America-An Evil Country?

[Lord of the Abyss]

Present an argument first, moron.

I have. Repeatedly, and with several variations. You and your fellow apologists simply keep trying to dismiss mine by pretending I'm saying something else, or ignoring them.

[SVPD]

You guys who are claiming that "but other countries do it too" isn't a defense are full of shit. It most certainly IS a defense to the claim that the United States is especially evil, since the term especially only has meaning in comparison to other nations.

And what if the other nations that you point to are also considered "evil"? The Soviet Union was certainly considered "evil" within our lifetimes, and it is still used as a negative example today, ie- people attack ideas by simply showing that the Soviets might have done things that way.

I'm not following you. If the other nations we're pointing to are at least as evil as the US, that would mean there was nothing especially evil about the US would it not?

[K. A. Pital]

May I add to the mess?

IMHO, "An evil country, especially historically" only means that historically the US was more evil than it is now (which is a definetely valid claim with the wiping out of indians, slavery and other shit).

If he said "An especially evil country, historically", that would've meant America is the uber-evil.

Just my 2c, but I think "especially" refers obviously to "historically" in the sentence, so why did people jump to the conclusion that it was referring to the US?

[Lord of the Abyss]

IMHO, "An evil country, especially historically" only means that historically the US was more evil than it is now (which is a definetely valid claim with the wiping out of indians, slavery and other shit).

Which is what I meant. Well, I also meant that it's still evil as a whole, just not as evil. Iraq isn't as bad as the genocide of the Indians and slavery, but it's certainly neither benevolent nor morally neutral, which leaves evil.

Just my 2c, but I think "especially" refers obviously to "historically" in the sentence, so why did people jump to the conclusion that it was referring to the US?

In order to distort what I said, and drag the whole conversation over onto this silly "America isn't any worse that any other country, so it isn't bad at all !" tangent. After all, they may be able to win that argument; they can't win an argument over whether or not America has done evil things.

[Darth Wong]

You guys who are claiming that "but other countries do it too" isn't a defense are full of shit. It most certainly IS a defense to the claim that the United States is especially evil, since the term especially only has meaning in comparison to other nations.

And what if the other nations that you point to are also considered "evil"? The Soviet Union was certainly considered "evil" within our lifetimes, and it is still used as a negative example today, ie- people attack ideas by simply showing that the Soviets might have done things that way.

I'm not following you. If the other nations we're pointing to are at least as evil as the US, that would mean there was nothing especially evil about the US would it not?

Oh for fuck's sake, are you always this dense? Let me explain myself again, since it appears you need it spelled out for you. We do single out certain countries for identification as "evil". Countries like the Soviet Union, North Korea, Iran, and Iraq under Saddam Hussein. And no, none of them did anything worse than the Roman Empire or the Mongol Horde either, but that doesn't mean they can't be singled out, especially if your historical timeframe is within the last few decades, not the last few millenia.

Are you seriously suggesting that it's impossible to single out a country for doing bad things or causing death and destruction? You can't differentiate between Saddam Hussein and Switzerland?

[Frank Hipper]

..."America isn't any worse that any other country, so it isn't bad at all !"...

If you honestly think that's what I'm saying, you just removed any doubts I may have had about calling you a stupid motherfucker.

[Quadlok]

I like that Warhammer 40K saying... "There's no such thing as innocence; only degrees of guilt".

I think this does in fact sum up much of this argument pretty well. The fact of the matter is that any society will, at some point, commit an evil act. The longer that society exists and the larger and more prosperous it is, the more evil acts it is likely to commit. The US bears more guilt than Ghana or Honduras because it has existed in its current form longer and has always wielded exponentially more power. But all societies have the capability, and have more or less universally been shown, to use 'evil' methods when they are able to use them to their own advantage.

Basically, evil becomes a term without meaning in an international context for exactly the same reason that people are easily forgiven for telling lies. Everyone does it, everyone is expected to do it, and feigning surprise at it being done is the height of idiocy. Nations are by their nature amoral in their dealings with one another, just as corporations or ant hills or any other agglomeration of organic life is. A nation will act in its own interest, and that often means committing despicable acts.

To simply put them all under the heading of simply evil does a disservice to the victims of truly vile acts that break even from the norm of amorality. Things such as the Holocaust, the brutal slave labor practices of the Spanish Conquistadors, or the publicly stated wars of annihilation waged first by the British and then by their US successors against North American tribes ought not to be lumped in with the more banal acts of the CIA, the 8th Air Force, or the KGB. Amorality is not evil for the very reason that the judgment of an act as evil is made from within a moral framework that does not constrain such entities under normal circumstances.

