Politics

[RDU Irish]

I've already made my position (marriage privatization) clear, but I'll provide a counter-point to your argument based on the "standard" conservative response, though it's not one I agree with.

First, marriage is not a basic human right. It's been a social institution since day one, so it's appropriate that "society" sets the bounds of what is and isn't legitimate.

Second, every person has the same rights. Each and every person, regardless of gender, has the right to marry someone of the complimentary gender. Straight Jim has the right to marry a woman. Gay Steve has the same right.

Though I'd still like to know why nobody will respond to the marriage privatization argument I've made previously. It solves EVERY side's "beef" with the whole issue but it won't even be considered.

I agree 100% with marriage privatization. Level the playing field for all.

 

[RDU Irish]

"A clean environment is a good thing — but so is a community that can sustain itself economically. These are rival goods that exist in tension. The problem that the more thoughtful people on the right (as distinct from the knee-jerkers) have with environmentalists is that so many of them treat environmental protection as an absolute good, and don’t see it as bounded by anything."


for me this is almost always where I part ways with Liberal and progressive folks...plug in any issue really. " ...so many of them treat X_Cause as an absolute good, and don't see it bounded by anything", and I might add that budget and implementation are frequently in their bounding blind spot...

Jesus, Mary and Joseph. This is so freaking true.

 

[wizards8507]

And just as wizards' devotion to laissez-faire capitalism is incompatible with community.

I'm sorry, that's just patently false. Individuals acting in their self interest does not mean they act alone. I'm sure I'm butchering the quote, but Aristotle observed that a man who cannot live in society is a beast and a man who need not live in society is a god. Libertarianism is not anarchy. (No, I'm not arguing that Aristotle is a libertarian, but his observation has merit). You talk about my false dichotomy but I think your conflation is much worse. You equate "society" with "the state" and that's dangerous.

More broadly, you didn't respond to the point to which I was most hoping you would. How do you reconcile state authority over the individual with the doctrine of imago Dei? Independent of any social telos, imago Dei precludes subjugation of otherwise free men and women, no matter how noble the goal.

 

[RDU Irish]

That's already well-established as Catholic doctrine. The only question is what that looks like in practice.



And that's exactly how every Randian "Catholic" will reconcile the upcoming encyclical with his libertarian indifference towards the poor and future generations.

Bet you didn't vote for Kennedy - the Pope will be running the White House!

C'mon Whiskey, you are better than this intellectually dishonest exercise.

 

[connor_in]

L.A. labor leaders seek minimum wage exemption for firms with union workers - LA Times

 

[Whiskeyjack]

I'm sorry, that's just patently false. Individuals acting in their self interest does not mean they act alone. I'm sure I'm butchering the quote, but Aristotle observed that a man who cannot live in society is a beast and a man who need not live in society is a god. Libertarianism is not anarchy. (No, I'm not arguing that Aristotle is a libertarian, but his observation has merit). You talk about my false dichotomy but I think your conflation is much worse. You equate "society" with "the state" and that's dangerous.

Seems like we're arguing past each other. My assertion is that the primacy of individual autonomy in liberal philosophy, which is shared equally between libertarianism and Progressivism, is explicitly hostile to community, because it seeks to free individuals from the bonds that naturally bind peoples together. Since you brought up Aristotle, he argued in favor of small virtuous city states full of people who were oriented toward sustaining that community; any Greek who sought his own profit at the expense of his city-state would have been exiled or executed as a traitor. That's a very far cry from the libertarian fantasy of a bunch of loosely-affiliated self-interested actors somehow bringing about utopia in the absence of laws or cultural constraints. Gordon Gecko would not have been welcome in Athens (or among Christ's Apostles, for that matter).

More broadly, you didn't respond to the point to which I was most hoping you would. How do you reconcile state authority over the individual with the doctrine of imago Dei? Independent of any social telos, imago Dei precludes subjugation of otherwise free men and women, no matter how noble the goal.

Authority is unavoidable. It gets back to Lenin's "who, whom?" Do you want to submit to your family, your church, and local government? Or a distant Federal leviathan that has filled the void where those civil institutions used to be? But there's no case where authority is escapable.

