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Comment by rayiner | Hacker News Reader

Consent isn't such a simple concept. Just as in business, it is possible to use power differentials in ways that are legal but unfair and arguably immoral. The President of the United States telling a teenager to blow a member of his staff counts.

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I'm interested to hear your reasoning for why it counts. Also at what point (age differential, position differential, gender differential) is it no longer unfair or immoral and why. Could we not argue that any sort of imbalance in a relationship makes it 'abuse'. If that's the case almost al social and commercial contracts are some sort of abuse of power.

You're asking for a clearly delineated line in the sand which I don't think is really possible with these kinds of things. Morals are just inherently fuzzy things. In other situations, this same behavior might be considered on the "crass, but reasonable" side of the line. In this case, I tend to agree that it was probably an abuse of power.

At what frequency is visible light no longer yellow but rather orange? If that line is not easily defined, does that mean there is no difference between violet and red?

Of course there's a difference. But in the case of morals who gets to decide? How do we know who is 'colour-blind' so to speak?

NB I'm not disagreeing necessarily with your assessment that it was an abuse of power. I'm just interested in your reasoning.

We get to decide for ourselves through educated dialogue with our community. That's why discussions like this are important.

Discussions like this get extremely emotional and dialogue reduces to the lowest common denominator. Tragedy of commons is very relevant to the forming of morals. This is evidenced by hundreds and thousand of years of various abuse of humans. And while humanity is arguably in the best shape ever, there is uncertainty if we are heading to global or only a local maxima.

So no. Argument from community consensus is a bad heuristic for searching global happiness maxima. Of course, if morals are means to an end, not a goal in itself.

I wasn't trying to make a plea for community consensus. I think individuals come to their own conclusions about morality, but those conclusions are informed by the information that they receive from their environment and community. A person who never experiences meaningful debate, thought, or contemplation is going to be morally stunted compared to those who engage in regular debate and discussion. That doesn't mean every person who argues a point is morally superior, but in the aggregate, engaging in moral discussions will enhance an individuals expertise in determining moral veracity.

If you treat community discussion as a search for optimal morals, I fully agree with you. However, I stand by my original point as top voted comment already decided on the immorality of the JFK-Mimi affair as immoral without meaningful debate.

I think you are improperly comparing community consensus with tragedy of the commons. Community consensus is more akin to regulation than it is to nash equilibria. It's the nash equilibria that has been a bad heuristic for finding the global happiness maxima, because it's through the nash equilibria that the tragedy of the commons occurs. In contrast, effective regulation can better ensure the global happiness maxima. So that's why community dialogue and a rough consensus of mores can be useful and productive towards the health of a society.

Juries.

So in other words particular people are unwilling to draw a specific line in the sand, but we nevertheless think that a democratic process is valuable?

Morality by committee. Wonderful.

Welcome to the world. It's been this way....forever.

There is a difference between recognizing the current state of reality, and embracing it.

Well, in so far as the episode by the pool was concerned, there was consensus among all three present--Kennedy included--that he should not have done what he did. Perhaps he was just shamed by Powers. That doesn't reflect well on him either.

This article from a while back supports your thesis: that Powers, who rarely gave heavy criticism to his boss, rebuked him. After accepting the fellatio, of course. Figures.

http://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2012/02/12/mad-men/?sing...

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