Assuming moral relativism, morality is a matter of opinion.

And even if one agrees or disagrees with a certain opinion, it doesn't make it any more or less valid as a moral view.

E.g. if people believe stoning someone to death for a minor crime is moral, it is. A moral relativist has no grounds to say that it isn't.

If all moral views are equally valid, the idea that one ranks their views above others already starts to raise some question marks.

But let's assume one answers in the affirmative.

The obvious follow-up question would be, by what metric?

This creates an interesting problem. Any appeals to objectivity are off the table as it would imply objectivism. I wonder if one could answer that question in a way that isn't circular.

Excuse me, but if one wants to persuade others, doesn't one have to believe their views are better than the other's? :chin:

You appear to to take the view that moral relativism entails normative moral relativism - the view that moral relativism implies that we ought to tolerate the behavior of others even when it runs counter to our personal or cultural moral standards. — ChrisH

What I said was that moral relativism makes morality meaningless. It turns morality into a buzzword that is used to make one's opinions sound more authoritative than they, by one's own confession, really are.

Most moral relativists hold that it is perfectly reasonable (and practical) for a person or group to defend their subjective values against others, ... — ChrisH

That's an open door, isn't it? If everything can be moral, then it is exceedingly easy to defend one's subjective values.

I invited you to present an argument that 1. isn't moral relativism, and 2. makes a distinction between personal and collective (group) morality.

If I understand correctly that is your position, since you mentioned you weren't a moral relativist, but do make said distinction.

I'm a bit skeptical as to whether that can be formed into a coherent argument, which is what I (perhaps clumsily) have been trying to express to you.

I thought I'd clearly said I didn't think they were the same? — ChrisH

Well, I don't think trying to distinguish between personal and collective morality is going to lead to a very coherent argument. This is what I tried to make clear in my first response to you. But have at it.

What those arguments tend to boil down to is that when many people believe a thing, it is moral. When a person believes a thing it is personal opinion.

I think that holds no water.

They're either all personal opinions (moral relativism), or they're all subject to objective moral 'laws' that human can try to discover (in which case there's no distinction).

The first describes any value/opinion/preference broadly encompassed by what is generally agreed to be the human activity, morality.

The second (the usage you're using I think), is "moral" as shorthand for morally good/permitted. — ChrisH

If morality is "opinions that one believes ought to be adopted by everyone", then having such opinions is moral in and of itself, no?

If morality is relative, then "morally good/permitted" is a tautology. Any moral opinions one holds (i.e. opinions that one believes ought to be adopted by everyone) are morally permitted.

It simply doesn't make sense to ask if their values are moral in the second sense without specifics. — ChrisH

Indeed, but if one holds a moral relativist view, the specifics cannot matter.

The reason all of this might sound confusing, is because moral relativism makes the term 'morality' become meaningless (and therefore it makes little sense, in my view). That's the point I'm trying to get across.

Isn't that what happens now? — ChrisH

Often times yes. An unfortunate state of affairs to be sure!

Only if you believe that what ever is imposed is "right". I don't. — ChrisH

But then it makes no sense to believe morality, personal or collective, are aesthetic preferences.

For me, the crucial distinction is that moral values are those values we wish to see adopted by others. — ChrisH

That's fine, I suppose.

However, if this indeed is the crucial distinction then it doesn't get us very far. There are many groups who have views on which values ought to be adopted by others.

Many such groups are terribly destructive.

Is what they are doing moral?

Based on what you've provided, I think you'll have to answer in the positive.


Personally, I'm not a moral relativist. I think morality loses all its meaning when it is viewed through moral relativism and you simply end up with morality being whatever the strongest group manages to impose on the rest of the people - "might makes right."

What I was attempting to say was that a personal morality that doesn't seek to influence others is not, in my view, really a morality - it's aesthetic preference. My understanding is that it's the intention to influence others which distinguishes moral values and aesthetic preferences — ChrisH

Assuming a moral relativist view, any and all notions of morality are nothing but personal fancy (aesthetic preference), and the only question is who gets to impose their personal fancies on other people; "might makes right."

