Coercive Pacifism

 Posted by on 23 October 2002 at 12:21 pm  Uncategorized
Oct 232002
 

Eugene Volokh has some interesting comments on coerced pacificism, namely the will to ban others from defending themselves. After some examples of this view, he writes:

Pacifism is not my view of the world, but at least those who practice nonviolence in their own lives are just taking their own lives into their own hands. If they tell me (as some friends of mine have) that they don’t think they could pull the trigger to kill someone who’s trying to rape or even kill them, that’s their choice. But the proposal on the list isn’t just pacifism: This is an attempt to force nonviolence on others, by threatening to imprison them for exercising what I see as one of their most fundamental rights. Let’s call it the pacifist-aggressive approach. I don’t like it.

Me neither!

   
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