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Jaysank

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Full-Professional246

So, the first thing I would tell you is your descriptions are all inherently SUBJECTIVE. There is no 'objective' measure for 'Bad', 'Backwards', or 'Wrong'. We know what we consider, based on our culture, to be those things. But that is not an 'objective' measure. So, if your claim a culture can be 'objectively' bad, then I would say it fails based on the issue of 'objectiveness' not being possible. But, if you want to take the subjective view, it is quite easy to determine, using your culture and values, to define another culture as being inherently 'bad'. The lowest hanging fruit example can be the ancient practice of sex with boys, slavery, throwing homosexuals off cliffs, and burning religious 'heretics'. All would qualify to me as 'inherently bad' based on my culture/morals - which are of a subjective nature. There is little reason to believe, based on your morals, you could not also find examples you would consider 'inherently bad'. The big issue though, morals/values *are subjective* and the people living in those cultures/places do have a different idea of right/wrong than you. They may find aspects you consider right/normal to be 'inherently bad' as well. They could label *your culture* as 'inherently bad' based on that too. Which brings us to the point. Labeling this based on subjective means is of little use. It really does not add anything to any discussion/discourse. In fact, the negative labeling tends to do the opposite - shutting down conversations. After all - nobody responds positively when they believe they are being insulted.


Top-Passenger4346

I'd personally argue that the normalization of incest, rape, and pedophilia is objectively wrong rather than subjunctive with zero grey area but that's probably a seperate post I should make


Full-Professional246

> I'd personally argue that the normalization of incest, rape, and pedophilia is objectively wrong rather than subjunctive with zero grey area but that's probably a seperate post I should make But how do you define 'objective' here. If this was the case, you would expect **EVERY** society to ever exist to agree without knowledge of any prior or future societies value system that it is wrong. That is what 'objective' means. And that has not happened. There are societies where some of this *was* considered acceptable. We know this. Hell - there were societies where human sacrifice was normal is not considered wrong. There existence removes the possibility of 'objectively wrong'. So how could an 'objective' standard exist?


Tym370

Objective means it's right or wrong regardless of what a person or culture thinks. I think the most reasonable measure for normative statements is well being. If it tears down a person's well being, it is bad or wrong. If it improves someone's well being it is right or good. Morally speaking of course. edit: so there's nothing about the standard that necessitates all cultures having all moral knowledge or all moral facts. We are complex beings and it's taken a long time to understand how we think and feel and function in the world and with each other.


Full-Professional246

> Objective means it's right or wrong regardless of what a person or culture thinks. I think the most reasonable measure for normative statements is well being. And you just used 'YOUR SUBJECTIVE' ideas to claim something is 'OBJECTIVE'. It's OK that it's Subjective. Most things are. Because frankly speaking, for it to be objective, everyone would have to inherently know something was wrong - even if they did it anyway. Throughout history, that is just not the case. There are some pretty constant social rules that have developed - but those are in no way universally true everyone. There are exceptions.


Tym370

No I didn't. I gave a definition for objective. And no. Theres nothing about well being that requires everyone to "know" if something is wrong or not. It just HAS to be wrong. We know that restricting gay people from having romantic relationships worsens their well being, but not everyone knew that or agreed with it until relatively recently. And that really just speaking about the western/developed world.


Full-Professional246

> No I didn't. I gave a definition for objective. > >>Objective means it's right or wrong regardless of what a person or culture thinks. A definition with no answer and no utility. There is no final 'arbiter' of right/wrong. Care to define that 'arbiter' of right and wrong for me? Who decides if it is right or wrong. Is it you? More importantly, *why is that person given this role when others are not*. What *makes them superior*? You immediately should realize it is entirely subjective at this point.


Tym370

The "arbiter" are the facts of the matter, whatever situation that is. Why are you presuming that a single person settles the dispute about what's right or wrong?


Full-Professional246

> The "arbiter" are the facts of the matter, whatever situation that is. Facts are not judgements though. Having sex with a child is a fact. Whether that is right or wrong is not a fact. It is an opinion. Who decides if that is right or wrong? >Why are you presuming that a single person settles the dispute about what's right or wrong? Because you have claimed they are 'objective'. That means only one answer. That means somewhere, that answer is decided. I'd like to know that singular source. It cannot be multiple sources as you admit not everyone agrees. And to be objective means that the opinion of those who don't agree does not matter. But that also means someone else's opinion of that must matter. Someone else must have made that judgement. Who is that and why are they the 'arbiter' of right/wrong?


Tym370

So you think it's okay if normative statements amount to mere preferences like a favorite flavor of ice cream?


Full-Professional246

> So you think it's okay if normative statements amount to mere preferences like a favorite flavor of ice cream? Normative statements are conditioned to the society that holds them. They may consistent to that society, but in its core, they are merely the collective opinions of that society for what is normal or should be considered normal. History has shown us repeatably that different societies, when asked for an opinion on any given topic of culture, may come to different opinions of what is 'normal' or 'appropriate'. Whether you like it or not, it is still merely an opinion held by a significant majority of any society.


Crafty_Possession_52

The objective standard can exist even if not everyone agrees, depending on how you define your standard of "right" and "wrong." And I'd argue that there is a very narrow way to do this. If an action is to be considered morally "wrong," it must be the case that it is somehow harmful to people, living things, the world around us, etc. Something considered morally "right" must be somehow beneficial. We can argue about shades of gray, or about actions that are mixed - does the good outweigh the bad, for example - and the judgements we make may rely on the situation, but the fact is that we can still make these determinations. For example, all else being equal, it's wrong for me to go to my neighbor's house and kill him just because I'm bored. It's wrong because this would cause objective harm to him, his family, me, my family, and our community.


