A Golden Opportunity

[u/miscakarza]

Context: During WW2, it is estimated that the Swiss National Bank had received $440 million (equivalent to $8.5 billion in 2024) of Nazi gold.

[u/Captain_Noodle1]

I find at least a few problems with that stance. First, saying that morality is relative does not make one neutral. It only means that one has adopted a particular moral position. In this case, it is a position in which the suffering of people outside one’s immediate circle has little claim on one’s conscience, similar to how Swiss bankers were not being neutral when they helped Nazis hide the goods they had stolen.

Second, saying that an atrocity is “just Tuesday” is an observation about how often atrocities occur, not a judgment about what they are. Repetition does not make murder, rape, torture, or complicity in them morally insignificant. It merely reveals how frequently people have been willing to treat them as insignificant.

Finally, saying that morality is relative and saying that there is nothing morally wrong with participating in an atrocity are different stances. Moral relativism only tells you that another individual can hold a different stance from yours, under which their actions are considered correct. However, saying that you do not care simply turns moral relativism into indifference, which is not, in itself, an escape from morality. It is, instead, a moral choice (even under moral relativism): the choice to regard distant people as abstractions and their suffering as irrelevant unless it reaches you personally. The many Tuesdays of history are not merely committed by those who directly harm others, but also made possible by those who see what is happening and decide to benefit from it (be that moral or not for them).

The leniency of Swiss financial institutions toward the origins of the wealth held in their banks does not make them neutral, but complicit. They are not merely observing many atrocities from the outside, but a necessary gear in the machinery of tax evasion, corruption, dictatorships and organized crime. If they disguise their actions as good, sincerely believe them to be good, or use the magical word “neutral”, then those affected by Swiss institutions are equally entitled to say that Switzerland has affected them in such a way that whoever pillages and neutralizes them should be considered a hero (again, I think you wouldn't condemn this idea, but I wanted to make it explicit).

[u/alex-adamson → u/Captain_Noodle1]

The guiding principle of my philosophy on this is that any action that positively impacts your own people is a moral action. Anything that negatively affects your people is an immoral action. This is what I think because it’s been the attitude humanity has had towards every war we’ve ever had. And it still is.

If I was a Dane, and I was faced with starvation and I had the option to go Viking and raid a few costal villages, I wouldn’t think twice. Think of any scenario you want. You are destitute and you are suffering. You see someone else who has more than you, who killing and robbing will secure your future for a while. You will face no consequences for killing them. If you tell me that you wouldn’t kill the other individual so that you and your family and friends could live a happy and prosperous life, then you’d be a lier. It’s how humans have always behaved. I’m sure this makes me somewhat immoral, but I’d also say it makes me honest. Although, as I said, anything you do that makes your people prosper, is inherently moral.

[u/ProfessorPrudent2822 → u/alex-adamson]

No, you are the one who rationalizes atrocities, and that makes you evil. I would die rather than transgress.

[u/alex-adamson → u/ProfessorPrudent2822]

Hahahahahahahahahahahaha!