TL;DR: "morality is democratic". This is incorrect.
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"Hitler was a great man."
- Thread starter Nix_Hex
- Start date
I never said morality was democratic and what is ''TL;DR'', please explain a little more so I can possibly understand what you mean.
I was trying to dumb down http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/appeal-to-popularity.html
Check it out, I'm citing Nizkor in a thread about Hitler!
I know what fallacies are, and what I did isn't a fallacy; in certain situations, most people agree to something because it's ''right''. In these types of situations, it isn't a fallacy. I also, did not mention as an argument something like '' because most people think it's right and because most of them live by that moral code, that moral code is the ultimate moral that everyone should follow -- hell it might be an objective moral code. Therefore, Hitler is a douchebag''. I rather provided you with argument backing up what I stated.
To a certain extent, I agree morality is democratic, to another I disagree. An appropriate example would be during the WWII: Most people in Germany thought that Jews were the cause of Germany's problems and therefore must be killed for the sake of the Aryan race. Does, because the majority at that time in Germany taught that killing Jews was good, that make murdering Jews good? No.
Morality is democratic whenever the majority agree with me.
I quoted your post to show you where you had appealed to popularity, assuming you had merely forgotten your former delusions after being corrected.
As for believing Hitler is good; like I said earlier, I can't approve of someone who'd poison his dog. That's not to say I'm not grateful for a lot of other things he (and/or his regime) directly or indirectly brought about. No one is perfect.
One could misinterpret the first sentence of my second paragraph as a fallacy, however it is not. The mere fact that I added the word ''even'' cancels out the possibility of my sentence being interpreted as an appeal to the majority; adding that simple word implied that despite the fact that some, if not most, of the morals at that time were different, the basis of morality still is somewhat the same as ours, today.
Hitler brought only disasters to this world and so did his regime. That foolish War led by that man may have given the opportunity to the women to work (at least, in Canada) and it might have boosted the economy, but those indirect effects of the War, although beneficial, do not make up for the tears and the bloodshed. Maybe you agree, maybe you don't, that doesn't really matter. However, you mustn't thanks Hitler for that, nor give him any credit for those things, but rather give glory to the brave men and women who opposed his regime.
You spoke in terms of absolutes. Your use of the words "even by our standards" does not change the fact that you are implying an objective system of morality by which Hitler is undeniably evil.
As I already said, there was good and bad to (and from) Hitler and his actions.
EDIT: I note that English is not your first language, which explains, though doesn't excuse, your temerity in telling me what nonsense you believe about the word "even".
Just because someone has the ability to see both sides, doesn't mean they agree in any way with what he did. And just because he makes valid points, doesn't give you the right to call him a Nazi, nor does his ability to view both perspectives. I'm disgusted you would call anyone a Nazi, or say anyone agrees with what he did or his methods just for saying what you disagree with.
Well pardon me for my misuse of this language. The fact that it isn't my first language is far from excusing my lack of knowledge about it, however, please, bare with my mistakes for the time being.
I did not imply that base on an objective system of morality, Hitler is bad. If you read my first paragraph I mentioned that morality is different from nations to nations and times to times which doesn't make it so objective.
I would like to clarify that when I mean bad, I mean it in a sort of unjust way, not in a evilish way. The same goes when I say good, I mean just.
Please take note that I erased that sentence while you were writing your post, meaning that I corrected myself. Also, I never called him a Nazi; I asked him if he taught that Hitler's regime was good for he seemed to think that, because he said that what I stated was incorrect, which led me to believe that he might be agreeing with some of Hitler's action. Also, basically agreeing with Hitler's methods and with what he did makes someone a Nazi.
I don't might him disagreeing with me; it would be stupid and unjust if he could only agree with me.
True. In french, we use raisonable both for reasonable and rational. I got the two mixed up. Thanks for clearing it up.
I define being morally good as : Using your power in such a way that it makes the world reflect your values. As Hitler certainly did that, he was a good person.
I deliberately chose to never make a judgement on values, because they change drastically from time to time, and a want a way to judge people as good that can work for any human being, in any culture, in any era. It is unfair to say someone is evil because of data that he did not possess at the time.
Hitler thought that the final solution was justified, desirable even. In this context, it would have been evil for him NOT to do it. Because he would have allowed the world reflect his values less even if it was in his power to shape the world for the better (for his definition of better).