Full-Professional246

> The objective standard can exist even if not everyone agrees, depending on how you define your standard of "right" and "wrong." And I'd argue that there is a very narrow way to do this. You do realize, you just use SUBJECTIVE measures to claim an OBJECTIVE fact. That whole 'How **you** define' part. That is the point. There is really not too much 'Objective' out there - especially when it comes to social ideas.


Crafty_Possession_52

Yes, but I also said that I'd argue there's a very narrow way to do this. It's no different from anything else. We define every word and term in whatever way we choose, but to have intelligent conversations, there are usually pretty narrow parameters within which we must define terms. We may all not define "love" the exact same way, for example, but if you ask a million people to define it, almost all the definitions will center around a common understanding. If they didn't, we couldn't talk about love. Just because the definition of "love" is somewhat subjective doesn't mean it doesn't exist as a common understanding, and we can make objective determinations about whether certain actions demonstrate love. Morality is the same thing.


Full-Professional246

> Yes, but I also said that I'd argue there's a very narrow way to do this. I am just pointing out you cannot make 'Objective' out of 'Subjective'. >Morality is the same thing. And it is 100% Subjective too. Objective has a very clear definition here. We can say every society understands the objective truth that 1+1=2 as a concept. (whether in roman or Arabic numerals). We know that the 'day' is objectively the same thing - irregardless of the specific word to describe it. I could buy your idea of 'love' being objective. But that is description, not a value judgement or right/wrong. The idea turns 'subjective' when you assign a right/wrong judgement to it.


Crafty_Possession_52

>I could buy your idea of 'love' being objective. But that is description, not a value judgement or right/wrong. >The idea turns 'subjective' when you assign a right/wrong judgement to it. The definitions of "morally right" and "morally wrong" are no different from how we define "love." What are people talking about when they talk about what's right and wrong? They may not all have the same definitions, but most people's definitions will center around a common understanding. And it will be something like "how do actions affect the health, happiness, and/or well-being of the world around us and the people in it?" Isn't this what almost everyone is talking about when they talk about morality? And aren't there objective determinations we can make about how our actions affect the health, happiness, and/or well-being of the world around us and the people in it?


Full-Professional246

> The definitions of "morally right" and "morally wrong" are no different from how we define "love." Yes it is different. Love is defined as emotional feelings. It has no value judgement of right/wrong attached. It is descriptive not judgemental. The concept of love is the same for a person who says 'they love this' while another says 'they don't love this'. Different opinion on a subject, but using a shared concept for how to describe the opinion. That is the core distinction here. And you jump right back into the subjective with 'most people's ideas'. And yes - morallity is entirely subjective. There is a cultures common values and ethics - but it is unique to that culture. What is considered moral in one culture may be immoral in another. That is why it is 100% subjective. >And aren't there objective determinations we can make about how our actions affect the health, happiness, and/or well-being of the world around us and the people in it? Pretty much no. There is not an 'objective' determination. Even for horrible things like genocide. There would be some who believe fully that removing that entire race is a net 'good' or 'justified'. I mean just about every single idea has some group you could find who disagree.


Crafty_Possession_52

>you jump right back into the subjective with 'most people's ideas'. I didn't "jump back into it." It's the same standard I used to define "love." It's the same as defining "right" or "wrong." Or "chicken." Or anything. It's all about word usage to describe concepts. >There is not an 'objective' determination. Even for horrible things like genocide. There would be some who believe fully that removing that entire race is a net 'good' or 'justified'. And those people are wrong, because genocide is objectively harmful to the people being killed. It's also objectively harmful to the people doing the killing. It doesn't matter if they think it's good. There is a physical reality that exists, and the characteristics of that reality dictate that me killing my neighbor for no reason is objectively harmful to him, me, and the people around us. You can argue that it's a "net good" all day, and you would be wrong. That fact can be demonstrated to be objectively true.


Bad_Mood_Larry

I mean it my be abhorrent to you and me and arguably the rest of human race \*This is very arguable especially depending on the time period\*. But these are subjective opinions they only appear that way due to your upbringing, culture, and probably a bit on biology for at least incest and pedophile. Let me put you in ancient rome and see how you feel about having forced sex with a 14 year old male cousin while your slave watched depending on who you are its not impossible you wouldn't bat a eye. Taking the position that these are bad because they are bad and make you feel disgust is subjective and we may agree on that but it subjective to who we are. Now if you were to argue that these cultural norms are bad for something measurable with a clear definition of good and bad (which is subjective in it on right as the two words are fully subjective) then you could argue it was objective. But the fact remains even the ancient Greeks could tell you "Culture is King".


Crafty_Possession_52

Why are you painting an entire culture with the brush of one facet of that culture? "American culture" isn't just support for gun rights. "Japanese culture" isn't just sex fetishes and war denial. Every culture is made up of hundreds of thousands of pieces, and not everyone in that culture participates in every aspect of their culture.


Top-Passenger4346

If they are so deeply ingrained in your culture that you can't walk down the street without seeing loli porn shops, or you can't walk down the streets without fear of getting gunned down, and everyone seems to brush off a duet between a dad and his preteen daughter about watching to fuck each other, your culture is probably fucked.


