[quote]pushharder wrote:
I love the “profundity” of Miss IC’s premise:
Hermaphrodites exist in this world. Rarely.
They possess genitals from both sexes.
MAYBE one or two of 'em wants to get legally married someday. How should they “register” themselves in order to do so?
Because they technically, anatomically could “register” themselves as either sex we, society, have a (illusionary or fabricated) quandary on our hands.
Therefore, in order to extricate society from this “quandary” inherent in the hermaphrodite puzzle, gay marriage should be legalized.
LOL[/quote]
Laughing at his premises doesn’t make the conclusions any less valid. Neither does typing “rarely” and “maybe”. Fact of the matter is, hermaphrodites DO present a problem for people that want to force their ideas of marriage on everyone else and those people should just man up and admit it.[/quote]
The entire body of law as we know is people forcing their ideas about stuff on everyone else. Just man up and admit it.[/quote]
So I assume you are fine with liberals forcing you to pay welfare trolls? No? Maybe your retort was just meaningless nonsense and an attempt to divert the discussion towards something more comfortable?
The Law isn’t meant for you to force your ideas of morality and propriety on me. It is meant to protect me from you and you from the government. Government legislating who can and who cannot “marry” is not just and has nothing to do with the Law. If I want to “marry” a rock, I should be free to do so. It doesn’t matter who is insulted by it because ultimately its MY body and MY life, not yours nor anyone elses. Accordingly I should be the one the make decisions regarding me and my body and nobody else. Marriage is just another extension of that right and hermaphrodites are just one convenient way to point out how arbitrary and nonsensical the current marriage legislation really is.
And don’t give me talk on “ethics and the moral fiber of society”. If we truly want a moral society it has to be one based on individual freedom and inalienable rights. Not homogeneity.
Let’s see, 1 in 1,000 are born with some form of hermaphrodism, or another condition where sex is ambiguous at birth and therefore assigned arbitrarily. There are 312,586,099 people in the US. This means that there are around 312,568 people that this applies to, which is about the number of people living in Miami, Florida. That’s a little bit more than “one or two”.
So, this “little” example is a real thing that should be given consideration. The truth of the matter is that if I was to bring up this argument to some Native American societies, or to the entire population of India, I wouldn’t have much of an argument because they’ve assigned these people a third gender, and this third gender has been considered by their moral code for centuries. But in the US, this stands as a great example of the fact that gender is assigned by law. It doesn’t reflect the natural order of things and you can’t make moral declarations of right or wrong based on it because it doesn’t account for all of reality.
To ignore this is like saying “Well, this study doesn’t really fit my expectations, so I’m going to fudge the data”. Is your moral code so tightly clung to that you can’t admit when there’s an area that it hasn’t taken into consideration, and so you’re smudging data to fit your reality, instead of changing your code to reflect reality?
[/quote]
I think your statistics include any bi-genital abnormality hence my use of the term “true hermaphroditism” earlier.
There is NO societal “problem” raging unchecked here, IC. You are just creating one in order promote your sacred cow of gay marriage.
Key words: “some form”[/quote]
It wouldn’t matter if there had only been one true hermaphrodite in all of recorded history. Your moral code still has to be capable of dealing with such individuals or else it is obviously flawed as it can’t account for all the recorded data.
[quote]
There is no place in the Western mindset for hermaphrodites. Therefore, you ignore them. [/quote]
Nope.
We don’t ignore them. But we won’t modify a fundamental institution just for them.
Because you know, laws are here to serve the general public interest, not to please each and every individuals. [/quote]
Bullshit. Law exists(or should exist) to protect the rights and freedoms of individuals. Not to serve as a means for the “general public” to enslave minorities.
Since you guys have serious reading comprehension problems I’m going to explain slowly.
It’s a human organism…[/quote]
I.e. Human life. The moment you admitted it was an individual human organism, was the moment you agreed that abortion was the deliberate taking of innocent individual human life (organism). Therefore, validating my claim, the one which you stated was false. You’re on the moral low ground now, so don’t bother trying to talk down to anyone. It’s like I’m an abolitionist, listening to a slaver trying to lecture me about right and wrong. It’s great being on the right side on good and history.
