Article Re: Clergy/Penitent Privilege

[bluebell]

5 minutes ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

This isn't true.

What makes something fundamental is that it applies all the time - and not just in a particular context. There is no doubt that sex in some contexts is good and in some contexts is bad - but those contexts don't reflect on the fundamental nature of sex because they aren't there all the time.

Sex is good (assuming you mean the physical act and not gender) because it is a biological mechanism for reproduction. The continuance of our species is a good thing - and we are built in a way that encourages this. And of course, we think that it is important enough that we (in our culture and society) have declared it a constitutional right under the 14th amendment. On the other hand, the fact that it can be good or bad in other ways depending on context suggests that in those circumstances, the context is important - and so cannot be considered a fundamental characteristic of sex ...

Like I said, we are going to have to agree to disagree on this.  Sex isn't good just because it allows reproduction.  Continuing the species by being immoral, for example, is not a good thing.  

[Benjamin McGuire]

10 minutes ago, bluebell said:

You really don't only have to take it from the text.  It would be dumb to ignore historical references and data.  All is useful.  

Why don't you respond to my sources ...

[Benjamin McGuire]

7 minutes ago, bluebell said:

Like I said, we are going to have to agree to disagree on this.  Sex isn't good just because it allows reproduction.  Continuing the species by being immoral, for example, is not a good thing.  

Clearly you want to take to this to a place that makes no sense ... I didn't say that sex was good JUST because it allows for reproduction. I said that reproduction was something that made sex good.

You still don't get it. If you have to put a qualifier on to the term - like immoral - you cannot be dealing with a fundamental property - because you already want to create a narrow subset to try and put bias into the discussion.

Early childhood marriage causes harm. Sometimes, under some circumstances, that harm may be worth it because it replaces an even greater harm (as Danzo has illustrated for us) - but it doesn't change the fact that harm occurs. What is the good that offsets that harm in every case? If there isn't such a good, then early child marriage is fundamentally bad - it just isn't the worst bad out there.

Feel free to have the last word.

[bluebell]

15 minutes ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

Clearly you want to take to this to a place that makes no sense ... I didn't say that sex was good JUST because it allows for reproduction. I said that reproduction was something that made sex good.

You still don't get it. If you have to put a qualifier on to the term - like immoral - you cannot be dealing with a fundamental property - because you already want to create a narrow subset to try and put bias into the discussion.

Early childhood marriage causes harm. Sometimes, under some circumstances, that harm may be worth it because it replaces an even greater harm (as Danzo has illustrated for us) - but it doesn't change the fact that harm occurs. What is the good that offsets that harm in every case? If there isn't such a good, then early child marriage is fundamentally bad - it just isn't the worst bad out there.

Feel free to have the last word.

Yes, reproduction can make sex good. But it doesn’t make sex good unless the context of that reproduction is also good.

i’m not sure how that is “taking this to a place where it makes no sense.”

Early marriage can cause harm. In some very limited contexts it can also reduce harm, or save from harm.

Edited December 14, 2023 by bluebell

[bluebell]

14 minutes ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

Why don't you respond to my sources ...

No thanks. I honestly don’t care if you believe those sources so there’s no reason to spend time refuting them.  My aim was never to convince you that you were wrong. Go forth and believe whatever you want with my blessing. 

All I was interested in doing was providing a source to back up the dozens and dozens and dozens of links that say the same thing, because you asked for one.

But note that I never asked you for your sources because they are irrelevant to my purpose.

 

[Vanguard]

2 hours ago, bluebell said:

Early childhood marriage causes harm. Sometimes, under some circumstances, that harm may be worth it because it replaces an even greater harm (as Danzo has illustrated for us) - but it doesn't change the fact that harm occurs. What is the good that offsets that harm in every case? If there isn't such a good, then early child marriage is fundamentally bad - it just isn't the worst bad out there.

Could you speak more on those fundamentals that make something that's not "Early childhood marriage..." good?

