Yeah, I was asking what the the topic was.The Saudi regime is is a brutal dictatorship with a cloak of piety, propped up by the West.

A witch-hunt is a synonym for unjust persecution and terrorising of a population and victimisation of any social deviance. Probably, it's an unsound legal concept, — unenlightened

This is why I often like your posts, but I have the need to throw way more words at it.

There's no such thing as supernatural witchcraft. The accused were therefore killed† on false‡ charges. Naturally, supernatural witchcraft was proven in none of the cases. Unjustified charges, conviction, sentence - state-sponsored. — jorndoe

Putting aside the debate on debate and epistemology for a moment, there is a big difference between there being no such thing as super-natural witchcraft (as in a set of actions causing a particular outcome by way of a mechanism other than that typically described by "natural") and there being no such thing as trying to perform super-natural witchcraft (however ill guided). It reminds me a bit of the idea of factual impossibility. I'm sure you can find better sources (I just wanted to point), but the idea is that whether or not your intent and behavior (mens rea and actus rea) can factually result in your desired criminal outcome, the factual impossibility is no defense to being convicted of crimes that do not (or may not) require a particular outcome to be accomplished (cf inchoate crimes such as conspiracy and attempt). In this context, the question is not so much whether being a super-natural witch is punishable by death, but whether you must have accomplished super-natural ends to be convicted of witchcraft.

The law (whether announced, secret, post hoc, well conceived, etc.) is a function of human relations and power (though many an academic/theologian/philosopher would like to posit law from an other source). The source of justification for law (rather than the power to coerce) comes in its ability to get agreement (or at least volitional cooperation) from its subjects. Asking a question like "Is action X justified?" is inherently context dependent - social group A may differ on what constitutes justification that social group B. This is not, of course, to say that relativism is true, but simply to point out that asking "Is this justified?" is fundamentally different than asking "do you agree?"

Unelightened more or less hit the nail on the head - in Saudi Arabia the public execution of a person is likely deemed justified by the relevant social/legal group. In this case "relevant" means those folks with sufficient ties to the group that their opinion/conduct could have substantially effected the outcome. The world community writ large is not the relevant community just as the murdered witch's family is not the relevant community. Making any appeal to Saudi Arabian authority (the "SAA"), process, etc. that the executions/murders were unjustified is almost certainly a non-starter. The SAA's internal justifications may be many and internally consistent/compelling. For instance, people may deem that reading Locke in an authoritarian communist state poses sufficient threat to social order such that public, brutal treatment of such readers strikes as an effective means to maintain order/remove the threat. In some social groups, the particular treatment of an individual simply does not carry as much weight as the overall integrity of the community. The prevention/condemnation of the ill-treatment of individuals at the hands of the law is not a universal requirement/desire.

Are the SAA authorities morally abhorrent, deserving of overthrow, etc? I'd go with a yes. Is the murder of witches justifiable? I'd also go with a yes given the right system/context of justification. Do I think it justified for my own purposes? No.

It is simple enough to call out the SAA for what they are and point to obviously abhorrent behavior as examples without engaging in the rhetorical device of an intellectual examination of those examples. It isn't just because your examination may reach unexpected results, but it is because the method of your examination and its results are independent of the abhorrence of the action. Suggesting that there is some context in which the murder of woman for political purposes can be legitimated is already to have slipped into an arena where it can be legitimated. We (presumably) all agree you shouldn't murder women for sticking pins into dolls hoping it will cause someone to break a leg or die (whether that person is a neighbor or the glorious leader). But it isn't because all people agree, rather it is the largely shared background posters on this forum have in the liberal tradition (rights theory and/or similar theories involving the protection of the individual from the group).

Questions like yours are merely requests for the inn-group to cluck approvingly in sophisticated ways. In a philosophy forum, intellectual rigor compels a "reasoned" exploration of the topic and there is no honor bestowed on the person who best argues for the position that the SAA should murder women for political gain. The same is true for asking someone to argue why the SAA should murder homosexuals. Yes, there are real consequences to philosophical theories and people should be careful of advocating for theories that in theory could give permission to bad people to do bad things (or good people to do bad things), but acting/speaking in this context as if there is no way that people could justify bad behavior is naive at best.

P.S. I'd love to hear from someone in Myanmar supportive of the junta and current order with respect to the moral acceptability of murdering women for political gain.

Putting aside the debate on debate and epistemology for a moment — Ennui Elucidator

Epistemic wandering off is subject to implosion, right down to subjective idealism or solipsism. And we could wander indefinitely down the diallelus. If we do (or entertain) that, then epistemic warrant evaporates — and evaporates equally to those claims of "supernatural magic". Dead end. Old story. Fortunately, though, such musings are roughly only found in philosophy departments; we already have strong epistemic standards to go by.

And those standards have more or less sent "supernatural witchcraft" packing. Besides, those claiming it's real, have consistently failed to justify. That's what the Saudi Arabian authorities go by nonetheless.

