Crud Meridian

with apologies to Tara, who deserves more rigorous philosophers for friends

If we squint our eyes and turn the lights off, we can generalize western moral thought into two categories. Those are, essentially, deontology and utilitarianism. In the first, we do what is right because it is right. In the second, we do what is right because of the effect it will have. It is a mistake to treat these as genuine rulesets for acting in the world – they are too perfect, too clean. We’re not going to subscribe to either one here, but we’re still going to use them to think. As a broad stand-in for deontology as a whole, I’m going to use Kant’s Categorical Imperative. You can say that I’m not being ethically rigorous, but I could say that this is my website and I can write whatever I want on it. Kant gives us three criteria for moral evaluation:

1. Universality: Would my actions be endorsed by universal law? Would it be okay if everyone did this all of the time in all conditions?
2. Humanity: Do my actions treat all other people as ends rather than means? My actions must venerate the will and autonomy of others and not subject it to my own means
3. Autonomy: Because I venerate the will of others, the source of morality must be rational self-governance, not external force. 

While it might be a universal maxim to murder an executive whose singular stock and trade is commodified human suffering, we can see that doing so treats him as a means and not an end, so Kant says no. Sorry gang.

Now, utilitarianism, on the other hand.

We can evaluate an action by its utility – does it maximize the good and/or reduce the harm for the most people? The needs of the many outweighing the needs of the few. This seems like a simple formulation, but let it breathe. Do I maximize human goodness by advocating for executives profiteering off of mass human suffering to be held both morally and mortally responsible for consequences of their decisions? Yes.

F.A.Q.

Q: But what if everyone always murdered people they felt were responsible for making the world a worse place? 

A: That would be bad, which is why I didn’t advocate for that. Also, didn’t you read the part about universality? We’re not doing universality.

Q: Who determines how to maximize the good? 

A: Me.

OKAY, SO

The thing about moral philosophy is that most of it is highly abstract. It’s a toolset for thinking about how we organize ourselves. Rulesets for the real world tend to be heavy with caveats, or, at the least, margins for human error. 

BUT ALSO

At least one iteration of the divine had some extremely choice words for the moral fate of the rich.

AND

Force is a complicated thing. A policy decision that threatens your safety or your life through economic privation or environmental destruction is an act of violence.

AND

Evaluations of violence tend towards the emotional, rather than the moral. Violence is almost never prosocial behaviour. I do not advocate for its use as a means of solving a problem. But. Historically, we can sympathize with certain violent actions – usually those in defense of something noble, those that attempt to prevent, avert, or end some further injustice. Acts of last resort, when rhetoric, legislature, entreaties to the soul no longer seem effective. If we cannot negotiate an end to slavery, genocide, the concentration camp, then we are obliged to violence, because we cannot be obliged to passivity. Is this a logically clear moral structure? No, it is a feeling. A compelling feeling. Even if I have not done the moral calculus – in which, perhaps, these actions will still be just – I am nonetheless sympathetic to their base motive. 

AND

Self-defence is the most sympathetic form of violence.

THEREFORE

It is sympathetic to respond to policy decisions that threaten you with economic privation or environmental degradation with violence

BUT

Vigilante justice is an adolescent masculine fantasy that does not map on to the real world

AND

It would be preferable to be able to arrive at a more just world without violence or fear

BUT

I am compelled by the idea that those who choose their own exorbitant profit over the safety, dignity, and livelihood of others should live hollow, fearful lives until their last breath

BUT ALSO

I cannot meaningfully condone violence as a viable solution

AND YET

One way to get rid of the Romanovs is to shoot them to death in a basement

AND ALSO

It is socially preferable for the Romanovs to believe they might get shot to death in a basement

SO

I have a problem. Imagine, if you will, that I have a problem. I have a door in my house that I have to get open. It’s stuck shut, and I have to get the door open. If I don’t get the door open, it will be catastrophic. I will be bankrupt. People will suffer, and die. I have to get the door open. Getting the door open is non-negotiable. 

I start with a small delicate tool. I have a set of picks, finely crafted. These are the tools for this job. I have to get the door open. I don’t want to damage anything, I just need to get the door open. I tension the cylinder of the lock with gentle rotational force, I try to move the pins above the shear line with a fine hook pick. Nothing budges. It’s fine. The door is stuck. I move on to a comb pick but nothing will move. I pull the tensioning wrench out. This tool, though perfect, will not do. The door is stuck. I will try to shim the lock, sliding something slim between the jamb and the strike plate to dislodge the latch bolt. I cannot gain any purchase, and I have to open this door. I am starting to consider more forceful entry. I don’t want to break the door, but I have to get the door open. An electric drill. I unscrew the lock assembly, pulling screws out of the faceplate around the cylinder, but I cannot reach any of the components. I replace the bit with a hardened drill bit and make my peace with the idea that I might damage the door. I do not want to damage the door. I have to get the door open. I cannot penetrate the steel of the lock with the drill – the bit does not find purchase, it scratches small pockmarks into the metal and skitters off. I call a locksmith. Any amount of money, I tell him. I have to get the door open. He pulls out his tools, his picks, his drill. He cannot get the door open. He tells me to call a contractor. I have to get the door open. It is getting late. I call the contractor. He says he will be there in a few days. I cannot wait that long. I do not want to damage the door. I have to get the door open. There is a sledgehammer hanging on the wall. I have to get the door open. It is more important to me that the door be open than that the door be undamaged. I have to get the door open. There is a sledgehammer hanging on the wall.

SO

I have to get the door open