Poll: The Ends JustifyingThe Means

[Frybird]

Pretty much every conflict could be solved with guns, but clearly it mostly wouldn't be worth that.

The Ends often do not justify the means, although sometimes a hard decision must be made...so it depends

 

[sumanoskae]

It depends but usually no

 

[coakroach]

More often than most people think.

Take the Tienanmen Square massacre for example, you had a world that's watching communist countries overthrow there governments with riots and civil war spreading like wildfire.
You have China, a nation with the worlds highest population, that's being kept in order by a bumbling group of Fascists (the party).
Suddenly protests begin, protests that appear very similar to the ones that lead to communist regimes being deposed in former soviet states.

So what did they do? Well we all know.

Its easy to look at this event from a humanitarian perspective, claim that the murder of hundreds of protesters in the name of 'keeping order' cannot be justified.
Protesters which began to openly attack military personnel, jumping on armored vehicles and hitting them with sticks.
But think for a second, if these protests had continued and escalated, what then?
Would the party be overthrown? Would the worlds most populous police state lose its police?
Would it descend into all out civil war? Would this divided China be able to re-unify or would it fall to pieces? What would the death toll be then?

I don't mean to say that they were necessarily correct in there actions, but there's a lot more to it than meets the eye.

And that's why they should have beaten those protesters in Thailand.....wait what were we talking about?

 

[w-Jinksy]

its all dependant. in war the end will always justify the means in other places not so much.

 

[NimbleJack3]

Thinking completely rational with no emotion, the ends justifies the means EVERY time. If you do kill everyone to achieve world peace, then you have achieved world peace. It's just that everyone is dead. If you want to achieve world peace WITHOUT killing everyone, then that's a different end entirely. And a new means.

 

[About To Crash]

You know, I'm not entirely sure if I picked "Depends" because that's what I believe, or because it's the easiest answer to defend. Anyone who takes a firm stance on one side or the other is going to have some very difficult situations thrown at them.

So despite what I voted, I'm going to say, "Yes, the ends do indeed justify the means." The Atomic Bomb stopped the second world war, animals are tested to save human lives. I know that it's occasionally heartless, but I'm becoming more an more of a believer in "Survival at any cost" as a way of life.

 

[Jamash]

It all depends on the situation, and to what means are applied to what ends.

For example, stealing a loaf of bread to feed your starving family is justifiable, but stealing the same loaf of bread but beating the shit out of the shopkeeper who catches you isn't justifiable.

The ends are the same in both cases, but feeding your starving family doesn't justify beating up a shop keeper.

 

[Zacharine]

On a general rule I'd say it doesn't, but there might be a few situations to prove the exception. So I guess it does depend on what the end result is and what possible means might be expected to be done in order to reach it.