Ranting to /dev/null

Ryan,

As you know, I don't comment much. We come at things so differently that a blog is not really the best medium for debate. And I don't have time for extensive reply here. But I did want to make a point and ask a question:

I can't tell from your reply whether you would consider the killing of innocent Lebanese civilians/citizens an ethical act. I'm assuming you would not. (Just because _anyone_ could be a terrorist due to the nature of the enemy does not mean that _everyone_ is a terrorist. So let's make the fair assumption that innocent people are dying as a result of Israeli and Hezbollah attacks.)

The crucial distinction must be made, I think, between the ethically legitimate act of self-defense, in which I believe Israel is engaged, and the morally wrong act of killing innocents, in which Israel, reluctantly, is also engaged. In the real world, there are clearly situations where you cannot have the one without the other. But that also does not mean that you can lump the two together.

The problem with more leftist arguments is that they see the morally wrong action and condemn the morally legitimate one which led to it. The right sees the moral legitimacy of self-defense and uses it to morally paint over the necessary evil (and it is an evil) of the loss of innocent life.

If you don't want moral equivocation, we must call a spade a spade. Otherwise, we run the very real risk of slipping into barbarism ourselves. But I don't have time to go into your tendency to argue for "civilization" vs "barbarism" right now.

The deaths of civilians in warfare are always to be avoided and always a tragedy. I'm not sure whether killing Lebanese civilians in this situation constitutes an ethical act or not, because the responsibility for the deaths lies with Hezbollah, not Israel.

Hezbollah is, in effect, taking hostages. If the hostages are killed, even by the actions of attempted rescuers, the responsibility for the death lies at the feet of the agents who put them in harm's way in the first place.

So yes, the killing of civilians in both Israel and Lebanon is wrong, and deaths on both sides are equally wrong. But it's Hezbollah, not Israel, that is responsible.

I would agree with you that Hezbollah is an agent here, and is responsible for the deaths of those citizens. But to deny Israeli responsibility, as an agent who is free to decide to take military action that it knows will cause the death of innocents, is unfair to Israel. In other words, the attribution of responsibility to both parties seems to me to be the only honest response.

And the only honest response on Israel's part as well. The fact that Israel is taking such pains to spare civilian life, even as it takes it, is a sign that it shares that responsibility.

Consequently, pundits, of whatever political shade, should not elide these distinctions. It is our responsibility as citizens of the USA, as it is the responsibility of Israeli citizens, to be ethically responsive to the realities of military action, and to name those atrocities when we see them, in order to keep the raw force of national militaries in check even as that force performs a necessary, and ethical function. Don't just blame it on the enemy, which amounts to nothing more than abandoning our ethical agency.

A lot of the things I'm expressing here are consequences of the position I articulate in a recent post, which you may or may not be interested in:
http://jaussen.seattleblogs.org/archives/000773.html

Ryan,

Perhaps I did not make it clear enough, but in my example, when I referred to a building, I was referring to a building that the murderer owned, not a building that someone else owned.

Furthermore, I use the term "civilian" and "citizen" interchangeably. Any distinction between them was unintentional, and should not have bearing on this discussion. Lebanon's government is not involved with Hezbollah, and, I believe, has officially condoned that group. From the perspective of the individual, there's no inherent difference between a civilian in Israel, and one in Lebanon, and I did not intend to suggest that there is a difference.

At any rate, I think that the evil and criminal nature of Hezbollah is well established and beyond opinion. However, you seem to be suggesting that the evil nature and actions of Hezbollah is in fact so great that all civillians living in Lebanon should be viewed as potential terrorists. Such a presupposition is moral equivocation in the worst form; it means we should treat people based on what they potentially could do, rather than on what they actually did do. The very definition of a criminal act is any use of unwarranted force against another individual. Accepting your presupposition, thus, means we must completely redefine the term "crime" and, in effect, render it meaningless.

You also seem to be moving a bit too close to a collectivist rationale for Israel's response to Hezbollah. Killing an innocent person, because he happened to be standing in an inconvenient location, is never just, even if the action kills a guilty terrorist. Any military action that results in the injury or death of even a single civilian is not "just" (please note that I'm not saying at this point that such action would be unwarranted, or necessarily even wrong, I'm just saying that it is not just). To make such a claim, you would have to find a way to objectively determine the total value of the deceased terrorists' lives, and compare it to the total value of the innocent civilians' lives. Obviously, such a pronouncement is utilitarianism, and has no place in Christian thought. Because no person has either the ability or the authority to determine the value of another man's life, you (and every person) are simply unqualified to determine whether a military act is in fact "just." There's just no possible way to compare the lives of two different people, and any attempt to do so is an exercise in collectivist thought. It certainly would not be a proper Christian perspective that recognizes the inherent value of each and every individual person.

"Obviously, such a pronouncement is utilitarianism, and has no place in Christian thought."

