Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Joint Liability

There exists amongst men, because they are men, a solidarity through which each shares responsibility for every injustice and every wrong committed in the world and especially for crimes that are committed in his presence or of which he cannot be ignorant. If I do not do whatever I can to prevent them, I am an accomplice in them. If I have risked my life in order to prevent the murder of other men, if I have stood silent, I feel guilty in a sense that cannot in any adequate fashion be understood jurisdicially or politically or morally... That I am still alive after such things have been done weighs on me as a guilt that cannot be expiated.
Somewhere in the heart of human relations, an absolute command imposes itself: in case of criminal attack or of living conditions that threaten physical being, accept life for all together or not at all. - Karl Jaspers

6 comments:

Spider42 said...

intruiging post as always.. cheers..

Anonymous said...

Truly said if we have to exist as communities. Modern 'man' (I tend to use th word huper as Baxi talks because man is a sexist notion, feminists fought away in the 60s) is an atomic individual.

it is the sense of atomic individuality that gives to us the rights we so much cherisha nd the desires for material and non-material items we value.

Can we expect social responsibility from an atomic indivudual? Atomic individual's responsibility extends onlt to his/her own direct acions. The cycle of effects is perpetious and can never be known.

Secondly, the notion of right and wrong play a role in our determination of social action. If I try to save a Palestenian chils, then i have an idea of suffering which I assosiate with that particular child.

Should we then extend these rights to all then? How about the oppresors? Do they have rights as a human? are they a part of the community of men?

What about the invisible hand of economy ( Adam Smith)? The invisible hand of economy is supposed to rationalize ethics and responsibilities fro us in order to maximize the efficiency of resurce allocation. Should we then challenge ideas first before we out our neck under the knife?

I guess we are still speaking in dialectics: actions or thought have primacy over the other. You bloggers emphasize the priamcy of action. But action without theory is nothing.

My voice against white racism will be the voice of black racism if we do not engage in critical engagement with theory.

Theory has to live in what Pierreu Badiou calls "praxis" with the actions.

Secondly, with theory undo th modern man. The man died with Focault. Focault referred to man as etches on the sandy beaches, which the waves of times will wash away.

Let us before we sacrifice our selves as martyrs-wihout-a-cause, create a cause; understand society; engage with its problems.

Anonymous said...

There is no joint liability. The subject of modern criminal law or tort law, does not make in-action a crime except in certain situations. And none of the exceptions have been talked about over here.

So law represents rationality in the Hegelian developement of society. law represents legality and what is right.

So when i am not agaist the law in my in-action, so why do I have responsibility?

Anonymous said...

Sorry I forgot my signature,

CREMATED WOLF :)

desert demons said...

Thanx dude :)

Anon - I see it the opposite way , all the theory and none of the action is just as pointless. In our over-thinking we find too many excuses for why we shouldn't couldn't and can't act. And just maybe in our willingness to be matyrs for a better world we will engage the problems .

Anonymous said...

Dear Blogger,

Can you please kindly give me a caricature of the better world, a brief caricature, without engaging in the abstract concepts of words such as justice.

let me remind you that this progress towards something better is what characterized the two totalitarian states/ideologies of 20th Century i.e. fascist Germany and Marxist Soviet Union of Stalin. (Hannah Ardent).

So I am surprised how you can justify a future caught in such ambeguous and often used for evil concepts.

i am sorry, but I have nothing to add as well. I have no vision for future. But at least I am trying to raise questions, trying to study the genealogy of ideas which we claim to be the building blocks of our future. So...basically we are both lost souls.

Instead of visioning a future let us observe the present and question the past.