Is anyone really surprised that the poster who questions the seriousness of rape also wonders whether or not Hitler was guilty?
+1 BP
Oh crap, I honestly did not think it was the same guy. I just brought up the rape thing by chance. This is starting to make sense now.
Now I'm just going to follow BP and throw in a Monty Python link. Not for any real related reaon though - just because Monty Python is funny:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnTmBjk-M0c
"As in a kaleidoscope, the constellation of forces operating in the system as a whole is ever changing." - Ludwig Lachmann
"When A Man Dies A World Goes Out of Existence" - GLS Shackle
Oh wait forgot,
Hitler scene:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQkcP0olmQY
Stop being so sensitive. If you want to discuss ethics, you need to get to the extreme cases. Maybe instead of personal attacks you could actually read my previous post and reply to it. I promise I will try to be more politically correct next time.
I realize there's a fine line between "consistent ethics" and "socially misanthropic," but there have actually been two responses that you seem to have ignored. One citing the institutional standpoint of Hitler being an agent of the state, the other addressing the collective standpoint of Hitler acting in conjunction with a culture that empowered him to comand others to murder.
With the line of reason you're going along no head of state is really guilty of anything, and if your ethics haven't taken you to at least the point at which the head of state is a murderer by nothing more than proximity, you shouldn't be on any board that claims to be anarchist.
Stop being so sensitive. If you want to discuss ethics, you need to get to the extreme cases.
Extremes are fine. Why not use Stalin or Mao instead of Hitler? Both were mass-murderers but ethical analysis of their behavior does not carry the very serious risk of accusations of anti-semitism. I don't know where you live, but I live in the United States where the President is politically required to rhetorically kiss the feet of the state of Israel, a politicaly reality fueled by the religious fervor of millions of fundamentalist Dispensationalist Christians, the ADL, AIPAC and other powerful political forces. An accusation of anti-semitism is tantamount to an accusation of racism. In the US, it is racism.
Maybe instead of personal attacks
I made no personal attacks. I am genuinely puzzled by your posting patterns. I've said this before, I'll say it again: If your questions are not ill-motivated, why don't you provide a little more background... like the passage of Rothbard you were reading or the news program you were watching when the question struck you. As it stands, it looks to me like you log on to mises.org, click the "New Thread" button and say to yourself, "how can I stir up the hornet's nest today?"
Clayton -
I am a Jew living in Israel. I am 28, and a software engineer. I honestly don't care whether it is HItler or Mao, I picked Hitler because another libertarian used this argument in another forum.
I usually watch "law and order", and then think to myself what would be the libertarian just solution, and then I ask you guys.
"I realize there's a fine line between "consistent ethics" and "socially misanthropic," but there have actually been two responses that you seem to have ignored. One citing the institutional standpoint of Hitler being an agent of the state, the other addressing the collective standpoint of Hitler acting in conjunction with a culture that empowered him to comand others to murder.
With the line of reason you're going along no head of state is really guilty of anything, and if your ethics haven't taken you to at least the point at which the head of state is a murderer by nothing more than proximity, you shouldn't be on any board that claims to be anarchist."
Thanks for the general background info, that helps.
Your missing every point here. No one is being sensitive. It's the sort of the other way around - we (or at least me) are noticing you are trying to be "hard and logical" - and probably wish to think people will be sensitive if they disagree (if I may be allowed to psychologize a bit); but you are neither being "hard or logical". You're simply being reactionary and putting up probably something like a psychological front, not even asking questions that can be thought about or formed logically in the way you want.
By my book he is (rather was) innocent as a baby. If people behave as animals, it may be convenient to shift the blame to a single depraved guy or even a cabal of a-holes, but the truth is that Adolf killed no one, he just made people to.
Now, that being said I believe that in a panarchic society this fact would make very little difference. Guilty or not, no one would stand up for Adolf (I’m thinking of insurers), no one would vouch for him and so he would be practically confined to house arrest for the rest of his life.
If he had single-handedly killed 60 million people the only difference would have been that any of the relatives of his victims could have killed him anytime. Now no one can rightfully kill him, but whoever agrees to have him on his property does so at his own risk. My thoughts anyway.
Okay, for a mintue I thought I changed my mind regarding this, but apparently I didn't.
The main reason I thought criminilizing people like Hitler is wrong was that in this way it becomes too easy to prosecute a person just because that person was charismatic enough to convince someone else to perform a crime. That opens the door for all kind of political presecution (like political presecution of the pastor Terry Jones for instance).
But then I realized that people can "cheat" others to death. For example I can say to my girlfriend that there is fire in the appartment and that she must jump from the third floor. This is definitely a crime. My conclusion from this was that you can't really have a justice system based on physical acts alone, sometimes words can kill too. But if that's the case, then convincing someone to kill someone else should also be a crime.
