Utilitarianism, Halloween, and Phantasm

http://wmbriggs.com/blog/?p=3029 ^ | William M. Briggs

[mattstat]

Halloween is coming, and that means it’s time to consider frightening things. And what over the past two centuries has been more horrific than the idea of utilitarianism? Because of it, parts of the Twentieth Century were as bloody as a John Carpenter movie. Thus, can be it be a mere coincidence that Jeremy Bentham, the father of utilitarianism resembles the Tall Man from the horror flick Phantasm? Stick with me here; it’s Friday, the day when regular rules of logic are relaxed.

In the Phantasm movies, the Tall Man’s mission, as far as anyone understands its bizarre plot, was to enslave the human race, to turn them into squat, mindless laborers, as dead as they were alive. Now, if that doesn’t sound like socialism—which requires for its existence the philosophy of utilitarianism—I don’t know what does.

There are many refutations of utilitarianism. As far as I know, its resemblance to a 1970′s horror film is entirely new. But this criticism is so novel, that I fear it will be misunderstood. So, here is a (crude, Friday-style) example of a well known objection...