[akudha]

Why don’t you have an opinion? They’re treating women so bad, their policies are stuck in 1200s, and we are in 2022. Does that not bother you at least a bit?

Honest question about the argument - how would you phrase it (I wrote that comment)?

[stavros]

I wouldn't make that argument that way, I'd say I don't like what they're doing. It's not useful to say "no normal being would do that", given that millions of "normal" human beings do it.

It makes it sound like they're inhuman monsters and that we'd never do that. The truth is, if you and I were raised there, we probably would, just like we eat meat.

[akudha]

Ok, fair enough.

The truth is, if you and I were raised there, we probably would

But that is kinda what I said though, isn’t it?

Anyway, I wasn’t trying to make them sound like monsters (except the rulers, they sure are).

I’ll try to word things better, next time.

[stavros]

It's not so much about the wording, it's about this line of argumentation separating us from them. I especially dislike this line of thinking when thinking about Nazi Germany and the atrocities there, because people tend to think "no sane person would do that, and we're sane, so we won't do it".

Instead, a much better line of thinking is "normal people can do this, under specific circumstances, so we should be very careful not to fall into the same trap ourselves".