Edited December 14, 2023 by Vanguard
Sorry. The quote I included was actually one made by BM and not Bluebell so the question is intended for BM.

[smac97]

6 hours ago, webbles said:

Do you think the push for "universal mandatory reporting" is worth it then?  Because you seem to focus only on professional mandatory reporters but the vast majority of people affected by universal mandatory reporters aren't professionals.  And the laws aren't really that specific.  For instance, Utah is a universal mandatory reporting state.  The law is https://le.utah.gov/xcode/Title80/Chapter2/80-2-S602.html.  The things to report are:

That's pretty generic.  If I have a "reason to believe", then I must report.  And if I fail to report, I can be convicted with a class B misdemeanor (https://le.utah.gov/xcode/Title80/Chapter2/80-2-S609.html?v=C80-2-S609_2022050420220901).  I think that is up to 6 months in jail and/or $1000 fine.

And one more arrow in the quiver of the State to use against its citizenry.  Another way for a prosecutor to upcharge/overcharge someone.

6 hours ago, webbles said:

Saying that the charges would only be used in obvious cases doesn't help.  A prosecutor can still threaten it and I'd still have to defend myself, which is more time and money.  Even if the prosecutor isn't successful, I'm still affected.  This happened in the child abuse case in Bisbee, AZ.  AZ isn't a universal mandatory state but they tried to argue that section A.5 in the law ("Any other person who has responsibility for the care or treatment of the minor.") encompassed the visiting teacher (as she was also the primary teacher).  It took months to argue that point and the judge finally ruled that she wasn't included in that section because the law was targeted to licensed professionals and she wasn't a licensed professional.

We are ceding too much power to the State these days.

Thanks,

-Smac

[Danzo]

20 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

And that is the sort of particular example that we need to avoid - because it isn't the child marriage itself that is good or bad on it's own, it is the context that made it good.

Isn't it the context that makes any decision good or bad?  If the decision improves the situation than it is a good decision.  If it makes the situation worse, its a bad decision. 

The decision wasn't fundamentally bad if it led to a better outcome for all involved.   The same can be said for  any marriage.  Some marriages, even those involving adults are bad decisions because they make ones situation worse. 

In the case of my mother in law, it happened in another country without all of the safety nets we have here today.  With her, the marriage was the safety net available to her.  She didn't have the option to go on welfare.   She went from a home of neglect and abuse to a loving family. She moved into her husband's family's home and her new mother and father in law became essentially her mother and father and finished raising her.

I know in our culture marriage is just about sex (isn't everything in our culture about sex?), but in the indigenous culture that my mother in law comes from, marriage is about creating and extending families and families are the primary means of economic security, as well as physical safety.  

Everyone involved, even with 60 years hindsight sees their marriage as a good thing, with a good outcome, and better than any alternative available at the time.  and not as something fundamentally wrong. 

 

 

[Danzo]

Back to my original post in this thread.

In my brother's ward the relief society president is a teacher who is a mandatory reporter in the state she lives in. 

She sees her self as being deputized by the state and feels that visiting members of a certain ethnic group in her ward (their ward is responsible for member if this ethnic group in their area) would require that she might be forced by the law to be a police officer instead of a minister.

Members of this ethnic group have practices that are somewhat strange to us in the US (including child marriage, living together in large extended families, and experiencing general poverty)

The Relief society president, as well as the bishop and elders quorum, and members of this ethnic group  feel that visiting these families would require that she would run the risk of having to be a police officer instead of being a minister.

Therefore the Relief Society President isn't allowed to visit these people.

All of this comes from the mandatory reporting laws in her state.

The mandatory reporting laws are impeding help rather than promoting help, at least in this situation. 

[bluebell]

22 minutes ago, Danzo said:

Isn't it the context that makes any decision good or bad?  If the decision improves the situation than it is a good decision.  If it makes the situation worse, its a bad decision. 

 

 

The scriptures often use the tree/fruit analogy when talking about whether something is good or not and I think you've alluded to it here.  I don't think anyone is suggesting that morality should be reduced to a "the end justifies the means" way of judgment, but for situations where God has not declared the morality, the good/bad fruit analogy can be helpful I think.