Bet you didn't vote for Kennedy - the Pope will be running the White House!

C'mon Whiskey, you are better than this intellectually dishonest exercise.

What was dishonest about it? Wizards responded with a predictable gripe about the Pope pontificating outside his area of expertise, which is what committed capitalists have always said whenever it's suggested that their economics conflict with Christianity.

I was merely pointing out that Christians have long recognized a duty to be responsible stewards of creation; so the upcoming encyclical likely won't be anything new. Catholics are supposed to care about the environment. That doesn't mean you have to support "Cap and Trade", or to oppose the construction of a particular pipeline; but it does put aggressive anthropogenic climate change deniers in an awkward spot.

 

[RDU Irish]

Christians have abortions every day. I can't prove it but I don't doubt it for a second. They do all sorts of other nefarious things that the Pope would condemn as well.

It is pretty intellectually dishonest to pronounce everyone suddenly is A) ideologically pure and B) in 100% agreement on the fundamentals of a handful of ideologies.

Fact of the matter, Rand Paul is as pragmatic of a politician as I can remember running for President with a real shot of winning. He is not an ideologically pure libertarian, but he is definitely closer to that line of thinking than anyone else in consideration. He also won't be a supreme dictator so your fears that he will transform the US to an anarchist dreamland are seriously unfounded and ridiculous.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

Christians have abortions every day. I can't prove it but I don't doubt it for a second. They do all sorts of other nefarious things that the Pope would condemn as well.

And the fact that individual Christians fall short of Christian doctrine is relevant to this discussion how?

It is pretty intellectually dishonest to pronounce everyone suddenly is A) ideologically pure and B) in 100% agreement on the fundamentals of a handful of ideologies.

Again, what does this have to do with anything?

Fact of the matter, Rand Paul is as pragmatic of a politician as I can remember running for President with a real shot of winning. He is not an ideologically pure libertarian, but he is definitely closer to that line of thinking than anyone else in consideration. He also won't be a supreme dictator so your fears that he will transform the US to an anarchist dreamland are seriously unfounded and ridiculous.

I have no idea where this came from. My support for Rand has cooled significantly since he rolled over for Zionist lobby, but he's still my favorite candidate. Wizards thinks his libertarian philosophy is congruent with his Catholicism. I disagree. That doesn't mean that I'm a closeted Progressive, or that I won't support libertarian-leaning candidates. The former scare me a helluva lot more than the latter.

 

[wizards8507]

Seems like we're arguing past each other. My assertion is that the primacy of individual autonomy in liberal philosophy, which is shared equally between libertarianism and Progressivism, is explicitly hostile to community, because it seeks to free individuals from the bonds that naturally bind peoples together. Since you brought up Aristotle, he argued in favor of small virtuous city states full of people who were oriented toward sustaining that community; any Greek who sought his own profit at the expense of his city-state would have been exiled or executed as a traitor. That's a very far cry from the libertarian fantasy of a bunch of loosely-affiliated self-interested actors somehow bringing about utopia in the absence of laws or cultural constraints. Gordon Gecko would not have been welcome in Athens (or among Christ's Apostles, for that matter).

I take it you haven't spent much time with intellectual libertarians? You seem to be describing the anarchists who want to destroy all institutions of authority and do heroin all day. Perhaps you're conflating libertarianism with libertinism?

In order to better pinpoint this concept, let us inquire as to the relationship between a libertarian and a libertine. We have already defined the former term. For our purposes here, the latter may be defined as a person who loves, exults in, participates in, and/or advocates the morality of all sorts of perverse acts, but who at the same time eschews all acts of invasive violence. The libertine, then, will champion prostitution, drug addiction, sado-masochism, and the like, and maybe even indulge in these practices, but will not force anyone else to participate. Are libertarians libertines? Some clearly are. If a libertarian were a member of the North American Man-Boy Love Association, he would qualify.