Really? Why is that? I'm not suggesting an ethical calculus of the value of human lives, because no such thing is feasible. But if, as you say, that "every person [is] simply unqualified to determine whether a miltary act is in fact 'just'", you seem to have argued yourself into a very small corner very quickly. If no one is qualified to determine whether a military act is just, it would seem to follow that no one is qualified to determine whether a military act is unjust. From here it follows that since the justice of military act is beyond human ken, discussions of justice should not enter into military considerations.

Sure, I can recognize the "inherent value of each and every individual person". I'm good with that. That's good ethics. But it is utterly unproductive when considering whether to bomb a terrorist, for the terrorist has value before God too. Fortunately for the civilized world, states do not make judgements based on whether people have value before God. It's not their job. Which leaves us with utilitarianism or some form of pragmatism.

I believe my graduate project will be arguing that pragmatism is not only compatible with Christian morality, but in fact ought to be the Christian political perspective.

My point was that nobody can determine what is "just" within the bounds of utilitarianism. Looking back at what I wrote, that probably was not particularly clear. I believe that viewing civilian casualties as collateral damage comes very close to a utilitarian ethic, so I was pointing out that with such a premise, the concept of justice is impossible.

I'm not really sure what you mean by a pragmatic approach to politics, but I find it hard to believe that it would be appropriate Christian behavior to emphasize and focus on the ends while glossing over the underlying principles. In my experience, people who advocate "pragmatism" in the political realm in actuality advocate the use of violent force to accomplish their own personal goals. For example, many Christians who support the war in Iraq (and even the so-called "War on Terror") believe that it is a pragmatic war necessary to defend our country. In this view, civilian and military casualties are regretable, yet pragmatic because the perceived end goal of "defending the country" will save more lives than if we do nothing at all. The problem with this view (other than the complete dismissal of all US foreign policy prior to 9/11) is that the pursuit of pragmatism has blinded many of these Christians from seeing the underlying principles. These people have lost sight of the fact that supporting the war in Iraq places obligations on other people who do not share the same view, because people who do not support the war are forced against their will to fund it. I find it hard to believe that a proper Christian perspective on anything involves the use of coercion and threats of violence to force those who disagree with you to support your position.

You're right: you didn't make that clear. But if that's what you did mean, it's not really saying much: utilitarianism in general and pramatism in particular aren't interested in "justice" in any abstract sense, just getting things done in ways that work for most people. We'll leave justice for people with too much free time. We've got things to do.

And if your second paragraph is your real objection here than I've a few things to say before I'm done.

Your "underlying principles" direction is indefensible, because as soon as you start talking about them you move beyond the realm of the empirical and into what are infinitely debatable rabbit trails. This is not a productive line of discussion. What principles? Ethical? Economic? Historical? Theological? Gastronomical? Whose princples? Yours? Mine? Mahmoud Ahmadhinejad?

If your objection to some Christians supporting the War is that it causes people who don't support it to pay for it, you can basically pitch majoritarian representative government in toto, because that's always how things work. I think both Social Security and the Mediplans are demonstrably harmful to our nation, but that doesn't mean I have any problem paying my taxes. Rendering unto Caesar and whatnot. It's only money.

Democracy is merely a way of determining the majority consensus, so obviously there are people who are going to disagree. There are two ways of avoiding this, the first being dictatorship, and the second being an utter withdrawal from the political process.

Finally, politics is the threat of violence. No matter how subtlely veiled or far removed from the immediate discussion the threat may be, without the reality of coercive force there is no politics. Politics is the art of directing, guiding and controlling the use of that force, but it is, ultimately, still force. There is nothing unchristian about this at all.

So, if we are to pattern a state after what survives your criticisms, we have a society in which no politically difficult action can be taken because no one is allowed to force anyone to do anything. We're also not allowed to insist upon loyal dissent, because it's wrong to use people's tax money for things they don't like.

Oh, I know! You want everything to look like the UN! Now there's an institution with a fantastic record on accomplishing its goals.

I agree that the state necessarily acts by force. However, I don't believe I said that there's inherently anything wrong with that. You have to dinstinguish between the initiation of force and the use of force in defense. My point has been that the initiation of force is inherently wrong, while the use of force to defend oneself, or one's property, is perfectly fine. I have no problem with the state using force to protect its citizens. I have a big problem, however, with a state that initiates force in order to take from the politically unconnected in order to give to the politically well-connected (which is the very definition of democracy).

I also disagree that democracy is just a way to obtain a majority consensus. It is that, but it's also a way to initiate force and violate a person's natural right to his own life and property. If the primary purpose of government was to obtain a majority consensus, then a group of independent, loosely united states could accomplish this feat much easier, and much more equitably. Rather than creating classes, and instituting class warfare (the necessary byproduct of democracy), people simply "vote" with their feet, by choosing to live in the states and communities in which the laws are most favorable. Establishing a centralized nation state, however, destroys this capability.