Thread

On the problem of political authority: If I made up a rule that my neighbors can't barbecue on Sundays, then I went around and told them all about it, then if any did barbecue on Sunday I extorted money from them and kidnapped them and assaulted them, this would clearly be criminal. So why isn't it criminal when a government official does it? One possibility is that might makes right. Government officials have the power to do it, maybe there's no such thing as right and wrong, so it happens. One problem with this is I have the power to kill a cop. Sure, a jury would have the power to sentence me to death, but they'd also have the power to let me walk free. If the police have no special moral authority they also have no special moral protection. I think most people recoil from the premise that whatever can be done is morally justified, but even if they don't the logical conclusion is that "whatever' is also done to those in power or to those who don't recoil. See: Luigi Mangione, who (seemingly) found the power to kill a healthcare executive who (seemingly) operated his business in a predatory manner. Another possibility is that government officials are somehow inherently morally superior to the rest of us. Obviously they would like us to believe this is the case, but in a post-monarchic world I don't see that they have a leg to stand on. Government officials are supposedly drawn from the general public on the basis of competence, and if the competent have the right to do whatever they want to the less competent we're back at the "might makes right" case we've already considered. Another possibility is that when any act is done in an orderly and organized manner it is praiseworthy, but when the same act is done on individual initiative it is evil. I don't know how you could justify such a claim, but even if you could it would seem to be an endorsement of organized crime. Finally, we should consider the possibility that what is evil for the private individual to do is evil for a government official to do as well. If this is the case, we must be anarchists, tax evaders, anti-imperialists, etc.