[/quote]
There is a perfectly logical way to get out of that conundrum. I haven’t decided which way I lean on the abortion issue(its a very hard issue to decide on imo) but you seem to be assuming that the child has a right to the woman’s body. That’s an assumption you aren’t allowed to make off hand without justifying it somehow(again, I’m not saying you can’t justify the assumption, simply that you haven’t). Without that assumption abortion simply becomes eviction of an unwanted person from your body, which is completely legitimate.
[quote]
There is no place in the Western mindset for hermaphrodites. Therefore, you ignore them. [/quote]
Nope.
We don’t ignore them. But we won’t modify a fundamental institution just for them.
Because you know, laws are here to serve the general public interest, not to please each and every individuals. [/quote]
Bullshit. Law exists(or should exist) to protect the rights and freedoms of individuals. Not to serve as a means for the “general public” to enslave minorities.[/quote]
Well ok, but then you’re not for state recognized gay marriage. So, you’re closer to the conservative side, which only limits government activity to one form of human relationship. Of course, you’d not support state-recognized hetero-couple-marriage, either. I mean, THAT would be hyper-individualist libertarian position. However, one form of state-recognized marriage is closer to none, than the expansion of state involvement to other alternatives would be. Most libertarians are really progressives on this issue, I’ve noticed.
Yes, I’m all for getting the state out of marriage Sloth. It may irk me to see one form of marriage arrangement favored by the state over others but I obviously recognize that the solution isn’t to create more favored groups but to eliminate all of them.
Since you guys have serious reading comprehension problems I’m going to explain slowly.
It’s a human organism…[/quote]
I.e. Human life. The moment you admitted it was an individual human organism, was the moment you agreed that abortion was the deliberate taking of innocent individual human life (organism). Therefore, validating my claim, the one which you stated was false. You’re on the moral low ground now, so don’t bother trying to talk down to anyone. It’s like I’m an abolitionist, listening to a slaver trying to lecture me about right and wrong. It’s great being on the right side on good and history.
[/quote]
There is a perfectly logical way to get out of that conundrum. I haven’t decided which way I lean on the abortion issue(its a very hard issue to decide on imo) but you seem to be assuming that the child has a right to the woman’s body. That’s an assumption you aren’t allowed to make off hand without justifying it somehow(again, I’m not saying you can’t justify the assumption, simply that you haven’t). Without that assumption abortion simply becomes eviction of an unwanted person from your body, which is completely legitimate.[/quote]
Rights are either argued as an endowment of a creator, or some circumstance of nature from which we somehow construct a series of rights. You could, of course, argue that government gives us rights, whatever those may be. I doubt the last is your position. Nor do I suspect you’re open to the creator argument.
Well, nature places the embryo/fetus in the womb. It is not a renter, behind a couple of months. Or a vagrant who has moved into a park, squatting. It has taken no action which can possibly be construed as a violation of it’s mother’s rights. So naturally, it is right that this human life be present in the womb.
No man has ever been formed in private property. But he has been formed in the womb. Yet, he confidently asserts a right to the first, but not the other.
I actually agree with you on abortion being horrible and I would like to be able to call it murder because instinctually I feel that it is. You have however correctly pegged me as a natural rights advocate and as such I have not been able to logically justify why. Much like inaction can’t make you a criminal(you are never obliged to help others as it would imply that they have a higher claim on your body and time than you do), expelling a child from your body and it dying because it is as of yet unable to support itself simply can’t make you a criminal because the logical implications would be unworkable.
I would however be glad for any solid arguments to the contrary.
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
I actually agree with you on abortion being horrible and I would like to be able to call it murder because instinctually I feel that it is. You have however correctly pegged me as a natural rights advocate…[/quote]
Well, explore the principle with an extreme hypothetical. All women will now abort all pregnancies. End of human race. The right to owning private property is a heck of a lot more precarious than that. Humanity would continue if the entire human race was either capitalist or socialist. Perhaps in dramatically different, obviously. But we’d still survive. So which is more obvious? The natural right to continued life in the womb, or how we use matter that no man created and placed into existence?