[Danzo]

22 minutes ago, bluebell said:

The scriptures often use the tree/fruit analogy when talking about whether something is good or not and I think you've alluded to it here.  I don't think anyone is suggesting that morality should be reduced to a "the end justifies the means" way of judgment, but for situations where God has not declared the morality, the good/bad fruit analogy can be helpful I think.

I think it is also helpful to remember that we are judged by the law that we are given.  Not everyone has been given the same law and we are going to be judged by how we do with what we have.

In the case of my mother in law, what happened was something that was, in fact, good for the circumstances and culture she lived in.  Marriage in her culture wasn't the same thing as marriage in our culture.  In her culture marriage was more about creating and binding families together.  They weren't just married and sent off to live on their own as one might expect in our culture, both husband and wife continued living with the husband's parents and were part of the larger family. Marriage wasn't about romance or choice and consent (these things were arranged, even for older couples).   We can't always judge people by our own culture and cultural expectations.  

[Benjamin McGuire]

15 hours ago, Danzo said:

Isn't it the context that makes any decision good or bad?  If the decision improves the situation than it is a good decision.  If it makes the situation worse, its a bad decision. 

Not really. We have a saying (that I have used previously) about 'choosing the lesser of two evils'.

Quote

The lesser of two evils principle, also referred to as the lesser evil principle and lesser-evilism, is the principle that when faced with selecting from two immoral options, the least immoral one should be chosen. ... The maxim existed already in Platonic philosophy. In Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle writes: "For the lesser evil can be seen in comparison with the greater evil as a good, since this lesser evil is preferable to the greater one, and whatever preferable is good".

The challenge we have continued to have in this discussion is the problem of relativism. I think that whether or not we have an appropriate understanding, that we can in fact speak of a real good or a real morality that isn't tied only to circumstances. But here, you are suggesting that we don't have that - that there is no underlying good or bad, only circumstances. To put that in a more basic context, I am arguing that that lesser of two evils is still evil, and you are arguing that the lesser of two evils isn't evil at all, but good.

I don't disagree, by the way, with the idea that sometimes we are forced to make such a choice out of necessity. But I am not going to concede that the necessity makes the choice good - the choice isn't good, it is only better than the alternative(s).

15 hours ago, Danzo said:

The decision wasn't fundamentally bad if it led to a better outcome for all involved.   The same can be said for  any marriage.  Some marriages, even those involving adults are bad decisions because they make ones situation worse. 

I don't agree with this at all. The reason why I don't agree with this (and this has been part of my attempts to dig deeper into what these ideas mean) is that child marriage isn't the same as other marriages. Child marriage comes with a set of bad consequences that don't exist for other marriages. So even if all of the issues associated with marriage more broadly also occur with child marriage, there are issues with child marriage that are unique to that type of marriage. And this means that regardless of the outcomes that we see in any particular child marriage, child marriage as a whole is not as good as marriages between adults. And this means that fundamentally, child marriages are worse than adult marriages. This is the reason that I bring up the question about what is good about child marriage uniquely. Not a specific example of a child marriage, but child marriage in all of its contexts. If there is something good about it in all contexts then we can start to discuss how child marriage is fundamentally good. But, I am at a loss to find something that is fundamentally good about child marriage in this way.

An example of how it works well in a specific case isn't helpful - but the specific context generally cannot give us anything fundamental about child marriage, unless it applies to all child marriages.