If, on the other hand, we're talking self-proclaimed witches, wearing talismans, doing whatever rituals, then their curses have still not been shown to harm others, not by "magic" at least.

"Supernatural witchcraft" is out either way. It's a non-explanation in the first place anyway.

the idea is that whether or not your intent and behavior (mens rea and actus rea) can factually result in your desired criminal outcome, the factual impossibility is no defense to being convicted of crimes that do not (or may not) require a particular outcome to be accomplished (cf inchoate crimes such as conspiracy and attempt) — Ennui Elucidator

Just as an example, I guess these people deliberately intended to magically harm someone they thought harmful, and other groups intended to (magically) counter that:

Witches cast 'mass spell' against Donald Trump (BBC; Feb 25, 2017)

Are the SAA authorities morally abhorrent, deserving of overthrow, etc? I'd go with a yes. — Ennui Elucidator

In this particular context (the opening post), I wouldn't go that far. Ending that ridiculous, unjust killing will do. (Per earlier comments, I'm reluctant to expand a verdict, let alone sentence, beyond the topic at hand.)

As mentioned, if we were to make a (strictly) legal assessment, then we reach a dead end because there's no definition of "witch". Going by the examples (executions) instead then, we're right back to "supernatural witchcraft". Not much more to see here. Ethics remain.

Fvcksakes, it's 2023.

Saudi man receives death penalty for posts online, latest case in wide-ranging crackdown on dissent
^{— Jon Gambrell · AP · Aug 30, 2023}

There's no such thing as supernatural witchcraft. The accused were therefore killed† on false‡ charges. — jorndoe

Modern legal systems don't actually have any problem with this: If a witch-doctor is cruel to animals, hurts other people or somehow creates huge annoyance to his or her fellow citizens, then there are laws against these kinds of behaviour. But one doesn't need the cause of witch-craft itself.

So yes, to specifically have laws against practicing witch-craft is dubious.

But anyway, Saudi-Arabia is a country that forbids the public practice of any other religion than Islam, so I think that's were to start in that country...

And about the modern day problem of "witch-craft", from some years ago:

(THE GUARDIAN, 6th Mar 2015) Police in Tanzania said on Friday they had arrested 32 witch-doctors this week as part of a campaign against ritual killings of albinos.

Activists say attackers have killed at least 75 albinos in the east African country since 2000 to use their limbs and other body parts as charms meant to guarantee success in love, life and business.

President Jakaya Kikwete last week vowed to stamp out the practice he said brought shame on to the east African country, and albino campaigners called on authorities on Friday to execute people convicted of the murders.

, well, crazy is easy enough to come by. :)

• Gypsy curse- my friend might be cursed by a rock? (Yahoo, ≈ 2009) (other archive)

• Nigeria police hold 'robber' goat (BBC, 2009)

Yeah, watch out for those evil rocks. And goats.

People being superstitious is quite real even today.

, yeah. It's when it turns dangerous/dehumanizing/detrimental that it becomes everyone's problem. For the time being, I'm not all that optimistic.

Enlightenment has still a road to go, that's for sure.

I think one of the worst things is when politicians use the superstitions of the people to back their power up. And of course they can be superstitious themselves naturally, so for a politician, it isn't only a thing to be popular among the uneducated. And someone being beheaded because of witchcraft naturally gives a totally different role for witchcraft than those being detained for murder (as in the case of Tanzania). Yet here we see the obvious difference: Tanzanian courts aren't a religious authority, while in Saudi-Arabia religious authorities can use legal power.

The problem is that as educated Westerners, we dismiss this, especially when viewing politics, because at first it's degrading to assume that people would rely on superstitions in their political decisions. Politics has to be logical and rational. Above all, the legal system has to be rational and logical. Hence we think that people are just cynically using these issues (withcraft/sorcery) as a tool for repression. That may be the end result, but are the people themselves cynical about it?

I don't think so.

If the Quran condemns witchcraft and sorcery and says that Iblis / Shaitans tempt people to sin, that these spirits may teach sorcery, I am very confindent that at least some religious authorities in Saudi-Arabia literally believe in this. If we have in the West people who take literally every word of the Bible, then we shouldn't be surprised that in Islam there are even more people that take literally every word of the Quran. Hence if the verdict is that Shaitan has taught sorcery for the women, then some will believe this. After all, the Quran says that there is this possibility. A true believer believes in the Quran.

In the West we just dismiss this or laugh about sorcery/Black Magic/the paranormal having a role in this World. Especially historians don't give it any role. Hence the only case what I remember was back when scholars eagerly gave importance to people believing in the supernatural is the example of Nancy Reagan believing in astrology and then having an influence on her husband. (Yes, it's used as a jab at the Republican president, but anyway, he drew old cartoons on the memos when listening Presidential briefings.)

Yet I think that a lot of people in this World think as Westerners thought about these issues (witchcraft/sorcery) in the 16th Century or earlier. Again, enlightenment has still a long way to go.