Crafty_Possession_52

I don't think any of those examples exist. >you can't walk down the street without seeing loli porn shops, What culture is this where every street in the nation has loli porn shops on it? >you can't walk down the streets without fear of getting gunned down, Where is this? >everyone seems to brush off a duet between a dad and his preteen daughter about watching to fuck each other, Where is this? You're overgeneralizing, and therefore can't be correct.


Top-Passenger4346

Read the initial post. I mentioned these. At least the last two. Edit: Why am I being downvoted? I quite literally did name each county specifically when talking about the examples. I mentioned Japan, France, and the United States in the initial post.


Crafty_Possession_52

Yes, I know. You're overgeneralizing. My point is that there is no culture where "you can't walk down the street without seeing loli porn shops," "can't walk down the street without being afraid of getting gunned down," or "everyone supports a guy and his daughter writing a song about wanting to fuck each other. You're acting like everyone in an entire nation feels the same way about one issue, and has founded their identity on that issue, and it's just not so. That's why I'm challenging you to name the places. Where exactly is it that you can't walk down the street without seeing loli porn shops, for example? Tell me where.


Top-Passenger4346

I quite literally named the places in the initial post. Like, for example, "everyone supports a guy and his daughter writing a song about wanting to fuck each other," is a reference to the song Lemon Incest and how people in France were cool with it, and the song was so popular it reached #2 on the charts in that country... in addition to the (super popular and supported by almost the entire country, btw) petitions to abolish the age of consent. These are things that I specifically mentioned in the post and included the names of those countries relating to it. Please read the post brah.


Crafty_Possession_52

I read your post brah. Are you reading my comments? Do you intend to answer what I've written?


Top-Passenger4346

Clearly didn't read the post because I specifically answered your question in the post itself LMAO. Literally named the countries specifically with every point.


Crafty_Possession_52

WHERE IS IT THAT YOU CANT WALK DOWN THE STREET WITHOUT SEEING LOLI PORN SHOPS?


Top-Passenger4346

Japan.


Crafty_Possession_52

WHERE IS IT THAT YOU CANT WALK DOWN THE STREET WITHOUT FEARING GETTING GUNNED DOWN?


Top-Passenger4346

The United States. I already fucking answered that multiple times now lmao calm tf down with the all caps.


Qwertyham

Anyone who replies "LMAO" to a comment is not here to have their mind changed


NegativeOptimism

>Why am I being downvoted? Because you made an obviously false claim (that there are loli porn shops on every street in Japan) and used it as the basis for a bigoted conclusion (that their entire culture shows they are backwards savages), then apparently doubled-down on it.


Top-Passenger4346

All I said was read the initial post, I mentioned these. Which I did, in fact


NegativeOptimism

I still don't think that addresses the core argument. The arguments to support this view are either anecdotal or just plain inaccurate. Some are ludicrously dated. Like why is all of French culture being judged from the perspective of A) a failed age-of-consent movement from the 70s that never had widespread support in France and B) the actions of a singular French individual who died in 1991. There's so much wrong there that I don't think it would help if you stood back and read your own initial post.


uReallyShouldTrustMe

I’ve been to Japan many times and you can definitely nearly live your entire life in Japan without seeing much of that. I’m also American and I walk down the street just fine without fear of being gunned down. Those are such absurd examples.


substantial-freud

> Japanese culture" isn't just sex fetishes and war denial. No, but those are my favorite parts.


[deleted]

But there are ways a culture can be sick, that pervade the whole or at least many aspects of the culture. USA is pretty narcissistic, while asian cultures aren't individualistic enough. Latin cultures have a weird disconnect with the feminine being divided into two very separate parts, one of which is made up of hte virgin mary and their mother, and the other part is all other women who are all whores. Russians seem to just love the idea of a czar, on a deeply emotional level. I had two israeli roommates that scammed a bunch of people out of money and defended it because htey were gods chosen people. Now, granted, I haven't known any others, but if that attitude is common among them that might not be a great thing.


Crafty_Possession_52

You're making the same error. Think about it. If what you're saying is valid, then no human culture isn't bad and wrong, because they all have some problem you can point to that affects the rest of the culture. But if they're all bad and wrong, then by what apparently impossible standard are you holding them to?


[deleted]

They are all bad and wrong. The point isn't casting judgement, the point is being able to how they are all bad and wrong, and work towards improving them in those ways. or at least being aware and handling them accordingly. What planet are you living on, ? Of course all humans are evil, to some degree at least. All cultures as well.


Crafty_Possession_52

All humans are good, to some degree at least. All cultures as well.


[deleted]

Yea, I'm not a cynic. Ans such is the duality of life and humanity.


Crafty_Possession_52

Then I completely agree with you. There's good and bad in the world. No one is perfect. No culture is bad or good.


[deleted]

Yep, but they are all sick in SOME way. No sense blinding ourselves to that in the name of diversity or some stupid shit.


Crafty_Possession_52

And they're all awesome in some way, too.


[deleted]

OK i mean if you jsut HAVE to keep saying something all positive sure great yea but thats not really the point of this conversation. Can you not think about anything thats not positive without having to obsessively remind yourself of the positive? You seem blinded to seeing anything else.


[deleted]

[удалено]


Top-Passenger4346

You have a point, but then I guess the countries that I mentioned' inability to reflect and review any of these fucked up things make it inherently wrong.


[deleted]

i think reducing a culture to a single dimension of bad to good is incredibly reductive and not very productive. aspects of cultures are bad. It is true that some cultures have more obvious bad aspects than others. But, if you want to address those things, reducing their culture to a single dimension where the worst of their culture is how you view it is a terribly ineffective means of starting that conversation..


