OK, I'm just pointing out that because you do so means other people will as well and for the same justification so moral absolutes aren't really absolutes. They are to you, but not to others, so that makes them not absolute.
... It's no longer 'absolute', it's must be a run-of-mill moral.
I'm still not making myself clear, then. I'm going to quote Gary again: "It's our understanding of the morals that is relative, not the morals themselves." That is, just because people disagree on what is right and wrong doesn't mean that whatever somebody thinks is OK for them. If that were the case, slavery and concentration camps would both have been just fine. No, the moral absolutes still exist, even if people interpret them incorrectly.
Another example: Just because Afghanis think homosexuality is wrong, doesn't mean homosexuality actually IS wrong in Afghanistan, but fine in the United States. No, it's one or the other. So either the Afghanis are incorrect, or the Americans are. You can probably guess which I vote for.
The second you say 'except', that's an exception to the rule and therefore the rule is no longer absolute.
Sorry, but I have absolutely no problem calling "murder is wrong except in self defense or to defend other innocents" a moral absolute.
That's the only one we could come up with that wasn't based on emotional arguments and even she was going to have to determine whether the research done 10-20 years ago was still correct based on inflation rates and longer lives of prisoners.
Tell your friend to check out this website:
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/getcat.php?cid=3So we should just do away with our justice system all together?
No. We shouldn't use it to kill people.
And you can separate our judicial system and government policy from the humans who run it - and are infalliable - how?
I wasn't attempting to do that.
But if you're asking how the judicial system and government policy differs from the rest of life, the answer is they are public institutions and, in a democracy, are expected to attempt to treat all citizens equally, regardless of race, wealth and other demographic differences.
It's the same thing, though. Obviously, there are white-collar prisons - what they call 'country club' prisons and hard-time lockups. We do differentiate in punishments and the length of time and how 'hard' that time is ... We make distinctions.
Yep. That's what I said. That's why there's no need to kill anybody.