It is striking how small the moral ambition community really is. Not because the ideas are obscure, but because truly seeing suffering and then accepting responsibility for it carries a real psychological cost. Most people narrow their moral field to whatever is directly in front of them. It is a defense mechanism rather than a lack of compassion. Once you recognize structural cruelty clearly, you cannot unsee it, and once you admit you could act, you also admit you are accountable for not acting. That level of clarity is rare.
History shows that every major moral shift begins with a small group willing to hold that clarity. Abolition, civil rights, early environmentalism, and animal welfare all started with minorities who refused sedation and insisted on agency. The goal is not to make everyone part of the core. The goal is to create a gravitational field strong enough that others eventually move into its orbit. Moral ambition has always been a minority position, but it is the minority that moves the world.
Since people like my thoughts…let’s keep this going:
How Do People Live With Themselves When Their Job Depends on Human Suffering?
One of the most disturbing features of modern America is how many professions are built on the suffering of others…and how normalized that has become. Immigration enforcement, the majority of the legal industry: from lawyers to judges(documented by behavioral scientists), detention systems, private prisons, and bureaucracies (the near entirety of the U.S. Federal Government at this point) that profit from fear or desperation all share a common psychological pattern:
They turn human vulnerability into a revenue stream.
And the question that keeps returning to me is painfully simple:
How do people who work inside these systems make sense of themselves?
Do they feel pride when they come home at night?
Do they tell their children what they actually did that day?
Do they believe their paychecks are clean because the system signed them?
Do they convince themselves that “someone has to do it,” as if inevitability were the same as morality?
There is a long, well‑documented psychological tradition—- from Hannah Arendt to contemporary behavioral ethics; showing how ordinary people can participate in harmful systems without ever seeing themselves as harmful. They fragment responsibility. They hide behind procedure. They tell themselves they’re “just doing their job.” They outsource the moral weight to the institution, and in doing so, they protect their self‑image at the expense of other people’s lives.
The tragedy is not only the harm done.
The tragedy is how easy it becomes for people to stop noticing the harm at all.
This is not about individual monsters.
It’s about systems that reward detachment, punish empathy, and financially incentivize the erosion of basic human dignity. When a profession is structured around the suffering of others, the people inside it must either confront that truth, or build psychological armor thick enough to avoid it.
And that armor has a cost.
It corrodes judgment.
It numbs compassion.
It teaches people to see human beings as cases, files, or obstacles.
So the real question is not “How can they do this work?”
The real question is:
What happens to a society when entire professions depend on people learning not to feel?
That is the moral crisis we should be talking about.
A good majority of them enjoy invoking suffering on others. There likely are some who are starting to question it but are not brave enough to say enough is enough.
Oh cry me a river. Now, let’s hold useless politicians to account! They are public servants! If they can’t properly do the job they are elected and paid to do then get out the way!!
There is enough evidence for the MN attorney general to open his own investigation, immediately. It’s not complicated, the shooter needs to be arrested immediately on suspicion of murder. The Dem reps should take the National Guard with them. The MAGA agents who always claim to be about law and order routinely violate the law.
Unfortunately he is shut out of the case and will not have access to the evidence which will be secret and then may just accidentally disappear. There is recourse, however, and that is civil suits by the family and possibly by the city. JD VANCE, graduate of Yale Law School, however, is not one who can provide advice. He is WRONG. Agents do not have immunity.
Exactly and why I didn’t these representatives bring them Maher and have the police escort them all there into the detention center? This is a racket. This is all show show show! It’s infuriating and I’m over it. These politicians who can’t and won’t do their job needs to step aside.
