You will be completely right to say why you should be interested in the opinions of some European blogger. But this is much bigger. It goes to what meta-ethics is and what ethics are used. What the particular individual had done, what kind of conduct suitable for his profession should have been. So shaking hands with prominents? You may be surprised whom I recommend to hate less or more.
Please note one important fact. I am talking not about men who killed 10 people, but such prominents who killed millions. So I derive my knowings from this.
Please also note, the numbers are absolute. If Breivik had the chance, he would have killed billions people. American presidents did not wish to kill billions—but their decisions affected millions. Please don’t think about shaking or not shaking hands literally, it is just a gesture. A metaphor. The criterion is basically about of absolute numbers the criminal had killed.
What is meta-ethics?
Meta-ethics is the branch of philosophy that explores the nature, origins, and meaning of moral concepts and judgments. Unlike normative ethics, which seeks to determine what is right or wrong, meta-ethics examines the foundations of morality itself, asking questions like whether moral values are objective or subjective, how moral knowledge is possible, and what it means when we label actions as “good” or “evil.” Meta-ethics delves into the language, psychology, and logic behind moral reasoning, providing a deeper understanding of the principles that underlie ethical systems. It is concerned with the “why” and “how” of morality rather than prescribing specific moral rules.
What do we mean when we say something is “good” or “evil”? Are moral values objective truths, or are they subjective and culturally relative? How can we know what is morally right or wrong? What is the nature of moral reasoning?
Heading against moral nihilism
In my humple opinion, we are living in moral nihilism (almost). No justice who will be born, how many people, what life events (painful, torturing, good, ecstatic) she or will live trough and the moment of death.
In my positions, I seek every moral action leads to creating an infinite army of humans, AI-beings with the most estatic moments. Of course, everything without harming anyone.
Utilitarianism and hedonism brings total utilititarianism, which is closest to my moral positions.
Shaking hands with prominents? How come if I have totally different moral-standpoint
Based on my own philosophy, every moral action is wrong, the whole system of every moral action and its subsequent consequences in justice, politics, legal system and the common morality are wrong.
My readers know that I skip from my hardcore stance to somewhere to the enhanced common morality.
If people are close to it (it is not their stance), they can relate to it and I can enrich them.
So judging a particular US politician versus a terrorist may be tricky.
What is ethics?
Ethics is the systematic study of moral principles, often within a formalized context such as professional conduct, law, or philosophy. Ethics seeks to apply a more objective, rational approach to determining what actions or behaviors are right or wrong, often considering broader implications for society. While morality is personal and cultural, ethics tends to be more universal and is concerned with establishing guidelines that can be applied consistently across different situations and communities. For example, professional ethics in medicine dictate that doctors must maintain patient confidentiality, regardless of their personal beliefs.
I seek how individual ethically performs in his extremely important positions. What he or she should have done or didn’t do.
History of shaking hands and my modest opinion
The practice of shaking hands dates back to ancient times, believed to have originated as a gesture of peace, showing that neither person was carrying a weapon. In ancient Greece, it was depicted in art as a symbol of trust and equality. The gesture evolved through the centuries, becoming a formalized greeting in Europe by the Middle Ages, often used in sealing agreements or showing mutual respect. Today, shaking hands remains a common social gesture worldwide, symbolizing goodwill, respect, and agreement in both personal and professional contexts.
I recommend shaking hands with nearly everyone of the common people, and – call me a coward – they can coerce me into this. So my title is a bit confusing.
But I don’t prefer to shake hands with enormously powerful people who made enormously significant steps altering the pace and form of the world we live in now.
Terrorists
If the wishes of the Islamic terrorists were fulfilled, nearly all people on this planet would be dead or tortured. Then we have right-wing terrorists. The issue is the real damage they did.
Osama bin Laden – evil person from my morality standpoint, from the common morality, but his damage was not too huge (PLEASE MAKE NOTE COMPARING TO THESE INDIVIDUALS), so YES, I would recommend shaking his hand
Anders Behring Breivik – a right-wing terrorist with narcissistic features, had his own agenda, but in my opinion, it was because of his own fame – YES, I would shake the hand
Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi – leader of ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria), which conducted numerous brutal attacks and controlled large territories in the Middle East, resulting in the deaths of thousands – his view of world is incompatible and he was ruthless, remorseless sociopath – NO, you should never shake his hand
Carlos the Jackal – a Latin American terrorists who served to brutal ideologies – NO – I wouldn’t have shaken his hand
Shaking hands with prominents: US presidents
There is a basic rule. Killing millions in wars and their following effects of people dying with low natality as another consequence. While they cannot be less evil in relative terms than terrorists, they actions affected billions. How many people will be born, what life he or she will, this is my rule. So a POTUS is kind of a God who actually serves evil in this fairy-tale like resemblance.
Václav Havel couldn’t have been more right when he had proclaimed that you can achieve very little in politics. You may object I am against what I wrote in this article. I think it is immoral just to be in that function. They can offer little since the whole background constellation is grossly distorted by the super-rich, lobbyists, crooks, movers and shakers. So only little power. So he should be enormously worrisome in every aspect of his work.
They “oversee” or are being “overseen” by the secret service with the largest operational scope which destroys lives and kills so many people.
Many special OPs, black sites (I may end up here), torture, kidnapping, imprisonment, total parody of democracy.
Barack Obama
He enjoyed his tenures carefree, killed, crippled so many people that even Breivik is a complete looser, a truly immoral being; without any doubt a war criminal; how can he live with that?
