Do you believe in punishment?

[Akka]

I don't really know how you got this from post.

Wut ? It's the entire point of your post, to describe how conservative are supposed to think and assign moral value.

I don't actually disagree. It seems, for want of a better word, natural that human s But that doesn't mean it true. It's a kind of magical thinking, a conviction that because the world should be ordered in a certain way, it must be; that because certain actions should produce certain outcomes, they must produce certain outcomes.

That's one part. Humans tend to overestimate personal responsibility and underestimate outside factors. But that's just one of several aspects.
Another part is simply perception bias - until you've actually lived through something, you just infer how it happens or work through how you imagine it does.
Yet another part is just psychological defense mechanism : if something is bad, you try to find reasons why it shouldn't happen to you - inversely, if something is good, you try to find reasons why it should happen to you.

My message you quoted initially was in fact mainly about this third point.

 

[Mouthwash]

I'm having a hard time parsing this. Are you just contesting that the perceived relationship between slatternliness and rape is empirically true?

Are you claiming that it isn't true? Even though licentiousness is expected behavior in this Brave New World we've created, there's still a huge incentive for rapists to go after what they perceive to be loose women (the notion makes even regular men pretty invasive). In Islamic societies, the hijab functions as a signifier of social capital (that you have a husband, that your family will protect you, etc). If you don't have one, you're either a prostitute or a Westerner and are going to get raped sooner or later.

Very few Christians sincerely believe this to be the case, not in the deep-down bit of themselves. Not historically, and certainly not today. Whether that's attributable to humanism or pragmatism, Christians have overwhelmingly prioritised putting the world in order to lamenting its disorderliness. The suffering-of-innocents stuff is a comfort and a salve, but it is rarely a worldview; something to croon sadly around the coffin, not something that informs how a society is organised. Outside of certain monastic communities, Christianity is as worldly in practice as Judaism or Islam, albeit somewhat less well-equipped in practically-oriented scripture.

I think you overestimate the degree to which misfortune falls upon the undeserving, at least at the hands of their own societies. The reason conservatives tend towards a more 'just-world' view is because virtue really works. You really are better off without pleasure-chasing.

 

[Lexicus]

Are you claiming that it isn't true? Even though licentiousness is expected behavior in this Brave New World we've created, there's still a huge incentive for rapists to go after what they perceive to be loose women (the notion makes even regular men pretty invasive). In Islamic societies, the hijab functions as a signifier of social capital (that you have a husband, that your family will protect you, etc). If you don't have one, you're either a prostitute or a Westerner and are going to get raped sooner or later.

Oh my

I think you overestimate the degree to which misfortune falls upon the undeserving, at least at the hands of their own societies. The reason conservatives tend towards a more 'just-world' view is because virtue really works. You really are better off without pleasure-chasing.

Well thank you for demonstrating that Tfish is basically correct...

 

[Mouthwash]

Oh my

On the other hand, I must be a bigot because I've condemned that system...

 

[Patine]

The reason conservatives tend towards a more 'just-world' view is because virtue really works. You really are better off without pleasure-chasing.

Of course, the KEY words there are JUST and VIRTUE - which are, in truth, all hypocritical and self-righteous false pretense aside - just as weak points of modern Conservatives as modern Liberals, Progressives, or Socialists. EVERY SINGLE DAY my sense of justice is violated by watching the news, and Conservatives are responsible for causing it as much as any other ideological group.

 

[Narz]

Are you claiming that it isn't true? Even though licentiousness is expected behavior in this Brave New World we've created, there's still a huge incentive for rapists to go after what they perceive to be loose women (the notion makes even regular men pretty invasive). In Islamic societies, the hijab functions as a signifier of social capital (that you have a husband, that your family will protect you, etc). If you don't have one, you're either a prostitute or a Westerner and are going to get raped sooner or later.

Your warped worldview doesn't even make sense.

First you're saying "licentiousness" leads to rape. Then you're saying that in fundy Muslim countries everyone without a hijab is guaranteed to get raped. Giving you the benefit of the doubt that that is true wouldn't that mean that super-sexually-repressed (anti-licentious to you) societies are actual worse (given 100% rate of eventual rape there (unless you hide under a sheet) and much lower than 100% chance of rape in the slutty ol' USA)?

 

[Mouthwash]

Your warped worldview doesn't even make sense.

First you're saying "licentiousness" leads to rape. Then you're saying that in fundy Muslim countries everyone without a hijab is guaranteed to get raped. Giving you the benefit of the doubt that that is true wouldn't that mean that super-sexually-repressed (anti-licentious to you) societies are actual worse (given 100% rate of eventual rape there (unless you hide under a sheet) and much lower than 100% chance of rape in the slutty ol' USA)?

Not at all. It's just that Muslim countries, even ones with low rates of polygamy, still have a culture built around it and it far outweighs the benefits of modesty. Among Haredim, by contrast, you're perfectly safe.

 

[AmazonQueen]

Not at all. It's just that Muslim countries, even ones with low rates of polygamy, still have a culture built around it and it far outweighs the benefits of modesty. Among Haredim, by contrast, you're perfectly safe.

Unless its your husband abusing you in which case the community just pretends it isn't happening.

 

[Mouthwash]

Unless its your husband abusing you in which case the community just pretends it isn't happening.

