Pacifism, is it now a dirty word in the US of A?

Well, this is a philosophy forum.

Philosophically, how far should society bend the rules to honor the moral position of pacifism?

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What an interesting topic. J_B, your aspects on pacifism raise some
excellent points.

Society certainly should honor the moral position of pacifists, however should
never go as far as to relieve them of their financial obligations to pay taxes.
Granted that military spending is extremely high in the United States,
a good portion of taxpayers money does benefit its people. No one should
be excused to pay its dues to benefit society.

I consider myself a pacifist and abhor violence in any form, but I most certainly would defend myself if attacked. Am I still a pacifist?

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My pacifism is much like CJ's.

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The initial women, J_B and CJ have hit the spot that determines how far pacifism should be allowed to progress. I agree that taxes should, must be paid for the good of society, even though so much money goes to the military, especially in the US.

Yes, I would defend myself and fiercely defend my family. I don't think I could call myself a pacifist because of that instinctive will to defend those who are my family. If any of my friends needed a 63 year old woman to defend them, I'd be right there, ferocious as hell.

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in Dys' terminology, the women in this thread would be *pragmatic* pacifists. i suppose i'm one as well to a certain extent. i certainly believe that the use of force should not be the preferred method of settling disputes.

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Pacifism. I'm of two minds about it. It cannot be denied that the world would be a much nicer place to live in if we all behave as pacifists. But that is as much a dream as a prospering communist country (And I mean devoutly communist!) is. It ain't gonna happen, bubba!

It's perhaps a bit cynical and quite negative of me to think so, but I think a situation like the cold war is perhaps the best to hope for. When two opposing superpowers, each with sattelite states, hold each other in check, relative peace may exist. The moment one country thinks it has the biggest warmachine, it's very tempting to use it to create favorable mondial conditions for themselves.

As for Tolstoy, I gather he got quite a whallop from the romanticism fugue sweeping through civilised europe. Good writer though. War and Peace was very boring, but well written.

Naj.

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Just to be clear about this, I am definitely a pacifist, on the other hand, I own fire-arms and if anyone tried to harm someone near and dear to me I would shoot them (in the knee). War, on the other hand, in modern times, is always based on lies and deceit and easily avoided by rational thought.

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hear hear

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That does beg the question, however, how so many individuals seem to become involved in them time and time and time again.

Besides, what would you call : 'armed resistance against a cruel tyrant'?

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Hm, owning a fire-arms and at the same time being a pacifist seems
contradictory to me. Defending myself, yes, but I never would own
or use a fire-arm.

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Hah. It took me years of careful manipulation, but I guarantee you my armpits can now be registered as Lethal weapons.

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dyslexia wrote:

Just to be clear about this, I am definitely a pacifist, on the other hand, I own fire-arms and if anyone tried to harm someone near and dear to me I would shoot them (in the knee). War, on the other hand, in modern times, is always based on lies and deceit and easily avoided by rational thought.

I'm probably one of your "pragmatic" pacifists. I whole-heartedly believe that force is not the way to resolve disputes between countries. Though, if it came to defending my country against an invasion I would definitely fight back.
Dys, I find it strange that a pacifist would own fire-arms. It seems to me that mass ownership of fire-arms leads to violence. I have personally never been in a situation where I would consider shooting a person to be a necessary defensive response. But then, I don't live in the US. These things are viewed very differently there, from what I gather.

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You know, msolga, I think deep down most people probably categorize themselves as pragmatic pacifists. Don't consider this as a dig on your post, though. It's just well, sort of bred into our society. A general dislike for war, preferring peace but not foreswearing on the use of violence(as in war) alltogether.

Of course, what people categorize themselves as, and what they turn out to bem are surprisingly often two very different things.

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(I meant to say this last night but somehow things got away from me: thanks, O'Bill, for your quick response to my query about your earlier post. Especially since you sounded so busy at the time.)

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najme, I think your observations are pretty accurate about "two different things."

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cicerone imposter wrote:

najme, I think your observations are pretty accurate about "two different things."

Could you expand on that a bit, c.i., or najmelliw? You're saying that people sometimes profess to be pacifists, but aren't, really?

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From my observations, I can see many different kinds of "pacifists."

What I see most often are christians or religionists (makes up the majority of Americans) that claim violence is not acceptable, but in reality, they are the participants and supporters of much of societies violence - in movies, wars, and plain old aggression.

Our involvement in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are good examples; we support our troops. They are engaged in a war that kills people - many of them innocent women, chilldren and men. By latest count, our coalition forces are responsible for the killing of over 50,000 innocent Iraqis. Where's the outcry? I hear none.

What people say and do are two different things; at least from my observations.

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Interesting History lesson, Set, but I think you either missed the context of my point, or read something into it that wasn't there.

msolga wrote:

(I meant to say this last night but somehow things got away from me: thanks, O'Bill, for your quick response to my query about your earlier post. Especially since you sounded so busy at the time.)

My pleasure. At night I baby-sit my bar and then do the paperwork after it closes. Baby sitting drunk people is an awful chore, unless you join them to some extent. :wink:

I think more than a few here are misusing the term pacifist. I think the title belongs exclusively to those who really are pacifists. Scarce few people really qualify, IMO.

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cicerone imposter wrote:

From my observations, I can see many different kinds of "pacifists."

What I see most often are christians or religionists (makes up the majority of Americans) that claim violence is not acceptable, but in reality, they are the participants and supporters of much of societies violence - in movies, wars, and plain old aggression.

Our involvement in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are good examples; we support our troops. They are engaged in a war that kills people - many of them innocent women, chilldren and men. By latest count, our coalition forces are responsible for the killing of over 50,000 innocent Iraqis. Where's the outcry? I hear none.

What people say and do are two different things; at least from my observations.

Ah, now I see what you were getting at!
Like the folk who value the sanctity of life, yet support the death penalty?

I think, BTW, that there has been outcry, it just isn't heard by the politicians in charge of the Iraq invasion agenda. Look at all those people who marched (in huge numbers around the world!) in protest at the planned invasion & have kept marching, talking, writing letters to their editors, etc, etc .... our voices simply don't matter, they're ignored.

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But, as the righties will continue to tell us, "we" voted for this president and congress into office, and "they" represent the citizens of this country. "That" is our voice - so they tell us.

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Pacifism, is it now a dirty word in the US of A?

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