Are all libertarians libertines? Certainly not. Most libertarians recoil in horror from such goings on. What then is the precise relationship between the libertarian, qua libertarian, and the libertine? It is simply this. The libertarian is someone who thinks that the libertine should not be incarcerated. He may bitterly oppose libertinism, he can speak out against it, he can organize boycotts to reduce the incidence of such acts. There is only one thing he cannot do, and still remain a libertarian: He cannot advocate, or participate in, the use of force against these people. Why? Because whatever one thinks of their actions, they do not initiate physical force. Since none of these actions necessarily does so the libertarian must, in some cases reluctantly, refrain from demanding the use of physical force against those who engage in perversions among consenting adults.

https://mises.org/sites/default/files/11_1_7_0.pdf



At the end of the day, I'm not an anarchist. I'm a federalist.

 

[Emcee77]

Now the argument about plural marriage raises some questions.

Yeah, people often say this, but I don't know if I see any realistic difficulty there. Polygamy carries historical connotations of patriarchal abuse (especially, for the American progressive, whose frame of reference includes the history of Islam or LDS) that are inconsistent with progressivism, to which patriarchy is an anachronism. Plus, at least from a legal perspective, the gay rights movement in America has proceeded by emphasizing equality and equal rights to participate in the institution of marriage; legal challenges have proceeded under the equal protection clause. The only distinction between SSM and "traditional" marriage, SSM advocates hold, is based on the sex of the people involved. But a polygamous relationship has another critical difference: a difference in the number of participants. It's an essentially different institution, not the same institution with a sex-based difference (which sort of differences progressives tend not to recognize as legitimate). So conclusions that SSM opens the door to polygamy have always struck me as poorly reasoned. The premise of such arguments is that once you change anything from "traditional" marriage, you can change anything else, but that reasoning is insufficiently attentive to the fact that the people who are in favor of changing the definition of "traditional" marriage have certain values too, and polygamy is just not in line with them.

Now, if the point is simply that once you untether marriage from its religious definition, it could, theoretically, be enlarged to include polygamous relationships, that's a perfectly valid argument. But as a historical prediction, I think it's silly.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

I take it you haven't spent much time with intellectual libertarians?

I'm very familiar with the non-aggression principle:

The Non-Aggression Principle – also called the Non-Aggression Axiom – is the idea that each person has the right to make his or her own choices in life so long as they do not involve aggression, defined as the initiation of force or fraud, against others. It is considered by many to be the defining principle of libertarianism. More technically, the principle asserts that aggression, a term defined by proponents as any encroachment on another person's life, liberty, or justly acquired property, or an attempt to obtain from another via deceit what could not be consensually obtained, is always illegitimate. According to some libertarians the NAP and property rights are closely linked, since what aggression is depends on what a person's rights are. Aggression, for the purposes of NAP, is defined as initiating or threatening violence against a person or legitimately owned property of another.

Considered in a vacuum, it seems eminently compatible with Christianity, in which violence is only justified under extreme measures. But it's still a poor organizing principle on which to build a society, since it's based on Locke's false anthropology of the autonomous individual. That's not how humans actually operate. Strong societies share a vision of the Good. Libertarianism is officially agnostic, so it forecloses the possibility of such a shared vision.

At the end of the day, I'm not an anarchist. I'm a federalist.

I'm also an ardent federalist. Subsidiarity is key at all levels of society. But I think you underestimate the philosophical similarities of libertarianism and Progressivism. Both seek to liberate individuals from the "tyranny of custom" so that they may participate in bold new "experiments of living". They only differ regarding how active the state should be in liberating people.

 

[wizards8507]

They both seek to liberate individuals from the "tyranny of custom" so that they may participate in bold new "experiments of living".

I'm sorry that's just not true. The non-aggression principle is the one and only tenet of libertarianism. Anything else is just "what if" scenarios. In the passage I posted, the author points out that a libertarian qua libertarian has no opinion on those other things. If you want to go undertake "experiments of living," you're free to do so. Libertarianism makes no value judgement as to whether those experiments are good, bad, or indifferent. You're also free to have a wife who stays at home with the baby in your cape-style house on a cul de sac while you go to work from 9 to 5 as a CPA at a media conglomerate. The most boring, traditional, non-experimental lifestyle you could possibly imagine. Libertarians can have wildly diverse views on the "tyranny of custom" as you put it, but those views are independent and not a function of the individuals' libertarianism itself.