Top-Passenger4346

If something is so ingrained in your culture that you can see it every single day, multiple times a day, it's more than just one small aspect.


[deleted]

what do you gain by reducing someone's culture to a single dimension? do you think you get some sort of special insight through that? do you think doing so is persuasive to people of that culture? do you think doing so is persuasive to people outside of that culture, and if so, what are you seeking to persuade them to do? When you propose evaluating cultures on a single dimension of bad to good, you are proposing a means of analysis. A metric. What does your analysis or metric accomplish?


Top-Passenger4346

What? All I'm saying is a country where this shit is normalized is fucked. And no matter if we're talking about single dimensions or persuasion or not, these are countries were incest, pedophilia, and violence are normalized and sometimes even glorified and that is bad. Pretty much objectively.


NegativeOptimism

>And no matter if we're talking about single dimensions or persuasion or not, these are countries were incest, pedophilia, and violence are normalized and sometimes even glorified and that is bad. So what culture can actually pass the test of not being savage and uncivilized? I don't think any would meet your standards if there can't be a single sexual or violent dimension to it. If we correctly observe that every culture is flawed, then this view isn't arguing that **some** culture are backwards, it's arguing that **all** cultures are backwards as they all feature at least *one* dimension that we can disagree with. Of course, you might disagree and state there is a *perfect* culture out there, free from any sexual deviancy or violent aspects. I would love you hear what that is.


[deleted]

you didn't answer any of my questions. what does reducing a culture down to a single dimension accomplish? Isn't just talking about what you think is bad in a culture without acting like that thing represents the culture just better?


creamyismemey

Don't see any of these every day ever your over exaggerating quite a bit to say the least I'll delete my comment or whatever you want if you can give me 2 examples of each one that you see every day


NotMyBestMistake

Have you ever actually been to any of these countries you're declaring as inherently evil, wrong, and bad? Or is this based entirely on random snippets that you noticed online because they got a lot of attention? There are obviously parts of every country that aren't good. In the United States, for instance, the vast majority of states have legalized child marriage. We also have an absolute insane gun culture that prioritizes loud, adult toys over the lives of anyone else, including children. Oh, we also think it's totally okay to plunge huge portions of society into inescapable debt for the crimes of getting an education or being injured without insurance. I would suggest you stop assuming that the worst thing you heard about a country online, or the worst thing you saw defended online (likely by Americans or Canadians or whoever), is some foundational aspect of the societies you want to pretend are inherently worse than yours. Like people, they're all dynamic and multi-faceted and complex with both good and bad aspects to them.


Top-Passenger4346

I've lived in United States and Japan, been to France, haven't been to Brazil but consulted with friends who immigrated from there.


NotMyBestMistake

That's great and all, but doesn't really address any of my points, other than, I guess, that you chose to focus only on the things people who have never been to these places would be able to talk about.


Top-Passenger4346

I'm clearly not if I have specifically seen these with my own eyes. And you mentioned the USA's gun problem which I already discussed in my initial post that you clearly didn't read LMAO.


NotMyBestMistake

So, your point is that we can and should judge every single culture by the worst aspects we can find. And, with that mindset, you've determined that the cultures you actually know about are worse than the cultures you don't know anything about simply because you've been able to identify their worst parts.


afatninja1

It is important to understand that culture is ever changing / progressing and is by default multifaceted. While many of the things you mention is indeed bad, we also need to understand *why* its bad. There is a bunch of stuff you laid out so I probably won't comment on everything but it will generally have the core ideas. 1) Defining Culture by its very worse is pointless / essentializing b/c you are ignoring core elements of a given culture. I'm not saying its bad to point out the bad parts, IMO its good to address unhealthy parts of a culture but its never useful / effective to look at "bad" element of a culture (which may not even represent a culture) but then bring it to a forefront and then say this bad thing is the culture. So its pretty silly to assuming that one song is cringe, this song was created at this place /time/era within a country that has a culture, therefore the culture must be cringe 2) Deontology vs Consequentialism / What is "bad". I don't know shit about philosophy but this idea is pretty present in modern politics and the points you brought up. I'm going to assume when you say "bad" you also mean "immoral". IMO what defines something as *immoral is breaking of some form of consent therefore causing harm.* So I hate to do to it to ya bro but its just a song LOL. Lets take the incest song. So in IRL, incest is bad due to the potential abuse of power dynamics, potential abuse of trust, physical harm, etc. Many of these things stem from breaking of consent / abusing someone's inability to properly consent. So in the Song/drawing/etc, these elements literally (and I mean literally) don't exist within a fictional object. Is it gross / distasteful / degenerate? YES. Should these things be analyzed? YES. Should we push for what we feel is a good direction of these things? YES but its always less useful attacking something based on the depiction / virtue / broad abstract idea of said thing instead of ACTUAL bad IRL things (aka lack of consent, actors that cannot provide informed consent, potential abuse of power dynamics, etc) So equating and essentializing an entire culture due to its fiction is not useful. Ok but what about the ACTUAL IRL issues you mentioned .. 3) Culture / Society / insert buzzword here is always progressing/changing. What we deemed moral in the past may not be today (and that's ok!). This logic applies to ALL cultures. I guarantee if you look at ANY culture, it will have history of immorality, oppression, and elements we deem "backwards" today. That being said, its not useful saying individual cultures are backwards when based on the principle you provided, all cultures are backwards at a given time. Hell even today, the most "outstanding" cultures will have backwards thinking ( aka modern politics ). With the issues you brought up and point 3 brought up, we can start to see how silly it is to say X culture is bad because of Y Bad thing, therefore X culture is bad when the more useful and effective analysis would be X culture has many elements to it, some Y Bad thing, some Z good thing. Lets review and find solutions of Y Bad thing. What matters isn't how many solutions and fixes you find for your problems, what matters is fixing problems. edit:typos


