zen_tom

I'm still not sure I've got my point across. My morality is based on asking what would happen if everyone acted the way I do. I understand that not everyone does, but if everyone killed at the first sign of threat, the world would be a miserable place indeed.

However, if everyone acted (perhaps naievely I admit) in a way that gives others the benefit of the doubt, we really would be a step closer to a kind of Eutopia. If I want others to trust me, and not kill me when I am percieved as a threat, I must try to act that way myself.

We maybe arguing a moot point here, since you conceed that violence should be the final resort. Perhaps our differences lie in our readyness to take up arms.

In the example you gave about being asked to wear a yellow star; If the people responsible for upholding that regime had refused to fight, it would never have been a problem in the first place.

I suppose that makes it a circular argument. If everyone was a pacifist, there would be no aggression or war in the first place. If everyone was aggressive there would be an eternal, ever intensifying conflict. What to do given that there are a mixture of people? Would you prefer a majority of pacifists, or a majority of aggressors?

Or, and here is a third option I'm willing to accept - a balance between the ability to do harm, and the preference not to?

Either way, we are drifting off topic. I don't accept that conflict based on belief is ever justified. Defence yes, I do accept that. Protection of what one loves yes, absolutely - given no other alternatives. But how can someone threaten a *belief* such that violence is justified?