Analogy since I'm not sure I explained that well: I like beer and I like pizza. Many people who like beer like pizza. But my liking of beer is not a function of my pizza fandom. Likewise, hostility towards social institutions is not a necessary tenet of libertariansm.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

I'm sorry that's just not true. The non-aggression principle is the one and only tenet of libertarianism. Anything else is just "what if" scenarios. In the passage I posted, the author points out that a libertarian qua libertarian has no opinion on those other things. If you want to go undertake "experiments of living," you're free to do so. Libertarianism makes no value judgement as to whether those experiments are good, bad, or indifferent. You're also free to have a wife who stays at home with the baby in your cape-style house on a cul de sac while you go to work from 9 to 5 as a CPA at a media conglomerate. The most boring, traditional, non-experimental lifestyle you could possibly imagine. Libertarians can have wildly diverse views on the "tyranny of custom" as you put it, but those views are independent and not a function of the individuals' libertarianism itself.

You misunderstand what "tyranny of custom" means. It comes from John Stuart Mill's On Liberty:

Mill also said that there was a third source of tyranny over the individual in society, and this was the tyranny of custom and tradition. He argued:

The despotism of custom is everywhere the standing hindrance to human advancement, being in unceasing antagonism to that disposition to aim at something better than the customary, which is called, according to circumstances, the spirit of liberty, or that of progress or improvement…. Custom is there, in all things, the final appeal; justice and right mean conformity to custom…. All deviations … come to be considered impious, immoral, even monstrous and contrary to nature.

Mill argued with great passion that societal customs and traditions could, indeed, very often be the worst tyranny of all. They were binding rules on conduct and belief that owed their force not to coercion but to their being the shared ideas of the right and proper held by the vast majority in the society. They represent what the ancient Greek Pericles referred to as “that code which, although unwritten, yet cannot be broken without acknowledged disgrace.”

Customs and traditions weigh down on the individual, they stifle his sense and desire to be different, to experiment with the new, to creatively design ways of doing things that have not been tried before, and to break out of the confinement of conformity. Custom and tradition can be the straitjacket that restricts a person’s cry for his peaceful and nonviolent individuality.

Custom limits personal choice/ individual autonomy by increasing the social costs of taking certain actions or expressing certain opinions that fall outside of what is considered acceptable. From the first sentence of the wikipedia article on the NAP:

The Non-Aggression Principle – also called the Non-Aggression Axiom – is the idea that each person has the right to make his or her own choices in life...

It all comes down to personal choice/ individual autonomy. Because, as I argued above, libertarianism is clearly and firmly within the liberal tradition. So whether you happen to agree with certain customs, or whether you live a rather bourgeois lifestyle is irrelevant to our discussion. Libertarianism is hostile to anything that limits choice; including much of what binds natural human communities together. So you can be a libertarian, and you can promote local customs and community. But if the people in power share your political beliefs, your community won't last for long.

 

[wizards8507]

Libertarianism is hostile to anything that limits choice.

No. Libertarianism is hostile to the State limiting choice.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

No. Libertarianism is hostile to the State limiting choice.

That's quite obviously not true. The NAP doesn't seek to limit the authority of just the government over individuals, but also the authority of other individuals and civil organizations. Libertarians would not endorse the right of a father to prevent his daughter from marrying outside the family's religion, or of a church to block an individual's ability to remarry.

You keep trying to limit the scope of your libertarianism to just the Federal government (since its not a sympathetic target), but that's not how philosophies work. It's just as bound up with liberating autonomous individuals from unchosen authority as Progressivism is.

 

[wizards8507]

That's quite obviously not true. The NAP doesn't seek to limit the authority of just the government over individuals, but also the authority of other individuals and civil organizations. Libertarians would not endorse the right of a father to prevent his daughter from marrying outside the family's religion, or of a church to block an individual's ability to remarry.

You keep trying to limit the scope of your libertarianism to just the Federal government (since its not a sympathetic target), but that's not how philosophies work. It's just as bound up with liberating autonomous individuals from unchosen authority as Progressivism is.

