Variables

Have you ever met anyone who argued that murder is the highest moral good, or that rape is a man's best course of action, or that the Golden Rule is: steal everything you can get your hands on, all the time?

Of course not.

Most people already consider violence and theft to be morally wrong. However, as morality gets more abstract, it gets harder and harder for people to maintain their consistency. I can’t even count the number of times people have agreed with me that “theft is wrong,” but who then instantly become baffled when I reply “therefore taxation is wrong.”

It’s the same with the military. No one has any trouble with the equation:

Man + murder = evil

Throw in one little inconsequential variable, however, and most people get very confused

Man + murder + green costume = ?zzttz¿¡[short circuit] um, national hero?

Universal Morality: A Proposition, by Stefan Molyneux.