The term evil ought only to be called out in those cases where nations go far beyond simple amoral self interest. It was not in the best interests of the European conquerors that the Natives of the Americas be so nearly destroyed, certainly not from an economic or colonial perspective. It was certainly not in the interests of Nazi Germany to actively exterminate their own Jewish population, a population that could have helped them greatly in their war effort. These excesses and those like them, that fly against what is really the only thing close to a moral code that guides nations, doing what is in their own best interest, can therefore properly be called evil. If we were to call everything nations do that hurts someone or something else as evil, the list of evil would never end, and the word itself would begin to loose any meaning because the fact of the matter is that almost any action an entity as large as a country takes is bound to impact negatively somewhere.

[18-Till-I-Die]

..."America isn't any worse that any other country, so it isn't bad at all !"...

If you honestly think that's what I'm saying, you just removed any doubts I may have had about calling you a stupid motherfucker.

Then what ARE you saying? Since the second post in the thread you're argument has been based off a distortion of the original statement.

Your argument (i'm guessing since i cant read your mind) seems to boil down to this:

In Country A is evil, and Countries B through D are also evil, then what point is there in calling any of them evil. None are worse than the others.

This is a black/white fallacy. There does not need a good nation to point out that one is Evil. Or by that logic pointing out that Generic Child Raper A is evil would have to be followed by "But Generic Child Raper C is a very nice fella all told" to be a valid argument.

I dont understand how it is so easy to misread what Lord of the Abyss said. It's quite clear, just as Stras pointed out and LotA himself has said many times. The thrust of the statement (which was taken out of context by the way) wa sthat historically America has done evil deeds, which as as bad or wose than what is happening today.

Thus to answer the (stupid) OP question all you have to do is show that the statement is true and America has done evil things historically just as bad or worse than what it has done today.

The opposition desperately tried to handwave it away, but that is the only thing the statement means. The very first post was Stark telling the CarsonPalmer that "You know it doesnt say that America is unusually evil, only that it has a history of such" the second was the beginning of this idiotic crap about "Well how is that any worse than anyone else"...which was started by YOU.

[K. A. Pital]

It was certainly not in the interests of Nazi Germany to actively exterminate their own Jewish population, a population that could have helped them greatly in their war effort.

Wait a moment. Are you saying that Nazis starting WWII and trying to conquer Europe and cleanse it of subhumans was NOT EVIL because it was in their interests, but murdering the Jews specifically was EVIL because they could've been used as fighting meat? That's low.

While there is no doubt that irrationalism is a cause of great evils, I do not find your example valid. Attacking and brutally subjugating countries was in the interest of the British Empire, for examle. But clearly this is not merely amoral but evil.

If you think that a country which acts in own interest but in the process wreaks havoc on other countries is not commiting evil, but merely is amoral, why would wars of agression be generally considered evil?

[Straha]

Having said that, one can say that America is in denial about its history. Just look at the absurdly understated figures for the Indian genocide that were quoted earlier in this thread. Do you really think the early settlers did anything to slow down the spread of smallpox? They knew exactly what it was doing to the natives, and in fact they actively encouraged its spread. Remember Amherst and the "donations" of infected blankets to Indian tribes?

The "donations" you speak of happened before the foundation of the United States in 1763 to break the siege of an English fort during the French-Indian Wars, that was it and no more. Further the early settlers to the west often didn't want there to be a spread of Smallpox because Smallpox kills everyone, and there are many recorded cases of doctors helping Indian Villages which were suffering outbreaks (obviously there were plenty of cases where no help was sent but the point remains that help was often sent.) That being said the American Advance westwards in regards to Indians, while brutal, was often restrained by the fact that the Army actively tried not to cause genocide and was reigned in by its structural organization from doing so, with few notable exceptions. On the whole the removal of Indian Tribes or the restriction to reservations were relatively free of bloodshed (though, like I said, there are notable exceptions.) The one area where this doesn't hold is California which was settled before the Army arrived thanks to the Gold Rush and has some truly horrific and genocidal history behind it (bounties for each Indian head brought back for instance.) Aside from California (which was mainly by the private individual or local government) the United States' advance west was evil but a very restrained evil.

[Quadlok]

It was certainly not in the interests of Nazi Germany to actively exterminate their own Jewish population, a population that could have helped them greatly in their war effort.

