we are going anyway, then the only course of action we have is to subvert the process by saying that since equality means fungibility, women in the armed forces will be required to perform fungibly with men.
The idea behind “black knighting” is to encourage and bring about the bad consequences of liberal policies as a way of discrediting those policies.
Actually it’s right out of the Alinsky playbook: defeat your enemy by making him live up to his own standards. It’s not about us being stupid, but applying the rules of liberalism so harshly and dogmatically back on the liberals that they can’t deal with it.
Mike T:
There are no “rules of liberalism”. Liberalism is rationally incoherent, as I have shown many times. You have not fully grasped the implications.
And for men of good will to deliberately embrace “the Alinksky playbook” is for them to cease being men of good will. Becoming the enemy is not defeating the enemy, and I don’t know why actual men of good will should prefer your kind of self deceived liar over the current crop of self deceived liars.
There are no permanent rules of liberalism, but there are current rules of liberalism. One of the examples of black knight that Vox Day used as a primary example is documenting anti-Christian or misandrist speech on the job and filing a “hostile workplace” claim against the speaker and HR if necessary.
You have this image of alt righters advocating objectively evil things, when in reality 90% of the discussion of black knighting is primarily around issues about equality and speech controls.
Mike T:
Alt-right weaponized nihilism doesn’t impress me any more than leftist weaponized nihilism. It just confirms that black knighting is a way of becoming the enemy.
Anti-Christian speech should carry consequences because it is shameful, false, and evil; not because it creates a ‘hostile work environment’ for poor delicate fragile oppressed alt-right SJW’s.
albeit less so than outlawing the marital act
No one has mentioned outlawing the marital act. What I said is that if women want to be in the main bodies of the military (rather than women’s auxiliaries where pregnancy was not that big of an issue), we should insist on them being held to the same standard of military readiness as men. Since women can get pregnant and men can’t, that necessarily means that a woman must subordinate her fertility to military necessity if she wants to serve there. A woman who deliberately gets pregnant before deployment has deliberately chosen an action that renders her unfit for deployment, it was preventable (NFP or contraception) and should be held accountable.
Look, I don’t know what guys like you expect to come from the current policies. You expect women to just magically choose one day to not serve when they can have their cake and eat it too? The military is full of unwed mothers because conservatives won’t insist that women who get pregnant in a way that undermines fitness for service be discharged. Prosecution for fornication or not, they won’t remove them.
This is why I feel like I’m talking to a rock with most conservatives on this issue. The “ZOMG, he wants to prosecute them.” No imagination on what we could do to the law used against them. It could be reduced to the level of speeding ticket with a dishonorable discharge as the real consequence.
Anti-Christian speech should carry consequences because it is shameful, false, and evil; not because it creates a ‘hostile work environment’ for poor delicate fragile oppressed alt-right SJW’s.
And yet that won’t fly with HR or legal, so that leaves us having to consider another legal argument. I don’t personally give a damn about “hostility in the workplace” as a general rule. However, if I had to use that as an avenue to defend myself I am not too proud to use it.
I am against liberalism because it is evil, stupid, and wrong; not because it doesn’t apply its own principles consistently. There is no such thing as applying incoherent principles consistently.
I can’t remember where I saw it, but a researcher at Harvard found that the disparity in sentencing between black and white men was a drop in the bucket compared to the disparity between men and women for the same felonies. Nothing better illustrates the double standard on holding women accountable as moral agents than the case of Mary Winkler who shot her husband in the back while he slept and got a slap on the wrist. The issue of treating women as full moral agents really does seem to cross into everything, not just abortion.
Mike T:
So what? Attempting to fight against liberalism by insisting on more liberalism is an underpants gnome strategy, in addition to being immoral and despicable and turning you into the enemy.
I am against liberalism because it is evil, stupid, and wrong; not because it doesn’t apply its own principles consistently.
And what makes you think that’s our reasoning? This is an example of the logic.
A radical feminist will make misandrist commentary on the job.
Hate speech is “not protected speech” according to them.
So call them out on that. Attack them for suborning hate speech.
They then have two choices. Either punish one of their own for hate speech or admit they’re hypocrites.
I cannot think of anything more psychically painful to a typical liberal than the thought “maybe I’m a hypocrite.”