In a disgusting display of arrogance and lawlessness Cheeto declared that the only thing now that can stop him is his own morality!!( https://bit.ly/4r5RS15)
Let that sink in for a moment This demented depraved malignant narcissist just said the quiet dictator speak out loud No laws constrain him or his regime No domestic or international norms can check his decision making No advisors or country’s opinions will make any difference as to what he will do
Yes How he views the world and his own immoral depravity will decide how he will proceed
This is the culmination of years of a psychotic mind’s development that is now so demented that it leverages the free domestic and world order Time to protest like never before and call your Congress people to obstruct him in every way possible It may not take a midterm election to get him impeached
There is no way ICE was sent to target Somali's since they are all positioned in a white working class and Latino neighborhood. They are all lined up and down Portland avenue. What exactlly is the objective over this operation. Can we get a published paper copy of their orders and the objective?
No one should be surprised by now that trump's criminal cabal does not follow the law or the Constitution. Only the Judges in the US that are not in the tank for trump, unlike Cannon down in Florida who also is corrupt, can be a check on trump's bat shit crazy, unhinged policies.
As long as members of congress refuse to physically break the blockade, then Trump has won. They need to get arrested and fight prosecution. The law is on their side!!! Stop with the performative drama. DO SOMETHING. Pretend crossing their blockade is like crossing the Pettus Bridge.
IT seems that Congress no longer has any power to exercise the duties of the office. Instead? A person with no public approval OR knowledge of the law decided he has the power.
Violence is no answer. What is the answer is all of those who are not allowed, by a member of the public, to obey the constitution are answerable for Treason. Acting against the constitution is treason. THey should be arrested and tried in a court of law. If nothing else? We can see how easy it is to burn the laws of the land. Are people really ready to give up the constitution and obey a prison guard instead? Did you elect him? Who is paying him. Is he our new federal worker?
What this shows, is that Trump and his DOJ are starting to escalate the violence because they figured out that no one is going to physically stand up to the ICE squads on the streets. This is how a mafia family works. They push and push until they can't anymore. We're seeing that on full display in Minneapolis, after seeing the start in Chicago. Portland, OR is also a test case.
I'm waiting for the protests to get violent and the anger being taken out on ICE agents on the streets. More shootings will come, from both sides. We're going to see soon, individuals shooting ICE soldiers, and when the cruelty ramps up, the guerilla war against the ICE soldiers will escalate. It won't exactly be a civil war but close to it.
It is clear that Trump et al. do not want any scrutiny of what their ICE thugs are doing! The goal of ICE is to threaten people and instill fear. As their past actions have shown, they will arrest you even though you can prove you are a US citizen, and, as recent actions by ICE demonstrate, they will kill you even though you are not breaking any laws. They are Trump's version of the Gestapo! They need to be stopped before more innocent people are murdered.
Its time to start assassinations of Ice agents, that will be the ONLY way to get justice.
People have to fight murder with murder, sad to say I am advocating assasinations but that is what has to happen to start putting fear into these rabbid cowardly dogs of men.
Nothing much happens in this video, but it came in pretty strong realizing US citizens just cannot move freely, obstructed by trigger happy morons who have a license to kill. Weapons out. This is seriously sick.
A tense standoff? Are you kidding me? Who are you trying to fool here? I watched the video, who else is embarrassed and sick and tired of not having an opposition party in this country?? We have Ice, a domestic terrorist group vandalizing private property, assaulting humans and executing them! Where the fuck is the mayor and why didn’t he bring in the police to escort the reps into the detention center? This is why I canceled my subscription with you all. What kind of reporting is this ? hold our paid politicians accountable for protecting American citizens! I don’t care if they’re blue or red. Do your job be firm And be aggressive when needed! I’m tired of words words words with no results. You should know better by now!! They are PUBLIC SERVANTS!!! And MUST DO THEIR JOB OR GET OUT THE WAY!!!
It is striking how small the moral ambition community really is. Not because the ideas are obscure, but because truly seeing suffering and then accepting responsibility for it carries a real psychological cost. Most people narrow their moral field to whatever is directly in front of them. It is a defense mechanism rather than a lack of compassion. Once you recognize structural cruelty clearly, you cannot unsee it, and once you admit you could act, you also admit you are accountable for not acting. That level of clarity is rare.
