Sidney Winston

Who’s going to mind?  That is the crucial question.

It depends very much on the moral system that you are using. And depending on the moral system it can also depend on moral norms. But yeah…of the three sorts of people you are referring to…people picnicking on a seemingly strangers grave could upset all three of those kinds of pe…[Read more]

Who’s going to mind?  That is the crucial question.

• the cemetary owners.
• the relatives of the deceased.
• onlookers.

In the last two cases, you could be accused of disrespecting the dead.  Is that what anybody wants?

They would likely get cited for trespassing doing something like that.

I’m not really looking for a legal answer here. There are all sorts of moral issues that are technically not illegal or not excluded by general rules or policies that can still be morally wrong. But in any case, I believe I can work out where you stand on the issue from your answers.

@Davis if they are abiding by all cemetery regulations and rules there is nothing wrong with it. If they are not then they are clearly out of line. Cemeteries don’t allow that kind of behavior…..I didn’t think I would need to add the caveat that “as long as they abide by cemetery rules,” but I’m adding it now. They would likely get cited for…[Read more]

If you’re talking about teenagers acting stupid and drinking beer on a grave versus somebody just bringing a blanket in a basket of food to have some lunch, those are two completely different pictures don’t you think?

Well no. You said there’s ABSOLUTELY nothing wrong with it. That’s a fairly categorical response. You then asked why it would be…[Read more]

@Davis: so… To follow up on the example that you just gave… First of all, I worked at a funeral home and cemetery, actually a string of them in the area and I’m pretty familiar with the culture of that profession. It would be a violation of their rules to have teenagers drinking beer and having a party like that… So that would be actually against…[Read more]

edit: [removed] nm-I don’t feel like extending this particular tangent.

So yes, you’ve changed too much at this point. With the additional conditions you’ve attached to the question, I don’t really find it an interesting question is all I’m saying.

This is the only way to approach the problem deontologically (and at this point we were discussing only my deontological answer…not my various other answers). In a deont…[Read more]

What would be wrong with having a picnic on somebody’s grave?

Ivy, imagine the worst happened and say, your son passed away (sorry to make you imagine the unimaginable). And then you go to visit the grave and you see a bunch of high school students and one of their pet dogs having a picnic on top of his little grave, eating sandwiches and d…[Read more]

Davis wrote:

I think you’ve now added enough new values to the scenario that this has substantially strayed from the original question.

No I don’t agree. How you approach any problem in deontological ethics is contingent on the laws you’ve formulated and how you apply them.

The original scenario was people picnicking on a grave. The next of kin s…[Read more]

Gravesites are real property

Yes totally. For some moral systems, the fact that the grave is private property is enough of a reason to brand the activity immoral.

@Davis I just read the question… What would be wrong with having a picnic on somebody’s grave? There’s absolutely nothing wrong with that

I think you’ve now added enough new values to the scenario that this has substantially strayed from the original question.

No I don’t agree. How you approach any problem in deontological ethics is contingent on the laws you’ve formulated and how you apply them. I don’t see the value in formulating a law over “is it wrong to have a picnic on a s…[Read more]

Fellow Unbelievers,

There is another consideration to account for here: Gravesites are real property mixed with human labor, enclosed, and claimed from the state of Nature.

All real property is owned by someone, and ownership means the right of the owner to set the terms and conditions for the real property’s use and, above all, the right to…[Read more]

Simon Paynton wrote:

Davis wrote:
I think the possibility of hurting or upsetting other people is significant enough to make an easily avoidable pointless activity one I wouldn’t do.

You’re talking about upsetting people (i.e., causing harm) for intangible rather than tangible reasons. Sometimes this seems acceptable, sometimes it doe…

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Davis wrote:
I think the possibility of hurting or upsetting other people is significant enough to make an easily avoidable pointless activity one I wouldn’t do.

You’re talking about upsetting people (i.e., causing harm) for intangible rather than tangible reasons.  Sometimes this seems acceptable, sometimes it doesn’t.

Davis wrote:
I think the possibility of hurting or upsetting other people is significant enough to make an easily avoidable pointless activity one I wouldn’t do. If there are 1,000,000 equally good places to picnic and I instead choose 1 location where my activity could potentially hurt/upset a person, with no added value to doing it there…I thi…

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Different norms (benefit/harm; respecting the dead; etc.) can clash or have different goals or structures.

This is certainly the case but I don’t think this would invalidate the rule. I mean, if suddenly a large number of people started getting upset if I used the words “marble, pickle and mirror” in the same sentence…I wouldn’t go out of my way…[Read more]

I think the possibility of hurting or upsetting other people is significant enough to make an easily avoidable pointless activity one I wouldn’t do. If there are 1,000,000 equally good places to picnic and I instead choose 1 location where my activity could potentially hurt/upset a person, with no added value to doing it there…I think it’s a…[Read more]

Kristina wrote:
relying on norms to govern behaviour has some questionable utility. I am sure there are cases where it is valuable, but I can also point to cases where it is causing harm. I would suggest that erring on the side of caution would be to rely on such norms as sparingly as possible, or at the very least to invest more in keeping…

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