to think that the catholic church are bloody immoral and need to be made answerable to the shit they seem to get away with?

[cupcakesandbunting]

I am referring to this; www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-11061296

and yes, I am totally aware that the police and government are to blame too but we expect governments and to an extent police, to be corrupt.

I am saying this as a RC too. I am fucking shocked at the amount of revolting crap that the church seem to get away with. Covering up paedophiles/abusers, bombers and who knows what else.

Why are they never made accountable?

'Law is the imposition of agreed (between who depends on the dominant power at the time) rules; it has absolutely no connection with any concept of inarguable, instinctive moral right or wrong. After all, abortion's legal in this country, but Freddo disagrees. That's her take on the mores and practice of modern-day Great Britain. Yes?'

Yes, it's her take, No, obviously I don't agree that law is something imposed, more of a mutually agreed contract where the various parties. This is especially true of those states where the common law is accepted, where the balancing of rights forms the essence of many debates (abortion for instance, where various individual rights run into each other, or less personal American debates about states' vs. Federal powers). Both parties in a debate that involves conflicting rights have an idea of innate rights.

You've lost me when you assert, albeit in qualified fashion ('inarguable'), that law has no connection with any instinctive moral right or wrong. Nothing is inarguable of course; thus far we agree, but your halfbaked and qualified statement that there is no connection between law and instinctive moral right and wrong does not hold water. The perceived violation of rights we assume we have is universally considered to be wrong. Individuals, even in places where the criminal code is very different from the one we accept in the west, do not go happily to be stoned for a crime they did not commit.

'Socrates was against democracy so, y'know, the man wasn't infallible.' Do you assume democracy is a Good Thing then? Why?

I can only keep asking: do you disagree that all the examples I gave earlier, that fail the RC Instinctively Moral test, have been enshrined in law by societies across the globe? Do you also disagree that defnitions of natural moral good and bad have wildly altered through time and geography? Yes or no?

Also " I don't agree that law is something imposed".

What?? Really? It's not imposed??

Burma, the USSR, Indonesia, China, North Korea are (or were) recent examples of the exteme end of this phenomenon and serve to easily disprove your assertion, but it also stands to define any law at any time within any non-anarchic society. Please tell me how the examples given above were "more of a mutually agreed contract". Seriously, I'm rather looking forard to reading your reply!

"'Socrates was against democracy so, y'know, the man wasn't infallible.' Do you assume democracy is a Good Thing then? Why?"

As Churchill once said in Parliament: "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."

I do disagree, partly because there's no real way of knowing whether actual people living in say, Babylon or Machu Picchu or ancient Ireland really agreed with human sacrifice or cannibalism or if they ever scratched their heads and wondered if there might possibly be a better way of doing things. And no way of knowing if the person tossing the sacrificial victims off the cliffs or whatever really had their hearts in it or whether they too had their doubts, some inkling that they would deeply resent it if they were the individual being hurled to his or her death.

Yes, law can be imposed by force, but history clearly shows this kind of setup is an arrangement that inspires strenuous objection, and even revolt. My assertion stands -- people have an instinct to claim individual rights, I'd hazard a guess even in North Korea.

But why apart from Churchill do you think democracy is good? What is bad about all the other forms of government?

Heracles, my view is that right and wrong exist as concepts which do not change. The very nature of something makes it right or wrong irrespective of what people (including we ourselves) think about it. It is your view on this, which is the opposite of mine, that I disagree with... and I think we will just have to agree to disagree Your points are valid but I think ultimately, it's a choice, a leap of faith, that we make. None of us can ever know for sure if we are right even if we argue it til the cows come home!

This is me done for this thread as I want to spend the last few days of the holidays not being constantly pre-occupied with philosphical thoughts!!

Interesting. Can you give me an example of something that is always, regardless of circumstances, wrong?