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ANother drunken cab experience for Kibbo

K

Kibbo

Platinum Member
So, ended up in a cab tonight, with a Sudanese driver.

First off, I asked if his family was safe, he said yes.

Tried to ask him about what was going on over there, he was somewhat avoident.

Then again, he'd lived in the US for 5 years, just moved up here in the last 5 months. I love our immigration policies.

So why do some think that "others" lives are less important than ours?]

***UPDATE*** Now, post drunken musings here!!!!
 
Hmm. That's a good question and I think I have a good answer. It's boils down to with whom you empathize with. Naturally, you will empathize with those that you have similarities and shared experiences with first. For starters...I know for myself I'd be a liar if I said EVERY life was equally important to me. They're not. Period. It isn't for anyone bro. My family/SO is the most importnat to me. Next in line come my close friends then the distant friends. Then come my neighbors and the people of my city...especially my hometown that was a small town. When someone passed away, we knew of them. By the same token if an American dies it matters to me more than someone else. Likewise as a person who's also Vietnamese, when a Vietnamese person see's harm, it affects me more than any other country. That's all there is too it. HOnestly, I think too many people try to put up a pretense that everything is equal to them when in fact it's not unless they can debunk anything I've said. It's a lie. Flat out. A lie. Either that or I'm living a life where the life I live where those closest to me are most important and the less so the further you go is all but a lie. I don't think it is. Remember, empathy isn't restricted to thoseyou have a personal interaction with, it's also with whom you share common experiences, histories, cultures.

Here's a good question to you Kibbo. If you can honestly tell me that everyone's life is equally important to you give me an honest answer to this scenario. Your cousin whom you've never met but is family is terminally ill with Hepatisis C need a liver transplant and you're a match. Jonathan Wong Abu from Country ABC needed the same surgery. Who would you give it to and why? I know for myself I'd give it to that distant cousin. I have never met the person but the natural empathy I feel "knowing" that he/she is somehow tied to me makes me value him more....at least to me.
 
Good point.

And a good illustration of that point, in your thought experiment.

And I would honestly say that your prediction of my behaviour would be correct.

But I ask you, is that right? I'm perfectly willing to say that my actions are not always "good."

But I will honestly say that I would choose two stranger's lives over the one family member's life had I not met any of the people involved.

At what point are you willing to say that the deaths of "others" are worth more than the lives of your "own"?

2:1, 10:1, 100:1 ?

How much more is the life of a stranger American worth to you than the life of a stranger Arab?

How 'bout the life of a stranger Canadian, or Brit? Or Frenchman? Or Pakistani?

And how "right" is this familiarity bias? Are your decisions based on cultural comfort objectively correct?

What would God say? (Assuming there were an objective arbiter of morality, which I do, although I don't think of "him' as a Biblical figure)
 
Hehe...I've made about 20 posts today which is probably a record in my four years here so why stop now 🙂.

I can only be honest myself Kibbo. I can't tell you if there is a number there until I'm faced with it. Once again, I refuse to take a number or stake a claim when in fact I don't know. As far as what is right...I also don't know. I'm not smart enough to say what's wrong or right when the stakes are this high. For example, I would love to say that all of humanity is equal and therefore if a killer were to kill me or let me go and kill two others I'd say...go ahead killl me. I'd be a liar and a hypocrite if I said I'd behave in such a manner without a doubt.

That said, I don't think this is a matter of subjectively assuming that this question has a right or wrong answer. It just is. It's unfortunate and possibly a by-product of the human condition. Remember, the good I do to myself, be it physical, mental or emotional supercedes the good for humanity as a collective. That's just the way I am and the way I think most people are (I'm almost inclined to say EVERYONE IS....but you know how those broad strokes can be).


A better question that could be asked is "is behaving in such a manner rational?" Nope 🙂. Humans don't behave in a rational manner if it throws in the face of what's good for them (once again, be it physical, mental, or emotional).

In conclusion, the sentiments I stated may not be RATIONAL, or moral...but they just are. I know...that's such a cop-out...but it just is. Better for me to state what I see of the human condition then for me put on a hypocritcal pretense of enlightenment...no? I know we got off on a tangent but the theme we're discussing apply pretty well to why people value those of their nationalities over others.

final edit - Kibbo, if you wanna discuss further, feel free to shoot me a PM, I'm gonna catch the last of Howard STern's rerun 🙂.
 