Possibly in the case of big-name rabbis, but women have a lot of power in Orthodox communities. It just isn't the explicit contract-based power that liberals want.

EDIT: In what other traditional group would you see things like this?

 

[brennan]

...virtue really works. You really are better off without pleasure-chasing.

Hmm... this is Epicurianism.

 

[AmazonQueen]

Possibly in the case of big-name rabbis, but women have a lot of power in Orthodox communities. It just isn't the explicit contract-based power that liberals want.

EDIT: In what other traditional group would you see things like this?

You did notice shes a Democrat who worked for Clinton.

 

[Patine]

Not at all. It's just that Muslim countries, even ones with low rates of polygamy, still have a culture built around it and it far outweighs the benefits of modesty. Among Haredim, by contrast, you're perfectly safe.

From outsiders perhaps. But given the CRIMES, VIOLATIONS OF TRUST, and OPPRESSION THROUGH BRUTAL SOCIAL METHODS IN INHUMAN LEVELS OF INTOLERANCE that always goes on this insular communities - but you don't consider those crimes, do you. Which is I keep saying you have ABSOLUTELY no moral high ground and promote no real justice, but want to take your twisted, perverse, wicked, and vain power, greed, and lust, to different arenas, while hypocritically condemning those you do such things in other areas. The filth that doe not rise or descend in the pond, it only scatters from each other across the surface.

 

[Narz]

I really don't understand your mindstate Mouthwash.

Everyone is "pleasure chasing". Obsessing about some strict set of rules gives the mind some peace/pleasure, you get pleasure thinking the other heathens on CFC are immoral & you are on the true path. Being judgemental is a dopamine fix just as sure as grinding against some lady's butt in the club (and with no risk, you don't have to leave your home, go out, risk rejection, make a real human connection... you only just have to ideas, state them, state others are wrong, profit).

I get annoyed YouTube is trying to feed me all these stoic videos just because I'm about bettering myself. Epicurianism is way better. It deals with the goal directly. I have no patience for those who try to pretend they are not seeking joy as their highest aim. Discipline is great but it is a means to an end - feeling better, feeling better is always the aim. Denying it and beating around the bush will always lead to nueroticism.

 

[Farm Boy]

Altruism is often fed and motivated by pain, not pleasurable response. It's nice to think chasing the better angels of our nature that does the lifting, and sometimes it probably does, but given the rates of good works that get done by the suffering and depressed, on the balance of things its probably the more empathic of us fleeing the whips of their demons.

Obsession is very nearly an opposite of peace.

 

[Narz]

Fleeing pain, chasing pleasure, it's two sides of the same coin.

 

[Farm Boy]

In the sense that everything is everything, sure. But to specify the objection: egoism is an inadequate universal explanation.

 

[Narz]

Epicurianism is not egotism. In the modern vernacular hedonism means eating, drinking & being merry, damn tomorrow but originally it was about temperance & mindful living to really appreciate the necter of life.

I liked Sam Harris' thoughts on the meaning of life, which was "Create a world that the mind wants to live in", I could add for oneself AND others.

But whether we like it or not we are always striving for well being/happiness/whateveryouwantocallit. I prefer philosophies that don't try to pretend we can ever value anything else above that (no stoic really values waking up at 4am to run up a hill, they value the feeling of it, the idea that they are being healthy & noble). What are values even? Principles that give us direction & on some level, peace. It's all striving for peace no matter how you slice it.

 

[Farm Boy]

Perhaps you have a definition of self interest I would find novel or maybe limited? Seeking personal peace seems like self interest, yes.

 

[Mouthwash]

You did notice shes a Democrat who worked for Clinton.

An administration that was to the right of the current one, yes.

Everyone is "pleasure chasing". Obsessing about some strict set of rules gives the mind some peace/pleasure, you get pleasure thinking the other heathens on CFC are immoral & you are on the true path. Being judgemental is a dopamine fix just as sure as grinding against some lady's butt in the club (and with no risk, you don't have to leave your home, go out, risk rejection, make a real human connection... you only just have to ideas, state them, state others are wrong, profit).

What I'm talking about is hedonism, i.e. pursuit of 'low' pleasures like sex and status.

I get annoyed YouTube is trying to feed me all these stoic videos just because I'm about bettering myself. Epicurianism is way better. It deals with the goal directly. I have no patience for those who try to pretend they are not seeking joy as their highest aim. Discipline is great but it is a means to an end - feeling better, feeling better is always the aim. Denying it and beating around the bush will always lead to nueroticism.

The fact that happiness is an emotion does not mean it is 'merely' an emotion. I pursue happiness because fulfilling my values creates it, not because happiness is the only good (against your example, I want to be happy because I really am healthy and noble rather than because I was deceived by an evil demon into thinking that I was). Modern moral philosophers - especially utilitarians - fundamentally do not grasp this point. It is why people sacrifice their emotional happiness, endure immense pain and give up everything they enjoy in life to serve purposes larger than them.

May I ask if you would support wireheading as a method of achieving your goals? If not, why?

 

[AmazonQueen]

An administration that was to the right of the current one, yes.

Do you mean the current Democratic party? The current Republican administration is generally regarded as far to the right of previous Democratic administrations.

What I'm talking about is hedonism, i.e. pursuit of 'low' pleasures like sex and status.

Pursuit of status is a feature of traditional societies too in case you hadn't noticed.