When Russian forces stormed the school held hostage by Chechen terrorists, over 300 people died. The Beslan school siege wasn’t the worst terrorist attack arithmetically – the fatalities were only a tenth of September 11th. What made the school siege particularly gruesome was that many who died, and died in the most gruesome manner, were children.
There’s something particularly distressing about kids being massacred, which can’t be quantified mathematically. You either get that point or you don’t. And the famed Chechen rebel, Shamil Basayev, got it. Issuing a statement after the attack Basayev claimed responsibility for the siege but called the deaths a “tragedy.” He did not think that the Russians would storm the school. Basayev expressed regret saying that he was “not delighted by what happened there.” Basayev was not known for contrition but death of children doesn’t look good even for someone whose modus operandi was in killing as many as possible.
There’s a code even amongst terrorists – you don’t slaughter children – it’s ok flying planes into big towers but not ok deliberately killing children. Of course, neither is ok but the point is that even the most immoral of our species have a moral code. Strict utilitarians won’t understand this moral code. Strict utilitarians, or rational amoralists, accord significance by multiplying the number of life years lost by the number died, and whether a death from medical error or of a child burnt in a school siege, the conversion factor is the same. Thus, for rational amoralists sentimentality specifically over children dying, such as in Parkland, Florida, in so far as this sentimentality affects policy, must be justified scientifically.
The debate over gun control is paralyzed by unsentimental utilitarianism but with an ironic twist – it is the conservatives, known to eschew utilitarianism, who seek refuge in it. After every mass killing, I receive three lines of reasoning from conservatives opposed to gun control: a) If you restrict guns there’ll be a net increase in crimes and deaths, b) there’s no evidence restricting access to guns will reduce mass shootings, and c) people will still get guns if they really wish to. This type of reasoning comes from the same people who oppose population health, and who deeply oppose the sacrifice of individuals for the greater good, i.e. oppose utilitarianism.
