Is Human Sacrifice Always Wrong?

[Angela]

Or, put another way, can cultural relativism go too far?

Well, it certainly can for me. Human sacrifice is bad. Period. Slavery is bad. Period. Genocide of other human groups is bad. Period.

Yes, we should try to understand the cultural practices of historical groups in context, in comparison to other groups living at the same time, for example, but some things are still just wrong. Only in modern academia could someone write something so asinine as this:

"

[/IMG]

In the vast majority of cases human sacrifices were of people conquered in war, or slaves. Or they were innocent babies, as in the case of the Carthaginians/Canaanites, which certainly gave both the Romans and the Hebrews good talking points in the ancient propaganda wars.

This practice was about POWER, not about the beliefs of the people being sacrificed. How can some academics be this stupid and uninformed, uneducated, in fact. It's an indictment of our entire educational system that it can produce such woefully ignorant young graduates equally woefully juvenile in their thought processes.

Almost as annoying is dragging European imperialism into it. As Khan points out, this has nothing to do with a Eurocentric moral view imposed on the "natives". Other inhabitants of the Americas were also appalled by this Aztec practice, and with good cause, as it could happen to them. As I also pointed out above, the contemporaries of the Canaanites and Phoenicians were appalled by child sacrifice. Most of the world was appalled by the mountains of decapitated skulls the Huns left behind them, and on and on. It's not "anti-Asian" to agree.

Honestly, this nonsense is so drilled into the heads of these young academics by their professors that it's just like a response by Pavlov's dog.

When is it going to end?

See:
https://www.gnxp.com/WordPress/2018...as-bad/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

 

[Jovialis]

Most of these students only learn how to virtue signal emotional appeals based on political rhetoric.

 

[exceededminimumso..]

If God or gods tell you, you do it, because, hey, it's god(s)

 

[Ygorcs]

I think these people in general don't quite get the irony of what they themselves say: they claim their views are "tainted" by their 21st century Western and eurocentric system of values and customs (in other words, they acknowledge their views and preferences are shaped by their culture in conscious and unconscious ways)...

HOWEVER they put foreign cultures in a pedestal way above the individual integrity of flesh-and-blood human beings and fail to acknowledge that that very same problem also affected ancient people in other cultures (being "tainted" by the values enforced onto them since they were babies, partially losing one's skepticism, neutrality and even one's individual freedom), especially in old times, when people were much more communitarian and traditionalist than nowadays.

They simply presume that those people would freely take the same decisions even in the absence of the huge weight of traditional institutions and social customs onto them. They don't realize that, especially in pre-modern, mostly illiterate times, most people would be intensely indoctrinated into believing and making whatever was held as "customary" or desired by "the gods" or even the local authority (court or priestly class), and rebelling against all that strong cultural construction could be risky (most people, I think, didn't even think about that, humans in general act like animal hordes when they see that the majority of the population believes in something).

These very same people often criticize Christians and the Catholic Church of the Middle Ages for burning "witches" at the stake for the sake of their own religious beliefs and cultural values. Why not apply all this "empathy" and "understanding" in that situation? The evidently anti-colonialist stance of most "devout" cultural relativists end up creating traps for them.

This is an incoherence I'll never "get" staunch cultural relativism. It seems that to them only Western modern people have cultural biases and culturally shaped decisions and desires. Besides, they elevate the often gruesome and cruel customs and traditions of other peoples, particularly pre-modern ones, to the condition of a human subject worthy of fundamental rights. That's just too much relativism for me. I think this idea is pretty good to allow us to UNDERSTAND what they did and why, but a whole different issue to is to condone and justify it.

 

[Angela]

I think these people in general don't quite get the irony of what they themselves say: they claim their views are "tainted" by their 21st century Western and eurocentric system of values and customs (in other words, they acknowledge their views and preferences are shaped by their culture in conscious and unconscious ways)...

HOWEVER they put foreign cultures in a pedestal way above the individual integrity of flesh-and-blood human beings and fail to acknowledge that that very same problem also affected ancient people in other cultures (being "tainted" by the values enforced onto them since they were babies, partially losing one's skepticism, neutrality and even one's individual freedom), especially in old times, when people were much more communitarian and traditionalist than nowadays.

They simply presume that those people would freely take the same decisions even in the absence of the huge weight of traditional institutions and social customs onto them. They don't realize that, especially in pre-modern, mostly illiterate times, most people would be intensely indoctrinated into believing and making whatever was held as "customary" or desired by "the gods" or even the local authority (court or priestly class), and rebelling against all that strong cultural construction could be risky (most people, I think, didn't even think about that, humans in general act like animal hordes when they see that the majority of the population believes in something).

These very same people often criticize Christians and the Catholic Church of the Middle Ages for burning "witches" at the stake for the sake of their own religious beliefs and cultural values. Why not apply all this "empathy" and "understanding" in that situation? The evidently anti-colonialist stance of most "devout" cultural relativists end up creating traps for them.

This is an incoherence I'll never "get" staunch cultural relativism. It seems that to them only Western modern people have cultural biases and culturally shaped decisions and desires. Besides, they elevate the often gruesome and cruel customs and traditions of other peoples, particularly pre-modern ones, to the condition of a human subject worthy of fundamental rights. That's just too much relativism for me. I think this idea is pretty good to allow us to UNDERSTAND what they did and why, but a whole different issue to is to condone and justify it.

That's all completely true. The standards are also different for modern "European" countries versus the rest of the world. A man in the "west" can get fired for giving a female co-worker a compliment or asking her out, but most of the intelligentsia doesn't want to talk about female circumcision, which should be called female mutilation, in Africa and in Muslim countries, or the stoning of women taken in adultery in Saudi Arabia while the man gets off free, or the taking of underage girls in marriage, or throwing acid at a young Muslim girl for wanting to study, or "honor" killings that take place even in the west, or on and on. Sometimes they even refuse to let these women speak at universities.

It just absolutely infuriates me.

 

[exceededminimumso..]

Since this is "political correctness gone mad" thread..

 

[Jovialis]

Consistency isn’t expedient for ideologues who pander to select constituencies. Partisan politics can make otherwise intelligent people say really stupid things, because they just want their “tribe” to “win”. They see something the opposing side might use as fuel for their own rhetoric, so they create these hypocritical positions. Or they apply some kind of distorted moral invective on anyone that points out viable flaws in the argument. I guess they think the ends justify the means. While many students militantly adhere to these warped talking points. To anyone that isn’t completely brainwashed, it only serves to make them look foolish or disingenuous.