No pay, no spray: Firefighters let home burn

[KrazyHorse]

If it's a moral obligation for the city to provide this douchetard with free (or vastly discounted, given the average ******'s ability to pay) fire protection then it is FAR MORE OF A MORAL OBLIGATION FOR THE CITY TO GIVE FREE MONEY TO THIRD WORLDERS.

Charity to ANYBODY who owns a house and lives in the first world is WAY DOWN THE ****ING LIST OF WORTHY CAUSES.

**** him, and **** his house. I'm personally glad it burned down.

[Asher]

Your argument brings us back to the status quo ante of no fire protection for the rural residents of the county as it would lead the expansion of services to county residents financially unsustainable.

You're unreal. Yes, if they put out this fire they would have had to shut down all firehalls in the county.

[Solomwi]

It's not charity when the man has offered to cover all expenses.

Yes it is, partly for reasons KH has already covered. Doing anything for someone that you don't have a duty to do is charity.

[KrazyHorse]

It's not charity when the man has offered to cover all expenses.

Yeah, right. He both:

a) Couldn't find 75$ to pay for protection ahead of time

AND

b) Could afford 10000$+ to pay for protection ex post

[KrazyHorse]

You're unreal. Yes, if they put out this fire they would have had to shut down all firehalls in the county.

They don't have any firehalls in the county. Only in the city. The county residents have decided not to pay for firehalls.

[Asher]

Yes it is, partly for reasons KH has already covered. Doing anything for someone that you don't have a duty to do is charity.

No, charity is benevolently giving help and not expecting anything in return. If you are offering to pay for a service, it is not charity. By definition.

[KrazyHorse]

It's not charity when the man has offered to cover all expenses.

If he could pay for all expenses then doing it wouldn't have been charity, but neither would it have been a moral obligation of the county to do so.

[Asher]

Yeah, right. He both:

a) Couldn't find 75$ to pay for protection ahead of time

AND

b) Could afford 10000$+ to pay for protection ex post

He has insurance.

[Wiglaf]

How do you walk by homeless people on the street? They don't even have possessions that can be protected, and you buy gay porn and play Xbox instead of giving them some.

[Boris Godunov]

1) He may well not have been able to pay them what they would charge (which would have to be sufficient to make paying 75$ worth it, probabilistically)

We don't know that. But even so, there are alternatives. People who get treated at the hospital without insurance are put on payment plans if they can't pay the full bill up front, after all.

2) Even if he'd had enough, the city is under no moral obligation to offer its services to him.

3 dogs and a cat dead. If I have the ability to immediately prevent that from happening but do nothing because I haven't been paid a fee, it's immoral. Again, firefighting is not a mere service, any more than police protection or medical treatment.

I suppose you don't think I have a "moral obligation" to let you know the man behind you is picking your pocket, but I think I do.

[KrazyHorse]

No, charity is benevolently giving help and not expecting anything in return. If you are offering to pay for a service, it is not charity. By definition.

Look, I might offer Obama a trillion dollars to blow me, but if he did it, it would be charity.

[KrazyHorse]

He has insurance.

I doubt his fire insurance covers paying off the fire department.

[Asher]

If he could pay for all expenses then doing it wouldn't have been charity, but neither would it have been a moral obligation of the county to do so.

You and Solomwi keep focusing on the moral obligation on behalf of non-personal entities. I've not made that point at all. I've explicitly and repeatedly talked about PERSONAL MORALITY.

That those firemen could sit there on a fully equipped firetruck and let the home burn down and pets die is utterly immoral. There's nothing moral about doing nothing when you are equipped to do something.

[Asher]

I doubt his fire insurance covers paying off the fire department.

Doesn't matter what it covers. They cut him a cheque at the end, a cheque he can use to pay the fire department what he promised.

[Imran Siddiqui]

It's a moral obligation. Or, it should be. It would be the Christian thing to do, in any case.

This is true. Though the law is, of course, not subject to Christian morals all of the time (otherwise stabbing business partners in the back would be dealt with more harshly). Morality and law can and are separate, because that's what we've decided to do. At the very least, it should present a tough moral dilemma (just IMHO).