Thou Shalt Not Kill / Real Life

---

• Saint Jeanne d'Arc took this very seriously, despite being called to lead the French army to victory (from the front!). As she herself stated at her trial, "I have told you often enough, that I have done nothing but by the command of God. It was I, myself who bore this banner, when I attacked the enemy, to save killing anyone, for I have never killed anyone."
• Just like his counterpart in Goodfellas, the real-life Henry Hill (who was a big-time gangster) claims to have killed no one. In reality, he is known to have killed at least three people.
• One of the Ten Commandments is usually written as Thou Shalt Not Kill, though experts disagree on the translation and interpretation. Some people who follow the Bible, and the Commandments, find justifications in extreme situations, as with Christians who go to war, or Jews who fought back against Nazis. It's generally seen as a prohibition against murder, meaning that some types of killing (such as self-defense, execution, or warfare) are at least sometimes justified.
  • Some editions of the Bible do indeed use the phrase "Thou shalt not murder", rather than kill. Coupled with one of the definitions of murder as being the unjustified taking of life, this difference in semantics is often used in military and other circles to reassure religious individuals (particularly after a first kill) that they have not violated the spirit of the Commandment (though at the same time the word "unjustified" is in and of itself subject to wide interpretation: one person's war crime might be another person's good works). "Gone Missing," an episode of the TV series The Unit, contains just such a discussion between a character who is preparing for an assassination and experiencing a crisis of conscience after having had to terminate a young boy during a mission, and a chaplain.
  • Jesus commanded Peter to put his sword away and told him that those who live by it, also die by it. This could be a New Testament account of Jesus' statement on pacifism, especially killing.
  • The very same book that contains the Commandments also contains "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live" in the King James Version, however this version alone explicitly included the phrase. Others simply say:
    "Let no one be found among you who sacrifices their son or daughter in the fire, who practices divination or sorcery, interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, or casts spells, or who is a medium or spiritist or who consults the dead. Anyone who does these things is detestable to the Lord;"
    Deuteronomy 18:9-13
    • This is because the same word which constitutes "poison" in both Hebrew and Greek, also refers to "witchcraft". Poison Is Evil.
  • In Catholicism, the work of scholars like Saint Augustine and Saint Thomas Aquinas led to the Just War doctrine, spelling out when it is acceptable for a good Christian to go to war and kill if necessary, and requires that both the cause and the conduct of a war be just.
• A belief in general non-violence that extends to all life is central to Buddhism, and this includes prohibiting the killing of any animal, human or otherwise. Certain sects, including Tibetan Buddhism, yield to practicality, and accept that sometimes it is necessary to defend oneself, one's nation, or the local Buddhist temple.
  • The related Hinduism has similar beliefs, mostly grounded in the concept of reincarnation (as potentially any other animal), so it's thought that an animal you encounter could be a reincarnated ancestor.
  • The Jains, where the monks take the idea so seriously that they walk while gently sweeping the ground before their feet with a broom so that they will not accidentally tread on any insects. They also wear small masks on their faces so that they would not accidentally inhale and kill a bug.
• The legitimacy of violence in revolutionary situations and among the oppressed is a major topic among theorists, law-makers, rebels, and resisters. In Europe, from the English Civil War to The French Revolution to Red October, the idea of Violence is the Only Option was widely accepted among many revolutionaries and theorists. However, at the dawn of the 20th Century, Mahatma Gandhi's non-violent civil movement provided a new alternative, largely derived from several traditions of European protests and civil disobedience. Gandhi himself reflected on the definition of non-violence as a revolutionary practice:
  Mahatma Gandhi: "I do believe that, where there is only a choice between cowardice and violence, I would advise violence. I would rather have India resort to arms in order to defend her honour than that she should, in a cowardly manner, become or remain a helpless witness to her own dishonor. But I believe that nonviolence is infinitely superior to violence, forgiveness is more manly than punishment. Forgiveness adorns a soldier. But abstinence is forgiveness only when there is the power to punish; it is meaningless when it pretends to proceed from a helpless creature. But I do not believe India to be helpless. I do not believe myself to be a helpless creature. Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will. We do want to drive out the beast in the man, but we do not want on that account to emasculate him...the world is not entirely governed by logic. Life itself involves some kind of violence and we have to choose the path of least violence."
