Shark on Shark Rape. How Can We Stand By and Let This Happen?

[Mae]

If you can figure out a way to stop animals from harming others, while still giving them good lives, I am all for it. Simply putting them in a cell obviously wouldn't work, for the animal would not have a good life.

¿Isn't preventing the death and suffering of countless fish justify a single "not too good life"? it certainly seems to me. locking a psychopath may not give him what he would consider a good life (since he would not be free to do what he likes), but we still think it's justified.

It doesn't require very deep thinking to realize we simply do not have a viable solution to animals harming each other. Let's try to figure out a way to do so, but our greater concern should be in us to stop exploiting animals ourselves.

People can hold many concerns at the same time, with varying degrees, and try to achieve them all at the same time. There are charities for almost everything after all.

Imagine I am a slave owner, and you try to tell me I should stop exploiting people. If I respond by saying "hey, there are other people in other countries who engage in slavery, and you can't figure out how to stop them. Therefore, I am going to continue to own slaves". Would anyone take this reasoning seriously? Of course not. If we are concerned with exploiting humans, the first thing to do is to stop exploiting humans ourselves. Next, we should work on stoping human exploitation elsewhere. Even if we can't help others (positive rights), we should at least not harm others (negative right).

We can stop exploiting people in our country while also at the same time try to stop exploiting people in other countries at the same time.

So you think we should lock up every single meat eater to save countless lives then right? TBOM, really try to think about what you are saying. Where are we going to put all these animals? How are we going to do so? Who is going to lock up the animals? The reality is, we don't have any reasonable way of accomplishing this. To reason from this to therefore, we have to let psychopaths torture others, just doesn't make any sense. I feel anymore time talking to you on subjects relating to animals is a waste of my time. I hope you have a nice day.

[TheBigOhMan]

So you think we should lock up every single meat eater to save countless lives then right? TBOM, really try to think about what you are saying. Where are we going to put all these animals? How are we going to do so? Who is going to lock up the animals? The reality is, we don't have any reasonable way of accomplishing this.

Not every animal, but we certainly could lock some.

To reason from this to therefore, we have to let psychopaths torture others, just doesn't make any sense

Yeah... i never said such a thing.

I feel anymore time talking to you on subjects relating to animals is a waste of my time. I hope you have a nice day.

Im not the one holding stupid ideas like that animals have tge same value as humans.

[Hawke123]

Mae,

I think it would be better to admit that TBOM has just exposed a logical inconsistency in your viewpoint via reductio ad absurdum reasoning.  This has nothing to do with moral agency or the pragmatics of living out the implications of your viewpoint.  It has everything to do with coherent standards and following ideas to their logical conclusions.

[Rostos]

Arent we all just a bag of chemicals under naturalism?

What have you got against bags of chemicals Rostos?  Did one fall on you once or something?  You seem to have real issues with them.  And where are we going with this?

1. A pile of poop is a bag of chemicals.
2. An ice cream jelly is not like a pile of poop.
3. Therefore, an ice cream jelly is not just a bag of chemicals.

Looks like the same fallacy to me.

Let's assume that naturalism is false but that my cat is just a bag of chemicals still because it isn't made in the image of God.  Is it OK for me to pour acid on it and what-not for fun?

You keep on missing the point.

Does a bag of poop have more value than an ice cream?

Human beings under naturalism have no more instrinsic value than a bag of poop, or a water rat, or a shark.

Sharks raping each other or humans raping each other is no different under naturalism.

[R3]

instrinsic value

Oxymoron. Nothing has intrinsic value under any system of thought. Unless you're defining the words in a very odd way - which I guess is always possible .

[Mae]

Mae,

I think it would be better to admit that TBOM has just exposed a logical inconsistency in your viewpoint via reductio ad absurdum reasoning.  This has nothing to do with moral agency or the pragmatics of living out the implications of your viewpoint.  It has everything to do with coherent standards and following ideas to their logical conclusions.

A logical inconsistency in what viewpoint? There is certainly no inconsistency with my views that we should stop psychopaths from harming others, and my views on veganism. If non-moral agents, such as psychopaths and animals engage in killing others, it obviously doesn't follow that you and I are justified in doing such actions. So there's no problem there. I guess you mean my view that we should stop psychopaths from harming others? Do you really disagree with this view? I'm willing to bet this is a pretty standard view for most people. But I agree we should stop individuals from harming others. We should stop psychopaths from harming others. I don't think prison should be used as punishment, however. Psychopaths should be given good lives, where they are able to have entertainment, exercise, good food, media, etc. Just the same, if you want to go chase down some bears and take them to a place where they will have good lives, while they won't harm others, go for it. Where exactly do you see the inconsistency?

[Catholic_Lady]

Shark rape?? Hm... learn something new every day I suppose... :/

[Rostos]

instrinsic value

Oxymoron. Nothing has intrinsic value under any system of thought. Unless you're defining the words in a very odd way - which I guess is always possible .

That is exactly right, so how can a human be more valuable than a shark?

[Trinity]

Trinity.  If a woman shows cleavage, this is a "good indicator" that her breasts are fair game for grabbing?  Yes?