The background premise is that it is possible for liberal principles to be applied consistently in the first place: that this notion of consistently applied liberal principles is itself coherent. But you can’t back a fundamentally incoherent ideology into a logical corner; so when you affirm the ideology and then insist on its consistent application you succeed in affirming it and fail in insisting on its consistent application. Even every apparent individual battle-level win is a strategic loss, as you do the usual neo-con thing of becoming the enemy.
You are right about it not being a real win, but it can at least buy you some safety and peace. That is more than what most conservatives ever could do with their strategy of “whine and act like a whipped dog and hopefully they’ll not beat you more.”
I’ll just note that personal self defense in a specific case and aggressive black knighting in policy advocacy as a strategy to “save western civilization” are distinguishable activities.
They are, but take the military case for instance. All of us here agree that women should not be serving in the military, at least in the same capacity as men (meaning outside of the old auxiliaries). One way to accomplish that is to eliminate the gender differences-based double standard and hold women exactly the same as men. I think that would be effective as a short term strategy because 99% of women couldn’t do that.
That aside, even if all black knighting does is make liberals act like dogs chasing their own tails until they vomit from dizziness (or bite the tail), then there is something to be said for that.
Mike T:
Black knighting involves assertively advocating for certain policies which take liberalism for granted as the foundational framework upon which everyone agrees.
If the recent pro-life Trump kerfuffle has taught us anything, it is that when movements adopt lies as their political strategy they come to believe in their own lies over time. It seems likely that the current pro-life shibboleth about the pregnant woman being a second victim rather than the main perpetrator of the crime started out as just this sort of tactic: tell some pretty lies in order to achieve tactical objectives. What this achieved in the long run was to convert the entire pro life movement over to the pro-choice position, to outrage at even thinking about discussing the possibility of any legal sanction or punishment whatsoever of women who choose abortion.
That’s the thing about embracing lies: they trap the liar and turn him into what he despises.
If women want to serve in the military, they have to subordinate their fertility to the mission.
If a person believes they’re a fish, they should be treated like a fish.
Yes, let’s call it evil so we can avoid the whole issue.
If we agree that X is evil, whether a specific means of implementing X is evil is still debatable.
o one has mentioned outlawing the marital act.
How do you imagine pregnancy occurs?
So how about conservatives for once say “you want equality, you can have equality good and hard. You will face the full measure of equality, including consequences.”
Yes. Let’s do evil so that good may result.
If a person believes they’re a fish, they should be treated like a fish.
See if you can figure out why this is a bad analogy.
It’s a perfect analogy. The argument is that since women want to be in the military (that is, they believe that they are like men in a way that they aren’t), they should be treated like men.
If we agree that X is evil, whether a specific means of implementing X is evil is still debatable.
Repeatedly asserting that something is evil, without demonstrating why, is not an argument. It’s a naked assertion.
It’s a perfect analogy.
Oh really? You mean that fish are even partially fungible with humans for any human endeavor? The issues with women in the military come down primarily to how gender differences and male sexuality interfere with women meeting the obligations of ordinary military service.
There are in fact women who, unlike fish, are quite capable of military service.
How do you imagine pregnancy occurs?
The military telling female volunteers that they cannot engage in a particular sexual act that will result in unfitness for duty is no more morally illicit than telling a homeless married couple they cannot have sex outside of a private space. Being married doesn’t mean you get to tell every authority to go eff themselves when your obligations to them could be unjustly or materially impacted by reproductive decisions.
How about this, AR. A married woman owns a business and signs a contract with another business. She gets pregnant and then can’t perform her contract and the other business suffers material harm. Are you going to let her just walk and claim in court that she shouldn’t have to pay out damages to the harmed business?
Mike T:
And there are women who cannot, for one reason or another, become pregnant.
But I don’t think that either of those points cuts against AR’s analogy, which is after all an analogy, the point of which is that men and women are in fact different in essential ways which pertain to the question at hand.
At bottom what the “black knight” underpants gnome wedgie shitlords are suggesting is that we should (dishonestly, since we don’t actually believe it) accept the liberal principle that men and women are the same, and treat women in the military as if they were men with boobs.
No thanks. If you (the generic you) want to build a castle of lies, have a ball. But don’t expect me to take it seriously or give it my approval.
Mike T:
How was the contract secured? The other party presumably can recover any security and/or absorb the business loss. I cover this in the Usury FAQ in Question 49.
Funny how things tie together.