And finally, the fact that I suggest that child marriages are worse than marriages made between adults isn't purely theoretical once we start looking at the data. Child marriages with 'good' outcomes are a minority. For example, currently between 40 and 50 percent of marriages end in divorce. That number climbs is in the 70-80 percent range for child marriages. And that is just one statistic that has that negative prediction. Perhaps you can find a statistic that provides a positive outcome for child marriages that exceeds the same statistic for marriage more generally. If it exists, this shouldn't be so hard. But, what it does point out is that your example (and the examples that you want to rely on for your argument) points to a challenge with your ideas - which is that having good outcomes is unlikely. And outliers don't make good justifications for policy decisions (which is what this thread is ultimately about). There is a reason why most of the U.S. frowns on early child marriages - and likewise why those that want to argue for child marriages (for whatever reason) tend to use the same arguments that have been raised here about the rare successes and the popular (and likely incorrect) religious beliefs about Mary the mother of Jesus.

15 hours ago, Danzo said:

In the case of my mother in law,

I don't really care about the example. The example isn't able to address the question of the fundamental nature of child marriages. That you keep wanting to return to this tells me that you don't actually have an argument about the fundamental nature of child marriage and the harms that it causes.

I have no disagreement with the fact that in the past, it has often been the lesser of two evils - but being the lesser of two evils doesn't somehow make evil good.

15 hours ago, Danzo said:

Everyone involved, even with 60 years hindsight sees their marriage as a good thing, with a good outcome, and better than any alternative available at the time.  and not as something fundamentally wrong. 

This just isn't true. I can only keep repeating myself - because you aren't actually responding to my comments - you are just repeating yourself without being able to explain why your example represents anything fundamental about child marriages and the harms they create - and yes, those harms may be more than worth experiencing in the context of specific situations. The risks posed by the child marriage may easily have been smaller than the risks posed by other options. In any culture and society, we shouldn't be putting people into the position of having to make a choice like this - choosing the lesser of two evils.

[Benjamin McGuire]

15 hours ago, Danzo said:

She sees her self as being deputized by the state and feels that visiting members of a certain ethnic group in her ward (their ward is responsible for member if this ethnic group in their area) would require that she might be forced by the law to be a police officer instead of a minister.

Look, again, your example doesn't mean anything to me. It reflects a wrongness.

The views that you are expressing reflect an entire range of misconceptions about the process as it usually plays out. Yesterday, I spent some time at the board meeting for the local (3-county) DHHS governance board. In 2023 (to date), of the reports made about potential abuse, only 25 percent were actually referred to Child Protective Services for an investigation. Of that 25 percent, only 2-3 percent were substantiated. Some of the cases where abuse could not be substantiated but where risk factors were present, families were invited (on a voluntary basis) to participate in provided family and parenting classes as a preventive measure. When targeted in this way, these classes (at least in my area) seem to be reasonably effective.

Reporters are never considered to be police officers. They only have the requirement to report when they believe that abuse is actually happening. Now if you have a family where professional reporters would believe that abuse is happening, then there is a good chance that there is real abuse happening. And the necessity to stop that abuse really outweighs these other concerns in my opinion. And frankly, this who discussion that you are having is disturbing because if there is real abuse happening, and the leadership in your ward is avoiding looking at it so that they don't have the liability created by that knowledge, this is problematic. It is like (to use an analogy that I appreciate) Luke 10:31 -

Quote

And by chance there came down a certain priest that way: and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.

Being the good neighbor isn't walking on the other side of the road, it is getting involved and helping to fix the issues.

It isn't the mandatory reporting laws that are impeding getting the situation improved, it is the attitudes of the members of your ward (yourself included).

[Benjamin McGuire]

14 hours ago, Danzo said:

I think it is also helpful to remember that we are judged by the law that we are given.  Not everyone has been given the same law and we are going to be judged by how we do with what we have.

I am not judging anyone. I have not said that your mother-in-law is a bad person. I have not said that those historically who were required to be child brides are bad people. What I am saying is that the practice of child marriage is bad - on a fundamental level. The way that we fix this isn't to condemn those that have engaged the practice - we fix it by eliminating the practice.

This isn't all that different (as I have pointed out) in declaring that other past practices are bad - like slavery. Slavery is fundamentally bad - even if in the past people have argued how there were situations in which slavery was good and helpful to those who were enslaved.

