Morality
In I Spit On Your Grave, a young woman is gang raped in a remote woodland. She is beaten and tortured in a series of deeply disturbing scenes, before she hurls herself into a river.
She survives, comes back, and inflicts a graphic and brutal revenge on the men who so viciously attacked her.
I can’t remember why I picked up the DVD - although I love horror and was possibly overcome with swaggering bravado after seeing the ‘watch it if you dare’ sticker.
Continue reading "The humourless hysteria of the holier-than-thou" »
It is easy to feel repulsed by the gruesome details of Colonel Gaddafi’s final moments as they continue to flood the airwaves in the wake of his burial. Yet it is also easy to identify sloppy moral relativism when it creeps into ethical public discourse.
It is easier still to ignore it when you see it in print. For a change, I thought I might not let a recent example of this slide. There were important operational and ethical differences between the deaths of Osama bin Laden and Colonel Gaddafi. The prospect of peacefully arresting and extracting a death-seeking jihadist barricaded in a fortified compound was always going to be slim.
This situation stands in contrast to the one faced by the militarised and murderous rebel mob who callously refused the surrender of a wounded and shaken 69-year-old armed only with a comically bling ‘golden pistol’ in a drain pipe in broad daylight.
Continue reading "Sloppy moral relativism in the wake of death" »
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OchreBunyip says:
The US routinely admits to using surgical strikes on cafes and restaurants to kill known terrorists usually with drones, and glosses over the civilians that were also in the buildings at the time. As far as I know the US has not invented bomb fragments that only kill the bad… Read more »
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OchreBunyip says:
@neo, killing civilians in war is a nasty business but why mention only women. Mentioning children I have no quibble with however are men not civilians as well? Is a woman’s death somehow more disturbing than a man’s death? I raise it because I’ve seen this a couple of times… Read more »
World leaders and of course, many Libyans, have celebrated the death of Colonel Gaddafi. Many suffered under his brutal regime. There is no doubt Gaddafi was a tyrant and the head of a government known for torture and mass killings of dissidents.
He was either complicit or directly aware of major human rights abuses happening under his rule. He also took power of a country without the mandate of his people. He was eccentric and unpredictable and many world leaders accepted him and treated him as their equal, yet none truly admired the man. His death was a cathartic moment for many.
But even though he was a mass murderer and rightly despised, his death should not have been treated in the undignified manner that we saw again and again on our screens.
Continue reading "Dancing on graves is appalling, even if it’s Gaddafi" »
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RyaN says:
@fml: “if you were you would of been compensated to the tune of US$10 million” Is that the price of human life then? I know no amount of money would compensate for the loss of a loved one. “I will allow my self to be offended by the Iran Air… Read more »
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A mi says:
Seems like you are the one who got offended by a peaceful article. Just because something is pro-Islam, it does not mean its against any other religion. Augurazab (its actually Aurangzeb, pronounced Au- rango- zeb), Gaddafi or Osama are not the teachers of Islam, in fact in my opinion they… Read more »
I have a regular segment on a community radio station in Sydney that often takes its subject matter from listeners’ email requests.
Unsurprisingly, this week I received a number asking me to explain the causes of the London riots.
My initial response was that the causes are complex, and we should ignore the many knee-jerk reactions emerging.
Continue reading "The moral of this story is politicians are immoral" »
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Nathan says:
TomZ you said “yes and someone told me that Howard once farted in a lift.” did you believe it just think it was another ALP conspiracy Read more »
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TomZ says:
@Howards biographerq, yes and someone told me that Howard once farted in a lift. Read more »
“It is not ideal that religious freedom is protected by so-called ‘exemptions and exceptions’ in anti-discrimination law, almost like reluctant concessions, crumbs from the secularists’ table.”
Cardinal George Pell’s recent lament to Prime Minister Julia Gillard about the “secularists’ table” seems odd, given that religion still defines our nationhood. Just ask our atheist Prime Minister. It is hard to imagine then how exceptions and exemptions are metaphorical “crumbs”, when they have a vast reach in excluding minority groups in Australia.
While each state and territory currently has anti-discrimination laws which protect against some forms of sexuality or gender identity discrimination, the inconsistency in terminology, and the wide-ranging exemptions (particularly for faith-based bodies) means there are considerable gaps in protecting the rights of individuals accessing health services, goods or services, aged care, employment and education.
Continue reading "The faithful are feasting on religious freedoms" »
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Pat Ross says:
I have found that modern churches will christen your grandchildren, then steal their inheritance, all under the umbrella of religious freedom, and privilege that knows no boundaries, no morality, and nothing but a show of humanity that pretends a loyalty and charity that doesn’t exist, and perhaps never has -… Read more »
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markjuliansmith says:
@Mark McKinlay You may be right I am not certain of anything. Faith provides secular and religious certainty the greater the certainty the greater the danger to humanity. So it is important not to be so certain you know the ‘truth’. “Why must be the custodians of “human rights” in… Read more »
Enough. Unpopular though it may be, it is a time to take a stand.
We have to stop celebrating morons and their attendant antics. We have to stop defending idiots and their self-imposed tragedies.
Whether it be a middle-aged former cricketer with a penchant for romancing equally vacuous bimbos or drug-addled footballers with a natural gift for screwing up every fifth chance offered to them - it’s about time we drew a line in the sand and said “sod off!”.
Continue reading "The Stupid People: They are legion, and dangerous" »
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felixmeister says:
“I mean, I know they’re there to stop stupid people running into the street and killing themselves! But we’re not all stupid! We don’t all need nurse-maiding. I mean, why not just have a Stupidity Tax? Just tax the stupid people! ” - Jennifer Saunders as Eddie Read more »
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Bill Parkment says:
Ironically, this editorial is guilty of what it claims to critique, and I’m surprised by all the people leaping gleefully on board. Calling people “stupid” is something we should avoid, no matter who they are referring to. It’s an ad hominem tactic used by people (mainly children, but sometimes adults)… Read more »
The Jerry Springer of modern philosophy was in good form when he addressed a packed crowd on Wednesday evening in the Great Hall of the University of Sydney.
Peter Singer, now a professor at Princeton University in the US, was back in his native Australia for a visit.
Most philosophers count themselves lucky if their mother appreciates their work. But Singer is regarded - by journalists, at least - as the most influential living philosopher. In fact, at Sydney Uni, he was introduced with the fulsome praise normally reserved for superannuated television stars: “If we had a collection of national living treasures, Peter would certainly stand tall amongst them.”
Continue reading "Peter Singer: the Jerry Springer of philosophy" »
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Ruby says:
In the context of the rest of the comments this is a bit off topic but what’s with the authors jab at vegetarians/vegans as not being well-fed? Does he not know about vegetables? Fruits? Grains? This is worrying. I guess non-vegetarians just have that ‘ruddy’ look that accompanies an increased… Read more »
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Joanne King says:
Methinks Mr Cook protesteth too loud. Read more »
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