But then I realized the following. When you "cheat" a person to get him killed, you break an implicit contract with him. When you convince someone else to do a killing no contract was breached. So it actually puts these two acts in different "buckets". My finaly conclusion from this line of reasoning is that Hitler WAS innocent, but people cheating others to death are not (because of breach of contract)
But then I realized the following. When you "cheat" a person to get him killed, you break an implicit contract with him.
Why do you break a contract with him? Because you lied to him? Or?
The main reason I thought criminilizing people like Hitler is wrong was that in this way it becomes too easy to prosecute a person just because that person was charismatic enough to convince someone else to perform a crime. That opens the door for all kind of political presecution (like political presecution of the pastor Terry Jones for instance). ... When you convince someone else to do a killing no contract was breached. So it actually puts these two acts in different "buckets".
There is one difference I can think of at this time. In Hitler's case there is also the element of compulsion. That is, if you do not do what Hitler (Nazi Germany, the state) wants you to do, you can fully expect he will try and suceed in convincing somebody else to do harm against you.
Eugene:Okay, for a mintue I thought I changed my mind regarding this, but apparently I didn't. The main reason I thought criminilizing people like Hitler is wrong was that in this way it becomes too easy to prosecute a person just because that person was charismatic enough to convince someone else to perform a crime. That opens the door for all kind of political presecution (like political presecution of the pastor Terry Jones for instance). But then I realized that people can "cheat" others to death. For example I can say to my girlfriend that there is fire in the appartment and that she must jump from the third floor. This is definitely a crime. My conclusion from this was that you can't really have a justice system based on physical acts alone, sometimes words can kill too. But if that's the case, then convincing someone to kill someone else should also be a crime. But then I realized the following. When you "cheat" a person to get him killed, you break an implicit contract with him. When you convince someone else to do a killing no contract was breached. So it actually puts these two acts in different "buckets". My finaly conclusion from this line of reasoning is that Hitler WAS innocent, but people cheating others to death are not (because of breach of contract) A person who pays someone to murder a third party is an accessory at the very least, if he's not a joint principal (also see this). I think that, under the common-purpose doctrine, Hitler (along with Stalin, Mao, and others) was indeed guilty of murder, more than 6 million times over. The keyboard is mightier than the gun. Non parit potestas ipsius auctoritatem. Voluntaryism Forum | Post Points: 5
A person who pays someone to murder a third party is an accessory at the very least, if he's not a joint principal (also see this). I think that, under the common-purpose doctrine, Hitler (along with Stalin, Mao, and others) was indeed guilty of murder, more than 6 million times over.
The keyboard is mightier than the gun.
Non parit potestas ipsius auctoritatem.
Voluntaryism Forum
Eugene: Okay, for a mintue I thought I changed my mind regarding this, but apparently I didn't. The main reason I thought criminilizing people like Hitler is wrong was that in this way it becomes too easy to prosecute a person just because that person was charismatic enough to convince someone else to perform a crime. That opens the door for all kind of political presecution (like political presecution of the pastor Terry Jones for instance). But then I realized that people can "cheat" others to death. For example I can say to my girlfriend that there is fire in the appartment and that she must jump from the third floor. This is definitely a crime. My conclusion from this was that you can't really have a justice system based on physical acts alone, sometimes words can kill too. But if that's the case, then convincing someone to kill someone else should also be a crime. But then I realized the following. When you "cheat" a person to get him killed, you break an implicit contract with him. When you convince someone else to do a killing no contract was breached. So it actually puts these two acts in different "buckets". My finaly conclusion from this line of reasoning is that Hitler WAS innocent, but people cheating others to death are not (because of breach of contract) I agree. You are bringing two very different things to the table there. I never said that only physical acts should count as crime. But an important maxim in a legal system, as I see it, is that all people have free will. This tenet is unbreakable. In the example you bring, that I cheat someone into throwing himself out of the window, this is clearly a crime, because that person is acting reasonably, given what I say is true. The guys that burned jews in the polish countryside, on the other hand, are not being cheated into killing folks in any way. How is what they were doing reasonable, even assuming that Hitler’s ideas where true? Jews own banks? So what! So, even if we take Hitler’s ideas as true (and we should also discuss whether it was reasonable or not for them to believe him, which it clearly wasn’t) they are still committing a crime. IF Hitler had somehow convinced them that those particular Jews had killed the soldiers girlfriends, and if it would have somehow been reasonable for them to believe him (I don’t see how, but let this pass), than OK, he would be liable. If he had personally held a gun to their head, than he would have been liable. But as it is, punishing Hitler would be to say that none of those soldiers was a human being, with free will. And that is unacceptable. So, I must insist, Hitler was innocent as long as he commanded human beings with free will, and not robots. By the very same token, (and this is a point of contention that has been debated thoroughly in another thread some time ago) if I pay a hitman to kill someone, I cannot be held liable in any way. Again, sometime it is profitable to pin all the blame for some monstrosity on one guy, but it just doesn’t fly. We cannot treat people as humans when it suits us, and as robots when it doesn’t. The Regression theorem is a memetic equivalent of the Theory of Evolution. To say that the former precludes the free emergence of fiat currencies makes no more sense that to hold that the latter precludes the natural emergence of multicellular organisms. | Post Points: 20
You are bringing two very different things to the table there. I never said that only physical acts should count as crime. But an important maxim in a legal system, as I see it, is that all people have free will. This tenet is unbreakable.