[Vanguard]

5 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

I don't really care about the example. The example isn't able to address the question of the fundamental nature of child marriages. That you keep wanting to return to this tells me that you don't actually have an argument about the fundamental nature of child marriage and the harms that it causes.

Again, could you comment on what you think the good, fundamental nature of unions are that are not child marriages? You have pressed others to explain what this nature is for child marriages but I can't find where you explained the alternative.

Edited December 15, 2023 by Vanguard

[Calm]

9 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

can only keep repeating myself - because you aren't actually responding to my comments

I think it is hard for some of us to wrap our heads around how you can see a tree that is fundamentally bad as producing wonderful fruit, to use the most common analogy.  Danzo’s example was not just making the best of a bad situation with the results less than what anyone would want for themselves.  The results were possibly even close to ideal for those involved if I understand Danzo correctly.

Edited December 16, 2023 by Calm

[Danzo]

10 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

Look, again, your example doesn't mean anything to me. It reflects a wrongness.

The views that you are expressing reflect an entire range of misconceptions about the process as it usually plays out. Yesterday, I spent some time at the board meeting for the local (3-county) DHHS governance board. In 2023 (to date), of the reports made about potential abuse, only 25 percent were actually referred to Child Protective Services for an investigation. Of that 25 percent, only 2-3 percent were substantiated. Some of the cases where abuse could not be substantiated but where risk factors were present, families were invited (on a voluntary basis) to participate in provided family and parenting classes as a preventive measure. When targeted in this way, these classes (at least in my area) seem to be reasonably effective.

Reporters are never considered to be police officers. They only have the requirement to report when they believe that abuse is actually happening. Now if you have a family where professional reporters would believe that abuse is happening, then there is a good chance that there is real abuse happening. And the necessity to stop that abuse really outweighs these other concerns in my opinion. And frankly, this who discussion that you are having is disturbing because if there is real abuse happening, and the leadership in your ward is avoiding looking at it so that they don't have the liability created by that knowledge, this is problematic. It is like (to use an analogy that I appreciate) Luke 10:31 -

Being the good neighbor isn't walking on the other side of the road, it is getting involved and helping to fix the issues.

It isn't the mandatory reporting laws that are impeding getting the situation improved, it is the attitudes of the members of your ward (yourself included).

I think you and I are looking at the issue from completely different points of view.

Talking to police officers (or people acting as law enforcement officers) is always a bad idea.  Always!

Any attorney who suggests that someone talk to an investigating officer (or someone acting as one) without an attorney is probably risking being disbarred.

Talking to the police (or someone acting as one) is the dumbest thing one can do if there is any risk that one might be part of the investigation.  It can never help you and can really harm you.  This isn't controversial in the legal world.  Anything you say can be used against you.  Nothing you say can be used to help you. Nothing!  This is evidence 101.  (Federal rules of evidence 801 if one wants to look it up)

I have seen it over and over again. I am dealing with a case in court right now where talking to law enforcement may cost my client an extra $200,000.00.   This is why you don't talk to investigators of any kind.  This is why you go through an attorney.

It doesn't matter whether the person calls themselves a police officer or a social worker or just a mandatory reporter.  Communicating with law enforcement without an attorney present is a bad idea.  

People come to me all the time to talk about the legality of the things they are doing. They pay me to do it.  Because what they tell me is privileged. because of this, they can talk to me freely and frankly. Often before the  conversation starts the client askes if it is safe to talk to me.   If I told them I was forced to report what they told me, the conversation would immediately stop.  

Because their conversation with me is protected, they can tell me the whole story. Often, I tell them that what they are doing is against the law. Then we come up with a plan to change their behavior start following the law.  Sometimes we even decide to disclose the behavior to the government, but often what happens is that we correct the behavior. Almost always the client is more compliant with the law after meeting with me than before meeting with me.  These conversations, even though they are protected actually increase compliance with the law, but they wouldn't happen without having these conversations protected by the law.

Conversations can't happen if in the background you know that the person you are talking to is required by law to report what you tell them to the authorities. It doesn't matter whether the person actually reports the conversation or not.  The perception is the reality here. If the perception is that you are going to be reported for your you say, you just aren't going to say it. 