Personally as a nihilist, I don't believe in things like "good" and "evil" as I believe they are constructed by people and should they exist they can never clearly be known. That being said (as horrible as this sounds) Hitler had a mom, a dad, a lover, was artistic, and had qualities we would all see as good in any other human being, so to say Hitler was horrible or evil (or to even demonize the names Adolf and Hitler, yeah almost anybody with that last name changed it and rarely has a baby been born into a non-racist family named Adolf) is a gross exaggeration of generally bad things he had done.
However while I won't say the holocaust was "evil" I could never agree with it or its principles of mass extermination of ethnic and political groups. Further, I heard a quote somewhere (and I'm paraphrasing) that I think sums up the Holocaust perfectly. "Intolerance isn't needed to have genocide, only apathy." So while Hitler may have been the one calling for the heads of all the minorities, the German people knew about it, and either ignored it, or took part in it. In summary, it would be like everyone hating Obama if 10% of Americans (with Obama's support) went out massively exterminated illegal immigrants. Hitler as a person was a figure head of the german people who either ignored the injustices, or took part in them. I doubt Hitler ever killed anyone with his hands.
And before anyone thinks I'm defending hitler and labels me an evil person; as an atheist and a socialist, I wouldn't exactly have voted for Hitler, or had a beer with him, or been one of his favorite people.
All in all though, I wouldn't worry about it. It's just dumb teenagers being dumb teenagers, just remember it and 10 years later if you see that person remind them of what they said and see how dumb they look.
Then your definition of being good or just is completely wrong; based on your vision on what his good, everyone is good. Everyone is this whole world would deserve to be glorified for their actions for all human beings act ''in favor of their values''. For that reason we should instead base our judgement upon how the person lived and acted.
Therefore, looking back at Hitler's actions, we can clearly see that not only their goal was unjust for the most part, but so was the actions he took to achieve those goals.
I am also an atheist, and I must agree on the fact that ''Good'' and ''Evil'' do not exist; we create what is good and what is evil for we need such entities for our survival. But on another level I think that ''good'' and ''bad'' could exist: on the level of justice. And I personally think that when you look back at someone to define them as ''good'' or ''bad'' we should look at his actions and tell if they were just or not. Sometimes, it is clearly obvious what the answer is, sometime it is not and at other times the actions in question might be both just and unjust.
For Hitler's case, I would say that overall he was unjust like I mentioned up there in my post somewhere. But I wouldn't say that Hitler is the ''devil'' nor a ''demon'', he was a human like everyone else. He simply acted unfairly.
I could agree to that in some degree of relative justice (a Rawlsian approach), but when you say "good" and "bad" on levels of justice, it kind of makes the statist arguments that you can legislate morality and by breaking the law you act immorally (a Rousseau Social Contract bit). Which begs infinite questions but most notably, Martin Luther King broke several laws, while Hitler broke none.
If you're not making the social contract argument, Justice is just as arbitrary as "good" and "evil"
And I'm not defending hitler nor am I saying he's good by saying he's not evil. I would like to think (we can never know what we'd do if we lived in Germany back then as everyone who did was apathetic) that I would have opposed Hitler. But just because I don't agree with something or someone doesn't give me the infinite-knowledge to call them evil. I think G.W is a dumbass and a warmonger, but just because I believe (emphasis on I) he started these wars for political and financial gain, it would be crass for me to say the man (or his actions) are evil.
If you're not making the social contract argument, Justice is just as arbitrary as "good" and "evil"
And I'm not defending hitler nor am I saying he's good by saying he's not evil. I would like to think (we can never know what we'd do if we lived in Germany back then as everyone who did was apathetic) that I would have opposed Hitler. But just because I don't agree with something or someone doesn't give me the infinite-knowledge to call them evil. I think G.W is a dumbass and a warmonger, but just because I believe (emphasis on I) he started these wars for political and financial gain, it would be crass for me to say the man (or his actions) are evil.
I'm reminded of a thread back in 2007, when I was lurking a lot, that chaos started that went something like, "Have you ever been trolled in real life?" Yeah, sounds similar to what these kids in your school are doing. Shock value, attention-grabbing bullshit. It's either that or they're trying to sound all philosophical and verbose by taking an out-of-the-ordinary view on things. Don't put so much thought into it, it'll only raise your blood pressure.
