Anti-Climacus

LINK: Eric the Unread goes off on a bit of cant from Chechen rebel leaders:

"If you accept responsibility, you bear the consequences."

Of course, they bear responsibility for what happens regardless of whether they accept it. You certainly don't need an admission of that kind to feel moral outrage, but it's also probably the case that the outrage you feel ought to go up in direct proportion to which they try to pass the buck of moral responsibility. I'm not here to especially defend Putin's behavior with regard to Chechnya (like most international crises, there's quite enough blame to go around*), but to be backed into the situation he was facing, where there was no clear good way out, and then to try and blame him for choosing amongst the undesirable options, well, the mind boggles.

*You might think, as I do, that this is maybe less problematic than it first appears. Certainly no one is exempt from the charge of adding to the level of misery of mankind (human nature being what it is and all); nevertheless, there are some pretty different categories uses of force can be put into, depending on what underlying principles they can serve.

But, you might say, is it not the case that everyone who engages in violent action will claim (certainly al Qaeda, et al claim) to be acting in defense of moral principles, same as your 'good guys' do; how is one to adjudicate between those claims? There are two potential answers: first, one could argue that deontology of its nature prohibits relativistic claims, so the claim I'd make to moral truth cannot possibly be reconciled with any other. This is unsatisfactory because it basically requires fiat-ing in what one wishes to prove. Second, and much more persuasively, one could argue (a la C.S. Lewis in Men Without Chests, among other sources) that the most basic principles of the deontological code are omnipresent in major faith traditions and civilizations, and that to the extent that norms are reasonable to speak of in international relations, it's because some moral truths are just kind of obvious to sensible people.