09-07-2020, 02:25 PM
(09-07-2020, 01:46 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I always get a good laugh when your side of this debate uses that example. It's patently absurd. Oh wait, are you saying that the protests are actually the first stages of a civil war and thus all the violence is justified?
Fredtoast Wrote: No. What I am doing is using an extreme example to prove the fault of your logic. It is a pretty common tactic. These riots do not have to be the first stages of s Civil War to show that your logic is faulty.
Fred's examples are logical, SSF's are faulty. Got it.
Yes, Fred's examples are logical. And you couldn't refute his argument with a thousand emoticons.
One tests definitions and principles by applying them to diverse examples to see if they hold.
If you claim the WWII example is "patently absurd" as a test of the claim violence is never justified, then you have simply dismissed any requirement for logical consistency. In effect you are saying violence is never justified for select actors in situations you specify, but you are hiding the very selective character of your application with the claim of universal application.
If violence is never acceptable in causing political change then the American Revolution was illegal. If you think that violence was acceptable in that Revolution, then you cannot say, as a universal principle, that violence is "never" an acceptable solution to political conflict. This was also the thrust of Bels' objections based on the example of union protests.
Recognizing that violence is in fact justified at times is not to claim that it always is. This is not a black/white, either/or issue. But the assertion that "violence is never justified" is simply impractical, a principle that has not been thought through and could never lead to a coherent legal or political policy. It's only practical value it could ever have is to hide selective ("biased' in your terminology) definition/application behind assertions of ("unbiased") universality.