Your plane crashes

[yguy]

Were there two different Eason Jordan's at CNN? Cause this one didn't resign for the reasons you gave:

I'll stand corrected on that, but here is his effort to justify suppression of info about torture:

Over the last dozen years I made 13 trips to Baghdad to lobby the government to keep CNN's Baghdad bureau open and to arrange interviews with Iraqi leaders. Each time I visited, I became more distressed by what I saw and heard -- awful things that could not be reported because doing so would have jeopardized the lives of Iraqis, particularly those on our Baghdad staff.

[...]​

 

[Nathan45]

Eitherway, a ruthless dictator of a third world country should not be considered an "authority figure" for the purposes of the milgram experiment, because the dictator is not trusted.

For example, if the dictator were to tell you to administer shocks to someone, I suspect most people wouldn't administer any at all without being threatened or tortured, because the dictator is the enemy not a trusted expert.

 

[yguy]

as i stated already and repeat, whether the patient thought the doses of electricity were "high" is not relevant because they were deferential to opinion the doctor who was conducting the experiment. Presumably he had conducted this experiment before and he knew what he was doing. All the experiment shows is that the subjects are more willing to trust an expert's judgment than their own on the issue of dangerous electrical shocks.

And just why would a reasonable person err on the side of recklessness to please an authority figure?

 

[yguy]

Eitherway, a ruthless dictator of a third world country should not be considered an "authority figure" for the purposes of the milgram experiment, because the dictator is not trusted.

On the contrary, our hypothetical dictator was trusted by a good many people here to do exactly what he said he would.

 

[Nathan45]

And just why would a reasonable person err on the side of recklessness to please an authority figure?

Because they're stupid and not reasonable? Not everyone in the milgram experiment administered the lethal dose, though, just most. I certainly wouldn't administer it, for example, because i'm not an idiot like the ~60% or so of people who flunk the milgram test.

But eitherway, there's a huge difference between that and this, it's not going through the same brain pathways:

doing something that a respected doctor/scientists tells you to do that seems dangerous, is a much more natural reaction than doing something that a hated enemy tells you to do when you know for a fact it's murder.

 

[Nathan45]

edit: misread, deleted.

 

[Nathan45]

On the contrary, our hypothetical dictator was trusted by a good many people here to do exactly what he said he would.

not by me. I told you earlier, i don't shoot. But trusting him a second time, after he's already broken his word, is abysmally stupid. edit: you'd have to be a complete idiot to take him at his word after he's already lied once.

edit: and to clarify, it actually wouldn't surprise me if he did keep up his end of the bargain. If he's doing this for the purposes of propoganda he has no real reason to kill the children. Although he might ask you to do it again if the first video wasn't good enough and he needed a re-shoot ( no pun intended)

 

[RealDealNeverstop]

I'll stand corrected on that, but here is his effort to justify suppression of info about torture:

Over the last dozen years I made 13 trips to Baghdad to lobby the government to keep CNN's Baghdad bureau open and to arrange interviews with Iraqi leaders. Each time I visited, I became more distressed by what I saw and heard -- awful things that could not be reported because doing so would have jeopardized the lives of Iraqis, particularly those on our Baghdad staff.

[...]​

Thanks for the admission of the Jordan error but it doesn't disabuse the false dilemma. Here is what was claimed:

"You won't necessarily have to wield a gun to have blood on your hands. You could just become a propagandist for him, helping him to maintain the power by which he continues to murder. Incidentally, this is essentially what CNN did by keeping silent about the torture it knew was going on in Iraq for a decade before the US finally invaded."

CNN did not help Sadman maintain power because Jordan didn't report on some rumors of specific heinous acts. I don't even know how that could even be loosely defended. Our government did quite a bit to ensure Sadman remained in power so to blame his maintained position by CNN not reporting on some specific crimes seems non-sensical. We all knew Sadman was a sick freak way back in the mid-80s. The claim also makes it appear as those IF CNN had reported on those specific crimes the world would have been shocked at what was reported.

 

[RealDealNeverstop]

On the contrary, our hypothetical dictator was trusted by a good many people here to do exactly what he said he would.

I don't know how many claimed they would have followed his instructions but I certainly am not one of them. Moreover, even for those who would have done what he said, that is insufficient evidence of trust. I think the mistake being made by 99% would not be trusting the dictator, it would be the absence of humility on their part. An arrogant person would likely succumb to the dictator, but not out of trust, only the arrogance of believing they could save the children and defeat the dictator.

 

[yguy]

Because they're stupid and not reasonable?

This does not strike you as facile?

doing something that a respected doctor/scientists tells you to do that seems dangerous, is a much more natural reaction than doing something that a hated enemy tells you to do when you know for a fact it's murder.

Nonsense. The two responses are more alike than they are different, because in each case the subject subjugates his will to that of an authority figure for no good reason.

 

[yguy]

Our government did quite a bit to ensure Sadman remained in power

This reveals a certain myopia on your part WRT the point of contention, but I'm not going into all that here. The bottom line is not that CNN reporting honestly would have necessarily brought Hussein down an hour sooner, but that it aided and abetted his designs, however marginally.

 

[Nathan45]

This reveals a certain myopia on your part WRT the point of contention, but I'm not going into all that here. The bottom line is not that CNN reporting honestly would have necessarily brought Hussein down an hour sooner, but that it aided and abetted his designs, however marginally.

I only wish they could have brought down reagan and rumsfeld.

Maybe if they had published what they knew about saddam in the 80's we never would have had this guy as secretary of defense:

 

[Nathan45]

This does not strike you as facile?Nonsense. The two responses are more alike than they are different, because in each case the subject subjugates his will to that of an authority figure for no good reason.

it doesn't matter how many similarities there are if there is just one key difference: The doctor is trusted and reputable, the dictator is an untrusted enemy, and the more he falls back on his word the less trusted he becomes.