Wait a moment. Are you saying that Nazis starting WWII and trying to conquer Europe and cleanse it of subhumans was NOT EVIL because it was in their interests, but murdering the Jews specifically was EVIL because they could've been used as fighting meat? That's low.

While there is no doubt that irrationalism is a cause of great evils, I do not find your example valid. Attacking and brutally subjugating countries was in the interest of the British Empire, for examle. But clearly this is not merely amoral but evil.

If you think that a country which acts in own interest but in the process wreaks havoc on other countries is not commiting evil, but merely is amoral, why would wars of agression be generally considered evil?

Wht I'm saying is that countries should be expected to act in a way that serves their own interest, and that while these often result in evil deeds, both by individuals and the state, such self interested amorality ought not neccessarily be categorized as evil because of its ubiquity. I guess basically what my problem comes down to is that, by being forced to apply the term evil so broadly, it cheapens the term.

So, to sum up:

Holocaust etc.=EVIL

CIA overthrow of third world leader, British conquest of South Africa=calculatedly amoral and self serving, likely to result in various evil.

[18-Till-I-Die]

You realize that if something is calculatingly amoral and results in evil then...

It's evil.

That is pretty much what everyone uses as the definition of evil.

And what is this that everyone keeps saying about if we call a lot of stuff evil it will cheapen the term. So what then, we cant accurately describe something because it's ubiquitous amongst a certain group? Can i not call all Child Molesters evil because it cheapens the term unless we only call the REALLY BAD child molesters evil and the rest are just "amoral and self-serving". If a whole group fits a certain definition then refusing to use that definition because, in your opinion, it 'cheapens' it then presupposes there must be some minimal level of X that is required to fit teh definition.

So what is the minimal level of evil required to be called evil? Genocide? We got that. Racism? Got it. Ethnic cleansing/oppression/enslavement? Got it. Unlawful wars of agression? Yep.

So what? Which one is it? Do we have to hit a minimum death toll first? Is it a round 11,000,000 like Hitler? If so then i guess the Rowanda Massacres were just 'amoral and self-serving' as they only hit 800,000. Also then Saddam wasnt so bad either he only hit, maximum, about one million assuming all the stories are true and none have been exagerated, and the Us was involved deeply in that too mind you so the overall number might be considerably lower.

[K. A. Pital]

Something doesn't need to be categorized as evil beause of it's ubiquity? Please. How do we come that the Middle-Age barbaric customs were evil? They were ubiqutous, but evil nontheless.

While clearly there's a difference between coldhearted self-service and more evil acts, they still remain evil. A lesser evil than something like Hitler's holocaust, pure destruction without other purpose than to "cleanse", but evil nontheless.

An amoral action is an action which does not result in neither harm nor good. Wars of conquest do not fall here, obviosly. Amoral action has neutral effects.

[18-Till-I-Die]

An amoral action is an action which does not result in neither harm nor good. Wars of conquest do not fall here, obviosly. Amoral action has neutral effects.

You're right.

The proper word then is Immoral or unethical.

I was confusing the two for some reason until now but you're right, that was stupid of me not to notice till now.

But yes i agree with Stas's post 100%, just because everyone else is doing it does not make it moral or ethical. By that same token it does not mean you cant call a spade a spade, just because you admit that a LOT of spades are out there.

[Big Orange]

Indeed. So I think concession is accepted, their actions were immoral?

Yes and no. Yes, in that the company was still operating in the midst of a very bad regime (making a profit) and no in that a soda company could not possibly directly contribute anything significant to war and genocide, like a engineering and chemical corporation could (such as Krupp and IG Farben certainly did).

The lend-lease somehow became infamous? Helping a nation (several nations united, actually) under threat of total annihilation became evil? I thought the US lend lease was a government program anyway, wasn't it? Of course the US demanded to pay back, but frankly,

Exporting weapons to fuel a continent wide bloodbath is not "good" from an objective point of view, even though it's going to the right side. And while the lend lease was government sanctioned, it was CORPORATIONS mass producing the war material and making a profit.

it was generous enough with those supplies to forget these debts for it's war allies.

Which the British finally finished paying off just this month, after six very long decades...

Indeed we traded with the Reich under the Pact for a short time. This was not good. At least the contributions from either side during this short time were fairly minor and didn't affect the overall course of war, but this was nevertheless a bad thing.

Exporting iron ore to make Axis tanks and planes, then oil to fuel these same tanks and planes was certainly more significant than brewing Fanta, yes, even though the Soviets exporting material to the Third Reich was perhaps overstated and this trade was relatively brief anyway (as was the non-aggression).