Assuming a non-relativist view, morality is, regardless of what people believe (e.g. Plato's 'the Good'). It's neither personal nor collective. It's up to us to discover, which is what a lot of philosophy, religion and spiritual practice have dedicated themselves to.

Ask yourself why it is so important to prove me wrong? Because your criticisms are getting desperate and feeble. — unenlightened

No need for posturing. You're posting your views for others to engage with, and you can stop engaging with mine any time you like.

DNA analysis is a rather recent option. Society is not therefore built around it. — unenlightened

In what sort of timeframe can we expect men to wisen up to the fact that the answer to their thousands-year-old struggle has finally arrived?

And this is what we find around the world, that polyandry is very very rare. — unenlightened

It's in fact not rare at all among history's female rulers.

It turns out that people who have power will use it to collect the objects of their desire.

... and this is the beginning of the induction of rape culture, ... — unenlightened

The idea of 'rape culture' is nonsensical for reasons I have already explained. The sentences and social repercussions are harsh. Even being suspected and/or acquitted of rape can ruin one's life or encourage people to take the law into their own hands.

It's one of the few crimes for which "innocent until proven guilty" does not seem to apply. It all implies the exact opposite of what you're arguing.

Familial relations are not based on sex at all, in contrast to the patriarchal nuclear family which is founded and maintained entirely by the sexual relationship of mother and father. — unenlightened

I think the nuclear family is maintained by a shared responsibility for the well-being of the offspring.

It's difficult to imagine how one arrives at this pitch-black image of modern male-female relationships you espouse, but it does start to paint a picture.

The main point of going through all this is to emphasise that matriarchy is not at all a mirror image of patriarchy. We can argue about whether it might be better or worse in all sorts of ways from different points of view, but the main difficulty for people is to understand the necessities of the patriarchy that prevails at present, and take seriously the possibility of other ways of organising society. — unenlightened

Matriarchy, like patriarchy, is about heirarchy. Heirarchy is about domination, and domination is about power, and therefore subject to the dynamics of power (which I will argue are the actual drivers behind human society).

We can imagine all sorts of ways to organize society, but societies tend to organize in ways that are dictated by necessity. When societies forego necessity for idealism that's called decadence (which historically preceded collapse).

Physical security has been the necessity that has dictated the structure of society for the past millennia.

During the era of industrialisation and mass warfare, physical security started to encompass the entirety of society, which also started to include women on a large scale. This is the mechanism through which we have arrived at today's situation of equality.

A matriarchy will only happen when the balance flips the other way, and women become more important to physical security than men.

The fundamental difference is that those who follow a personal moral code do not seek to impose it on others. It's exactly that impulse to impose that makes conventional morality little more than an expression of the base will to power.

Morality devoid of the impulse to impose is simply what a personal moral code is.

Note that not imposing one's views upon others does not mean one cannot discuss views, or judge others.

In normal relationships it would currently be a very damaging, insulting expression of distrust, because of the social expectation of sexual exclusivity that patriarchy depends on. — unenlightened

Ah, but then you have put the cart before the horse, haven't you?

Your claim was that the fundamental driver was uncertainty of fatherhood. But apparently social bonds of mutual trust and fidelity are more important. So important in fact that to put said uncertainty above trust would be essentially unthinkable in a healthy relationship.

To loop that back to patriarchy is, as I said, putting the cart before the horse.

Do social values of modern consumerist societies not seem broadly more masculine to you? — Baden

No, they don't.

They seem neither masculine nor feminine to me. Confused and ungrounded are some of the milder terms I would use to describe modern society.

Refuse to call it a patriarchy if you like but then give your theory as to why this has been and continues to be the case. — Baden

Men used to be in charge because physical security was much more of an uncertain factor historically, and warfare a much more physical activity.

So ultimately the structure of society (especially large societies) is a result of power dynamics (security dilemma, prisoner's dilemma, etc.), much in the same way political realism views geopolitics.

Ironically, in the past there used to be some counterbalance through moral systems, usually in the form of religion (but also, for example, chivalric codes). In the modern day of moral relativism and moral confusion, all that's left are the dynamics of power, which is why nothing has truly changed.