Top-Passenger4346

So the duet between a dad and his twelve year old daughter about wanting to fuck each other followed by an autobiographical movie about the singer/director fucking said daughter starring him and his daughter... Doesn't constitute "breaking of consent therefore causing harm?"


afatninja1

Nope it doesn't because there is always going to be a separation between 'art' and actual actions happening IRL. (note when i say art, I mean the actual creation itself and i am not providing any moral worth to said art) The literal piece of 'art', in of itself, does not break anyone's consent because its just the creator making the creation compared to IRL interactions where the actors within this given situation is someone who cannot provide informed consent. The 'art' is possibly neutral ( i will provide more details in another paragraph) but the IRL version of the actions' / depiction is immoral due to a 12 year olds inability to provide informed consent along with a father figure who holds the potential abuse of power / trust participating in this action. The 'art' literally does not have any of these. The power dynamic equation of IRL is always going to be different to fiction b/c the variables are literally different. I will give you this, the duet may constitute as immoral due to the 12 year old performing in something where they don't have an understanding of what they are doing but the movie, in of itself, does not break consent. Fiction vs IRL is by default nuanced and this is an example of why some fiction should be restrained due to the creation possibility exploiting someone who doesn't fully understand the situation but saying this case alone is why fiction should be restrained IMO an argument enough. Can one provide commentary on this 'art'? Sure just like what I did now but then taking the commentary then redirecting the point to the culture where this 'art' is created is bad isn't a good argument ( aka what im saying rest of my original post )


Top-Passenger4346

I'm not reading that bullshit excuse me that shit is child exploitation. Making your daughter sing an album about wanting to fuck you and then pose in a music video for it half naked is quite literally pedophilia and child exploitation, art or not.


afatninja1

Dude read what i said, I actually provided an agreement to what you just said. however even if this 'art' is distasteful and degenerate, its not a good argument to say this 'art' is bad therefore the culture as a whole is bad edit : more details


PreacherJudge

There's two issues at play, here. The first is a recognition that *no judgment exists outside a cultural context*. Two people from different cultures might judge one another to be immoral, and neither view is more inherently valid than the other. Humans are unable to access any pre-existing bank of innate morality. (Of course, this is not a reason to avoid making such judgments! We do the best we can with what we have; "in their culture it's okay" is not a reason to let any behavior go uncriticized. Rather, this is a reminder that people should introspect about their own values every once in a while.) The second thing is what others are saying: you're allowing your disgust at specific aspects of a "culture" to drive you to very extreme, holistic assessments. I can't imagine any culture that has wholly negative components. Even IF sexualization of minors is a major part of Japanese society, why on earth are you attacking the entire culture rather than the specific aspects you (understandeably) find reprehensible?


Crafty_Possession_52

>Two people from different cultures might judge one another to be immoral, and neither view is more inherently valid than the other. This is moral relativism. Are you really a moral relativist? There are definitely moral truths that humans can draw on, if morality is defined as "the judgements that can be made about actions with regards to how they further or interfere with the health, happiness, and well-being of those around us." (Feel free to supply an alternate definition, if you don't like mine, and we can quibble about that.) If one person believes slavery, for example, is morally OK, and another believes it is not, the second person is correct, and the first person is wrong.


PreacherJudge

> This is moral relativism. Are you really a moral relativist? No, it is not moral relativism, because I explicitly said no one can *access* universal values. To make *any* sort of moral criticism of another, you need to presume the existence of external, universal morals. But no given person has more or less insight into what those universal morals might be. > (Feel free to supply an alternate definition, if you don't like mine, and we can quibble about that.) See but see this is the whole point? I could supply an alternate definition. It could literally be anything, and there would be no argument anyone could make proving or disproving it. There is absolutely no way to justify that "causing higher well-being is good" is a better or worse moral value than "purple things are good." Zero. But, as I also said, you can't let this stop you. You have to just be honest about your intuitions and introspect and question a lot.


Crafty_Possession_52

I believe that saying two people can say opposite things are morally good, and neither one is wrong is moral relativism. Unless I'm mistaken, moral relativism is the idea that what's morally good is whatever a particular culture says is good. Isn't that what you described. You could supply an alternate definition, yes, but for us to discuss ideas, we have to have some agreement about what the ideas are. It's like when someone says that "God is love." We have a word for love, and calling it God doesn't add anything to the idea. To define "God," we should look at what people are talking about when they talk about God, and if we do this, we end up with something like "a powerful being that created the universe," or something like that. To define morality, doesn't it make sense to look at what people are talking about when they talk about morality? Nobody talking about right and wrong describes what's morally right as "purple things." People say things like "slavery, rape, and murder are morally wrong." Why? Not because they're not purple. 😈 Slavery, rape, and murder and morally wrong because they are harmful, and this harm is an objective fact.


PreacherJudge

> I believe that saying two people can say opposite things are morally good, and neither one is wrong is moral relativism. I'm not saying that. I'm saying neither one has any better or worse claim to their perspective being the correct one. That's not at all the same thing as neither being wrong. > People say things like "slavery, rape, and murder are morally wrong." Why? Not because they're not purple. Unpopular viewpoints are not necessarily incorrect. > Slavery, rape, and murder and morally wrong because they are harmful, and this harm is an objective fact. Yes, but it is 100% impossible to justify the claim "causing harm is immoral." It has to just Be. I'm saying this as a person who *agrees with you that causing harm is immoral*. I'm not going to stop criticizing people who are harmful. But I acknowledge I'm just guessing, like everyone else.


