Roe Vs Wade Overturned

[Dill]

(06-29-2022, 07:07 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I'm sorry, I looked in the first post and I don't see the three choice question that you're referring to.

The question addressed in #1 of my previous post was

 Does being a slave owner automatically make you a horrible person?  

There are three possible standpoints from which to answer that question:

1. From a viewpoint based upon deontological ethics and the liberal concept of universal individual human rights, yes, being a slave owner does automatically make one a horrible person. 

2. To contest that [i.e. horribleness], while retaining the concept of universal human rights, one would have to adopt some form of situational ethics, perhaps combined with a CRT approach which roots racist behavior in institutions rather than random individuals who just choose to behave badly.  

3. Embracing some form of illiberal ethics, one might conclude slave-owning isn't bad, so people practicing it aren't "horrible persons." I don't think there are other options. Which of these would you choose?  

#2 primarily involves situational ethics. The CRT reference is added as a possible help to sorting that out, not as essential to #2.

So I am wondering which option you might choose.

I have, by the way, answered this sort of question before, perhaps several times, the gist of which was, before I answer any such question, I imagine myself in the subject's time, with his/her resources.  I'm a sincere admirer of Washington. Would I think differently about slavery were I raised in his household? Being a materialist, I don't have grounds for supposing I would be "special," gifted with ideals outside history, and respond with outrage, like a 21st century leftist-without-quotation-marks. 

So I don't "blame" Washington the way I would censure, say, Trump. But then I do strive to understand how W's. race and gender views were built into a system of government whose principles are otherwise remarkable.  Recognizing that history is about fixing the present, continuing an Enlightenment legacy, not blaming dead guys who cannot hear me anyway. Blaming is not analysis, but many people cannot tell the difference.