Quote:
Originally Posted by mogui
In some of the societies in which I have lived public morality is contingent upon consanguinity. If you are my brother I will treat you with all the care and honesty of which I am capable. If you are a stranger you can count on me cheating you if I am able. This is a fact of life in countries with high populations and pervasive poverty. Public morality is, unfortunately a luxury of affluence.
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I know you're making a different point, but I think something is important to say here.
The public vs. private morality is a form of moral relativism. Morals change based on who, what, where you're dealing. I want to note, however, that the OP, DeusEXMe, brought up serving God. In this case, we are NOT dealing with moral relativism, but universal morality -- and thus if it's wrong to do something to your brother, it's wrong to do it to a stranger. This isn't a function of affluence, it's a universal function, applicable across the board.
To whit, let me make it applicable to this situation, as it WAS part of the OP.
Let's say a rich person who downloads a stranger's e-book without paying is wrong. How can it be right for a poor person to do the same? Saying "it's okay because they can't afford it" is actually
justification.
So I fully disagree with this "function of affluence" argument. Certainly there are 3rd World countries (China in particular) pirating DVDs like mad, and it's facilitated by the relative cheapness of the DVDs and the relative poverty of the people. That does not mean it's okay. It's still piracy, and still -- ultimately -- wrong. The same would go for e-books.
-Pie