Quote:
Originally Posted by Peter_Spaeth
Fair enough, I think this is in a different category though, because to me yes there's a core (trimming, recoloring, adding material) but there are many other things as to which there is no consensus and which to me are more than the examples around the edges in other cases. Thus, when one says murder, it has a relatively common meaning. I don't think that's true, any more anyhow, for alteration. It just means different things to different people. So people could say yes, selling an altered card without disclosure is fraud, but they might think cleaning was fine.
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The reason I chose that particular example as one of my three specifics, is
precisely because the line between punishable by law homicide and legally protected self-defense is very very gray. In most jurisdictions it is poorly defined both within the legal code and among the public conception, relying on clauses about 'reasonable fear' etc. that are not strict lines or well defined at all. And yet, you and I are still able to state the absolutely obvious - we are against murder. Now, if we were together on a panel of two judges, we would almost certainly come into conflict playing with those further refinements - is this particular case a 2nd or 3rd degree murder, or a legitimate act of self-defense? We surely both believe those two things exist, a murder and an act of self-defense, and that one of them should be punished by the law, but will we draw the line in the exact same narrow spot? Probably not, because we live in a complicated world of grey. We would surely both understand that there was room for grey, and that disagreement on a particular case may happen. And yet, as functioning people, we could surely still express a negative opinion on the central issue. We don't have to sit and pretend that we can't say murder is wrong. You don't start with the grey, you start at the center for any other crime, and we are fully capable of rendering our judgment of that crime, while being cognizant that there are many particular cases that reasonable folk may or may not consider to be covered by the edges of that rendering.
Again, replace this crime with any other crime about which the two or more people conversing are somewhat informed on, as we all are about card alteration. We are able to function - except when it's card alteration in a group of hobbyists. Only here is it so tremendously difficult.