In the example you bring, that I cheat someone into throwing himself out of the window, this is clearly a crime, because that person is acting reasonably, given what I say is true.
The guys that burned jews in the polish countryside, on the other hand, are not being cheated into killing folks in any way. How is what they were doing reasonable, even assuming that Hitler’s ideas where true? Jews own banks? So what! So, even if we take Hitler’s ideas as true (and we should also discuss whether it was reasonable or not for them to believe him, which it clearly wasn’t) they are still committing a crime.
IF Hitler had somehow convinced them that those particular Jews had killed the soldiers girlfriends, and if it would have somehow been reasonable for them to believe him (I don’t see how, but let this pass), than OK, he would be liable. If he had personally held a gun to their head, than he would have been liable. But as it is, punishing Hitler would be to say that none of those soldiers was a human being, with free will. And that is unacceptable.
So, I must insist, Hitler was innocent as long as he commanded human beings with free will, and not robots. By the very same token, (and this is a point of contention that has been debated thoroughly in another thread some time ago) if I pay a hitman to kill someone, I cannot be held liable in any way.
Again, sometime it is profitable to pin all the blame for some monstrosity on one guy, but it just doesn’t fly. We cannot treat people as humans when it suits us, and as robots when it doesn’t.
Wait a second. My position is simple. If you commit a crime, regardless of the reasons you committed it, you are liable. So it doesn't matter if Hitler threatened you to commit a crime, or whether this was your only chance to stay alive. You are still liable, because you are 100% responsible for what you did. I don't think this can even be debatable. Obviously if you hurt someone you are liable. You can, and in many cases, will be forgiven, but the victim still has a legal case against you.
So this is not what separates "cheating" my girlfriend and Hitler cases. What separates them is that in the cheating case, you breached an implicit contract with your girlfriend that none of you will cheat each other to get hurt.
In the Hitler case, as Merlin also noted, there was no implicit contract breach between Hitler and his soldiers, so Hitler is not liable.
However my reason for regarding only physical acts as aggression is more practical than theoretical. I just don't like the idea that everyone can be liable for murder (again see Terry Jones example) just because they mispoke, or used their charisma in an immoral way. Murder or any physical crime is very serious. There is a huge difference between commiting a crime yourself and convincing someone else to commit a crime. The former is despicable and violent, the latter is just very immoral.
Besides, people are different and have different values. I don't think that physicaly harming other people even if they live far away in a different community just because you suspect them of inciting someone to commit some unlawful acts, would be conducting to peace. The assumption that others share the same values as you regarding liability is somewhat arrogant, and can lead to conflicts instead of solving them.
I myself try to steer as far away for using “contract” and “implicit” in legal issues as I can.
So, my reasoning stays as I wrote: you are not liable if you a) were forced to do it (and there was nothing reasonable you could have done against it, of course) and b) you where cheated into acting reasonably given the information you had, and of course you had reason to believe that information.
I cannot think that if a platoon of soldiers holds guns to my head and threaten to shoot me if I do not kill some other guy, I can be held liable. Anyway, the market will show which of these interpretation makes more money in the long run.
But anyway, the question has been settled. Hitler was a far cry from someone who merely lied people into carrying out criminal acts. He also threatened and, as Autolykos noted, bribed people into commiting them. So the question of does "convincing" someone to harm another means you too are guilty is a moot point for the question posed in the topic title.
Even if someone threatens you, you shouldn't kill anyone. Why is your life worth more than the life you take? It doesn't make sense. I believe people have a 100% right to live unscathed in the world as long as they don't hurt others. So if someone does harm to a person he should be liable for that.
Everyone should answer for their own actions. The person who threatened should answer for threatening, the person who assaulted should answer for assaulting. However I believe most people would forgive the person who harmed them because he was threatened. Those who won't forgive have different set of values, and it is their right. I believe no one has the RIGHT to hurt another person no matter the circumstances.