----- Original Message ----- From: "Matt Grimaldi" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Tuesday, July 23, 2002 6:21 PM Subject: Re: Israeli Airstrike Kills Nine Children
> Alberto Monteiro wrote: > > > > Chosing a lesser evil *is* chosing > > evil - unless there is no other way > > out. > > > > No. It's still choosing evil. However, > such a choice could be understood and > possibly even forgiven. The real question, then, is what a moral person will do in a situation in which he has a moral choice. For example, if we don't vote to disband the police we are responsible for the people the police kill. If we disband the police, we are responsible for the murders they would have stopped. The Catholic rite of penance states: I confess to almighty God, and to you, my brothers and sisters, that I have sinned through my own fault, in my thoughts and in my words, in what I have done, and in what I have failed to do; Not deciding is deciding. Is it evil for a city to have a police force, for example? I know that when I vote for police protections, I vote for having people willing to kill, if need be. If I vote for limits on the use of force, I vote to have police killed when they could have saved themselves. I think that a person can always make a moral choice. Its true that we often choose violence too freely. However, when the Dutch failed to protect the Bosnians under their protection from the Serbs through the use of force, they were responsible for their deaths. They would also have been responsible for the deaths of the Serbs who were attacking, had they responded. The world is responsible for not intervening in the genocide in Rwanda. We also would be responsible for those killed in our stopping of the carnage. Reasonable people can differ on the most moral choice, but we do have responsibility for when we don't act as well as for when we do. Dan M.