History shows that every major moral shift begins with a small group willing to hold that clarity. Abolition, civil rights, early environmentalism, and animal welfare all started with minorities who refused sedation and insisted on agency. The goal is not to make everyone part of the core. The goal is to create a gravitational field strong enough that others eventually move into its orbit. Moral ambition has always been a minority position, but it is the minority that moves the world.
Since people like my thoughts…let’s keep this going:
How Do People Live With Themselves When Their Job Depends on Human Suffering?
One of the most disturbing features of modern America is how many professions are built on the suffering of others…and how normalized that has become. Immigration enforcement, the majority of the legal industry: from lawyers to judges(documented by behavioral scientists), detention systems, private prisons, and bureaucracies (the near entirety of the U.S. Federal Government at this point) that profit from fear or desperation all share a common psychological pattern:
They turn human vulnerability into a revenue stream.
And the question that keeps returning to me is painfully simple:
How do people who work inside these systems make sense of themselves?
Do they feel pride when they come home at night?
Do they tell their children what they actually did that day?
Do they believe their paychecks are clean because the system signed them?
Do they convince themselves that “someone has to do it,” as if inevitability were the same as morality?
There is a long, well‑documented psychological tradition—- from Hannah Arendt to contemporary behavioral ethics; showing how ordinary people can participate in harmful systems without ever seeing themselves as harmful. They fragment responsibility. They hide behind procedure. They tell themselves they’re “just doing their job.” They outsource the moral weight to the institution, and in doing so, they protect their self‑image at the expense of other people’s lives.
The tragedy is not only the harm done.
The tragedy is how easy it becomes for people to stop noticing the harm at all.
This is not about individual monsters.
It’s about systems that reward detachment, punish empathy, and financially incentivize the erosion of basic human dignity. When a profession is structured around the suffering of others, the people inside it must either confront that truth, or build psychological armor thick enough to avoid it.
And that armor has a cost.
It corrodes judgment.
It numbs compassion.
It teaches people to see human beings as cases, files, or obstacles.
So the real question is not “How can they do this work?”
The real question is:
What happens to a society when entire professions depend on people learning not to feel?
That is the moral crisis we should be talking about.
A good majority of them enjoy invoking suffering on others. There likely are some who are starting to question it but are not brave enough to say enough is enough.
Excellent point, and isn’t that always the case.
One would think, at this point in history, we’d be past this nonsense.
Oh cry me a river. Now, let’s hold useless politicians to account! They are public servants! If they can’t properly do the job they are elected and paid to do then get out the way!!
Explain yourself, smartarse
You obviously know everything.
Very well said.
Another way of saying "critical mass" which is a physical law whether it be electrons or people
Asha Rangappa, FBI agent, has a very clear explanation why that was a bad shot.
https://open.substack.com/pub/asharangappa/p/friday-round-up-1926?utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web
Thank you Linda for this link.
I support Rep Ilhan Omar and appreciate her standing up for what is right.
There is enough evidence for the MN attorney general to open his own investigation, immediately. It’s not complicated, the shooter needs to be arrested immediately on suspicion of murder. The Dem reps should take the National Guard with them. The MAGA agents who always claim to be about law and order routinely violate the law.
Unfortunately he is shut out of the case and will not have access to the evidence which will be secret and then may just accidentally disappear. There is recourse, however, and that is civil suits by the family and possibly by the city. JD VANCE, graduate of Yale Law School, however, is not one who can provide advice. He is WRONG. Agents do not have immunity.
Jd is ALWAYS wrong! How can someone that stupid be vp of this shithole?
Why aren't the local police arresting these ICE agents for breaking the law????
Exactly and why I didn’t these representatives bring them Maher and have the police escort them all there into the detention center? This is a racket. This is all show show show! It’s infuriating and I’m over it. These politicians who can’t and won’t do their job needs to step aside.
Lawless jungle, chump will bring this empire to the ground!