AR’s reaction was initially in opposition to the very idea that a married, pregnant service member could be punished if she didn’t engage in NFP leading up to a deployment. That’s why I used the contractual example. If a female service member can reasonably know of a deployment and get pregnant without consequences so as to avoid her duties, that is the military equivalent of imposing a legal right for women to rip up even a secured contract Because Pregnant.
But I don’t think that either of those points cuts against AR’s analogy, which is after all an analogy, the point of which is that men and women are in fact different in essential ways which pertain to the question at hand.
But they don’t address the fundamental fact that if most of the men were killed and the enemy still attacking, young women could literally form militia combat brigades to defend the children and elderly. We recognize this as an awful last resort, but the fact is that women are literally capable of military service, they are just not fungible with men. It’s much like how there are plenty of men who can be nurturing parents, but as a group we recognize that men are not fungible with women as nurturers and it would never be the same if we tried.
Bottom line is I think AR is taking gender differences to a point that is itself irrational. Men and women are not fungible, but we can often do what the other does if push comes to shove. We’d just be very poor, unnatural substitutes.
Mike T:
And he is entirely correct. That the military hires married women who may become pregnant is a business risk for which it is entirely responsible. Anyone who hires a married woman takes on the risk that she may become pregnant and therefore suddenly unavailable.
If the military doesn’t want to take on that inherent and very obvious business risk, it shouldn’t hire married women.
That is the actual truth, not the half truth mixed with lies that you are pushing.
Mike T:
Either you don’t understand what an analogy is, or you are deliberately attacking a straw man for what you imagine to be the rhetorical effect.
Anyone who hires a married woman takes on the risk that she may become pregnant and therefore suddenly unavailable.
And a married woman is capable of signing a contract that requires her to engage in NFP or contraception if she prefers until she can coordinate her pregnancy with her employer’s needs.
Mike T:
Whether a wife could licitly sign a contract agreeing to refrain from sex entirely with her husband’s permission is a mildly interesting question. Contraception is intrinsically immoral and off the table. Neither NFP nor contraception absolutely guarantee no pregnancy: only total abstinence is a guarantee.
I don’t really know the content of the contracts female recruits currently sign, but I rather doubt that they include terms that you would find amenable. In any new contracts I think it would be OK to require posted security to cover the contingency of pregnancy, perhaps in the form of lower pay for women to cover a pregnancy insurance bond. But anyone who wants to outright forbid married women from becoming pregnant can (and probably will) go to Hell.
In any case this all loses sight of the central fact that ‘black knights’ are self-destructive moral and strategic imbeciles.
It’s a perfect analogy. The argument is that since women want to be in the military (that is, they believe that they are like men in a way that they aren’t), they should be treated like men.
But they are in the military. I don’t like it, but they are. They can’t be fish. They are soldiers. Your analogy is preposterous.
I don’t consider this black knighting at all. It’s pretty straightforward.
If the military doesn’t want to take on that inherent and very obvious business risk, it shouldn’t hire married women.
Of course.
Malcolm:
You say that like you think that being a soldier turns women into men.
Repeatedly asserting that something is evil, without demonstrating why, is not an argument. It’s a naked assertion.
I assumed that it was taken for granted here that women in the military was an evil phenomenon.
Oh really? You mean that fish are even partially fungible with humans
“Men” and “fish” are both things that women aren’t. Which is sufficient for the analogy in question.
The military telling female volunteers that they cannot engage in a particular sexual act that will result in unfitness for duty is no more morally illicit than telling a homeless married couple they cannot have sex outside of a private space
Getting pregnant is equivalent to public lewdness.
How about this, AR. A married woman owns a business and signs a contract with another business. She gets pregnant and then can’t perform her contract and the other business suffers material harm. Are you going to let her just walk and claim in court that she shouldn’t have to pay out damages to the harmed business?
Compensatory damages are equivalent to a felony conviction.
if most of the men were killed and the enemy still attacking, young women could literally form militia combat brigades to defend the children and elderly.
If everyone over the age of ten were killed, ten year olds could form a militia to defend younger children.
I still don’t think we in the real world should let them in the army.
To quote our host, “Conservatives are the abused enablers of progressives and always will be, mopping up the vomit and excrement after the drunken binges to make sure that they can continue.”
In this instance, the drunken binge is women in the military. Forbidding married women from becoming pregnant is mopping up the vomit.
You say that like you think that being a soldier turns women into men.
