Is pacifism the morally pure answer?

[Blue3]

Is pacifism the morally pure answer?

People can sometimes justify use of force/violence, but all things considered, is pacifism still more naturally morally pure than justifications for violence/force?

[vitoNova]

Absolutely.

The ultimate goal of humanity should be pacifistic discourse to replace all vestiges of nationalism and militarism. 

This is the only way that humanity will ultimately colonize the cosmos.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

I don't think "purity" in this sense is a helpful concept for everyday moral decision-making, but a world of morally perfect actors would lack violent interpersonal and intergroup conflict, yes.

[Aurelius]

No. For instance, if armed brigands are seeking to kill my family, the solution closest to "morally pure" is the one that prioritizes the well-being of my family first, thus requiring violence to beat back the brigands if necessary.

It's one thing to have moral purity on paper in a simple closed system, it's another thing - and much harder - to achieve in the messy real world, and thus right morality looks very different in practice than in paper. I had a brief flirtation with Tolstoy's ideas of nonviolence in college but abandoned them once I realized the impracticality and even obvious harm they can and would cause if applied to the real world.

[Fetterman my beloved]

No man has the right to take the life away from another man, no excuses.

[Ferguson97]

Pure pacifism is naïve at best and self-serving at worst.

Violence should be used a last resort, but ruling it out entirely just makes no sense.

[°Leprechaun]

Non violence and pacifism are two entirely different things.
This is obvious because violence is not always lethal.

The Just War Theory is BS. It could destroy all human life on the planet, so it would be good to have colonies on other planets so all human life would not end, assuming that you believe that humanity is worth saving.

Mutual Assured Destruction, by definition, is insane. It is evil.

If human life has any value then the only moral answer to the evil of war, is uncompromising pacifism. When has war ever brought peace?

I do not know if the insanity of war will ever be seen in it's true light.

Pacifism is a no brainer.
Pacifism has been successful when it has been dominant, although that is rare.

If you are truly "pro life" you must never be "pro war".

All the money wasted on wars could be used to better the human condition.

[Aurelius]

No man has the right to take the life away from another man, no excuses.

If that man is trying to kill my family and my only option to save them is to shoot him*, then to not shoot him is morally depraved.

*In practice, there's no such thing as "shooting to disable"; if you're shooting at someone, you're accepting that they very likely may die as a result.

[Beet]

Pacificism has more often been used as a straw man for war hawks to paint their opponents as naive and clueless than it has served a useful purpose.

[Senator Incitatus]

Absolutely.

The ultimate goal of humanity should be pacifistic discourse to replace all vestiges of nationalism and militarism. 

This is the only way that humanity will ultimately colonize the cosmos.

We won't colonize the cosmos until someone finishes conquering the Earth.

[Georg Ebner]

No, because - as human ex-istence is - pacifism results in bellicism and vice versa.
Only soldiers were really dreaming of peace - today's "pacifism" is nothing else than the bourgeois dream of replacing the hero by the ShopKeeper, the armies of national states by the police of a single WorldState.

[dead0man]

if all good people were pacifists the world would be a horrible place

[No War, but the War on Christmas]

Absolutely.

The ultimate goal of humanity should be pacifistic discourse to replace all vestiges of nationalism and militarism. 

This is the only way that humanity will ultimately colonize the cosmos.

We won't colonize the cosmos until someone finishes conquering the Earth.

You really think the world is most likely to eventually unite through conquest? And even if it was, would there even be a world left to govern / use to colonize from afterwards?

[No War, but the War on Christmas]

To answer the OP, obviously so in my opinion. But similar to the 'Paradox of Tolerance' I think there can be a similar 'Paradox of Pacifism' where you can both strive for Pacifism but recognize that sometimes the very continuation of peace/pacifism requires force against those who would see that peace broken.

[°Leprechaun]

I do not see how a pacifist can support the idea of using violence to throw people out of a temple as many do (see the thread about this).

https://talkelections.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=487971.0

Also, the opposite of pacifism is nuclear war. If we can't learn to live together we'll all die together.