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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 5705479" data-attributes="member: 4937">I basically agree with this, especially for the purposes of keeping the thread from being closed as now seems likely, the italicized part.  There may be no difference in the transgression of the will, although given that we are comparing something that is real to something that is unreal how are we to know and judge whether the violation is the same?  But, there is at least apparently a difference in the utility and for some judgments of what it means to be moral that's an important distinction.There are a lot of things I could say about how different philosophies within the game might approach the topic raised by Steel_Wind and how they might object to his assertion.  And, I do think Steel_Wind's opinion is a legitimate one.  Unfortunately, I don't think that line of argument is going to be that profitable, because I think its well demonstrated that people can't keep emotionally distanced from it.  It quickly transforms from a debate over 'people in an imaginary world might believe these things', to 'I believe these things about you real people in the forum'.  That way lies trouble.Rather than debating this from the perspective of such a hot button topic as rape (especially given past history at this site), it's better I think that if you want to continue to debate the point over whether its objectively and absolutely evil, that you approach the question not by way of what you can compare it negatively to, but what you can compare it positively to.   In particular, the issue of whether dominate is absolutely evil is going to parallel quite strongly the issue of whether pacifism is absolutely good.  Clearly violence against persons is a terrible thing and among the worst of crimes.   So, does it follow that violence against persons is always wrong?  Even if you accept the argument that the end results of violence (stopping a bigger crime) can justify the means, are there particular acts of violence, without focusing on any one in particular, that might be always wrong because they never have a utility which a lesser act of violence might also have.  In other words, lets say you accept the death penalty as just in some cases - it doesn't necessarily follow that you accept that drawing and quartering someone is ever just.</blockquote>

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