Awfully Kantian of you. I happen to like Kant though and your argument does fit neatly into my body of thought. I’m going to give the matter some more thought but as it stands right now I’ll most likely end up in the anti-abortion camp.
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
I actually agree with you on abortion being horrible and I would like to be able to call it murder because instinctually I feel that it is. You have however correctly pegged me as a natural rights advocate and as such I have not been able to logically justify why. Much like inaction can’t make you a criminal(you are never obliged to help others as it would imply that they have a higher claim on your body and time than you do), expelling a child from your body and it dying because it is as of yet unable to support itself simply can’t make you a criminal because the logical implications would be unworkable.
I would however be glad for any solid arguments to the contrary.[/quote]
speaking about “claim on your body” :
do you think a conjointed twin has the right to “expel” the other one by killing it ?
because it’s what happen in an abortion. A fetus is not just “inside the mother’s body”.
Both bodies are connected.
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
I actually agree with you on abortion being horrible and I would like to be able to call it murder because instinctually I feel that it is. You have however correctly pegged me as a natural rights advocate and as such I have not been able to logically justify why. Much like inaction can’t make you a criminal(you are never obliged to help others as it would imply that they have a higher claim on your body and time than you do), expelling a child from your body and it dying because it is as of yet unable to support itself simply can’t make you a criminal because the logical implications would be unworkable.
I would however be glad for any solid arguments to the contrary.[/quote]
speaking about “claim on your body” :
do you think a conjointed twin has the right to “expel” the other one by killing it ?
because it’s what happen in an abortion. A fetus is not just “inside the mother’s body”.
Both bodies are connected.
[/quote]
The two are not the same. It is quite obvious which one came first and which one came second in the case of a mother and child and so self-ownership is preserved. Not so with conjoined twins. To answer your question, a conjoined twin should be able to get the surgery required to extract himself from the other twin providing the two are conjoined in such a way as to allow that to happen. If they are joined in such a way that that is impossible(for example, if they share a heart) they will simply have to live with each other as neither can rightfully claim to own the body.
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
I actually agree with you on abortion being horrible and I would like to be able to call it murder because instinctually I feel that it is. You have however correctly pegged me as a natural rights advocate…[/quote]
Well, explore the principle with an extreme hypothetical. All women will now abort all pregnancies. End of human race. The right to owning private property is a heck of a lot more precarious than that. Humanity would continue if the entire human race was either capitalist or socialist. Perhaps in dramatically different, obviously. But we’d still survive. So which is more obvious? The natural right to continued life in the womb, or how we use matter that no man created and placed into existence?
[/quote]
You could say the same about abstinence. All women practice abstinence. End of human race.
[quote]Gaius Octavius wrote:
I actually agree with you on abortion being horrible and I would like to be able to call it murder because instinctually I feel that it is. You have however correctly pegged me as a natural rights advocate…[/quote]
Well, explore the principle with an extreme hypothetical. All women will now abort all pregnancies. End of human race. The right to owning private property is a heck of a lot more precarious than that. Humanity would continue if the entire human race was either capitalist or socialist. Perhaps in dramatically different, obviously. But we’d still survive. So which is more obvious? The natural right to continued life in the womb, or how we use matter that no man created and placed into existence?
[/quote]
You could say the same about abstinence. All women practice abstinence. End of human race.[/quote]
Forest…trees…and stuff. It’s simply dealing with the notion of the embryo/fetus as squatter, loiterer, vagrant, or home-invader. No, it’s presence is simply a matter of nature. In fact, with most abortions the actions of the parents result in the natural outcome. That being a pregnancy. Even in cases of contraceptive failure the reproductive act is still the reproductive act. The unborn human life is exactly where it would naturally be as a result of those actions, planned or not.