meritocrat

For as long as I can remember, I've been told that it's 'wrong' to hit women. Why?

Yes, men are in general stronger, but it's overly stereotypical to state that ALL females are weak.

Besides, what if a man or woman were of equal physical strength. Would it still be intrinsically wrong to hit her?

girlwriter

Well, I would say yes. But no more so than it would be for the woman to hit the man. Or for a man to hit another man.

Jamie_L

The notion of not hitting women is a chivalrous/chauvanistic holdover from the days when women and men were much less equal than today. So, I pretty much dispense with this notion.

You shouldn't hit people, period, regardless of gender, unless the situation requires it to prevent greater harm.

Jamie

dangin

Attacking those who are weaker is considered wrong. For the most part (according to averages) women are smaller and have less upper body strength than men.

However, there are women who could kick a man's ass, and their are men so wimpy that children could flail on them at will.

That said, attacking someone is a last resort as a method of self protection. In that case screw the gender of your attacker, protect yourself.

Jamie_L

This implies that it is not wrong to attack someone who is stronger than you. Isn't it just as wrong for me to punch an olympic weight lifter with no provocation as it is for me to punch a skinny guy with no provocation? Even though I might be foolish to do the former, isn't it still just as morally wrong?

Jamie

nermal

I suspect that there is a greater chance of physical injury if you attack someone substantially weaker or smaller than you. Also, if you attack someone stronger than you, they can exact consequence immediately, while someone weaker would, for the short term, be a slave to your abuses.

Ed

dangin

I don't know about the morality of the issue. Is it morally wrong when a lioness attacks a gazelle? Is it morally wrong when an alpha male gorilla kills the infant of a new female who joined his troupe so that she would go into estrous sooner so that he could mate with her?


But I think the real issue here is that if you attacked a person of equal or advanced physical abilities compared to your own, even if it was unprovoked, you would get what you've got coming.


The act of choosing to engage in an unprovoked attack against someone weaker has the extra meaning that it is probably cowardly, thus even more worthy of disdain.

Jamie_L

Let's take a scenario.

I'm at the movie theather. I see two guys standing in line. One is a big, burly, linebacker-type. The other is a scrawny geek. I feel like hurting someone. Is it really more moral for me to give the linebacker a surprise kick in the nuts or bash over the head with a baseball bat than for me to do the same to the scrawny guy?

Looking at it from the flip side, does the linebacker's strength make his desire to be unharmed less important than the scrawny geek's desire?

Jamie

girlwriter

I'm with Jamie_L,

What if the big linebacker type doesn't want to hit back? Maybe he's a pacafist, or maybe he believes he shouldn't hit someone weaker than himself, and therefore can't defend himself. Or maybe he only looks tough. Maybe he doesn't know how to hit or even the best way to take a punch. Maybe he's been harrassed his whole life in this way because he's big.

dangin said:
I agree, but I would add that this does not make it more wrong to engage in said attack, just more cowardly. I guess to me it's a meaningless distinction though. It's wrong, cowardly and disdainful to engage in unprovoked violence no matter what the reletive strength or weakness of the victem is. If you're living according to this standard, what difference do these finer points make?

meritocrat

If it's immoral to hit people, then why should it be 'less ethical' to hit the big man?

Quote:

Looking at it from the flip side, does the linebacker's strength make his desire to be unharmed less important than the scrawny geek's desire? Jamie

Because someone is 'tough', that really does not give anybody a 'right' to hit him. The big man still posseses a right not to be physically harmed.