Religion and civil organizations are not unchosen authorities. Neither are state and local governments. I can move to Utah and become a Mormon if I'm not happy with the way the people of Connecticut or the Catholic Church decide to govern themselves. I'd rather not get into children and their parents because, frankly, I'm ill-equipped to argue that point.

ETA: I didn't respond directly when you brought up "On Liberty" earlier, but Mill was a socialist.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

I'd rather not get into children and their parents because, frankly, I'm ill-equipped to argue that point.

I'd encourage you to explore this argument, because it highlights a major problem with libertarianism. If unchosen authority is so odious, then why shouldn't children be able to divorce their parents prior to reaching the age of majority? What right do you and your wife have to parent your daughter, a future citizen of this great republic, if a government agency determines that you're lacking in some important way?

ETA: I didn't respond directly when you brought up "On Liberty" earlier, but Mill was a socialist.

He was one of the most influential philosophers in the liberal tradition, and a direct intellectual descendant of Locke. And the socialist bend of his writings late in life doesn't present any problem for me, since my argument is that Progressivism and libertarianism are both fruits of the same poisonous tree. But if you'd prefer to distance yourself from Mill, who would you endorse?

 

[wizards8507]

I'd encourage you to explore this argument, because it highlights a major problem with libertarianism. If unchosen authority is so odious, then why shouldn't children be able to divorce their parents prior to reaching the age of majority? What right do you and your wife have to parent your daughter, a future citizen of this great republic, if a government agency determines that you're lacking in some important way?

Again, I haven't thought this through, but my first instinct would be that children are agents-in-the-making, incapable of agency (and therefore free association) on their own until they reach majority. I realize that defining "majority" in this sense would be troublesome, and it certainly wouldn't be the arbitrarily-defined 18 years old.

He was one of the most influential philosophers in the liberal tradition, and a direct intellectual descendant of Locke. And the socialist bend of his writings late in life doesn't present any problem for me, since my argument is that Progressivism and libertarianism are both fruits of the same poisonous tree. But if you'd prefer to distance yourself from Mill, who would you endorse?

I'm not as well-read as you so I don't think I can pick a philosopher and say "that guy, over there, 100% what he said."

ETA: Once again, this thing you're describing as the "poisonous tree" is the doctrine of imago Dei. Since I don't think that's what you're saying, please explain the nuance I'm missing. How do you interpret imago Dei in a way that doesn't necessitate liberalism and a sovereign individual?

 

[woolybug25]

I'd encourage you to explore this argument, because it highlights a major problem with libertarianism. If unchosen authority is so odious, then why shouldn't children be able to divorce their parents prior to reaching the age of majority? What right do you and your wife have to parent your daughter, a future citizen of this great republic, if a government agency determines that you're lacking in some important way?

You can though... Children can seek emancipation through the legal system right now. If the state feels that the argument set forth shows the parents not meeting the standards of the state, then emancipation is granted.

Not that I want to join the debate on one side or the other, but thought this was worth note.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

Again, I haven't thought this through, but my first instinct would be that children are agents-in-the-making, incapable of agency (and therefore free association) on their own until they reach majority. I realize that defining "majority" in this sense would be troublesome, and it certainly wouldn't be the arbitrarily-defined 18 years old.

Since we can't appeal to Natural Law within liberal philosophy, by what right are parents entitled to the "first attempt" at forming these agents-in-the-making? And picking a non-arbitrary age of majority is a persistent problem for any liberal political regime, because that magical moment when one ceases to be an incapacitated minor and instead becomes one of the holy autonomous individuals takes on absurd importance.

ETA: Once again, this thing you're describing as the "poisonous tree" is the doctrine of imago Dei. Since I don't think that's what you're saying, please explain the nuance I'm missing. How do you interpret imago Dei in a way that doesn't necessitate liberalism and a sovereign individual?

Because humans aren't Imagines Dei in liberal philosophy. They're assumed to be autonomous individuals. The former are highly contingent beings--creations--for whom life is a gift; such an anthropology imbues human life with a distinct purpose, and entails unchosen duties from which one cannot opt out. The latter are fictitious entities, utterly self-interested and primarily concerned with self-actualization.

