from what i've read, the muslims, after taking control of india, accepted all their hindu traditions, but outlawed widow burning and enforeced the law. they did not interfere with the rest of their traditions, but after their intervention, widow burning was a "dying" tradition, with few practitioners (although from what i understand you still have one occasionally) as far as psych inpatients, we can keep them against their will for months. seen it, done it. we can take htem to court, and while we wait for a hearing they stay in the ward, if htey escape we send cops after them and drag them back in. they don't like it they get medicated, again and again, until we decide they are no longer a threat. we hold them for long long time. we have institutions, in chicago we've Got Pilson's psych ward, that it practically a dormitory which you cannot leave, and Madden Mental Health, which is like several small communities. you don't leave till the doctors say you can. and they have heald people for over 6 months who where only a danger to themselves (As per doctors opinion) even as the person fought in court to be let out.

Oh, and on the psych front, there is judicial review, etc..

I don't think force is an effective means to change behavior. E.g. Iraq. Or just think about any time you try to convince people in every-day life. I don't know enough about widow-burning to comment, but even if it was true, I'm not sure other people in india would agree that the other costs (war, death, subjugation, etc.) were worth the benefit (increased life span of women in their later years). In terms of your psych example -- unless people are a danger to others you can really only hold them for a month or so, and most of the time only for 3 days (this is eminently sucidal). So its, extremely limmited.

Dude, you gotta be kidding me if you think Muslim military intervention put an end to widow-burning, that?s ludicrous.

The Mughal dynasty in fact was really in peak power from only 1600-1700 or so.. the intitial rulers were actually quite tolerant of the Hindus especially Akbar... They were more busy expanding their empires, building forts for themselves, tombs for their beloveds, gardens for their people than to be concerned with widow burning. The demise of the Muslim Empire came with Aurangzeb in 1700 and it was all downhill and the British basically took power in 1800. The latter Muslim Empire basically plundered temples, forced Hindus to convert to Islam and were a bunch of weak rulers sucking up to the British.

In fact it was the British, once they took over from the weak Muslim empire that outlawed the "Sati" practice in the early 1800s. And just because it was outlawed did not mean it stopped or abated back then. It continued to be rampant into the 20th century. But it was major Hindu reformists like Raja Ram Mohan Roy, Dayanand Saraswati, Gandhi etc.. through the 1800s and 1900s who fought against this practice and helped eradicate it.

It still exists of course, but in the villages and at a much lesser extent (that?s the only part you got right). But "Muslim Military Intervention" has absolutely nothing to do with it.

So in fact the society that perpetuated it actually helped eradicate it. Your absolutely wrong on this one, you have to come up with a better example of how outside military intervention helped eradicate a social evil.

let me point out. In India they no longer, or at least, very very rarely, burn widows, on the husbands funeral pryer. It was military intervention by the muslims that halted this. It seems to have worked. If you pick 1 issue, and go after it without abusing your power, i think stopping a cultural norm is possible, as long as the people's situation would improve without the practice. supress it for 1/3 of a generation, and things get better people will not go back to it after you leave.

Both of you sound like different chapters from the same book, ?Problems with Modern Civilization?. Anon is more like the introductory chapter where its more about the bigger picture and the reality of our global situation, whereas Plato seems to be the chapter on "Societies Gone Wrong and Human Right Abuses" Of course when I glanced at Plato?s previous journal on Human Rights this title appears inappropriate. ;)

Anyway.. if this a tribe in Mars then of course there is no debate, we have too many issues right here to deal with. However if we?re talking about a society on our planet then I have to agree with both of you to an extent. If this is a purely hypothetical case and the society your talking about is of top global priority in terms of World Problems then I?d have to agree with Plato that we can?t just sit and watch them do what they?re doing. But the intervention would not be a war, it would be a Peace Outreach where Envoys from Developed, rather more Humanistic societies would try to reach out to that society and try to make them aware of Human Right issues and show them how they are being abused in their society, teach them about other ways of life practiced in the world around them and expect that that exposure would bring about a change in their ways. However if they do not change and people are still being ritually killed and their way of life is very much counter-productive to life itself then they should be held accountable since they are part of the global community. But complete subjugation and war would never be the answer if these are culturally accepted norms, which originate in the grass roots of their society. Complete annihilation would then be the only way, which would make us no different from a murderous society that we attempted to change to begin with.

However on the other side is Anon?s argument.. If this is not a global priority and we have more significant widespread issues at hand? hunger, disease/death, poverty to name a couple, where we could easily intervene and alleviate the situation, then the Martian society (again, if on earth) should slide down the list, and be taken up on a lesser scale. But either way turning a blind eye is not acceptable, lest this society turns into a modern day disaster like Rwanda - 800,000 dead when all we needed to do was mobilize a NATO Army and maintain a U. N. Peacekeeping force??

wehn the muslims took control of india, they outlawed widow burning, and they enforced with with military might. they gained notheing but the animostity of the hindu's. was that good or bad? should they not have done it? left well enough alone? the hindu society was funcitoning fine, before they showed up. should they ahve accepted it as "a cultural thing" and left it at that?

i don't know if i agree. maybe i'm not seeing this like you guys are. but i can't help but think. "if something must be done, something must be done" and we do put people into institutions for their own good, we force people to take medications for their own good, and we force bulimics and anorexics to eat, for their own good. many times it is also because htey are a danger to society as well, but oftentimes they are harmeless othre than too themselves. what kind of scale is ther to work on here?

is that the gist of it?

ok, correct me if i'm wrong. but from what i understand - you (anon) are saying that there is no reason, and no justification for going in militaritly to help. Mystie is saying the smae thing (it seems) that charity, and education and encouragement, rather than military force? regardless of what is going on, no reason to invade?

whoa, the two of you act too fast for me! i'd like to join in on this, but i'll have to pass until after next week when school is over.

Why is something have to be done there, while nothing is done for people who are homeless right now? Or the 2 billion people who live on less than $2 a day? Like what do you see as the moral difference between those situations and the ones in the real world?

it would seem, that force would be called for, i don;t knw if it would work, but woudl it be worse to just sit and do nothing? it feels like someone should try something. i know this is hypothetical and agonizing over it is stupid, and the reality si as annon says, we'd invade and taketheir gold and leave them to be screwed anyway, but assuming we where actually trying to be nice. isn't a "war of mercy" a better reaction than "sit wait and teach?"

so, you are saying, no matter what, no one could justify such an action. no matter what the people are doing, you cannot go in there and help them, by forcing them to stop? i am tempted to agree... but, in the hypothetical situation i've given up there. it seems like something must be done.

HEH, I know I'm being difficult -- but I'm basically saying, you would not be morally justified because human institutions are inherrently flawed. When I said star trek was fantasy land -- I didn't mean the space travel -- I mean how the majority of cast act all prim and proper and in the best intentions.

ok, again, there are not tribes on mars. this is hypothetical.

human nature aint gonna change, even if we make it to Mars. Star Trek is fantasy land.

but this discussion isn't based on todays reality. it is obviously hypothetical (no tribe on mars). in a case as severe as the one described above, where culture, and traditional norms are such that they are destructive to that extent, would there ever be a reason for sending in an actual army of Mercy? save through subgication? at what point, if any, would it be permissible to act. or at what point, would it be morally mandated that you must act.

i agree with you. on all counts.

Or one more time, in other words -- basically in this hypothetical situation -- I don't believe there is a human institution that I would trust to forceably change another culture's rituals.