If you present me with a trolley problem in which the only way to destroy Hamas also kills a million children, I won’t know what the right answer is. I suppose it would depend on what would happen to Israel if Hamas wasn’t destroyed.
However, the moral calculus for nations is not the same as it is for individuals. The standard established the last time the Western world fought a war it took seriously does seem to be “as many as it takes” and I suspect that this would still be the standard if such a war happened again. (All those nuclear missiles we have ready aren’t precise weapons…) In that context, demanding that Israel should show restraint that other countries haven’t and wouldn’t seems like hypocrisy.
It’s easy to act self-righteous when that has no consequences, but in practice most people on this planet live in countries (including democratic countries) that probably would actually kill the children in an analogous scenario.
Okay? But this was about you, not the governments that run those countries. You said you wouldn’t know what the right answer is.
The right answer is obviously don’t kill a million children and the fact that you don’t realize that it’s obvious is highly disturbing to say the least.
If you present me with a trolley problem in which the only way to destroy Hamas also kills a million children, I won’t know what the right answer is. I suppose it would depend on what would happen to Israel if Hamas wasn’t destroyed.
However, the moral calculus for nations is not the same as it is for individuals. The standard established the last time the Western world fought a war it took seriously does seem to be “as many as it takes” and I suspect that this would still be the standard if such a war happened again. (All those nuclear missiles we have ready aren’t precise weapons…) In that context, demanding that Israel should show restraint that other countries haven’t and wouldn’t seems like hypocrisy.
Seriously? You don’t know?
Because I would say most people on this planet would say don’t kill the million children.
It’s easy to act self-righteous when that has no consequences, but in practice most people on this planet live in countries (including democratic countries) that probably would actually kill the children in an analogous scenario.
Okay? But this was about you, not the governments that run those countries. You said you wouldn’t know what the right answer is.
The right answer is obviously don’t kill a million children and the fact that you don’t realize that it’s obvious is highly disturbing to say the least.