Asklemmy

Do not compare evils, lest you be tempted to cleave with the least of them!

--Victor Saltzpyre

(A raw line probably inspired by somebody else lol)

I think of it as the food I must eat.

I am to hunger and I am to eat, I am to end something's being in order for me to be.

Best I can do is reduce the damage I induce. Eat just enough and waste little. Regardless I did an evil and now that something is no more.

I must have reverence for the harm I induce. To apply this into politics, harm will always happen - best you can do is fixate on the interests that are dire and do your part to reduce the harm in other avenues. The world is so interconnected, that almost every action has a negative - we are often just oblivious for we can only see our part.

Depends on the context, but almost always a strawman imo.

Evil is simpler and easier to pull off than good (because you don’t have to value everyone in your equation), so “reasonable” compromises with evil compounded enough times leads to some pretty evil outcomes.

There is always the option to not pick.

I was in a discussion a couple months ago with someone on here who told me "you have to vote for the lesser of two nazis." That wasn't hyperbole. We were literally discussing how you could vote in election where the two options were Nazis. Something about Elon musk's new party I think I forget. But the guy thought that if there's two Nazis running the responsible thing to do is to vote for the one you think is less bad. Which I don't know how you make that decision but okay. By the way that discussions seemed a little more absurd a few months ago now it seems downright prescient.

That discussion kind of perfectly encapsulates my feelings on the subject of voting for the lesser of two evils. Now I get the Strategic reasoning of voting for the lesser of two evils. I get the logic. But my feeling is it always does eventually end in what we were talking about. Voting for the lesser of two evils eventually is going to get you the point where you're voting for a literal Nazi. That's where the road leads.

What's to think about? You going to choose the GREATER evil?

Seem fairly sound and self evident. Obviously there can be disagreements on judgement, but I can't think of an scenario where the greater evil should not be opposed.

False dichotomy.

Also, read Witcher. It have like 9 books about it.

There are always more choices.

Obviously true? In real life I’ve found it’s often worth doing a bit of thinking / effort to find a third option though. Not always possible though - like when voting - though I don’t think picking the least worst (imho) option when it comes to political representation is immoral

It's particularly sensitive to false dichotomies, and used to justify immoral behavior.

It's far more effective to argue from the veil of ignorance.

Choosing the lesser evil is the cornerstone of our great democracies!

Yes, always.

Yes, of course. That always assumes a lack of good choice (i.e. no choice also being a bad option).

It's rarely true.

You can aim to do something good, with a risk of something bad happening (e.g. as another poster said, rolling the dice on surgery to alleviate suffering at the risk of the patient dying)

...or you can do evil.

The "lesser of two evils" is just used as justification for something that can't be morally justified otherwise.

I think it's like the trolley problem: a trolley (like a train) is barreling down the tracks to a fork in the tracks. You have a lever that will divert the train. Tied to the tracks dead ahead are five innocent people who will all certainly die if you don't throw the lever. However, one innocent person is tied to the tracks that you would divert the trolley to. Assume the trolley has no passengers and all five (or the one) will certainly be killed by the trolley.

The dilemma here is that by doing nothing, you could say you have nothing to do with the five people dying. You didn't put them there. You can blame the person who did put them there, but by doing nothing, you can say you have no blood on your hands. Or you can pull the lever, but then the blood of the one person is absolutely on your hands, but you can say you saved the other five.

Diverting the trolley is the lesser of two evils. But is it the right call? Depends on the situation.

This question is redundant. Evil people choose the evil option, normal people choose the other.

IMO, developing conciousness of the society is far more important than choosing the lesser evil.

Also the bigger evil, is only evil in your view. And letting the course run, is one of the best ways for that big evil to show people why it is bigger evil.

It's a good concept but I'm more fond of the concept of sound. It comes down to personal preference.