Now to your ridiculous argument that parents do not test their children's DNA, as if modern men do not care about their fatherhood! On the contrary, it is the result of the patriarchal society that we live in, whereby society is so structured as to control women's sexual behaviour sufficiently well that men are fairly confident, not always justifiably, of their fatherhood. — unenlightened

If your argument is that the uncertainty of fatherhood is the fundamental driver of human society for the past 2,500 years, then access to DNA testing should have to be revolutionary. But it turns out it's really not.

This isn't ridiculous - it's a strong indicator of whether your argument holds any merit.

Yes, yes. And you seem to believe that this is a fundamental driver of human behavior.

How many normal couples you know have a DNA test done to confirm the father? Very few, I imagine. I know none. So perhaps it's not as fundamental as you believe.

Also, why is it an 'idiotic question' to ask whether you believe we currently live in a patriarchy? I think that is a pretty key question since it determines whether we're limited to judging your theory in a historical context or in a contemporary one, and I think there's very little substance when judging it by a contemporary one.

You seem to believe we currently live in a patriarchy, correct?

Are you talking about the modern age? Because it's rather hard to see 'economic dynastic implications' being the driver of the behavior of modern people. Equal inheritance is the norm as far as I know.

In a matriarchy there is no sexual politics, in the sense that it does not ever matter who fucks who. — unenlightened

Don't you think that's a bit naive? Women can be just as possessive of their partners as men.

You said it was "as simple" as a show of force. The show of force was provided, and the Americans pushed ahead with their plans anyway. Your premise is nonsense.

A simple show of force by Russia would have put Ukrainian aspirations to NATO into limbo. — ssu

Russia provided that show of force the same year NATO proclaimed its intention to incorporate Ukraine and Georgia. So I guess it's not that 'simple'.

And if Russia succeeded in absorbing/subjugating Ukraine, it would then have four more NATO countries at its borders! — SophistiCat

There's no evidence that the Russians intended to absorb or subjugate Ukraine.

Since 2008 the Russians have argued for a neutral Ukraine, and even as recently as March/April 2022, during the peace talks which the United States shut down, a neutral Ukraine was still on the table.

In my opinion it clearly shows the West's culpability in this conflict.

An interesting look into the lead-up to the Ukraine conflict through analysis of WikiLeaks documents:



Main talking points:
- Were Western politicians aware of the risk of conflict in Ukraine?
- Was Ukraine's ascension into NATO really planned?
- Russian and German viewpoints.

None of this suggests any essential link between biological sex and violence because masculinity is a way of characterizing traits and behaviours that can apply to either sex, though they are ideologically associated with men. — Baden

The one-sided focus on men in these kinds of debates gives a very different impression.

Masculinity and femininity nowadays are seen as traits present in both men and women, but when discussing the so-called 'darker side' of masculinity the discussion is always about men. Not about masculinity, and (obviously(?)) not about women.

Even still, it's unhealthy to associate these essential traits with inherently negative things. The message it sends to boys and young men is that there's something wrong with them. Sadly, I think that's a message many of them have already taken to heart.

What this reminds me of is how certain religious groups like to label the woman as inherently flawed and sinful. Forgive me for being skeptical when such a group claims to be taking an open-minded, balanced approach to things.

There's a sense then in which men are controlled and formed in ways detrimental to their personhood by the social roles that are expected of them. — Baden

I'm well aware. That discussion must be had, but the tone matters, and it's the tone I saw in this thread and others that reeked.

Shaming men for being men, whether explicitly or implicitly, is certainly not the way forward.

Western society in general seems to lack positive male role models and has a conflicted view of masculinity at best, so really it needs to be taking a long look in the mirror instead of complaining about the faults of its offspring.

Really hard to see where you are coming from.

Rape is punished by heavy jail sentences. No sane person would defend an act of rape. Convicted or even suspected rapists may wear that mark for the rest of their lives, even after their jail sentence is done. When the justice system fails, it's not uncommon for people or communities to take matters into their own hands.

I'm not sure what more you would expect from a society.

At the end of the line, a justice system is also limited by the degree to which it protects the accused. Putting people behind bars for a long time requires conclusive evidence, and rape tends to be difficult to prove.