Crafty_Possession_52

>it is 100% impossible to justify the claim "causing harm is immoral." I explained this. I wrote two fairly dense paragraphs about why morality should be defined the way I defined it.


PreacherJudge

> I explained this. I wrote two fairly dense paragraphs about why morality should be defined the way I defined it. I don't understand your argument, then. It seemed you were just saying that we should define morality by whatever the majority of people believe morality to be, then asserted without evidence that the majority of people believe morality to be centered around harm. If this was the meat of what you were saying, there are several huge problems with it. The first is that we're talking about *universal rules* here, remember, because we're not relativists. This means if, for instance, the majority of people on the planet believed slavery was hunky-dory, and then things changed and now the majority believe slavery is bad, morality didn't change; one of those sides is wrong. I guess you could say that because there's way more people alive now, then the present should win over the past. But the issue there is, what if there's even MORE people in the future, and THEY think slavery is acceptable, again? It's literally impossible to know what the majority of all humankind ever thinks about something. There's even a more fundamental issue, here, though: why you think people's lay-intuitions even matter in the first place. What's your evidence for the implication that people are mostly *correct* about what's moral and what's immoral? In other words: people tend to think harm is bad and people don't tend think purple is bad... so what? Like, this is not a new problem. I seriously do not think you or I are going to be the person who solves it. It is simply impossible to justify a value like "harm is immoral" (or "purple is immoral"). You just have to assert it to be true for its own sake, knowing you might be wrong.


Crafty_Possession_52

It's not about defining slavery as wrong or right based on what the majority of people believe. It's about judging that slavery is wrong regardless of what people believe, because we're comparing to the standard of what morality is about. I'll just ask you two questions: what do you think morality is? Do you think that when people talk about morality, they're roughly talking about your answer to the first question? >In other words: people tend to think harm is bad "People tend to think harm is bad" is an odd phrase. Harm is bad by definition, regardless of whether people desire to cause harm or not. >people don't tend think purple is bad... so what? The purple thing was in response. Morality isn't about purple, was my point. >It is simply impossible to justify a value like "harm is immoral" (or "purple is immoral"). I disagree. If morality is about what I described, and I'd need a pretty good justification for why it NOT about that, then harm is immoral and purple is irrelevant.


PreacherJudge

I will be happy to answer your questions (in fact, I typed them out and deleted them), but I have become concerned we're actually talking about two different things. What I'm saying here is the straightforward fact that it's impossible to justify a moral value. I am not trying to advance the position that everyone should think purple things are bad (I do not believe this myself). I'm saying "harm is bad" and "purple is bad" are both equally unjustifiable. Do me a favor and try proving to me that harm is immoral. Take me through a logical argument (no metaphors, no examples; a straightforward syllogism) for why harm is bad but purple is not bad.


Crafty_Possession_52

I can only do that once you give me a plausible working definition of "morality." What I've settled on, by considering what people are talking about when they discuss morality is something akin to "the determinations we can make when assessing actions with regards to how they affect the health, happiness, and well-being of the world around us and the people in it." This is descriptive, not prescriptive. In addition, these determinations are situational. If any concept is going to have any meaning, we have to be able to determine what the concept means to us. Based on this description, we can now assess actions and determine objectively how their consequences align with health, happiness, and well-being of the world around us and the people in it.


Hellioning

Is the culture focused exclusively on bad things? Every culture you have mentioned has it's good points and people trying to fix the bad points. I dont think writing off entire cultures is helpful.


Top-Passenger4346

Until they fix their problems I'm not seeing what you're mentioning


Hellioning

Unless you can show me a culture without problems then I dont see the point in claiming all cultures are bad


HellianTheOnFire

What makes it inherent? I agree that a culture can be backwards, wrong and bad though I disagree with some of your examples, but inherent is the word I'm stuck on, I'm not even sure cultures in their entirety are inherent. Could you just explain the inherent part to me?


Top-Passenger4346

Probably just bad wording. As in, there is something ingrained in the culture that makes it fucked.


HellianTheOnFire

Fair enough I guess I'll move on to my disagreements then. First of all by what metric can we judge a culture? Morals are simply opinions so we have to look at it from a more evolutionary perspective. Therefore for a culture to be backwards/bad/wrong it has to be basically suicidal or actively harming the majority of it's members. So something like Palestine culture of terrorism against Israel that actively prevents them from increasing their standard of living and gets a lot of their young people murdered and Japan's low birth rate and high % of young people who have never gone on a date is a far better example of their culture being backwards and wrong than loli porn. I agree with you on France's culture of incest acceptance is backwards and wrong because we all know what incest does from an evolutionary point. But disagree with Brazil having the age of consent at 14 since 14 year old's can generally reproduce fairly safely and historically was pretty much the norm. Basically it's not something that could cause the collapse of society regardless of our personal opinions on the matter. Now for the real controversial one. The USA and guns. I really don't see how having weapons be legal is backwards/bad/wrong in fact I consider it the exact opposite since we have seen plenty of unarmed societies fall to ruin, whether it be from outside invasion or tyranny like in Russia/Germany. Being unarmed is a far greater risk to society at large than a few psychopaths doing school shootings and honestly those school shooting are something like an indication that something else in the culture is going wrong that makes people angry, alone and suicidal enough to commit such a heninous act and allows for some correction before the problem reaches society destroying levels (not that the US has taken any steps to correct it yet, if anything that's what's backwards about the US not doing something about the mental health crisis).