According to the German school policy, apparently yes.

[Trinity]

Emuse,

Isn't that true for humans as well? For instance, the recent events in Germany and Sweden have led the authorities to issue brochures and 'sex eds' to basically teach refugees about indicators, behaviour and female willingness to sex. I remember a brochure which explained that body language and how a woman dresses should not be used as indicators. Some German schools have even issued policies telling their female students to cover their bodies in order to not send the wrong sexual indicators and body language to male refugees.

We can misinterpret non verbal signals.  For sure.  But some are pretty unambiguous.

This is where knowledge of Autism helps incidentally.  The difficulties that autistic people have in reading facial expressions also makes it incredibly hard for them to know how another person is thinking and feeling.  The claim that we don't accurately judge subjective states based on observations of outward behaviour is demonstrably false.

I don't think refugees are any more autistic than non-refugees.
Separating sexual behaviour from sexual willingness is a recent western phenomenon. Most cultures do not consider behaviour to be separate from willingness. If men and women dress and behave sexually, then this is a good indicator for their willingness to sex. This explains why the school has issued new policies regarding dress code to their students, because the school understands that different cultures have different understandings of human sexuality.

Dressing in a particular way to show a willingness for sex is not to show a willingness for sex with anybody.  A person would have to be fairly socially inept to not know that.  The woman who dresses provocatively is either hoping to attract someone in particular or she wants to be able to choose from those who show an interest. We see this latter type of behaviour across different species too.  In order to get to the point of raping somebody, a man would have to ignore a whole host of other verbal and non verbal signals.  If a woman became aggressive, shouted at you and tried to push you away, you wouldn't get away with claiming not to know she wasn't interested even if she shouted at you in a foreign language whilst wearing a low top.  But this only further emphasises that we can accurately judge the subjective state of another from their outward behaviour.

If a woman doesn't want to deal with unwanted attention in certain situations then she needs to dress less provocatively in those situations, of course.  But this is about the woman ensuring that she is matching her behaviour with her subjective intent.

You fail to take into account cultural differences. As I said earlier, the separation of sexual behaviour and sexual willingness is a recent western phenomenon.

[Emuse]

You fail to take into account cultural differences. As I said earlier, the separation of sexual behaviour and sexual willingness is a recent western phenomenon.

Because I'm referring to rather obvious non verbal signals that it would be very difficult for a neurotypical individual to misinterpret, despite cultural differences.

This is what we find in autistic people.  An autistic person would be able to identify extremes of emotion, but struggle with more nuanced situations so confuse boredom with anger for example.

[Trinity]

You are still not taking into account cultural differences. Different cultures view sex differently. This has nothing to do with autism and everything to do with culture. People in western culture have learned to ignore sexual signals, but many people in non-western cultures have not learned how to ignore sexual signals. From a non-western perspective, western culture is conducive to rape. People in western culture are unaware of this due to the echo chamber effect.

Your point regarding autism does not apply to culture, because autism is with regard to the confusion of emotions, while culture is with regard to the justification of emotions.

[Emuse]

You are still not taking into account cultural differences. Different cultures view sex differently. This has nothing to do with autism and everything to do with culture. People in western culture have learned to ignore sexual signals, but many people in non-western cultures have not learned how to ignore sexual signals. From a non-western perspective, western culture is conducive to rape. People in western culture are unaware of this due to the echo chamber effect.

Your point regarding autism does not apply to culture, because autism is with regard to the confusion of emotions, while culture is with regard to the justification of emotions.

In order to rape someone, a man would need to ignore several non verbal signals from the woman that are unambiguous, many of which would be involuntary on her part (crying, looking scared, shaking, putting hands up and trying to block the person).  And yes, this does relate to autism.  If a person couldn't understand those signals then it would trigger concerns of a sensory impairment.  Do you know what autism is?

[Trinity]

I know what autism is, and I don't think it plays much role in this case. The issue here is not ignoring signals, the issue here is overriding signals. Culture tells people how to deal with signals. We even have a name for people who cannot deal with certain signals, we call them ''uncultured''. Different cultures tell people how to deal with different signals. Western culture tells us to override our passions with reason. Other cultures may or may not tell people to do the same thing to the same extend. Passion can override signals without ignoring it, and it is the job of culture to keep passion under control by means of reason.

[Emuse]

Autism is a sensory impairment that radically affects and limits communication.  There are certain tests for autism.  In one test, a subject will be shown a number of facial expressions alongside a list of emotions (sad, happy, angry, scared, bored and so on).  The goal of the task is to pair the emotion with the correct facial expression.  Most neurotypical individuals will successfully complete the task.  An autistic person won't and that would be one indicator that the person has a spectrum disorder.

Most non verbal expressions of emotion (laughing, shouting, crying, shaking) are culturally non specific.  More than that, some are even involuntary if the underlying emotion is particularly strong.  This is the case even if modes of dress are culturally specific.   If a woman cried and pushed you away whilst shouting in a foreign language, you would have no excuse for raping her unless you could convince a jury that you were unable to interpret her non verbal expressions as a no.  If you made that claim then there would be grounds for suspecting a neurological disorder.