Cheeto’s Morality Governs America And World
In a disgusting display of arrogance and lawlessness Cheeto declared that the only thing now that can stop him is his own morality!!( https://bit.ly/4r5RS15)
Let that sink in for a moment This demented depraved malignant narcissist just said the quiet dictator speak out loud No laws constrain him or his regime No domestic or international norms can check his decision making No advisors or country’s opinions will make any difference as to what he will do
Yes How he views the world and his own immoral depravity will decide how he will proceed
This is the culmination of years of a psychotic mind’s development that is now so demented that it leverages the free domestic and world order Time to protest like never before and call your Congress people to obstruct him in every way possible It may not take a midterm election to get him impeached
There is no way ICE was sent to target Somali's since they are all positioned in a white working class and Latino neighborhood. They are all lined up and down Portland avenue. What exactlly is the objective over this operation. Can we get a published paper copy of their orders and the objective?
No one should be surprised by now that trump's criminal cabal does not follow the law or the Constitution. Only the Judges in the US that are not in the tank for trump, unlike Cannon down in Florida who also is corrupt, can be a check on trump's bat shit crazy, unhinged policies.
As long as members of congress refuse to physically break the blockade, then Trump has won. They need to get arrested and fight prosecution. The law is on their side!!! Stop with the performative drama. DO SOMETHING. Pretend crossing their blockade is like crossing the Pettus Bridge.
IT seems that Congress no longer has any power to exercise the duties of the office. Instead? A person with no public approval OR knowledge of the law decided he has the power.
Violence is no answer. What is the answer is all of those who are not allowed, by a member of the public, to obey the constitution are answerable for Treason. Acting against the constitution is treason. THey should be arrested and tried in a court of law. If nothing else? We can see how easy it is to burn the laws of the land. Are people really ready to give up the constitution and obey a prison guard instead? Did you elect him? Who is paying him. Is he our new federal worker?
What this shows, is that Trump and his DOJ are starting to escalate the violence because they figured out that no one is going to physically stand up to the ICE squads on the streets. This is how a mafia family works. They push and push until they can't anymore. We're seeing that on full display in Minneapolis, after seeing the start in Chicago. Portland, OR is also a test case.
I'm waiting for the protests to get violent and the anger being taken out on ICE agents on the streets. More shootings will come, from both sides. We're going to see soon, individuals shooting ICE soldiers, and when the cruelty ramps up, the guerilla war against the ICE soldiers will escalate. It won't exactly be a civil war but close to it.
It is clear that Trump et al. do not want any scrutiny of what their ICE thugs are doing! The goal of ICE is to threaten people and instill fear. As their past actions have shown, they will arrest you even though you can prove you are a US citizen, and, as recent actions by ICE demonstrate, they will kill you even though you are not breaking any laws. They are Trump's version of the Gestapo! They need to be stopped before more innocent people are murdered.
Its time to start assassinations of Ice agents, that will be the ONLY way to get justice.
People have to fight murder with murder, sad to say I am advocating assasinations but that is what has to happen to start putting fear into these rabbid cowardly dogs of men.
lauriemillerjade.com
Nothing much happens in this video, but it came in pretty strong realizing US citizens just cannot move freely, obstructed by trigger happy morons who have a license to kill. Weapons out. This is seriously sick.
"Land of the free"? "Land of the few!"
A tense standoff? Are you kidding me? Who are you trying to fool here? I watched the video, who else is embarrassed and sick and tired of not having an opposition party in this country?? We have Ice, a domestic terrorist group vandalizing private property, assaulting humans and executing them! Where the fuck is the mayor and why didn’t he bring in the police to escort the reps into the detention center? This is why I canceled my subscription with you all. What kind of reporting is this ? hold our paid politicians accountable for protecting American citizens! I don’t care if they’re blue or red. Do your job be firm And be aggressive when needed! I’m tired of words words words with no results. You should know better by now!! They are PUBLIC SERVANTS!!! And MUST DO THEIR JOB OR GET OUT THE WAY!!!