Philosophical Vegan Forum

Below I have attempted to describe a family dilemma to which I would like Brimstonesalad or other forum member knowledgeable in consequentialism to respond.

The acting agent in question is my father-in-law, 67 years old with a history of strokes and severe diabetes. His wife (my wife's mother) died three years ago resulting in suicidal depression. He has three daughters, two of whom are devout Catholics; my wife, the third, is a former catholic who is leaning towards agnosticism.

The acting agent in question has a new woman in his life. Two of his daughters and their husbands see this as a sin and have broken all relations with him. One of his daughters, who is a cop, even got in a physical altercation with his new lady friend.

I recently argued my opinion with one of my brother-in-laws. My argument was that our father-in-law seems happy and has not mentioned suicide since meeting his new lady friend and that no one (reasonable) has been hurt by his behavior. He argues that our father-in-law disrespected his dead wife, and that his sinful actions have resulted in a broken family.

I suspect the consequentialist approach is that my father in law acted in an immoral way since more harm than good resulted from his action and that one of the few people who benefited from his action was himself. However, I am a bit torn on the right vs. wrong in this matter as those who suffer are clearly delusional.

Great question Jebus!

Actually, both sides are acting here, and both sides are doing something wrong (though aren't necessarily both wrong on the balance). Reaction is a kind of action, particularly when it's chosen and not reflexive.

Your father in law is being selfish and hurting his children, but your siblings in law are being selfish (favoring their irrational ideologies) and hurting their father.

Who is more wrong?

On the balance of things, it's harder to say.

Your father in law is supposedly making this woman happy, right?
Also, as a systemic issue, he's putting pressure on a much larger social problem of conservatism, which is a meme that generally causes problems and hurts everybody.
We can't just look at the people who are being harmed by actions, but also the ideas that are being broken down or reinforced. Memes are creatures in their own right, although made of propagating information/ideas rather than biology, and actions that apply selective pressure to those -- even if in the short term they may seem harmful -- may be good.

Take, for example, that I might criticize somebody for eating meat. This may make that person feel bad. And yet, if there's a chance of that changing an idea (which is the root of malevolent behavior and the bad feelings of cognitive dissonance that creates), it has potentially resounding positive ramifications.

Now, I know your father in law probably isn't trying to overturn unethical conservative social conventions. But neither is he trying to hurt his children. Both are accidental consequences, and as such they should both be considered in that light (not as we might hypothetically give a deliberate consequence more weight than an accidental one [although this is debatable] -- because in this case there are no deliberate consequences)

Does that help?

brimstoneSalad wrote:Does that help?

Yes, thank you. That does help me understand consequentialism a bit more. However, it doesn't change my opinion of what my role should be in the mess, namely to convince the irrational that they are being irrational (while doing my best to avoid involving religion in the discussion).

Jebus wrote:However, it doesn't change my opinion of what my role should be in the mess, namely to convince the irrational that they are being irrational (while doing my best to avoid involving religion in the discussion).

Nor should it. The consequences of irrationality are almost always harmful, and if you can talk people out of it without making more of a mess, then that's great.

Although, I would say that the effort involved in talking reason to these people will probably be much higher with lower returns (and much greater risk) than the effort focusing on a more rational group for (for example) vegan outreach.

brimstoneSalad wrote:I would say that the effort involved in talking reason to these people will probably be much higher with lower returns (and much greater risk) than the effort focusing on a more rational group for (for example) vegan outreach.

Low returns, indeed. Unfortunately, these are people I am forced to be around from time to time, so I could might as well try to make good use of that time.

Fair enough.

When life gives you lemons, and all that.