5.3.3 |
RISKING THE DEATH OF OTHER PEOPLE
OR THEIR BODIES |
The difference between causing the death of a number of
people of a certain category and risking the death of a number
of people of a certain category is merely gradual (if existent
at all). It is only with respect to a particular person that
the difference between causing and risking
'er death is of
greater significance. Thus when it is certain that a particular
person has been convicted of murdering someone else, it is also
certain that the execution of this convicted murderer causes the
death of a convicted person. But considering the system of
capital punishment in general, it is not always the death of a
guilty person which an execution causes; in practise it may also
be the death of an innocent person. Therefore every time that an
execution causes the death of a convicted person, it risks
the death of an innocent person. This is another, very serious,
objection against the death penalty, because insofar as it is
based on maximizing the number of lives saved (and not on
fanaticism or retributivism) it is actually based on minimizing
the risk of death. If the death penalty prevented other
killings, it is only a question of the risk which would be lower
if the convict were executed (instead of being given a life
sentence): people never have the knowledge of the number of
actual killings which would be prevented; and similarly, if, and
insofar as, the death penalty deterred other killings. This
is why one theorist has said about executions and assassinations
with uncertain consequences that the decision makers in question
'are gambling with lives, whether they kill or not'. The certain
death of a convict or public figure whose career is costly in
lives is simply gambled against the chance of averting a
number of other deaths. Not only the institution of capital
punishment but terrorism in particular involves then the risk of
the death of innocent people.
Risking the death of people, or their bodies, who have not
committed any crime, is an everyday practise. Allowing cars to
drive on the road is risking the death of others, not only of
the people who drive a car themselves, but also of people who do
not drive, of small children and of nonhuman animals. All
systems of motorized traffic take their toll of lives, and we
know that a number of lives will be saved --if not a great
number-- by not building such systems or by building more
expensive systems (without dangerous level crossings, for
instance). Only those who believe in the fundamental sanctity of
life itself, and who also attribute to life, or to human life, a
value incomparable with anything else, are committed to saying
that allowing motorized traffic is definitely wrong for this
reason. In their so-called 'no-trade-off' view the complete
absence of motorized traffic must be preferred to any kind of
general system of motorized traffic, a piece of life-saving
equipment to any amount of better housing or schooling, and so
on and so forth. But for no-one else can the saving of life
automatically have such absolute priority over all other
objectives. If on balance the existence of a traffic system is better
than its nonexistence, then the advantages outweigh the number
of fatal and other casualties (such as the 'statistical deaths')
in consequence of its existence (and which would not have been
there without it). Yet, such does not release anyone from 'er
personal duty to minimize as much as possible the risk of
killing, for example, by not speeding or by not driving while
under the influence of alcohol or other drugs. It is in such
cases that killing another person is slaughter (manslaughter
in traditional parlance): an unintended or accidental killing
(and accordingly without express or implied malice) for which a
person can be held responsible nevertheless. It is not that one
would not be allowed to take any risk, for taking the risk of
killing someone is inherent in a system of motorized traffic;
it is rather that one must not take too big a risk.
There are, or can be, important moral differences between
running a general system of motorized traffic and carrying on a
war (civil or international), the most important one being
whether participation is voluntary or not. Yet, there also is,
or can be, a remarkable similarity. It is that war too
--particularly a revolution-- may be waged solely to attain a
social objective, and not to kill anyone. Nonetheless, by
engaging in a war (or revolution) the decision maker always
takes the risk of people being killed, if not at the other side,
then at 'er own side. The metadoctrinal principle requires that
no-one be killed against 'er will who respects other people's
extrinsic rights, but if the people fought against in the war
concerned do not recognize other people's extrinsic rights
without being, or having been, provoked to do so, then they
cannot appeal to the right to personhood. (They may, for
example, keep and use a considerably larger portion of the
natural resources than belongs to them according to the rules of
the extrinsic right-duty constellation.)
In such a case one may
fight such people, but whether one should do so is another
issue altogether again.
The doctrinal principle of neutrality
may affirm that the social objective of the party whose
extrinsic rights are violated is a good one, but when the war is
bound to bring about the death of living beings, the death of
happiness-catenal beings, an awful lot of destruction and
terrible suffering, the badness of the war itself may outweigh
the goodness of the proposed objective. In other words, the end
does not justify the means on the neutralist model, for both the
end (a penultimate or lower-level value) and the means will have
to be judged by the same
catenary standard. By choosing
means which are worse than what is fought for in the first place, a
party or country would overshoot its mark. One way, then, to
prevent defeating one's own ultimate end is to minimize the risk
that others in the conflict concerned will be killed. Again, it
is probably true that some risk of killing human or other
living beings will have to be taken in a war or during an
insurrection, yet this in itself does not justify taking too big
a risk, nor does it justify taking a risk of killing too many
human or other living beings.
'War' is a conflict between opposed parties characterized by
the coercive use of violence. Violence itself has been
defined as intentional infliction of damage, pain, injury or
death by forcible means. Now, genuine pacifists would argue
that people are to refrain from using violence under all
circumstances. On their view violence is evil, and people ought
to eradicate, or at least minimize, it by not getting involved
in it themselves. (Their reply to those who 'fight for peace' is
sometimes that this is as absurd and self-defeating as 'fucking
for virginity'.) The crux is, of course, whether pacifism does
indeed reduce violence given that not all other people are
pacifists as well. An interesting point made is then that a
moral principle is not a principle to be adopted by one person
or group only but by everyone. And if everyone were to adopt the
principle of pacifism, violence would indeed cease to exist. But
it has been demonstrated that this argument is fallacious in
that it does not solely apply to the pacifist principle but
also, for instance, to the principle that violence should only
be employed defensively. If everyone were to live up to this
principle, violence would be eradicated too. The principle may
not be as simple as that of the pacifist, but it is equally
universal. Defensively tho, is too vague a term for us, as
it may be so narrow that it only concerns a person's own body
(or the lives of the members of the group
'e belongs to), or so
broad that it also concerns everything that is called "'er
property" in the country or community in question. On our
normative considerations the alternative to the pacifist
principle is rather: use violence against other people only if
extrinsic rights are violated . However, if they are, the
implication is not yet that we should use violence. We may still,
like pacifists, actually never use violence.
In cases of armed conflict risking the death of other people
or their bodies does not only mean risking the death of those
belonging to an opposed party, it equally frequently means
risking the death of others belonging to the same party.
When a government forces its own citizens, or a particular
category thereof, to fight in a just or unjust war, it risks the
death of other people; those making the decisions at the top
are seldom or never the ones risking their own lives. In the
event that a person who fights in a war has voluntarily agreed
to participate in that particular war, or in all wars waged by
the government in question, 'er right to personhood is not
violated in this respect. The situation is quite different,
however, if the person whose life is at stake is forcibly made
to partake in that war despite 'er conscientious objection. It
may be that the war in question is a brutal act of violence, or
a serious violation of foreign extrinsic rights. It may be that
the government in question requires its citizens to die, or risk
their lives, for a state of
religionism and/or
monarchism, or
for a state of party-political and/or military totalitarianism.
It may be that the nation's armed forces discriminatingly
conscript or hire people or human bodies of one particular
category only (gender, race or otherwise). These are all reasons
why risking the death of a countryman or countrywoman in a war
can be in the same league as murder.
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