 

 

 

[Stormin' Mormon]

11 hours ago, Benjamin McGuire said:

The challenge we have continued to have in this discussion is the problem of relativism. I think that whether or not we have an appropriate understanding, that we can in fact speak of a real good or a real morality that isn't tied only to circumstances. But here, you are suggesting that we don't have that - that there is no underlying good or bad, only circumstances. To put that in a more basic context, I am arguing that that lesser of two evils is still evil, and you are arguing that the lesser of two evils isn't evil at all, but good.

It's the Manichean approach here that I disagree with. You seem to be saying that if something isn't good, then it's bad, and if it's not bad, then it's good.

Can something just be neither good nor bad? Can it exist without any moral valence whatsoever until circumstance and use gives it one?

[MiserereNobis]

I'm a high school English teacher and thus a mandatory reporter. Obviously I read a lot of student writing so there's a greater chance I find out about something than, say, a math teacher. I've been teaching for 17 years and have reported twice. Once was a journal entry where student wrote about smoking pot regularly with her mother. The student was very positive and happy about it. This was an upper middle class family, parents still together, girl drove a nice car, etc. Without mandatory reporting (and because of my personal feelings about cannabis) I might have just let that one go, but there was no way I was risking my job and getting in trouble with the law. The other time was a truly abusive situation. A girl wrote a narrative essay about on going sexual abuse at the hands of her father. She was definitely asking for help by doing that. I immediately got our best guidance counselor involved (who got the school social worker involved) to help support her through the upcoming difficult times. I had to fill out the reporting form for that one, too, since I was the first person she disclosed it too. Obviously I would have reported that even without mandatory reporting laws.

I had a girl years ago write in her journal about a recent theatre trip where the theatre teacher was creepy towards her and some other girls. She wrote about the comments he made and didn't mention anything physical. I turned that over to the principal and was told I didn't need to fill out the mandatory reporting form and that the school district would investigate. At the end of the year he resigned his position and moved away. I wonder about that situation.

[Tacenda]

10 minutes ago, MiserereNobis said:

I'm a high school English teacher and thus a mandatory reporter. Obviously I read a lot of student writing so there's a greater chance I find out about something than, say, a math teacher. I've been teaching for 17 years and have reported twice. Once was a journal entry where student wrote about smoking pot regularly with her mother. The student was very positive and happy about it. This was an upper middle class family, parents still together, girl drove a nice car, etc. Without mandatory reporting (and because of my personal feelings about cannabis) I might have just let that one go, but there was no way I was risking my job and getting in trouble with the law. The other time was a truly abusive situation. A girl wrote a narrative essay about on going sexual abuse at the hands of her father. She was definitely asking for help by doing that. I immediately got our best guidance counselor involved (who got the school social worker involved) to help support her through the upcoming difficult times. I had to fill out the reporting form for that one, too, since I was the first person she disclosed it too. Obviously I would have reported that even without mandatory reporting laws.

I had a girl years ago write in her journal about a recent theatre trip where the theatre teacher was creepy towards her and some other girls. She wrote about the comments he made and didn't mention anything physical. I turned that over to the principal and was told I didn't need to fill out the mandatory reporting form and that the school district would investigate. At the end of the year he resigned his position and moved away. I wonder about that situation.

I think you did the right thing in each instance. 

[CA Steve]

17 hours ago, Calm said:

I think it is hard for some of us to wrap our heads around how you can see a tree that is fundamentally bad as producing wonderful fruit, to use the most common analogy.  Danzo’s example was not just making the best of a bad situation with the results less than what anyone would want for themselves.  The results were possibly even close to ideal for those involved if I understand Danzo correctly.

I think it is because you and Danzo are looking at individual trees and Ben is talking about orchards. When you plant an orchard in bad soil the results are worse than when you have good soil. Sure, some trees are going to thrive even in the bad soil but overall, it makes a huge difference. But, hey, what do I know? I can't understand nuance, I have kneejerk reactions and have no background in women's issues.