My issue isn’t whether or not they’re men. It’s whether or not they’re soldiers. They are.
My issue isn’t whether or not they’re fish. It’s whether or not they’re sea creatures. They are.
Malcolm:
“Your issue?”
Women and fish are not men – ontologically. That was the point of AR’s analogy; and calling the analogy preposterous, or redirecting to “your issue” (the family of jobs loosely falling under the label “soldier”, apparently), doesn’t make his ontological claim any less true.
In that case, I submit that we’ve been talking at cross-purposes the whole time – or else the claim he’s making isn’t very interesting.
Of course, even among men, not all contracts are equal. They vary widely depending not only on the individual themself and their qualifications, but also the recruiters, the “needs of the service,” etc. Folks in different rates or MOS’s will often have very different experiences and contracts, with variations in deployment cycles, bonuses, advancement, and even length of contracts. Many men have or develop medical issues which will need to be accommodated, and the military further distinguishes between married and single men when it comes to BAS and such like.
Given that, even among just men, the military does adjust for marriage and children and medical incapacity, the claim that in order to rigorously enforce equality we should NOT make allowances for married women is a bit precious.
Of course many of the pregnant women are not married, but again the military also makes some allowances for cohabiting fornicators and their children. Personally I’d recommend that the military apply to pregnant fornicators a program similar to one commonly used these days for drug users, where they’re kept in long enough to get some help but not given regular duty, and eventually processed out without simply tossing them on the street. The root problem in such cases, though, is not pregnancy, but fornication, and is just one more reason to keep women out of the military, especially out of deployable billets.
Of course, my real position is even simpler: Don’t allow women in the military at all, and stop negotiating with the terrorists.
Let me put it another way: I don’t get AR’s point. I guess he’s saying women aren’t men. Gotcha. It doesn’t have anything to do with what I said, but gotcha.
Or maybe it does. If so, I don’t get it.
If we all agree women shouldn’t be in the military, then yeah, no argument.
@Hrodgar
Isn’t unmarried cohabitation still a court martial offense (in theory anyway)?
1. It’s not licit in principle for the military to prohibit its married soldiers from having kids.
2. There shouldn’t be women in the military in the first place, but the fact that there are doesn’t invalidate 1.
Adultery is forbidden in the UCMJ, or was when I went through Basic. In at least some circumstances, though, long term relationships can get at least some of the benefits, probably by filing concubine and children as dependents, but I don’t know the details; not something I personally have had to worry about, and I’m not a lawyer.
Encouraging delusion is not harmless. It is, in fact, destructive. This is why black-knighting works — that is, it works *if* the goal is to allow those with delusions to destroy themselves. However, those with delusions are already self-destructing, which is why the rate of suicide of transgender people is over 40%. Black-knighting simply hastens along the process.
“In any case this all loses sight of the central fact that ‘black knights’ are self-destructive moral and strategic imbeciles.” I’m not entirely convinced of this and will have to consider it further.
As an aside, the irony is not lost on me that almost exactly a year before the House committee vote for the female draft, social media erupted over male cadets being forced to march in red high heels.
“…black-knighting works — that is, it works *if* the goal is to allow those with delusions to destroy themselves…Black-knighting simply hastens along the process.”
You’re too smart not to see that that’s not an accurate description. The black knight is not “allowing” some process to finish its course unassisted. He ‘hastens the process’ by facilitating and encouraging it, via means he knows to be evil.
It seems obvious to me that if these people balked at the absurd, they wouldn’t be SJW/progressives/liberals in the first place. I still remember when “if women want equality, make ’em sign up for the draft” was a killer argument. Now they’re actually going to do it and it hasn’t slowed feminists down one bit. Remember the slippery slope arguments about gay marriage? Now newsmags can’t wait to publish the next debate-club-at-Auschwitz article about polyamory, adult incest, and even pedophiles. But yeah, I’m sure that getting the feminist in Accounting fired for making a dick joke will totally turn the tables.
“The black knight is not “allowing” some process to finish its course unassisted.” I’m sorry. I assumed the definition of black-knighting was understood by the audience. By its very nature, black-knighting assists the process, or it would not be black-knighting. Black-knighting uses the rules of the system against itself. I did not mean to imply otherwise.
In a very basic sense, a black knight attempts to equalize the scales of justice by using the same measure of weights that have been used against him. This works best in individual cases, when there are grievances against specific people.
