For a CD to out another CD would have to be one of the most horrible betrayals I could imagine. I hope I never have the misfortune to meet someone who's character is so low that they could do that.
Yes
No
For a CD to out another CD would have to be one of the most horrible betrayals I could imagine. I hope I never have the misfortune to meet someone who's character is so low that they could do that.
I wouldn't even dream of doing that.
Ditto! Well said!Originally Posted by sterling12
[SIZE="4"]Sheri[/SIZE]
Well, I would probably out someone who outed me. I think that's a line I'd be willing to cross. Just call me Johnny Fairplay!
Big but really important post. If you give a damn about the right and wrong of this please read on.
Now... someone voted yes presumably thinking they'd be anonymous and was outed as having done so for having done so in this discussion.
Morality: outing them for doing so protects those here from disclosing details to that person and risking being outed. It protects the group at the expense of the individual.
Counter morality: outing people as CDs forces them to be honest with the world, their families, their communities and our visibility helps us as a group become accepted while putting individuals at greater risk in the short-term.
Ethics: While the person should have been aware that there was no gauarantee of anonymity by reading all appropriate policies it is true that most humans don't, making any policy based on the assumption that everyone will read, memorise and successfully remember it or will check it before doing anything not just unrealistic but practically unfair as well as discriminatory to those with attention defacit or memory disabilities itself rather unethical and invalid. (yes I know this makes much of the legal system unethical but the fact is much of the legal system does neccessarily discriminate against large portions of the population and is in fact quite unethical but less so than other current alternatives)
Further Ethics: Idealism: If outing something someone wants secret or could be presumed to probably want as secret is wrong then it is wrong whether the motivation in doing so is good or bad. Therefore outing the voter is as bad as outing a Cd.
Further Ethics: Utilitarianism: The greatest good for the greatest number. If harming the voter causes good to a significant number of people by keeping their secrets safe then it is good. If outing a single CD helps most CDs then it is good. If beating a CD to death helps enough cisgendered people who find CDs uncomfortable to be around then it is good (see why I think utilitarianism is a load of crap!). However if adapting to CDs, a short-term social pain for a greater number of people than CD is considered better than executing every generstion of TG people or oppressing them into hiding, a long-term amount of suffering, then the suffering of those who dislike CDs is best (a utilitarianism seems reasonable there again now doesn't it). However! If outing CDs, especially those who are celebrities, authorities etc has a chance of increasing the public adaptation then it is for the greatest long-term good and is the most right thing to do! (Utilitarianism is crap!)
Further Ethics: Egalitarianism: All people should be treated equal. To be equal all people require substantial rights/freedoms bordered only by the need to respect others rights/freedoms. crucial to those freedoms is consent. A person must give consent, informed and uncoerced to any activity. So then does the CD give consent to do whatever they other person wants with information imparted to them? The person told a CDs secret is done so often under a contractual obligation of secrecy. Even if not stated overtly this can be argued would be assumed in any society/community where possible negative consequences await disclosure unless the thing being disclosed violate/d/s anothers rights (such as the guilt of a murder etc) where instead the responsibility to the others rights takes precedence. Therfore confidances must be kept unless the thing confided was/is/will be violating anothers rights/freedoms.
Now the voter may be said to have given consent when signing up. But was that consent informed and uncoerced? This would make a fascinating legal case. They read the rules, or were supposed to before joining up. However, it's common practice for many people to skim them, lengthy or hard to remember rules can be discriminatory to disabled people with even mild memory or attention impairment, even ordinary people can have memory lapses about them.
Therefore by this school of Ethics outing a CD is definately wrong as CDing does not violate the freedoms of others and the outing of the voter is quite probably wrong as it can be reasonably supposed that the voter had forgotten that the vote was not necessarily anonymous.
Further Ethics: Consequentialism: The wrongness of an act depends on it's severity. Stealing a cookie is rather insignificant, stealling a billion dollers is very much worse (under idealism both are stealing therefore both equally bad). Killing a deadly snake near a home is good or at least excusable, killing a mosquito possibly good as it could carry disease, killing a fly less so, killing a snail not near the garden slightly bad, killing a pet bad, killing a person very bad, killing an entire race of people extremely bad, destroying all life on Earth as bad as one can get.
Now for this one outing someone in an accepting place and/or to an accepting person might be against their wishes but for their own benefit. Doing so in a less so is less so and where they are likel to be assaulted is very bad indeed. Outing the voter depends on how people will react to them... probably not so good. Do they have many friends here already? Unlikely but possible. Do they have alternative places to go? There are other sites if they can find them. Is the person likely to be very hurt? With the rates of depression and suivide amongst many Cd's they could well take it badly indeed, but then so could an outed person even when outed to accepting people.
Conclusion: While I could go on through the many others philosophies of Ethics it's still true that in many of them outing the voter will be as wrong as outing a Cder for the same reasons. There are relativistic arguments that could be made in each school but for idealism of course.
Motivation for not waning to be outed as a CD is important, as is why the person may have chosen to vote the way they did. Whatif they missread the question? What is they have dyslexia or some other disability? what if they just plain missclicked?
How much harm does the voter suffer by being outed? Possible social ostracism in this community.. that's not insignificant, but is it greater or lesser than the harm that person might do if they outed another CD? Does it matter in what circumstances they might have done so or not done so? Did they vote that way as a joke, a missclick? Do they mind people knowing they voted thst way?
There's the biggest stone in the shoe of utilitarianism and other relativist positions, the weighing of harm and comparing it and the assumptions required for peoples actions as well as their reactions.
Also it's worth everyone noting that there is not one way of determining right and wrong. Depending on the foundation idea, ideals, utility, equality, order and many others that then determines whether an act is right or wrong and both actions of outing will be right or wrong seperately or together depending on which foundation one builds on.
This post is not judging anyone or criticising anyones choices or decisions. It merely is to educate people on the deeper aspects of making decisions on what is right and what is wrong. It is by no means complete on possible philosophically legitimate ways of looking at the issue either!
Posting Permissions