The assumption here is that punishing rapists is easy. The truth is, punishing any crime in modern society is exceedingly difficult, which is why a lot of crime goes unpunished across the board. Western societies have chosen to err on the side of the accused - innocent until proven guilty. That has upsides and downsides.

Attributing these things to some sort of unspoken deal by men to oppress women frankly sounds insane to me.


As with many criticisms of 'patriarchy' which I've seen espoused here, it assumes these unfortunate circumstances are there for no other reason than men wishing to oppress women.

Yet, what we find is that when things are changed according to the anti-patriarchy crowd's wishes, these circumstances don't change. Which then again is taken as proof of patriarchy.

The reality is, they are just as powerless to change the state of affairs as the people whom they so readily criticize. That's not the effect of patriarchy. That's reality being stubborn.


Normally, I wouldn't think anything wrong of criticism, even if ill-conceived. However, this criticism of 'patriarchy' is particularly insidious, because it is a veiled attack on all men, as are many modern feminist critiques. It is man-hating at its core.

Katrina Doxsee isn’t CSIS. And then everything said before and after doesn’t at all give your impression.

And then there is whar Putin has said about this. It was Putin that referred this to 1917. — ssu

Be sure not to watch the whole thing, because you may just have to face the fact that she's not the only one who puts it forward and they all seem to agree.

This endless cope upon being faced with unwelcome information is getting rather tiresome.

Yeah, maybe shooting down helicopters is just a form of protest. — ssu

CSIS doesn't seem to think his intention was a coup.

26:55 - They seem to actually confirm my idea.

You are protecting your tribe and all it stands for. — universeness

Bullshit.

You're succumbing to peer pressure in a vain attempt at forming an ego. But I'm guessing you view that as something 'manly' too.

Had you felt you were protecting anything, you wouldn't be here confessing your shame.

I would now say, I was involved in, and was influenced by, a violent manifestation of masculinity and patriarchy. — universeness

What is masculine about senseless violence?

I find it quite worrying that people attribute such things to masculinity without batting an eye. In my view, this is nothing other than misandry - man-hating.

Ironically, the view you profess fuels the problem. Apparently senseless violence is considered manly, and therefore naive, young men trying to be manly will be drawn towards it.

Germany ready to put 4,000 soldiers permanently in Lithuania

As Wagner is moved to Belarus, it seems NATO is not taking chances.

Maybe the action was genuine, and Prigozhin hadn't anticipated that his protest against the top brass would be interpreted as an attempt at a coup. He'd have to be pretty naive for that, but it's possible albeit not very likely.

Prigozhin doesn't strike me as the type who would march on the Kremlin armed with nothing but the power of hope and a handful of troops.

The timing for a coup also seems illogical, since the Ukrainian offensive had just stalled after achieving very little.

My sense is that unless we get more information, this episode will be best judged by the effects it has on the battlefield.

If Ukraine suddenly starts winning on the battlefield, there is genuine chaos in the Russian camp.
If things stay pretty much the same, it was probably a fluke blown out of proportion by the media.
If the Russians launch a new offensive, it was probably a psy-op.

Boethius and Tzeentch haven't made much sense to the rest of us since the war began. We're not really expecting that to change. — frank

Unless 'the rest of you' stop hitting the hopium, I don't expect that to change either.

Patriarchy is the term that's used when the liberated women of the West entered the social, economic and political power structures only to realize that they were unable to change it in the ways some had envisioned.

This of course demanded an explanation, and in a somewhat typical fashion men became the scapegoat for this unfortunate state of affairs and the use of the term suggests projected misandry.

What's actually happening is that these spheres are fundamentally dictated by the dynamics of power, power structures, heirarchy and domination. Apparently, those things are equal to 'masculinity' (hence the term 'patriarchy'), and the fact that women's entry into the various fields was unable to change things for the better can squarely be attributed, of course, to men.

This view is of course nonsensical, since women wield power and create heirarchies (and thus dominate) too.

These dynamics always have, and always will, dictate the relations between people on a societal level. There's nothing about power, heirarchy and domination that's inherently masculine, and to attribute all of society's unfortunate but innate characteristics to men is, as I noted earlier, projected misandry.

