Safety Vs. Compassion
- DuncanIdaho
- New Trial Member
- Posts: 9
- Joined: September 29th, 2016, 5:21 pm
Safety Vs. Compassion
While listening to a video with Sam Harris and some other guy talking about the issue of refugees in the United States in reference to the upcoming election and current refugee issues, it got me pondering on the benefits and risks of different stances when it comes to policy making regarding these issues. Basically, it seems like there are two major principles you could choose between when deciding on the goals of refugee policy. You can either make your decisions based on saving or protecting as many citizen lives as possible, or you can provide aid to as many innocent refugees as possible. While immigration policy has some parallels, I'm more interested in discussing the benefits/risks of how liberally we allow refugees across our borders.
Without getting religion involved in our decision making, is it more ethical to be more restrictive in who we let in, in order to reduce the risk of letting people in who are only doing so in order to take violent action against us? Or, knowing that we can't stop everyone with ill-intent from crossing, do we take in as many refugees as possible in order to give aid and protection to as many innocents as possible? Like I said, I'd like to see everyone's thoughts on this without dragging religious issues into the discussion. I'm more interested in discussing the relative morality of protecting those within your group versus the morality of helping others.
- LuckyR
- Moderator
- Posts: 7935
- Joined: January 18th, 2015, 1:16 am
Re: Safety Vs. Compassion
You take reasonable steps to minimize (not eliminate) the risk to the public. No one can reasonably ask for more than that. If preventing future harm was the goal, there are plenty of current citizens we should "deport".DuncanIdaho wrote:I struggled for a bit deciding whether to post this here or in the politics section, so my apologies if this doesn't seem like the perfect place for this one.
While listening to a video with Sam Harris and some other guy talking about the issue of refugees in the United States in reference to the upcoming election and current refugee issues, it got me pondering on the benefits and risks of different stances when it comes to policy making regarding these issues. Basically, it seems like there are two major principles you could choose between when deciding on the goals of refugee policy. You can either make your decisions based on saving or protecting as many citizen lives as possible, or you can provide aid to as many innocent refugees as possible. While immigration policy has some parallels, I'm more interested in discussing the benefits/risks of how liberally we allow refugees across our borders.
Without getting religion involved in our decision making, is it more ethical to be more restrictive in who we let in, in order to reduce the risk of letting people in who are only doing so in order to take violent action against us? Or, knowing that we can't stop everyone with ill-intent from crossing, do we take in as many refugees as possible in order to give aid and protection to as many innocents as possible? Like I said, I'd like to see everyone's thoughts on this without dragging religious issues into the discussion. I'm more interested in discussing the relative morality of protecting those within your group versus the morality of helping others.
-
- Posts: 2181
- Joined: January 7th, 2015, 7:09 am
Re: Safety Vs. Compassion
Ideally you take what precautions you can and work with other countries to organise the most reasonable settlement of as many as possible, sharing funding for those in a position to take more. The EU had a go at that, it rarely works that way because countries prioritise their own national interests. Nearby countries will be worst hit, if you can help fund them and keep refugees close to home that's sometimes the best thing, but often such countries are poor or unstable themselves.
Alongside working for the peaceful resolution of the source conflict/injustice which caused them to flee initially.
And not starting wars yourself which are likely to destabilise huge parts of the world.
2023/2024 Philosophy Books of the Month
Mark Victor Hansen, Relentless: Wisdom Behind the Incomparable Chicken Soup for the Soul
by Mitzi Perdue
February 2023
Rediscovering the Wisdom of Human Nature: How Civilization Destroys Happiness
by Chet Shupe
March 2023