[Calm]

21 hours ago, CA Steve said:

I think it is because you and Danzo are looking at individual trees and Ben is talking about orchards. When you plant an orchard in bad soil the results are worse than when you have good soil. Sure, some trees are going to thrive even in the bad soil but overall, it makes a huge difference. But, hey, what do I know? I can't understand nuance, I have kneejerk reactions and have no background in women's issues.

To me it appears you are examining an idealized forest and drawing conclusions from it about how trees exist in a real forest without looking at either the trees (a specific couple’s relationship) or the actual forest (a society such couple’s exist in)….say like saying a certain soil should never be used for a forest…which is great if you have other soils to use, but if it is a choice between a not great soil and no soil at all, can one say use of that soil is always bad (fundamentally bad) if there is actual growth that occurs and the trees survive and even produce good fruit?

I don’t see how the ideal situation (no child marriage ever) is being connected to reality—as in showing rather than assuming the child marriage doesn’t provide anything an adult marriage couldn’t provide—in Danzo’s example as she wasn’t going to be able to get nurturing and protection in her society in any other way because her society didn’t provide such things.  Waiting till she was an adult in that time and place would have been more harmful for her, not less due to her immediate needs.

I am looking at this like I would a math equation which describes a particular function.  It makes a certain sense when it just has variables in place, such as you can see it involves addition and subtraction when it is just a+b-c=d, and you can even manipulate it by combining it with other functions, etc so in one sense you can describe it as good or bad, but I don’t see how you can call it fundamentally good or bad if the function makes sense, as in there are valid results in some cases but also there are values that yield nonsense.

There are some functions that will not work at all, so those could be viewed as fundamentally bad, but if a function even yields one valid result, it does appear to me there is a range of variables for which the function can be defined as good.  Maybe the range amounts to one value only, but it still exists.  In that case I would describe the function as having a very probable result of failure rather than describing it as fundamentally bad.

Same thing with marriage.  Marriage has certain attributes, but most of them exist within a society, defined by by social expectations and legal constructs.  You have a marriage type (child) that is a failure/harmful in almost every situation and yet in at least one case provides protections the person can’t get any other way, then .I don’t see it as being able to be defined as fundamentally bad.

And I would like to understand, but it seems like the reasoning comes down to ‘it is recognized as undesirable in all cases, therefore it is fundamentally bad even though it might be the best solution for a specific case’.

——

what follows is unnecessary hopefully to understand my comments above, but I added it to show the thought process.

I suppose I see something as having bad attributes if it is harms.  Something is fundamentally bad imo when all its attributes are bad, harmful so that since it causes harm in every case, it can’t result in good things.  The lesser of two evils means for me that one evil causes less harm, not that it results in some good things and some bad.  

I realize there are very few things, if any, that only result in good things, so there are few mortal things I would label as fundamentally good.  Even love can harm at times.  God’s love I would say is fundamentally good, but he is a perfect being that has allegedly perfect knowledge and I assume that the evils that appear to be a result of God’s love (such as the unavoidable pains that comes as part of the mortal experience of birth, growing up and growing old and dying) have meaningful, benefits in reality that we just lack understanding such as the birth experience must seem like meaningless pain to a baby who has no awareness that the hours of labour will allow them to continue to grow and are absolutely necessary due to the benefit to survival for the baby to be more developed and having a larger brain, etc…getting off track here.

There are likely more things that can only result in harmful things, such as torture (I don’t believe torture is best for getting reliable intelligence, perhaps if someone demonstrates that it actually does, that torture has saved lives that could have been saved in no other way, I might say one can’t even call torture to save other lives is fundamentally bad.  I think I can say without conditions that torture for pleasure is inherently evil in that even the pleasure it gives to the torturer is harmful to them because it will cause them to more likely torture someone again, which causes harm.

