I've read a little feminist philosophy here and there, and I've had philosophical conversations with many people who call themselves feminist.Anyway, was interested in whether other people have studied feminist philosophies and such. What's your take on feelings such as care or love be the guiding force to moral decisions? Is it overly simplistic or elegantly simplistic? — Posty McPostface
Yes, they do profess. It is part of the character role. In actual practice .... I have observed no differences between men and women when it comes to caring. Some people do and others don't.
Caring is not an ethic, it is a feeling. Where does this feeling come from, is tough to say? Some people certainly seem to care more than others. In part, caring can be somewhat learned by trial and error in a lifetime, but then again it may take, many, many, many lifetimes. — Rich
What "love and care" is, is deep deep bias. We definitely should have love and care for those close to us, but this means favoritism. This means bias. That's been well known for a long, long time. The idea that these should be a wide spread ethical system, is to propose tribalism. — Wosret
There is far too much conflict for compassion to be all that great as a general ethical model. It is of course good to be compassionate, but compassion is also the source of guilt, and retribution, is my only point. If someone that you are uninterested in falls in love with you, or the truth might hurt someone, then compassion is going to make you feel shitty about rejecting them, or telling them the truth. You can be forced into lots of situations if you're too compassionate, and be tempted to lie all the time. You have to reduce compassion in order to be able to set boundaries, and not just let people walk all over you, or to tell people things they don't want to hear.
Also, when you reduce someone's problems to victimization and oppression, that compassion is going to make you feel invested, and personally hurt as well, and the blame, or responsibility, rather than being placed with the self causing guilt in the first case, will be placed with the third party causing anger, frustration, and desires for retribution in this case.
You can see that compassion is partial, or indeed individual, taking of sides, and feeling equal compassion for everyone leads to a stalemate, where a super-ordinate value must be the ruling principle in all cases, meaning that "compassion" itself is a nonstarter. Sounds nice and fluffy, and is a feel good word, that signals all kinds of virtue, but it isn't a great ruling principle — Wosret
I'm not entirely sure what you mean here. I understand how this happens in divine command theories (but why?? BECAUSE I SAID SO!!!), but theories like Kantianism, utilitarianism, or similar find grounding in reason, or intuition, or something. — darthbarracuda
I don't think an ethical theory would count as an ethical theory if it didn't put emphasis on other people instead of yourself. I'm totally on board with investigating the ethics-before-duty, the phenomenology of the encounter with the Other (Levinas), etc. But I think it's a straw man to say only virtue-care-feminist ethics are ethics concerning other people, because that is certainly false. — darthbarracuda
Additionally, I think it was Aristotle who said virtue comes with habit. True, you must want to be virtuous, but it's something that needs to be taught as well. I'm not sure if the claim that virtuous people will always be a better moral actor than a prescriptivist person is true - and what are we defining "better moral actor" as apart from a person who does what is right, i.e. what ought to be done, i.e. prescriptions. — darthbarracuda
You mentioned previously how someone who doesn't "get" an ethical command will never see the rationale behind it. Yet I believe this is merely a case of someone not seeing the whole picture, or of having an impaired set of reasoning skills. — darthbarracuda
I find it hard to believe this is intended to be a serious statement. Or am I misunderstanding. Are you saying women are more ethical than men? I don't know which it is more insulting to. — T Clark
I have wrestled with this statement to a large extent, and still think it is generally true. A prime example I ask of is why are males much more representative of prison populations than woman are, around the world? I'm not saying that men are inherently more guided by 'dark forces' or whatever you want to call it. — Posty McPostface
I'm inclined to say that a conception of moral responsibility grounded in compassion and fairness is more basic than a conception of "rights". — Cabbage Farmer
So we have here the best of both worlds, compassion and reason. — Frank Barroso
I still find it hard to assume that a rationale can be devised to be taught or encouraged to people to care more. Rather, one can encourage certain feelings of care or empathy towards others to maintain some sense of care towards another. — Posty McPostface
Philosophy has been searching for an ideal rationale for guiding moral theories and ethics for a long time. Even the most universal of ethical postulates, such as the golden rule, rely on people to empathize with others to decide what is the best moral positions to be in regards to others. So, I don't see what's wrong with moral theories if most rely on notions such as 'caring', 'compassion', or relatability in regards to others. — Posty McPostface
I have wrestled with this statement to a large extent, and still think it is generally true. A prime example I ask of is why are males much more representative of prison populations than woman are, around the world? I'm not saying that men are inherently more guided by 'dark forces' or whatever you want to call it. — Posty McPostface
I'm inclined to say fairness and compassion are more basic than a conception of "rights". I might also say that compassion is more basic than fairness: Arguably, in order to have a genuine sense of what's fair in each case -- apart from abstract rules and laws and customs -- you must have compassionate insight into each party to the case and a feel for human nature. Along those lines, fairness may seem to depend on and be motivated by compassion.I think you're right. I should have included fairness along with compassion. In a way, fairness is more basic. If responsibilities, benefits, and costs are apportioned fairly, it's in everyone's interest that people get treated kindly. — T Clark
I don't mention feminist philosophers much because "feminist philosopher" always struck me as being akin to something like "gardener philosopher" or "Bolo tie-wearing philosopher." — Terrapin Station
How can that be? Just the fact that they're women? — Wallows
In other words, I don't see "feminist" as having any bearing on doing philosophy, at least if you're doing philosophy right (in my view). — Terrapin Station
It's just like whether you're a gardener or not should be irrelevant to philosophy, and whether you wear a bolo tie or not is irrelevant to it. — Terrapin Station
Anyway, was interested in whether other people have studied feminist philosophies and such. What's your take on feelings such as care or love be the guiding force to moral decisions? Is it overly simplistic or elegantly simplistic? — Wallows
Sometimes proponents will suggest we dispense completely with the notion of "duty", which is entirely unreasonable and unpersuasive... — darthbarracuda
Is there still some hefty amount of sexism in the field of philosophy despite ethics as care being a strong argument being proposed by feminist philosophers? — Wallows
There's a repugnant feeling of male superiority or downright chauvinism that has dominated philosophy since Aristotle and the likes. — Wallows
What's more important though is that this really shouldn't have anything to do with philosophy. It doesn't at all matter if one is a feminist or not when one is discussing whether universals are real, when one is addressing Gettier problems, or even when one is looking at how moral statements work formally. — Terrapin Station
Ideally, yes. In practice? Not so much... — Wallows
Well, what could we possibly be doing when we're discussing that stuff that feminism, or gardening, or wearing bolo ties, etc., would have anything to do with it? What would be an example of that? — Terrapin Station
I'm saying that we've tried the (stereotypical) male approach to solving ethical problems — Wallows
Happy mother's day! :100: :party: :flower: — Wallows
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