Naah, no PM neccessary,

I'm confronted by intellectual honesty, which is a rare thing on this side of the forums.

If I may allow myself some drunk talk;

I hear what you're saying, man.
 
I was in Toronto and needed directions, so I asked a cab driver who was parked nearby. He gave me directions and then offered me he'd give me a free lift since he was heading that way. I declined since I didn't want to impose on him, but he insisted so I said fine.

We chatted along the way and when I got out, we shook hands.

He was missing several fingers.

As he was Arabic, I've wondered if was tortured or brutalized. Maybe he was an Iraqi?

Anyway, I wished I'd asked him some more questions during the ride.
 
Originally posted by: Riprorin
I was in Toronto and needed directions, so I asked a cab driver who was parked nearby. He gave me directions and then offered me he'd give me a free lift since he was heading that way. I declined since I didn't want to impose on him, but he insisted so I said fine.

We chatted along the way and when I got out, we shook hands.

He was missing several fingers.

As he was Arabic, I've wondered if was tortured or brutalized. Maybe he was an Iraqi?

Anyway, I wished I'd asked him some more questions during the ride.
Click to expand...
Hope you had the presence to discreetly leave a fiver on the floor. Not necessary and no biggie if you didn't, but we who are all too comfortable often forget that, at the end of the day, sustenance trumps sentiment.

 
Surperficially people are different but human nature is the same everywhere. People who haven't engaged or lived with people from other cultures don't know this. Makes them think they are different. And if you think something is different, it's easier to think it's not as important. It comes down to ignorance, as always.
 
Since I hold dear my beliefs, values and morals I would put someone who shares the same ones above others who don't. That isn't "wrong". You have your own set of beliefs and feel that they are right so naturally others who share similar thoughts would be "right" in your view too.

It just so happens that we equate these with cultures and ethnicity through stereotypes. They may be wrong sometimes, but for many cases you can be right.
 
What flaw is it that exists within you that differentiates your critical thinking in relationship to your physical state of sobriety or drunkenness? Think about that next time you are in a cab and drunk.
😉
 
Originally posted by: Infohawk
Surperficially people are different but human nature is the same everywhere. People who haven't engaged or lived with people from other cultures don't know this. Makes them think they are different. And if you think something is different, it's easier to think it's not as important. It comes down to ignorance, as always.
Click to expand...

Read my post before crying ignorance.
 
Bump for official P&N drunken philosophy thread!

Tonight I discovered that sometimes when the girl you're hitting on all night 'goes to the bathroom' it's not cause she's trying to ditch you. It's cause she's passed out drunk in a stall🙁
 
Topic is edited, and renamed.

Hopefully we'll catch the east coasters before they have to face the that terrible beast named sobriety.
 
Originally posted by: 3chordcharlie
Bump for official P&N drunken philosophy thread!

Tonight I discovered that sometimes when the girl you're hitting on all night 'goes to the bathroom' it's not cause she's trying to ditch you. It's cause she's passed out drunk in a stall🙁
Click to expand...

hehe, rofl

🙁 sorry to hear your predicament. 🙁




snicker
snicker
😀 😀
 
Tonight I learned that names aren't really that hard to remember.

Names of:

a) girls who aren't hot, and;

b) guys who don't have the same name as you;

are hard to remember.

I think that makes it their fault, not mine.
 
So I was at the bar again (funny how I always end up there), and I went to the bathroom:

Above the urinals, there's all these poster-ads for various stuff, and one of them is a 'motivational' ad with a picture of terry fox (canadian; lost leg to cancer; ran halfway across canada on a wooden leg before the cancer came back and killed him). The poster says something like 'terry fox started running for cancer research when he was 21; what have you done lately?'.

So some dude walks in with a friend, pulls up in front of the poster, and starts talking:

Dude - Man, I hate Terry Fox.

Friend - What? No one hates Terry Fox, what are you talking about?

Dude - I mean sure it's great what he did and all, but they don't have to throw it in my face all the time. So I'm drunk instead of raising money to cure cancer. What's the big deal? Don't try to make me feel bad about it!

-------------------------

The only funnier thing I've seen was overhearing a (very) gay guy talking to another (very) gay guy about someone that looked at him when he walked in and said loudly: "man, I hate it when f*gs come to the bar". So his friend interrupts and says "What are you talking about? I LOVE it when f*ags come to the bar!!"

I loves my bar...
 
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