“An estimated 3.6-3.8 million people have died indirectly in post-9/11 war zones, bringing the total death toll to at least 4.5-4.7 million and counting. Over 432,000 civilians have been killed as a result of the fighting. 38 million — the number of war refugees and displaced persons.” Costs of War – here
Los Angeles Times reads: “U.S. military forces have been at war for all eight years of Obama’s tenure, the first two-term president with that distinction. He launched airstrikes or military raids in at least seven countries: Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, Yemen, Somalia and Pakistan.”
I absolutely loathe him and now a cherry at the top of the cake – Obama claimed his worst day during his presidency was the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. Are you kidding me? After killing all those people. And the best of it? By just using a slight piece of his political capital he might have ignited higher natality, giving millions of children a chance of being born. But he didn’t give a f***!
No matter how Americans blindly follow, cherish and adore their criminals in chief, absolutely NO, please don’t shake hands with him
George W. Bush
Basically a sociopath and warmonger. Truly believes the benefits of the super-rich are greater than liabilities. His motto could be summed up as the following: if they kill one American, we will kill millions of foreingers.
When I was young, I thought George W. Bush had been a good guy. When you start acquiring intelligence, judgment, and critical thinking, you start to realize that he is a world’s class criminal, a war criminal.
You don’t agree with this filthy establishment, we will find you, torture you and then kill you.
At least 136 individuals were reportedly extraordinarily rendered or secretly detained by the CIA and at least 54 governments reportedly participated in the CIA’s secret detention and extraordinary rendition program; classified government documents may reveal many more. (source)
Bush’s terrible legacy is also in iniciating a massive espionage program which Orwell looks like a looser. So NO, I recommend never touching his hand
James Earl Carter Jr.
Of course, as those aforementioned, he had overseen a lot of evil which was derived just because of his position.
But he was one among a few who were not war criminals (or balanced on the cliff) – YES, I would have shaken a hand with him
Abraham Lincoln
One of a few of the good guys, no war crimes, no assassinations of enemies – YES, if we can have a time machine, I would have shaken hands with him
Secret services’ heads
This goes completely without any names. FSB, CIA, BIS – they kill their opponents depending on the scale, destroy lives of tons of people bringing them on the brink of committing suicide.
Character assassinations, massive surveillance, blackmailing – NO, shaking hands with any of them is a moral crime
Autocrats, dictators and other war criminals
I have already mentioned some war criminals (especially the US presidents), now let’s go to even worse criminals.
Adolf Hitler – mass torturer and murderer, no way
Joseph Stalin – ditto
Mao Zedong – ditto
Vladimir Putin – Russia cannot be without an autocracy, but sorry 180 torture sites for Ukrainians (even though the war is not black and white) – NO
Alexander Lukashenko – a criminal, but the last person on this supporting natality – YES
Nicolás Maduro – he is in a stark opposition of the US government, refusing the play Global North vs Global South, but given how unfortunate his citizens are, he should step down, even if it meant succumbing to the US – NO
Henry Kissinger – Henry Kissinger, operating under the guise of diplomacy and realpolitik, orchestrated and enabled covert coups like the overthrow of Chile’s Salvador Allende, supported genocidal regimes in East Timor and Bangladesh, prolonged the Vietnam War with secret bombings of Laos and Cambodia, backed Argentina’s Dirty War, approved Suharto’s bloodshed, facilitated Operation Condor across Latin America, encouraged authoritarian brutality for geopolitical control, and left behind a legacy soaked in civilian deaths, disappearances, torture, and the cynical manipulation of entire populations for American imperial strategy – NO, this man was a monster
Criminals
Carl Panzram – filled with hate and misanthropic, he didn’t kill too many people – YES
Al Capone, John Gotti, Semion Mogilevich, Pablo Escobar – tortured people, deformed state apparatus – NO
Warlords – torturing people, destroying otherwise vibrant economies in Africa and so on – NO
Good side, bad side, still, we end up killing
Let me make one thing clear before the readers raise their eyebrows: I am not writing this to provoke. Nor to pretend that my hand, or anyone’s hand, has divine weight. But shaking hands is a metaphor. It is a symbol. And symbols matter.
We are surrounded by people who call murder “foreign policy,” torture “security,” and mass suffering “unfortunate collateral.” These same people are welcomed on red carpets, praised in memoirs, and decorated with peace prizes. Meanwhile, solitary terrorists, deranged killers, or drug lords are rightfully condemned—but rarely match the scale of death, damage, and despair inflicted by presidents, generals, or covert operatives.
Shaking hands with prominents: The results
So whom do we shake hands with?
If I followed mainstream morality, the answer would be simple. But I don’t. I use a scale that measures pain, opportunity cost, unborn futures, psychological horror, and wasted decades. I ask what power the person had. What they did—or failed to do—with it. Whether they supported life, or suffocated it.
By that logic, many U.S. presidents are war criminals. Dictators are worse. Torturers, the filth of the earth. And secret service chiefs? Walking nightmares in suits.
And Breivik? An abomination, yes—but with limited reach. Carl Panzram? A horror show—but no machinery, no empire, no budget. Obama, on the other hand, had everything—and let the machine keep running.
So this is not a matter of culture. It is a matter of conduct. And conduct must always be judged within power.
If your job description is to kill, suppress, terrorize, or manipulate—and you do it—then no, you do not get a handshake. You get history’s finger.
And if you ask who I would shake hands with? A poor peasant mother in Bangladesh raising five children. A Venezuelan doctor working without electricity. A Syrian refugee who still believes in life.
Because morality is not about titles. It is about what you do when you could have done better.
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