Flame — HabitableZone

Flame » in reply to That's actually interesting

re: That's actually interesting
gbaikie — (archived)

"Your attempt to differentiate between preaching and doing is one of the more considered arguments in this whole mess. Not necessarily correct, but at least worth discussing.

I'm sure you've heard of the crime "inciting to riot". The logic behind it is pure commonsense: Somebody who stirs up others to riot is as responsible for the resulting damage as any direct participant. The law wisely rejects the defense that "it's not my problem if they actually took me seriously. I was just kidding, honest [wink wink]". Responsibility is responsibility.

That's why I took Gary's accusation of "scumbags in the HabitableZone preaching treason" just as seriously as if he'd said that people here are committing treason: It's an artificial distinction. Somebody preaching treason is as morally culpable as somebody who actually commits treason."

I agree it's a serious matter. And I did say:
"Btw, I don't mind that Robert objects to what Gary said. He might regard what Gary said as something that damages the reputation of the HabitableZone. Robert probably got a little over excited, maybe it was the last straw thing for him. So he took to Flame, which seems reasonable."
http://www.habitablezone.com/flame/messages/392250.html

"The Right loves to claim the moral high ground. So how come I'm the one holding to a moral absolute, and you guys are splitting hairs and making contrived technical arguments to deny responsibility?"

I don't regard my posts as an effort to deny responsibility. I imagine that Gary could been "excited". But it wasn't as if Gary making some case against posters that were preaching treason. Instead Gary actually was making the case that the Iranian student was behaving in a reasonable and even moral manner:

"A genuine Iranian patriot would prefer anything to national suicide including foreign invasion. Besides we've got scumbags here in the HabitableZone preaching treason against the United States so why is it unreasonable for an Iranian to preach treason against the mullahs?"

Now, if Gary hadn't been so excited there might been a remote possiblity that he could been able to summon some ironic inspiration and could have made this statement:

"A genuine Iranian patriot would prefer anything to national suicide including foreign invasion. Besides we've got outstanding citizens here in the HabitableZone preaching treason against the United States so why is it unreasonable for an Iranian to preach treason against the mullahs?"

It would made to same point, but it probably would have earned a chuckle instead of the longest flame thread in history.

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