  • Gandhi's idea of non-violence would inspire Martin Luther King Jr. and other Civil Rights leaders and, briefly, Nelson Mandela. Martin Luther King Jr. was a radical left-wing thinker who was opposed by the middle-class establishment: but he managed to win public (white) support when Malcolm X and much later the Black Panthers gained a voice in the public, and King codified non-violence movements as effective and relevant to create change. Now whether King alone could have achieved that without Malcolm X and the Black Panthers playing Bad Cop is a huge debate
    • or rather, the media portraying them as such. In reality though, both Malcolm X and the Black Panthers largely fell victim to a potent combination of Red Scare and the "Angry Black Man" Stereotype. King sidestepped both by playing up his identity as a preacher and downplaying his association with socialist organizations (helped by the fact that one of the main things the Soviets were vilified for was being atheists). He could deliver a fire-and-brimstone sermon just like any other good Baptist minister, and he was in reality not at all opposed to violent actions in the name of defending one's community when no other option existed similar to Gandhi above. Malcolm X largely shared this view: but his decisions to use violence were shaped by the fact that he did not possess King's preaching ability, and had considerably fewer resources to work with. Still, he was more likely to threaten violence than to actually use it. Indeed, this view is not particularly an unusual one: it is the general attitude that socialists take towards the use of lethal force. Socialists see self-defense as an obvious exception to the general rule that killing is bad, and defense of one's community as an extension of self-defense. This is an area where they differ from other pacifists, such as Quakers, who believe that ALL violence is immoral. Only after his death did Dr. King become constructed as a "good negro": and it should be noted that this is a racist trope, often used to deflect criticisms of being racist. This led to the very amusing situation of people complaining that an entirely appropriate statue of MLK, styled after statues of Chairman Mao and Ho Chi Minh, was insulting to his memory: usually younger white people with no actual idea of what he believed or did.
• In general, police forces in most civilized countries prioritize bringing in people alive as opposed to killing them. Sometimes, this doesn't happen. Most cops never even fire their weapon, much less kill anyone. Some nations place such a high priority on non-lethal policing that their police officers don't even carry guns at all under normal circumstances. However, police officers are in no way immune to stereotypes and cultural biases: this pacifistic attitude can very easily go out the window when they are dealing with marginalized communities. This is particularly true if the civil authorities, or the local community, see that marginalized group as fair gane: overtly or not. Merely disarming the police also does little to decrease their lethality: indeed many of the more obviously unjustified cases don't involve weapons at all. Indeed, policing is often an attractive job position for the Noble Bigot: as his badge often protects him from criticism, because questioning a police officer's judgement is often seen as unpatriotic (though this is not necessarily the case everywhere: how police are viewed by a given culture can vary wildly).
  • Note that this even applies to units like SWAT, despite the fact that they're the police equivalent of Special Forces. Like any other police officer, they are supposed to prioritize the saving of lives. However, this goes out the window should a suspect demonstrate the intent (threatening with clear intent to follow through) or action (they've shot at the officer or some such) of being a threat to themselves, the officer, or another human being - in which case, the officer may use lethal force.
  • Although the media makes it appear as if every police officer has a license to kill - and while, indeed, police officers are trained in the use of deadly force - in reality, only a small percentage of police officers ever fire their weapons at anything other than a paper target during their careers.
  • There is also the fact that police officers who do use lethal force are taken off the patrol roster and their actions are investigated to see if it was justified. Even in cases where it is found that the use of lethal force was justified can and will often result in the police officer(s) being disciplined, which can include dismissal from the police force and/or being arrested if the investigation shows that the situation was allowed to escalate that far in the first place by officer's own actions.
    • The Canadian TV series Flashpoint illustrates this frequently, as any time an officer uses deadly force, he or she is depicted as having to submit to a thorough investigation to ensure their actions were justified.
• This is one major argument against the death penalty or capital punishment. Naturally, it also comes up in other issues such as abortion, assisted suicide, euthanasia etc.

---