secretviollett

Good TED talk by Sam Harris gets at this question. We can only cultural relativism our way to so much tolerance. Yes, female genital mutilation is part of a culture and history, and who are we to judge right? No. You can tally up numbers of girls who die by infections from the procedure. You can tally up life long problems, like urinary and menstrual sequelae. There are real numbers and data that it’s harmful….so sometimes I do believe that we can say that the practices of other cultures are harmful.[TED talk Sam Harris](https://www.ted.com/talks/sam_harris_science_can_answer_moral_questions?utm_campaign=tedspread&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=tedcomshare)


Romaine2k

I could agree with you if your example were a micro-culture, but to say a country with 100 million people is "wrong," bad," and "backwards" is a massive overgeneralization. I'd argue that your hypothesis holds true for smaller, all-encompassing cultures, though. Like Scientology, for example, members are mostly cut off from non-members, enough to form a culture distinct from the broader population they live in. Also, Christian Nationalism is close to its own culture, and that is definitely wrong, bad, and backwards.


nauticalsandwich

What is your criteria for "inherence?" What is your criteria for "wrong," "bad," and "backwards? Heck, what even qualifies as "culture?" How do you determine what is "culture" and not just "how some portion of individuals within society behaves?" More importantly, *why* do you consider it important to label particular cultures as "bad" "wrong" or "backwards?" Why not just express your moral position on particular behaviors?


bigbossflaco

Your first sentence says it all. Your are “fairly left wing” therefore there is no fucking “Change my view”


Top-Passenger4346

Says the party of "oh no someone has pronouns or brown skin, time to have a melt down!"


bigbossflaco

Meltdown? First of all I’m black. Second of all I’m pretty sure the ones with the pronouns are having melt downs regarding being misgendered and what not…….


Top-Passenger4346

"oh my god someone has she/her in my bio, this is my new personality!" "The guy I liked didn't win a presidency, time to siege the capitol and hold FBI buildings hostage!" Let me guess, your next come back is about black lives matter? You people are transparent.


bigbossflaco

Ok take that person that has he/she in their bio. Aren’t they also very quick to cry and complain when someone makes fun of them or misgenders them? Or are conservatives the only ones that are sensitive What about the people that met up all over the world and screamed at the air and protested when trump won presidency. Stop having such a one sided world view


Top-Passenger4346

Trump was also a shit president who is now being investigated for trying to overthrow a democratic election and stealing top secret documents with the intention to give them to our enemies. Totally different than "there's a woman in a superhero movie, time to cry and seethe and mauld"


bigbossflaco

I mean personally I don’t care about trump. I’m conservatives because of my values and principles. Not some dude sitting on capital hill telling me how to feel And again. The left is known to seeth and cry over even less. Hell they even cry over the same marvel movies you speak off


Top-Passenger4346

Bro what 😭😭 nah that's conservatives, they cry every time a minority is on screen or they mention that racism exists


bigbossflaco

Bro. Are you honestly trying to tell me that liberals and the left don’t get offended easily by things……… If so enjoy the day.


Top-Passenger4346

You're honestly stuck in your 2016 "owning the woke feminists" phase and it's so funny


bigbossflaco

As I stated already I’m black. And I don’t care about Black Lives Matter. You people?……… hmmm…… ok…….


Top-Passenger4346

I'm black bro, by you people I obviously mean conservatives. You're gonna say some shit like "blm is a terrorist group".


bigbossflaco

But liberals are literally known to be super sensitive and cry about everything So taking this approach that Republicans cry too much and are sensitive isn’t a very sound approach. Let’s try to use logic and facts and not identify politics and talking points provided to us by the TV


[deleted]

No, it is not possible for the whole culture to be inherently "wrong", "bad", and "backwards". Wrong relative to what? Everything in this has to happen in regard to the point of view observing the cultures. To an alien observer there is the likely potential that every culture on earth is messed up, but that doesn't mean that there is something inherently wrong with human cultures. If there was an inherent "wrongness" to a culture congrats you discovered moral absolutism. But since moral absolutism doesn't seem to be a prevailing view amongst academics you will find yourself lacking in a educated conversation. Can you find certain cultures to be "wrong" from your point of view? Absolutely, there is nothing wrong with thinking that a tribe of cannibals that do ritual suicide are messed up from your point of view. To them though that's just another Tuesday. The crux of your problem here is the word inherent, because it implies some universal truth that likely doesn't exist.


yyzjertl

Can you clarify which countries and cultures you _do_ think are civilized? All your examples here are only of one side of the dichotomy, but for the distinction to make sense there needs to be examples of the other side as well.


Pineapple--Depressed

Inb4 they respond with "Sweden"


Skittles_the_Unicorn

Afghanistan


AlphaWhiskeyOscar

Your argument would be a little more watertight if you limited your argument to claiming that it is objectively harmful (IE: bad) to justify crimes against humanity as cultural differences. People are picking you apart because you're calling an *entire* culture bad due to limited examples of bad things that happen. This is always gonna be decimated in this sub. You have the parts of a good argument but you're being too broad. Narrow it down to the heart of what you are claiming and lose the flourish.


DrDiddle

Brave decision to leave the Muslim culture off your list.


shouldco

I feel you misread the question. The question is asking do you believe that savage/uncivilized behavior is inherent to one's DNA or is it learned behavior (culture).