Neither sex is responsible for it, and neither sex is able to change it. No one participates in it voluntarily. One might consider this view 'social realism', thinking along the lines of political realism. Simply a result of the structures and dynamics of power and mankind's flawed nature.

This whole episode was probably a little too odd to be taken at face value.

Cool down dudes, that's obviously a feint. Wagner troops are not enough to conquer the entire Russia, even less Moscow, or 17/4567th of Kamtchatka. These are hard numbers, sorry. Even Mearshaimer said it somehow somewhere somewhen. The rest is trite Crypto-Pluto-Nazi-Sionist-LGBT-Neocapitalist-Imperialist-Amerikan propaganda. The US has lost the war between Ukraine and Russia. But feel free to believe your lies. — neomac

Rebel Russian mercenaries halt advance on Moscow, Kremlin says fighters to face no charges

Oh, the exquisite irony.

Historically, it's the norm that people don't realize the ship is sinking.

The Lord of the Rings is quite relevant to mankind's predicament.

Virtually everything mankind does revolves around power, or illusions thereof. Technological advances, economic planning, social engineering, politics, and obviously things like war and conflict.

A lot of this is directly motivated by a drive for power, or indirectly through a prisoner's dilemma: "If I don't do it, the other guy will and surpass me in power (and subsequently oppress me)."


Thus, everyone is forced into this wheel of abuse and exploitation.


As long as there is even a single person who desires power or security at the expense of others, that wheel will keep turning.

There are many who believe they can stop the wheel from turning through the same methods by which it turns. This is perhaps one of the most dangerous illusions of all. "Peace" through control - the central fallacy of states. Fighting fire with fire only finds 'success' after the entire house has burned down.


For the individual, the only way out of this wheel is by relinqusihing their desire for power (ego), and their desire for security (life).

Only if one acknowledges there are things more important than one's ego and one's life, will they be able to pursue a genuine goal of peace and coexistence. Without that, it's simply impossible. Without that, one will fall prey to delusions born of one's contradictory beliefs; the crusaders, "do-gooders", ideologues, etc.

This is a typical dynamic. Because, as a lingering effect of religion, man is still aware that their desire for power is inherently undesirable and the cause of most, if not all, of man's trouble. So it hides in the subconscious under a facade of good intentions, where it's arguably even more malicious because of its hidden nature.


It's no coincidence that Frodo is a Hobbit. Hobbits are content with a simple life (suggesting a lack of ego), and have no aptitude nor desire for violence (suggesting a lack of convulsively clinging to life).

Nice post. :ok:

Who can discern the cause of our collective psychopathy? Perhaps it is the overabundance of social media, prescription drugs, something lurking in our sustenance, or the fluoride within our water... All I know is that we have become incapable of engaging in rational discourse. Decency is jettisoned when the prevailing narrative is challenged. It is met with outrage, hysteria, shunning, witch hunts, ad hominem attacks, or the hollow invocation of emotional platitudes—anything but a reasoned exchange.

This pattern of behavior first emerged in response to Trump's electoral triumph. — yebiga

My impression is that Trump's election, who ran directly against the neocon establishment, caused said political elite to press the panic button, and ramp up the propaganda.

Propaganda slowly drives people mad. It's literally the manipulating behavior of a psychopath, but applied on a societal scale. Lying, gaslighting, different kinds of blackmail, etc.

Regular people just aren't equipped to deal with that kind of malevolence.

They will subconciously realize something is wrong - they get nervous, anxious, frustrated, etc. - but the propaganda machine accounts for that as well by readily presenting scapegoats upon which those emotions can be projected.

And this is only one arm of the propaganda machine.


The other arm involves whipping people up into a self-righteous frenzy in pursuit of goals set by the political elite. These are essentially appeals to people's sense of moral superiority, seeking to bind their ideology directly to people's ego. Once the ideology is bound to their sense of self, they cannot leave the ideology without cutting off a part of themselves. This is why every discussion with such people turns hostile; they are in psychological survival mode. Losing means having to cut off a part of their ego.

Note the eerie similarity to the methods of nazism and communism; the assigning of scapegoats and the appeal to moral superiority.

You may get to vote for an actual person this time, Americans. Don't disappoint please.

