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Julianne4y ago
**Cruelty is an important factor in judging right and wrong.**
- Cruelty is being indifferent to or even finding pleasure in someone's suffering, especially when there is an option to help (such as in a physical situation) or refrain from inflicting the pain in the first place (in a psychological one, say.)
- Because there are very available options to literally _not_ take pleasure in seeing others suffer---or to not inflict the pain in the first place---when it comes to cruelty, I would argue that cruelty is a clear component of things we should class as "wrong".
- When cruelty is involved, there is always the choice to refrain from the action altogether, unlike morally loaded situations where one may be bound by circumstances to choose one action over another. So, at least for me, cruelty is a very important criteria for judging right and wrong.
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Turi4y ago
Is it the only clear cut moral wrong today? And I wonder what its cultural history is: when did it become so universally not OK?
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Julianne4y ago
Interesting - I wonder if it is one of the only clear cut moral wrongs today, because of that "easy choice" factor?
Anti-cruelty laws for animals seemed to arise first in the 19th century, so I wonder if that was a big turning point? Dehumanization leading to cruelty, in particular, is something that seems like it only recently became so universally not OK, just in the last few decades, even?
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