Do You Feel Lucky?

(and feel free to comment! My older posts are certainly no less relevant to the burning concerns of the day.)

Monday, October 26, 2009

Why I Hate to Have to Kill People

I hate to have to kill people. I just do. It's not even like I have to explain that, or give reasons, is it? I can give you as many reasons as you want!

Number one, it's just wrong! I don't care about these so-called situation ethics, or moral relativism, or any of that. For me, me personally, it just feels wrong. I hate it, I hate doing it. Even in an extreme situation, let's say: capital punishment. Let's say it was hypothetical. Let's say it was a situation where it was possible to prove 100% that the guy did it, and that the law got it right, no mistakes, no takebacks no breaksies. Even in that 100% situation, where I was 100% certain the guilty party deserved it, even in that situation of pure objective certainty, it would still be wrong for me to kill him, because that's not my job! I'm not even sure I'm qualified for that kind of job. That's got to be some kind of heavy, elite, civil-service qualifications to land a job like that. I'm sure there are a ton of applicants crowding in for a shot at that gig. I don't think I could land that even if I wanted it. WHICH I DON'T.

Because, like I said: I hate to have to kill people. Even just for personal reasons - let alone for pay! Forget it. No way. It's just one of those things where I have to step back and say, "Oh I don't know, I think I'm going to have to draw the line on that one..." Only understand, my "hesitancy" there is pure sarcasm, because come on! There's no "I don't know" about it! I know perfectly well. Killing people is something I just can't get behind, for some reason.

And don't give me this whole "oh, have you ever DONE IT? You don't know what you're talking about then," bag. I call that whole line of argument a crock of intellectual cowardice. It's not like I have to kill people to hate doing it. Imagine what kind of a world this would be, if everybody had to actually go out and kill a bunch of people before they could feel entitled to say, "man...I really hate that. Ug. Not for me." Imagine what kind of world that would be! Imagine the senseless slaughter. And for what? Nothing! That's what "senseless" means, in this context.

Well, I for one don't think all of that is in any way necessary. Maybe you can disagree with me if you feel you have to, maybe you want a world like that, but the very idea of having to live there puts my heart in my stomach.

Ug. Not for me.

4 comments:

Lunarchick said...

I hate killing people also. I haven't done it either. So there that is. Yup.

dogimo said...

AWESOME! I was a little reluctant coming out with a strong stance like that. Thanks for letting me know I'm not the only one! :-)

JMH said...

I read a Navy blog that tends to run right-wing, just to endure a point of view that often sickens and infuriates me.

I think to myself, "If I were trained to believe the basic assumption that killing certain people is necessary, even admirable, would that ruin all of my subsequent conclusions?"

dogimo said...

Possibly so. I fear it could indeed.

It may be possible for reason to reach the end result that death is necessary to inflict. But if that's the case, it's far better to have that as your reluctant conclusion, than to allow it to serve as a premise to build on.

Somehow I always ignore the potential for a post like this to turn serious!

But then, I never mind when whimsical flights yield serious meditations - any more than I mind when grave musings birth fanciful tangents.