I'm not sure the world can handle another four years of muppets and puppets on the throne.

The irony in all of this is that the "evil capitalist corporations" are actually public, and not private. In a similar vein, they owe much of their power to governments.

And governments essentially are nothing other than giant monopoly corporations either.

I would really recommend watching the following video to have a more historically aware sense of what these terms actually mean and where the current confusion stems from:



It's a long video, but well worth watching.

I really like Laozi's teachings. They never cease to instill virtue and a sense of moral duty in would-be leaders and people in general.

Virtuous people won't support corrupt leaders. And virtuous leaders won't abuse their power. To a society, the virtue of its people is truly more precious than gold.

Sadly, western society is way past that point on both fronts. And once that genie is out of the bottle who will take the power away from the corrupt, powerful elite?

Please elaborate! (Assuming you mean ‘the actual game-plan real politic’ of WC? And not the countless philosophies that have sprouted from within… and often opposed to… western civilization?) — 0 thru 9

What I mean is that concepts of Yin and Yang presuppose some form of sophistication.

It's hard to describe the behavior of apes through a concept like Yin and Yang (at least in the context of this discussion).

One could try, though. Does ignorance belong with Yin or with Yang? I think it belongs with neither, hence my previous remark.

Power here = ‘hard power’? Lawyers, guns and money? (so to speak. As opposed to the concept of ‘soft power’ which relies on influence. Cooperation and convincing, rather than coercion.) — 0 thru 9

Yes, but also science, politics, (what goes for) western philosophy has no other purpose than to further the pursuit of power. So both soft power and hard power.

Power for the sake of power, with no moral groundedness whatsoever. That's the axiom of what one might generalize as "western civilization". It's the language of Washington, of Brussels, of Davos and WEF, BlackRock, the central banks, etc.

The West has turned into a giant Nietzschean jungle.

The current western system is not philosophically coherent enough to be understood through Yin and Yang.

It has become a virtueless cult of power. Everything is understood through power. Everything revolves around power. Everything may be sacrificed for the sake of power.

Critically imbalanced, yes. In the sense that chimpanzee society works on the same principles.

If I say "Oppression is wrong", when I see oppression, I am horrified and enraged, I want to destroy it, correct it, and I'm filled with sympathy and deep sadness towards the victims. Morality requires this strong emotional reaction. — Judaka

I cannot agree with this.

Emotions may just as well mislead us in regards to morality. How many terrible things aren't done out of fear or anger? And why couldn't the ethical thing to do be something that we don't feel particularly strongly about?

'Oppression' in my view is way too vague a word to be useful in a moral context. It can describe a whole range of behaviors that may or may not be present when someone is accused of oppressing another.

Accurate language is important.

In the case of killing in self-defence, if it was necessary then most would say it's justified, I assume you feel the same. That would mean no triggering of any of the emotions associated with morality. You wouldn't hesitate to do it, you wouldn't stop someone else from doing it, and you wouldn't dislike that it was done, or any person who did it, so it was allowable and acceptable to you, right? Saying afterwards that it was still "immoral" because killing is wrong, well, that's just a bit hollow to me. It's your feelings that show what you find moral and immoral, not your words, right? — Judaka

Being forced to kill someone in self-defense is, I would assume, a deeply traumatizing experience. Tragically, it may leave people guilt-ridden for the rest of their lives, despite merely defending their lives.

In my view, Justice implies some kind of positive result. Therefore an act of killing cannot be Just. (despite possibly being legal/lawful).

Likewise, an act of killing, self-defense or no, cannot be moral.

In the particular case of self-defense, while the act of killing is still immoral, it would be hard to argue the person has committed an immoral act if they are involuntarily forced into a position where they must protect their lives. In that case, an intention to kill is not present, and without an intention there cannot be a moral act or immoral act.

The same could technically apply to any act which would otherwise be deemed immoral. If the act is 'accidental' the person has erred in some way, but it cannot be said they acted immorally, because an intention is not present. This is the realm of tragedy, ignorance, inevitability, etc.

An act of unintentional killing out of self-defense would fall in the tragic category.

That isn't so much a justification, but rather a means of rationally understanding the nature of the act.