A friend shared the link to this site (Unethical Rationalizations and Misconceptions) a bit ago and said it was pretty good, except for #30.
Wow, was he right about #30!
30. The Prospective Repeal: “It’s a bad law/stupid rule”Citizenship, an ethical value, requires obeying the law, but a lot of people convince themselves that that laws are voluntary, and that it is somehow ethical to violate “bad” ones, defined, of course, as those that are inconvenient, burdensome, or that stop you from doing what you want to do. Laws embody the ethical values of society, and if one of them seems wrong to you, you are nonetheless obligated to follow it as part of the social contract. To do otherwise is unethical. Your options are limited: write and speak in opposition to the law (or rule), in hopes of changing the societal consensus; work within the system and with others to change the law; find a legal and ethical way around it; or violate it openly as a matter of conscience, and accept the penalty—civil disobedience. It isn’t ethical to violate what you think is a bad law while it is still a law, because this creates an obvious breach of the Rule of Universality: if everyone followed that course, we would have chaos and anarchy. There are bad rules and laws, no doubt about it. It must be the group—society, the culture—that decides when one of them needs to be amended or eliminated. The individual who does this unilaterally is threatening the stability of society, and that’s unethical no matter what the law is.
I mostly skimmed the others and didn't find anything I disagreed with, except that one- which is simply wrong. Not only is #30 wrong, it turns ethics inside out and fails the ethical behaviors as outlined by the others on the list. Number 30 is anti-ethical.
No, Mr. Ethics, "bad law" is NOT defined "as those that are inconvenient, burdensome, or that stop you from doing what you want to do." A bad law is one which violates your Rightful Liberty. One which props up the superstition of "authority". One which "legalizes" unethical acts like theft, kidnapping, murder, or anything else that would be wrong for anyone not acting as a government employee to do- and which "criminalizes" self defense from those violators. Or a "law" which requires you to submit to them or comply with their vile opinions. That is a bad "law", not what the author imagines one to be.
The author can justify his anti-ethical opinions on that point from now until the sun burns out, and it won't change the fact he is dead wrong on at least that one point.
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