Was India, whose anticolonial government we also helped to industrialize and had strong ties with, a "tinpot regime"? I thought we helped the world's largest democracy there.

Well I have to read up on Indian history leading up to independence and while India is a relatively stable, prosperous nation today, what about the slaughter three million minorities in Hindu dominated India and the tumultuous founding of Muslim dominated India? Africa was ten times worse.

Most of the Third World's problems in the last 30 to 40 years stemmed from the collapse of European colonialism ...

And the alternative? The Empire over which the sun never sets? Please. You have another solution to colonialism? I'm all ears.[/quote]

Come on, Stas Bush, I know full well that Britain was unable to hold onto it's colonies forever and perhaps the writing was on wall for the wiser British as early as the 1920s, but the former colonies could've been left by the British much later and with less potential for the rise of petty tyrants,.

[Big Orange]

*snip*

The same could be said for the Nazi persecution of Jews between 1933 and 1941, before the invasion of Russia. Before the death squads and Wansee Conference, the Nazi authorities were mainly displacing it's Jews either into work camps or in the walled ghettos in the General Government, with many other occasions of the Nazis helping wealthy Jews to migrate to North America and Palestine (before Auschwitz was finalised, they seriously thought about transporting the bulk of European Jews to Madagascar).

[K. A. Pital]

Yes and no.

I see that you conceeded that their actions were immoral. The fact that they did not contribute significantly to war I don't dispute.

And while the lend lease was government sanctioned, it was CORPORATIONS mass producing the war material and making a profit.

Yes, I too think war profiteering is negative. But remember, the US government paid for that out of their own pocked. The corporations were merely contractors. It would've been different if the US then harshly demanded payback from wartorn Britain and USSR, but it didn't demand it back so harshly.

Which the British finally finished paying off just this month, after six very long decades...

They could've demanded immediate payback and ruined the economies of Europe. But they didn't demand it immediately and consistently rescheduled payments, and a very large quantity of lend-lease material was simply written off. This was not a super-altruistic action, but nonetheless a good example of help.

but the former colonies could've been left by the British much later and with less potential for the rise of petty tyrants

Less potential for the rise of tyrants? Please. Many colonies became authoritarian regardless of who set them free, but to say that this means they should not have been set free is ridiculous. Unless one is of the opinion that colonialism would've simply ceased on it's own (from what we saw, it took military action on a World War scale to demolish the colonial system, and then worldwide national liberation movements).

[Darth Wong]

Having said that, one can say that America is in denial about its history. Just look at the absurdly understated figures for the Indian genocide that were quoted earlier in this thread. Do you really think the early settlers did anything to slow down the spread of smallpox? They knew exactly what it was doing to the natives, and in fact they actively encouraged its spread. Remember Amherst and the "donations" of infected blankets to Indian tribes?

The "donations" you speak of happened before the foundation of the United States in 1763 to break the siege of an English fort during the French-Indian Wars, that was it and no more.

No, that was it for DOCUMENTED cases where someone actually wrote down that he was doing it. You can't seriously believe that nobody else ever did that. The use of disease-carrying material as a weapon of war had been carried on for centuries prior to this in the European theatre; don't tell me that nobody but Amherst ever thought of it.

Further the early settlers to the west often didn't want there to be a spread of Smallpox because Smallpox kills everyone, and there are many recorded cases of doctors helping Indian Villages which were suffering outbreaks (obviously there were plenty of cases where no help was sent but the point remains that help was often sent.)

So? There were people in America who disagreed with or even agitated against the Trail of Tears too, but that doesn't mean it didn't happen.

That being said the American Advance westwards in regards to Indians, while brutal, was often restrained by the fact that the Army actively tried not to cause genocide and was reigned in by its structural organization from doing so, with few notable exceptions. On the whole the removal of Indian Tribes or the restriction to reservations were relatively free of bloodshed (though, like I said, there are notable exceptions.) The one area where this doesn't hold is California which was settled before the Army arrived thanks to the Gold Rush and has some truly horrific and genocidal history behind it (bounties for each Indian head brought back for instance.) Aside from California (which was mainly by the private individual or local government) the United States' advance west was evil but a very restrained evil.

A "very restrained evil"? You must have gotten a degree in DoubleSpeak. The fact is that the Americans, from government on down through to regular people, regarded the Indians as subhumans and treated them accordingly. They did not have rights or considerations, they were treated as a nuisance to be removed.