Slavery is possibly fundamentally bad in my view, but I would have to be more informed about the cultures and if there were options for those made slaves to survive as free individuals. It seems like people could agree to band together to help each other in any society even if there are some that might choose to refuse.  In that case the others could just exclude that individual so their resources are not used by someone who does not contribute and won’t eventually.  My guess though are that there have been cultures that were so xenophobic anyone seen as “other” were killed and the only way to avoid that was to become property and there might be situations for the “other” where there was no option of living elsewhere (famine, war perhaps) or there was just no way for them to get to areas they could survive, so being expelled as other was as much of a death sentence as being outright executed.  I think slavery could be seen as a better outcome than life imprisonment or execution if those were the options available, say for manslaughter, someone was made a slave to replace the person they had accidentally killed, especially if this only meant they were required to stay and work as needed and not allowed to be mistreated.

I have no problem calling slavery dysfunctional because while there may be good resulting from it as in some individuals survive that would not have in certain societies that provide no other options, it perpetuates itself in many cases.  For example, prisoners of war made slaves instead of being executed….it may create a society that goes to war to get slaves.  What looks like economic or safety benefits of owning slaves will also drive up the ‘need’ for slaves (societies may mistakenly believe they are safer with some as slaves rather than free without realizing that the slavery creates the rebellion and violence they are attempting to control by enslavement).

For me, it just makes more sense to talk in probabilities and not absolutes when it comes to human behaviour as behaviour is so varied.  Slavery has a high probability of bad results with rare exceptions, for example of societies with very limited resources using slavery as a very limited alternative to execution for crimes.  Of course, this can also go wrong by making harsh punishments for trivial crimes more likely to fill the desire for slaves, if this happens in each case in reality, I would remove this as “good result”.  Same with societies that enslave “others” rather than executing them.  If this is shown to always lead to more xenophobia, to create a vicious cycle iow, then it would make sense to remove this from the rare cases of slavery being beneficial even in a limited way.  This is getting way too detailed, but I am trying to show why I see speaking in probabilities and not absolutes is more useful and it is not just that I am ignoring how some behaviours result in more harm than good whether it is big picture or small. 

Back to child marriage…I don’t think one can assume that allowing some child marriage is always going to result in creating a vicious cycle of more child marriages, even if one assumes like I do it is never a good thing for a minor to have sex, meaning the benefits of early sex will never outweigh the costs in my view because marriage isn’t only about the effect of having sex.  And realistically child marriage may be a necessary part of a culture as the culture hopefully transitions to a more functional form….such as in the case of Danzo’s relative (hopefully her country has better social safety nets for neglected children) or the Romani females who lived in a society that lacked protections for children and a rampant rape culture (unfortunately there is still a lot of rape culture out there in the world, but at least it isn’t part of the legal rights of landowners or nobility as in primae noctis or Droit du seigneur, etc anymore).

 

Edited December 17, 2023 by Calm

[MustardSeed]

Are there any lifestyle examples of fundamental badness? 

[Vanguard]

6 minutes ago, MustardSeed said:

Are there any lifestyle examples of fundamental badness? 

Ate there any lifestyle examples of fundamental goodness?

[Benjamin McGuire]

On 12/15/2023 at 1:55 PM, Vanguard said:

Again, could you comment on what you think the good, fundamental nature of unions are that are not child marriages? You have pressed others to explain what this nature is for child marriages but I can't find where you explained the alternative.

Your question doesn't make a lot of sense. Child marriage is a sub-category of marriage. Child marriage (as a sub-category) would potentially contain all of the fundamental good that comes with marriage. But, there are unique additional aspects of child marriage (which distinguish it from other marriages between adults) - and those unique aspects are harmful.

What is the alternative that you are suggesting exists? The alternative to child marriage isn't other types of marriage, it is simply not to allow child marriages. We don't offer the choice of child marriages to parents for their children. Or, to put it another way, and to illustrate through one of the harmful facets of child marriage, we allow individuals to have their own autonomy when making decisions about marriage (and sex) - an autonomy that children don't have.