As I understand it (and certainly as I am addressing it), “black knighting” is not self defense. It is an attempt to aggressively use liberal principles and SJW tactics against liberal and SJW targets.
Those who think “black knighting” is an effective strategy fall under two categories, generally–
1. Silly people who don’t think through the consequences of actions.
2. Internet trolls.
To further address Hrodgar’s point, the military allows (presumably only married) men to leave their deployments for a few days when their child is born. This leads to the totally expected consequence that men time their wives’ pregnancies to correspond with that very deployment. This practice causes some serious anger among the singles or marrieds who didn’t intentionally do this. I should also clarify that this only matters to that 1% of the deployed who actually do the work of war, not your typical 99%er fatbody who’s slurping Starbucks at a desk in Kuwait. The military used to be a harder place though, and men weren’t allowed to leave the forests of Germany or the jungles of Vietnam even for birth and death of loved ones.
Also it is strange that married women are the topic since many of these women are unmarried and often abort once they’re scott free of the deployment. The army doesn’t dare track these statistics so you have to talk to people about it.
I admit I don’t hang out in the manosphere, as I find it solipsistic to an extreme. My understanding comes from having read VD since his WND days and having observed people in real life using the techniques VD advocates, such as this: Black-Knighting. So perhaps I don’t fully understand black-knighting, but my understanding is that it’s using the corrupt system against itself and in defense of oneself. Example of what I mean: a man at work was accused anonymously of sexual harassment. He retaliated by turning in the numerous women who regularly sexual harass others and get away with it because they can. No further action was taken against the man accused of sexual harassment, but there have been many communiques since about everybody treating each other respectfully, as well as management actively writing people up for rule infringement. Do delusions about gender still exist? Sure. But justice in this case prevailed.
If that isn’t black-knighting, then I possibly need a better definition. However, I did qualify my first comment with how black-knighting works best in specific situations to equalize the scales of justice. The scales of justice are not so easily righted when we are using the tactics against an entire class of people — women in the military — who have grown up in a world where they believe they are equal to men and can do anything a man can do. Pregnancy itself should be the tell that dispels this myth, but delusional people will go to great lengths to uphold their delusions. It would be far better if we as a society stopped feeding the delusions and just forbade women from being in the military, despite any kind of exceptions (e.g. women who are mentally tough and savvy with weapons). But I think we all agree on that.
@MtC
I think this is it. To put it in terms that are frequently used by VD (his ideas seem to be a touchstone for you and MikeT) you and MikeT want to talk about tactics. AR and Zippy keep referring to the strategy; specifically that the tactic of black-knighting undercuts the strategy of Truth, Good, etc.
There’s so much doublethink to cut through. I think AR’s fish analogy failed upon you two because no one anywhere is saying women are fish (no one keeps them in aquariums, for example) but the definition of a soldier is someone in an authorized military action. Women actually are in those other tanks.
@Jill
It is both. I think a strong case can be made that anyone who is trying to tell the truth and do good in our society is perpetually being weighed against false measures. (I think Zippy has made that case well himself.) So it’s not clear to me that it is always wrong to use the enemies tactics against them. On occasion the Bible says that the Lord sent an evil spirit to torment different people. I don’t wholly know what to make of that, but one thing to consider is that in every case I’m aware of it was done to those in high authority; not Judy in HR.
One more thing: Because of the monstrous presence (both in size and intent) of doublethink, a person might gloat of a success in black-knighting when the reality is that it was an instance of perfectly straight-forward and just counter-attack. Black-knighting as a separate thing–a specific tactic–poisons the well for others who might be have supported the good in a fight between good and evil, but instead they retreat.
There’s so much doublethink to cut through. I think AR’s fish analogy failed upon you two because no one anywhere is saying women are fish (no one keeps them in aquariums, for example) but the definition of a soldier is someone in an authorized military action. Women actually are in those other tanks.
Exactly.
I’m not really thinking of this as black knighting, actually. I have even spoken against that specifically. I simply think we need to either be one or the other: Either be against women in the military entirely, or take things to their logical conclusions and allow women into the draft. I choose the former.
I don’t actually think saying, “Well, I’m against it, but IF it’s happening then…” is ever going to work. All that means is that you’ve surrendered part of the battle and now are trying to negotiate terms with the victors…from the position of the losers. You already lost.