[Quadlok]

And what is this that everyone keeps saying about if we call a lot of stuff evil it will cheapen the term. So what then, we cant accurately describe something because it's ubiquitous amongst a certain group? Can i not call all Child Molesters evil because it cheapens the term unless we only call the REALLY BAD child molesters evil and the rest are just "amoral and self-serving". If a whole group fits a certain definition then refusing to use that definition because, in your opinion, it 'cheapens' it then presupposes there must be some minimal level of X that is required to fit teh definition.

See this is the part I have problem with. Basically, in your analogy, all nations are child molesters, some simply worse than others. To say that the nation state is in its very form evil is to call in to question both its validity and the validity of moral judgment in regards to such entities. Either we have to acknowledge the bad inherent in the system and just try to direct it in less damaging directions or we can sit back and bitch and moan about all the bad being done in the world until no one at all gives a shit anymore.

Do countries do evil? Yes. Should they, where possible, be appropriatly reprimanded for this? Yes. Will they ever stop? No. Is it really a worthwhile enterprise to catalog all their past mistakes simply to show that they are evil? No. Am I going to stop now because I'm starting to sound like Donald Rumsfeld? Yes.

[K. A. Pital]

Will they ever stop? No.

Bull-fucking-shit. Nations aren't immune to moral progress. The fact that today they are less evil than they were centuries ago proves that it's possible to minimize evil acts.

[Darth Wong]

I'm sick of people saying that all countries are the same. That's just ridiculous. Even different regions of countries are not necessarily the same. For example, during the American Civil War, the South was more evil than the North (cue Southern apologist fucktards bullshitting about "state's rights").

In any given period, you can identify groups which were more or less backward or barbarian than others. The Romans may have been barbaric by our standards, but they were fairly civilized by the standards of their era. Similarly, slavery was barbaric in the mid to late 19th century, in the sense that the more "civilized" countries had abolished it. Same goes for torture today.

Social morality does tend to progress over time, as do many other things. The question is: at any given time, is your country ahead of the curve or behind it? If it's ahead of the curve, then it's part of the solution. If it's behind the curve, it's part of the problem.

[SVPD]

Oh for fuck's sake, are you always this dense? Let me explain myself again, since it appears you need it spelled out for you. We do single out certain countries for identification as "evil". Countries like the Soviet Union, North Korea, Iran, and Iraq under Saddam Hussein. And no, none of them did anything worse than the Roman Empire or the Mongol Horde either, but that doesn't mean they can't be singled out, especially if your historical timeframe is within the last few decades, not the last few millenia.

Are you seriously suggesting that it's impossible to single out a country for doing bad things or causing death and destruction? You can't differentiate between Saddam Hussein and Switzerland?

I'm not suggesting that at all. What I'm saying is that "but other nations do it too" is a defense to a claim that the United States is evil in some way that deserves special mention, because every other nation has done evil to some degree or another. Only a few nations, such as those you mentioned, are evil to a degree that merits special notice.

If every nation is evil to some degree, then the United States would need to be evil to the same degree as the other nations in your example to deserve special mention, would it not?

[Darth Wong]

If every nation is evil to some degree, then the United States would need to be evil to the same degree as the other nations in your example to deserve special mention, would it not?

Yes, it would. And given that the United States has caused more problems in the world than Saddam Hussein did, I have yet to see any rational explanation why it's OK to label Hussein's regime as "evil" without applying the same label to the US.

[Quadlok]

Bull-fucking-shit. Nations aren't immune to moral progress. The fact that today they are less evil than they were centuries ago proves that it's possible to minimize evil acts.

You just conceded my point. You say yourself minimize. The fact is that any system as large and complex as a nation will commit acts that could be categorized as evil, although their severity and frequency are subject to change, and the tendency is towards decline, albeit with many major breaks in the path.

[Darth Wong]

Bull-fucking-shit. Nations aren't immune to moral progress. The fact that today they are less evil than they were centuries ago proves that it's possible to minimize evil acts.

You just conceded my point. You say yourself minimize. The fact is that any system as large and complex as a nation will commit acts that could be categorized as evil, although their severity and frequency are subject to change, and the tendency is towards decline, albeit with many major breaks in the path.

Pssst ... I have a secret for you. The black and white fallacy is actually not an acceptable debate technique. Trying to equate different nations on a "pure as the driven snow" vs "evil" false dichotomy is just sophistry at best, stupidity at worst.