Laws can be made unjust by an unjust Leader for example. Laws can be made just. Laws aren't the greatest authority; Justice is. Yes, the way I mentioned it is pretty arbitrary, but there is a perfect middle within just and unjust. Martin Luther broke unjust laws, while Hitler respected unjust laws.
For these reasons, Hitler was ''bad'' or unjust.
I've defended Adolf Hitler many times in arguements, the vast majority of people (that I've come in contact with) immediately bash him and say he was the worst person in the world and nothing good came from him and he was pure evil. I don't feel like writing out my whole arguement, but first of all, Stalin killed more people than Hitler, he was in fact a genius and invented very important things such as a highway system, and he wasn't evil, as far as he was concerned. He believed that the ends justify the means, he was only trying to make the world perfect, and everyone pretends that he was trying to corrupt the entire world. Quite the contrary, his goal in his so called evil and brutal actions was to create a utopia. The ends do justify the means, Adolf just didn't have long enough to prove that it's true.
http://www.cracked.com/article_18389_the-5-most-widely-believed-wwii-facts-that-are-bullshit.html
Look at numbers 3 and 4 in the article.
Look at numbers 3 and 4 in the article.
Hitler had a terrible goal, but a great way of accomplishing it. Convincing enough to get the nation to follow him. Smart enough to use propaganda. Smarter still to kill all who resisted in an instant. Insane enough to believe he could take over the world. The ends do not justify the means, and in general, Hitler was the worst thing that could've happened to the planet. He was brilliant, but he did horrible things. Hitler was about as great as a piece of crap in my opinion.
The fact that Stalin killed more people doesn't make Hitler a just man. It simply makes Stalin responsible for more deaths than Hitler. Stalin wasn't a genius, granted he was smart, but he wasn't a ''genius''. Stalin was a good politician; he knew who to place where, how to keep his power, etc. Stalin as just like Hitler was unjust, maybe his goal were more noble than Hitler's were but his actions still remain unjust. Also, the ends do not justify the means; the means must be as noble as the end for if they are not, the end is ''corrupted''. How could have Adolf Hitler proved that? As far as I can tell his regime was unjust and so were his goals.
How was Hitler brilliant? Granted he was a charismatic man and an excellent orator, but other than that you must give the credit for keeping Germany under the Nazi regime to Adolf's subordinates. Killing those who oppose you isn't the greatest way to accomplish your goals either.
he was brilliant at getting them started but it fell apart when he started going insane. One key thing, for example, was not letting his generals do their job and ordering them to do shit that blatantly cost them many troops. Not to mention he was a bit of a dipshit and 2 weeks after D-day he was still preparing for a "major allied invasion".
You are being a complete hypocrite. You say he was the worst thing ever, (which is an insane exaggeration,) and that making the world a perfect place as best as he could is terrible, but the part about killing millions of people is fine? Killing millions of people is not fine, but just like I said earlier, Stalin killed many more people than Hitler, and Hitler did have a just goal. Hitler wanted to kill the Jews because he thought they corrupted society and the economy, he wanted to kill those who were handicapped or not physically fit so that the next generation would be strong and fit and so on and so forth. How in the hell are you going to say he was terrible by wanting to live in a perfect world, but there was nothing wrong with how he went about doing it? You said the ends don't justify the means, but you view the ends as terrible even when it's extremely positive
In what way is a definition of good wrong because it makes everybody good?
Besides, people who follow their interest instead of following their values are not good people, and people who follow their interest at the expense of their values are bad people. And they exist.
so 1- A moral system is not invalid simply because it classifies everyone as good.
and 2- My system ain't one anyway.
I never said I thought Hitler's goal was good. Whether or not we consider Hitler's goal good or evil is irrelevant. You cannot judge anyone, Hitler included, on standards that were not his own. Hitler thought his goals were noble and good. He thought the means he used were justified. So when you judge Hitler, you have to consider his intentions noble and his means justified. At worst, you could blame him for failing. But not for being evil.
Also :
When trying to rationaly judge Hitler, you have to separate yourself from your mentalities, your passions and all that, and consider the above as desirable.
Please be rational.
Oh and while we're at it, you might find this interesting. Especially number 5 and number 1.