As Mike Ehrmentraut once said: No half measures.
http://genius.com/Vince-gilligan-mikes-half-measures-speech-annotated
Malcolm:
If we aren’t black knighting then I agree with you except for the either/or part. Women should not be soldiers, period, and coming up with “equality” rules under which it is supposedly more tolerable for women to be soldiers is self defeating. The response to “women get pregnant” is not “punish female soldiers who get pregnant”: it is “women should not be soldiers”.
So-called “black knighting” is just an admission of defeat accompanied by noises of bravado: all black knighting is Monty Python black knighting.
I’ll put it to you this way: A guy comes up to me and says “Women are soldiers now. Should they be included in the draft?”
I respond, “Women shouldn’t be soldiers at all, so, no. I don’t negotiate with terrorists.”
I’ve never heard the term before, but black knighting sounds a bit dangerous. I am afraid using this kind of tactic could leave a person without a leg to stand on.
The black knight in fiction usually isn’t very successful, unless he’s Batman.
As I understand it (and certainly as I am addressing it), “black knighting” is not self defense. It is an attempt to aggressively use liberal principles and SJW tactics against liberal and SJW targets.
With the understanding (in more Christian alt-right circles like Vox Popoli) that we are not engaging in intrinsic evil. For example, it is not black knighting to do a hoax that makes someone look like they did what they didn’t. It is, however, black knighting to go after a misandrist feminist using her own standards of gender bigotry and make a federal case to HR about her jokes about men. Not because you believe she should be punished objectively, but because until the rules are enforced good and hard they might not back down.
IMO, black knighting is fundamentally more about using their own rules (as they exist right now, with the aforementioned caveat) to make an example out of them.
If we aren’t black knighting then I agree with you except for the either/or part. Women should not be soldiers, period, and coming up with “equality” rules under which it is supposedly more tolerable for women to be soldiers is self defeating. The response to “women get pregnant” is not “punish female soldiers who get pregnant”: it is “women should not be soldiers”.
That’s mostly true, but here we run into a problem of practicality. Unless you want to stage a coup and force your will on society, you have to convince people to go your way. The problem with society today is that it is incredibly generous and protective of women to a point of absurdity. The vast majority of women have no good reason to oppose military service for women because women are allowed to actually serve at whatever level of service they want from “just show up and collect a paycheck while making the men do the physical work you can’t” to trying to be GI Jane.
A large part of the problem is precisely the efforts to accommodate women on standards of performance and conduct. Taking that accommodation away is a positive step toward forcing people to the conclusion that “women should not be soldiers” because in the vast majority of cases, women won’t meet the objective standards and then the discussion can be one of why are you undermining the military.
If their standards are false then enforcing those standards against anyone is intrinsically unjust. And if their standards are true then you have no grounds to complain about them in the first place.
Black knighting is a kind of lie and a perpetration of injustice. That you think the targets deserve it is similar to thinking that some particular victim of rape or torture deserves it: that might even be true, but it doesn’t excuse doing it.
“If we don’t torture captives the terrorists will win.”
Also it is strange that married women are the topic since many of these women are unmarried and often abort once they’re scott free of the deployment. The army doesn’t dare track these statistics so you have to talk to people about it.
It’s not being discussed mainly because we’d have an echo chamber here on how to deal with such women. I doubt anyone here thinks an unmarried service member who gets herself knocked up before a deployment should allowed to stay in rather than get a dishonorable discharge for both immoral conduct and dereliction of duty.
If their standards are false then enforcing those standards against anyone is intrinsically unjust. And if their standards are true then you have no grounds to complain about them in the first place.
Or as is often the case, the standards applied are merely someone’s opinion and more of a prudential position than anything objectively moral. Most corporate speech codes fit that definition. For every case where someone’s speech is intrinsically immoral, there are probably 100 where it’s just a matter of opinion and a conflict of personal tastes signifying no objective truth.
If the standards are just a prudential judgment legitimately asserted by those in authority, then once again you have no reason to complain about them (including their conventional exceptions, asymmetries, implicit designation of victim and perpetrator categories, etc).
No matter how you slice it, black knighting is stupid, immoral, and self-undermining.
Suppose you worked at a really SJW-inclined office where not separating your trash into recyclable vs non-recyclable and someone reported you. That standard is not evil, it’s just stupid. There is likewise nothing evil about black knighting that person by documenting every slight screw up they make on recycling and handing it into HR for punishment.
then once again you have no reason to complain about them (including their conventional exceptions, asymmetries, implicit designation of victim and perpetrator categories, etc).