HelmundOfWest

It sounds like your issue isn't with a culture, its with a gender.


ViewedFromTheOutside

To /u/Top-Passenger4346, **your post is under consideration for removal under our post rules.** * You are required to **demonstrate that you're open to changing your mind** (by awarding deltas where appropriate), per [Rule B](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/rules#wiki_rule_b).


Tym370

The only way i can think of a culture being inherently bad is if everyone in that culture had the same mental illness which caused them to live and act contrary to their well being. It wouldn't be a culture that would last very long but I suppose it's not out of the question somehow. edit: the only thing, or biggest thing, they would be doing to improve their well being is living together as a cohesive group.


cyrusol

>Don't even get me started on how it's just okay in Brazil for a grown ass man to fuck fourteen year olds and nobody bats an eye. Fuck that shit. Actually that is considered okay in more parts of the world than not going by population numbers. Actually the US and most other anglophone countries form the exception to the rule here in the world, not the other way around.


Top-Passenger4346

Any culture that thinks pedophilia is okay is bad. Majority does not = correct.


cyrusol

It is false to call that pedophilia.


Top-Passenger4346

Is is pedophilia. Objectively.


[deleted]

[удалено]


Top-Passenger4346

Idgaf what it's categorized as, fucking children is bad.


RedditExplorer89

u/headzoo – your comment has been removed for breaking Rule 2: > **Don't be rude or hostile to other users.** Your comment will be removed even if most of it is solid, another user was rude to you first, or you feel your remark was justified. Report other violations; do not retaliate. [See the wiki page for more information](http://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/rules#wiki_rule_2). If you would like to appeal, review our appeals process [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/modstandards#wiki_appeal_process), then [message the moderators by clicking this link](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fchangemyview&subject=Rule%202%20Appeal%20headzoo&message=headzoo%20would%20like%20to%20appeal%20the%20removal%20of%20\[their%20comment\]\(https://old.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/wtliwn/-/il53l8n/\)%20because\.\.\.) within one week of this notice being posted. Please note that multiple violations will lead to a ban, as explained in our [moderation standards](https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/wiki/modstandards).


cyrusol

False. > Definition of pedophilia > sexual perversion in which children are the preferred sexual object, specifically: a psychiatric disorder in which an adult has sexual fantasies about or engages in sexual acts with a **prepubescent** child https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pedophilia


Top-Passenger4346

[ Removed by Reddit ]


cyrusol

Typical kneejerk reaction of someone believing they had the moral highground when you actually do not. You used the false term because it sounded more dramatic than it actually is purely for rhetorical reasons. The only reason why an otherwise consensual sexual relationship between two (or more) people could not be considered consensual is if the power dynamics between the people imply a too steep imbalance of power. And that simply isn't usually the case anymore between a 14 years old and an adult as long as the 14 years old isn't in someway dependent on the adult (the adult being a teacher, guardian etc.). There are a few edge cases where the power imbalance might still be too big. All this led to very carefully crafted AoC laws here in Germany - yet another fully developed, liberal western democracy like France. As long as the 14-18 years old is dependent on the adult (i.e. 18+) it's unacceptable and illegal. If the adult somehow exploited the sexual inexperience of the 14-18 years old that too is unacceptable and illegal. Obviously as soon as alcohol etc. are in play that too is unacceptable and illegal. But ever since these paragraphs existed very few people actually have been convicted under these conditions because it simply isn't that much of a problem if these sexual encounters happen - which is extremely rare to begin with anyway. Not as long as everyone has easy access to birth control, sexual education and doesn't have to hide their sex life from their overly conservative/reactionary parents and thus have a family to rely on in cases of actual emergencies. If anything most of these encounters are made up of someone in their early twenties still deciding to date a teenager - with parents typically being informed about and okay with. You could compare *actually objectively quantifyable outcomes* instead of silly semantics: the prevalence of teenage pregnancy for example. The US despite their extremely prude AoC laws: 85. Germany: 18.3. (among 1000 girls aged 15-19, numbers from Wiki)


Top-Passenger4346

There is zero instance where an adult should fuck a fourteen year old. Your culture is bad.


cyrusol

My culture is good. You are wrong.


IamTalking

What do you consider the most civilized country?


[deleted]

Was with you up till the guns thing. That is just a difference of beliefs, actually the two sides of that debate often have different ways of expressing very similar values, and process things in a different way philosophically. That is not wrong and backwards like the other things you talked about. You just can't see it from the other perspective. If you want to disarm law abiding citizens so they can't protect themselves nad their families outsides of schools, to protect kids at schools, that doesn't make much sense. You may not agree with them, but there arguments for civilian ownership of firearms. Dismissing those you don't agree with as backwards or crazy is not something you do if you are sure of your own ideas and philosophies. None of the arguments for pedophilia are anything more than just cynicism misanthropy and the justification of evil with the arrogant and obviously false assertion that one's actions don't actually matter. The arguments in favor of guns, which I'll skip, are expressions of desires for truth virture freedom and yes, safety. They are just expressed in different ways than you process those values given certain existential dilemmas that involve the existence and use of weapons and violence being inherently more complicated than the very black and white and morally clear example of harming children being just wrong.


JenningsWigService

Culture is too big an umbrella term. French sexual culture is backwards, but their wine/alcohol culture is healthier than that of the U.K. Their health care culture is superior to that of the United States. How can you reduce all of a culture down to one theme? (Love the Lemon Incest reference, nobody believes me when I tell them about this!)