An Open Letter to Political Pundits: Convicts != Fetuses != Animals

[rowyn]

What is with this whole soundbite rhetorical argument that, somehow, one's position on the death penalty needs to be aligned with one's position on abortion and/or hunting? Is it so hard to imagine that one could believe that convicted criminals, fetuses, and wild animals are not, in fact, identical creatures and should not, therefore, be treated as though they were? I am so sick of hearing "how can she be pro-life and yet favor the death penalty?" or "how can he allow the murder of unborn children and yet oppose the execution of hardened killers?" Neither one of these positions is ethically inconsistent. They just require a marginally nuanced version of the world that does not do things like, oh, group frogs and plants in the same family because they're both green. No one over the age of ten is going to change their position on any of these things based on this line of argument. Please, stop. Thank you.

Comments

[terrycloth.livejournal.com]

Personally, I think consistency is a bit of a red herring anyway, even in places where it does apply.

There's some amount of altruistic value in being predictable -- it helps other people plan around your future actions. But that's really the only value that it has. Sometimes (like, say, if you're a politician and people are trying to vote on someone based on what they predict they'll do) this is *really important*, but normally it's just not.

So the threshhold for consistency should be (a) it's important that people correctly guess what you're going to do, and (b) your position is clear enough that they can correctly guess what you're going to do.

And for almost everyone in the world, on almost every possible topic, (a) doesn't apply.

[rowyn]

...

I don't think I've ever considered why consistency is considered a virtue before. O_o

I think it also has to do with fairness. I don't know, consistency in how you treat your friends is important, for example. And moreso in how employers treat employees (and vice versa). And really, really important for parents raising children. It seems like one of those things, like honesty, that it's easier to practice all the time than to figure out when it's important that you do so. Less likely to flub it that way.

[terrycloth.livejournal.com]

You're not really talking about the same kind of consistency here.

Still, that sort of fairness is only good because people want to know how you're going to treat them. If how you treat them doesn't matter (if you're the kid, say) then whether you're fair doesn't matter either.

But 'being fair' is more likely to matter to other people than 'holding logically consistent beliefs', sure. For one thing, you've narrowed it down to your actions instead of your philosophy, which is a huge step.

And it's not a matter of deciding to be consistent or not -- it's really, how do you react when what you know is right in two separate cases seems to conflict? If the answer is 'do the wrong thing in one of the situations', you're doing it wrong.

[zaimoni.livejournal.com]

it's really, how do you react when what you know is right in two separate cases seems to conflict?

Been there, done that: first reaction is that I'm transparently lying to myself, so stop the lie of knowing what is right.

The hypothetical doesn't have enough detail to go further than that.

[terrycloth.livejournal.com]

It's a pure hypothetical so there isn't really any more detail to give.

I think your reaction is common, and becoming uncertain is definately a more reasonable reaction than choosing one or the other out of hand because it logically follows.

Usually, I end up discovering that there wasn't *really* an inconsistency in the first place, but in the process I learn more about my own values and stuff.

[jordangreywolf.livejournal.com]

I think consistency is considered valuable because it implies more rationality going into your decision-making process than just "I do it just because it's what I feel like doing" - or, as I remember from my grade school days, the much shorter version of that would come out as "because." (Why'd you do that? Because. No clue whatsoever as to future behavior to expect out of this individual! Unapologetic admission of arbitrary behavior, surely!)

Sometimes, people reach certain moral/logical frameworks without doing all the math - and, if faced with an argument over the matter, it may be inferred that such people are morally or logically inferior because they didn't "do the math" to "come to their own conclusions."

However, there are cases wherein I repeatedly come to certain conclusions (relatively lightly held) without "doing the math." For instance, a friend of mine goes to see a movie, and informs me that it well and truly stinks and that I should not go to see it. Based on my good relationship with this friend, and the observation that we share in common many movies that we both enjoy, and that we happen to despise a great many movies in common as well, I may infer that I am likely to reach the same conclusion. I put a certain amount of trust into this individual. I may, of course, end up seeing the movie anyway, and find out that it wasn't all that bad. (Maybe my friend just had a bad day, or there were some particular points in the movie that were a hot button for him, but not for me, or various other reasons.)

I suppose it'd be silly of me to insist on liking the movie anyway - or claiming that I like it - even though my personal experience suggests otherwise. But I can't blame people for hearing arguments made by people they trust, and coming to certain conclusions without doing all the homework (seeing the movie, reading the passage in "the original Greek," etc.). Life's short. In such cases, it might be beneficial to point out genuine internal inconsistencies ... but it's a pretty rare thing in my experience to find truly blatant internal inconsistencies that can be easily shot down by "pointing out the obvious."