You can though... Children can seek emancipation through the legal system right now. If the state feels that the argument set forth shows the parents not meeting the standards of the state, then emancipation is granted.

That's a great point, but such cases are rare and widely recognized as tragic when necessary. But for how much longer? Check out this article from the ABC titled "Is having a loving family an unfair advantage?":

So many disputes in our liberal democratic society hinge on the tension between inequality and fairness: between groups, between sexes, between individuals, and increasingly between families.

The power of the family to tilt equality hasn’t gone unnoticed, and academics and public commentators have been blowing the whistle for some time. Now, philosophers Adam Swift and Harry Brighouse have felt compelled to conduct a cool reassessment.

Swift in particular has been conflicted for some time over the curious situation that arises when a parent wants to do the best for her child but in the process makes the playing field for others even more lopsided.

‘I got interested in this question because I was interested in equality of opportunity,’ he says.

‘I had done some work on social mobility and the evidence is overwhelmingly that the reason why children born to different families have very different chances in life is because of what happens in those families.’

Once he got thinking, Swift could see that the issue stretches well beyond the fact that some families can afford private schooling, nannies, tutors, and houses in good suburbs. Functional family interactions—from going to the cricket to reading bedtime stories—form a largely unseen but palpable fault line between families. The consequence is a gap in social mobility and equality that can last for generations.

So, what to do?

According to Swift, from a purely instrumental position the answer is straightforward.

‘One way philosophers might think about solving the social justice problem would be by simply abolishing the family. If the family is this source of unfairness in society then it looks plausible to think that if we abolished the family there would be a more level playing field.’

It’s not the first time a philosopher has thought about such a drastic solution. Two thousand four hundred years ago another sage reasoned that the care of children should be undertaken by the state.

Plato pulled few punches in The Republic when he called for the abolition of the family and for the children of the elite to be given over to the state. Aristotle didn’t agree, citing the since oft-used argument of the neglect of things held in common. Swift echoes the Aristotelian line. The break-up of the family is plausible maybe, he thinks, but even to the most hard-hearted there’s something off-key about it.

‘Nearly everyone who has thought about this would conclude that it is a really bad idea to be raised by state institutions, unless something has gone wrong,’ he says.

Intuitively it doesn’t feel right, but for a philosopher, solutions require more than an initial reaction. So Swift and his college Brighouse set to work on a respectable analytical defence of the family, asking themselves the deceptively simple question: ‘Why are families a good thing exactly?’

Not surprisingly, it begins with kids and ends with parents.

‘It’s the children’s interest in family life that is the most important,’ says Swift. ‘From all we now know, it is in the child’s interest to be parented, and to be parented well. Meanwhile, from the adult point of view it looks as if there is something very valuable in being a parent.’

He concedes parenting might not be for everyone and for some it can go badly wrong, but in general it is an irreplaceable relationship.

‘Parenting a child makes for what we call a distinctive and special contribution to the flourishing and wellbeing of adults.’

It seems that from both the child’s and adult’s point of view there is something to be said about living in a family way. This doesn’t exactly parry the criticism that families exacerbate social inequality. For this, Swift and Brighouse needed to sort out those activities that contribute to unnecessary inequality from those that don't.

‘What we realised we needed was a way of thinking about what it was we wanted to allow parents to do for their children, and what it was that we didn’t need to allow parents to do for their children, if allowing those activities would create unfairnesses for other people’s children’.

The test they devised was based on what they term ‘familial relationship goods’; those unique and identifiable things that arise within the family unit and contribute to the flourishing of family members.

For Swift, there’s one particular choice that fails the test.

‘Private schooling cannot be justified by appeal to these familial relationship goods,’ he says. ‘It’s just not the case that in order for a family to realise these intimate, loving, authoritative, affectionate, love-based relationships you need to be able to send your child to an elite private school.’

In contrast, reading stories at bedtime, argues Swift, gives rise to acceptable familial relationship goods, even though this also bestows advantage.