Define asymmetry, then because there often cases where politics and favoritism means “the rules apply to you, but not them. Why? Because f*** you, that’s why.” SJWs take that to a new level which is why a lot of people are adopting a view that they are fair game for anything.
Going back to Jill’s example, the black knight isn’t acting on his own authority, but building a case to force the authority’s hand against a favored group. That is a legitimate tactic for a subordinate if the authority is openly suborning conduct against its own rules for no legitimate reason.
Mike T:
This is just the usual equivocation between self-defense in a particular case and aggressive attack against unjust policies.
In the first place, if those are the rules where you work and they are not unjust rules then you should be following them.
In the second, your personal counterattack against the ‘recycling rat’ is still subject to moral evaluation. You still need a good reason to justify it, or else you are guilty of the sin of detraction (exposing true but unflattering things about a person without good cause).
In the third place, black knighting is specifically supposed to be about employing policies to which you object to attack particular persons. Whether those persons deserve it or not, black knighting is a species of lie.
In the fourth place, black knighting is simply stupid because it legitimizes the very principles or rules to which the ‘black knight’ supposedly objects.
Black knighting – again understood as something distinct from personal self defense in particular cases – is stupid, immoral, and juvenile.
Mike T:
You are trying to have it both ways. Either the rules as instituted and enforced are unjust, or they are legitimate prudential judgment with all that that implies. In the former case employing them yourself is intrinsically unjust; in the latter, you have no legitimate gripe.
Either the rules as instituted and enforced
The bold part is why I asked for clarification on the asymmetry issue. Often times the instituted rules are reasonable or even just, but their enforcement is manifestly not with some people receiving a functional exception from the rules.
Mike T:
So you agree that black knighting affirms and reinforces the legitimacy, justice and reasonableness of the progressive rules themselves, and proposes that they are not being enforced fairly? That black knighting intrinsically validates progressivism but proposes that it isn’t authentic?
So you agree that black knighting affirms and reinforces the legitimacy, justice and reasonableness of the progressive rules themselves
No, I don’t because a given rule may be arrived at by different justifications. For example, a tradcon and a SJW may agree that dirty jokes have absolutely no place in the workplace and someone who makes them deserves an immediate reprimand or termination. I personally don’t agree with that and would support hoisting someone by their own petard the moment they step out of line.
See I don’t agree with your argument about Detraction. If you do the very thing for which you denounce your neighbor, your shameless hypocrisy makes you a worthy target.
That black knighting intrinsically validates progressivism but proposes that it isn’t authentic?
FWIW, to the extent that the person who does the black knighting is a liberal I do believe that this can be an issue. However, I don’t believe one has to be a liberal to black knight. One can be opposed to their policy and tactics but use them against them much like one can be opposed to something like the use of poison gas in a war but use it aggressively in retaliation for its use on one’s own troops.
It is always a little bemusing when someone says “No, because [reasons]” when what they clearly mean is “Yes, because [reasons].”
Zippy, your comment on torture reminds me of something I’ve been meaning to ask, since I do not find the answer on the blog. Where St. Augustine says, in City of God XIX.6, that “a wise judge… thinks it no wickedness that innocent witnesses are tortured,” much less guilty men, do understand him to be teaching that torture to gain information can be justified—and if so, do you oppose him on that? The whole chapter 6 is relevant: http://newadvent.org/fathers/120119.htm
Chapter six, Of the Error of Human Judgments When the Truth is Hidden, does not, in my reading, countenance torture. E.g., “These numerous and important evils he does not consider sins; for the wise judge does these things, not with any intention of doing harm, but because his ignorance compels him, and because human society claims him as a judge… and had he any piety about him, he would cry to God ‘From my necessities deliver me.’ ” (Emphasis mine).
We need deliverance from only one thing, which is found in the last line of the Lord’s Prayer.
Unam Sanctam Catholicam has an article on tortue which might be interesting and references that very quote. It is the only position I have I have seen maintained on the subject varying even slightly from Zippy’s which ever struck me as tenable, and I’m a bit curious as to our host’s opinion on it: http://www.unamsanctamcatholicam.com/component/content/article/93-social-teaching/moral-issues/503-torture-historical-and-ethical-perspectives.html
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