 

[yasic]

or for anyone.



As i already stated, I don't shoot because i think that the dictator will tape it and use it as propoganda.

So a follow up question to you: Would that change your outlook?

If you knew that you were killing the kid on tape, and it would be taken completely out of context and used in some kind of anti-western propoganda video, would you still shoot the kid?

If I knew the dictator was to use a tape of me for nefarious plots, then I will do the best cost-benefit analysis I could, weighing the odds of having the children being released against the possible damage that could come about from such a tape.

If I felt the damage from the tape would cause more harm, than I simply would not comply. I would need a lot more details to determine which side I would choose.


For the problem asked in the OP, I obviously thought of this possibility, however I concluded that as the dictator has means of getting complying folk of any race he needs, and that I am a relatively unknown figure in my society, that the chance that he actually needs me for video tape evidence is minuscule, worth not considering. I could be wrong, but this was my judgement to the best of my ability.

 

[yasic]

It doesn't matter, because you would have. If you can't see that, nothing else I say will make sense to you.

I am still waiting for the justification for how my actions would have been the wrong one, and all I got was a claim that killing children is an addictive behavior.

You would need to offer some better support for your claims here.

But they wouldn't be, because you never bothered to ask yourself why the dictator would go through all this, so that your calculation leaves out the most important factor.

I have thought about why the dictator would put me in such a position, and I could not come up with any answer which has enough strength to tip my decision.

But you have already shown a susceptibility to manipulation by killing the child. Once you do it, he may kill them all right in front of you just to rub your nose in your stupidity.

If you read my posts, you will see that I took this chance into account and figured that I still have a better chance to save the most people by complying.

And then maybe he'll wine and dine you, make you believe he's your bud. By such various and sundry psychological inducements, he'll make a new man of you. You won't necessarily have to wield a gun to have blood on your hands. You could just become a propagandist for him, helping him to maintain the power by which he continues to murder.

If a dictator kills any number of children for no justifiable reason, then no amount of wine and dining would make my ally him. He would be despicable in my eyes and there virtually nothing he would be able to do to change this.

 

[yguy]

the dictator is an untrusted enemy, and the more he falls back on his word the less trusted he becomes.

You evidently don't know much about the history of the last century. Dictators don't need to be truthful to stay in power. They just need to avoid lying to the wrong people - which does not include those who have shown susceptibility to manipulation.

 

[yguy]

He would be despicable in my eyes and there virtually nothing he would be able to do to change this.

That's the problem. You can't keep hating forever - and that's exactly why you will end up on his side. Especially since he will remind you that you're a murderer, wherefore you will hate yourself as well - possibly less for that than for the fact that you were foolish enough to take the word of a murderer.

 

[Nathan45]

You evidently don't know much about the history of the last century. Dictators don't need to be truthful to stay in power. They just need to avoid lying to the wrong people - which does not include those who have shown susceptibility to manipulation.

Ah, i understand. The dictator has magical powers which will make yasic do exactly what he wants, despite yasic's insistance that he won't do what you say he will.

Yasic: In that case i'll...
Yguy: No! you can't do that! You've already been brainwashed by the dictator!

 

[yasic]

That's the problem. You can't keep hating forever - and that's exactly why you will end up on his side. Especially since he will remind you that you're a murderer, wherefore you will hate yourself as well - possibly less for that than for the fact that you were foolish enough to take the word of a murderer.

I would find it exceedingly difficult to forgive anyone who slaughters children without cause. This is especially so if the person remains unapologetic.


And if I have the title murderer and I end up hating myself over it, then trust me, the majority of this hate would be aimed at the dictator that put in in that position rather than myself.

And while I certainly cannot say that I will not spend a long time hating myself as I simply cannot imagine what killing a child would do to me, I would find the idea of me hating myself very odd given that I would know that I did what I felt to be the best possible action to save the lives of the most people I could and I would see nothing to blame myself over.

I could see myself in shock or depression over killing a child fairly easily, however I doubt it would be fueled by self-loathing.

 

[RealDealNeverstop]

This reveals a certain myopia on your part WRT the point of contention, but I'm not going into all that here. The bottom line is not that CNN reporting honestly would have necessarily brought Hussein down an hour sooner, but that it aided and abetted his designs, however marginally.

Utterly ridiculous to cherry pick one sentence out of a paragraph. Is it too much to ask for convo courtesy to not edit out relevent points? The accusation of being nearsighted on top of that is a double whammy and unbelievaby ironic. The nearsightedness here is claiming CNN aided and abetted Saddams brutal reign. Trying to employ the phrase "however marginally" is an implicit admission the claim cannot be supported. There was no media blackout on Saddam and our government even made sure of that. The nearsightedness initially got revealed with the claim Jordan resigned from CNN due to a media blackout because it showed what happens when claims are made in backwards fashion.

CNN couldve had a 24 hour Iraq Torture channel and it still wouldn't have made a difference.

"CNN found that intervention is often weighed against political and economic costs.Declassified U.S. government documents show that while Saddam Hussein was gassing Iraqi Kurds, the U.S. opposed punishing Iraq with a trade embargo because it was cultivating Iraq as an ally against Iran and as a market for U.S. farm exports.

According to Peter Galbraith, then an idealistic Senate staffer determined to stop Hussein from committing genocide, the Reagan administration "got carried away with their own propaganda. They began to believe that Saddam Hussein could be a reliable partner." Read once-secret U.S. documents.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/11/20/sbm.overview/