‘The evidence shows that the difference between those who get bedtime stories and those who don’t—the difference in their life chances—is bigger than the difference between those who get elite private schooling and those that don’t,’ he says.

This devilish twist of evidence surely leads to a further conclusion—that perhaps in the interests of levelling the playing field, bedtime stories should also be restricted. In Swift’s mind this is where the evaluation of familial relationship goods goes up a notch.

‘You have to allow parents to engage in bedtime stories activities, in fact we encourage them because those are the kinds of interactions between parents and children that do indeed foster and produce these [desired] familial relationship goods.’

Swift makes it clear that although both elite schooling and bedtime stories might both skew the family game, restricting the former would not interfere with the creation of the special loving bond that families give rise to. Taking the books away is another story.

‘We could prevent elite private schooling without any real hit to healthy family relationships, whereas if we say that you can’t read bedtime stories to your kids because it’s not fair that some kids get them and others don’t, then that would be too big a hit at the core of family life.’

So should parents snuggling up for one last story before lights out be even a little concerned about the advantage they might be conferring?

‘I don’t think parents reading their children bedtime stories should constantly have in their minds the way that they are unfairly disadvantaging other people’s children, but I think they should have that thought occasionally,’ quips Swift.

In the end Swift agrees that all activities will cause some sort of imbalance—from joining faith communities to playing Saturday cricket—and it’s for this reason that a theory of familial goods needs to be established if the family is to be defended against cries of unfairness.

‘We should accept that lots of stuff that goes on in healthy families—and that our theory defends—will confer unfair advantage,’ he says.

It’s the usual bind in ethics and moral philosophy: very often values clash and you have to make a call. For Swift and Brighouse, the line sits shy of private schooling, inheritance and other predominantly economic ways of conferring advantage.

Their conclusions remind one of a more idyllic (or mythic) age for families: reading together, attending religious services, playing board games, and kicking a ball in the local park, not to mention enjoying roast dinner on Sunday. It conjures a family setting worthy of a classic Norman Rockwell painting. But not so fast: when you ask Swift what sort of families is he talking about, the ‘50s reverie comes crashing down into the 21st century.

‘When we talk about parents’ rights, we’re talking about the person who is parenting the child. How you got to be parenting the child is another issue. One implication of our theory is that it’s not one’s biological relation that does much work in justifying your rights with respect to how the child is parented.’

For Swift and Brighouse, our society is curiously stuck in a time warp of proprietorial rights: if you biologically produce a child you own it.

‘We think that although in practice it makes sense to parent your biological offspring, that is not the same as saying that in virtue of having produced the child the biological parent has the right to parent.’

Then, does the child have a right to be parented by her biological parents? Swift has a ready answer.

‘It’s true that in the societies in which we live, biological origins do tend to form an important part of people’s identities, but that is largely a social and cultural construction. So you could imagine societies in which the parent-child relationship could go really well even without there being this biological link.’

From this realisation arises another twist: two is not the only number.

‘Nothing in our theory assumes two parents: there might be two, there might be three, and there might be four,’ says Swift.

It’s here that the traditional notions of what constitutes the family come apart. A necessary product of the Swift and Brighouse analytical defence is the calling into question of some rigid definitions.

‘Politicians love to talk about family values, but meanwhile the family is in flux and so we wanted to go back to philosophical basics to work out what are families for and what’s so great about them and then we can start to figure out whether it matters whether you have two parents or three or one, or whether they’re heterosexual etcetera.’

For traditionalists, though, Swift provides a small concession.

‘We do want to defend the family against complete fragmentation and dissolution,’ he says. ‘If you start to think about a child having 10 parents, then that’s looking like a committee rearing a child; there aren’t any parents there at all.’

Although it’s controversial, it seems that Swift and Brighouse are philosophically inching their way to a novel accommodation for a weathered institution ever more in need of a rationale for existing. The bathwater might be going out, but they’re keen to hold on to the baby.

Sounds like something straight out of Brave New World. Fucking terrifying. This is the future of autonomous individuals that liberal philosophy is ushering in.

 

[wizards8507]

Since we can't appeal to Natural Law within liberal philosophy, by what right are parents entitled to the "first attempt" at forming these agents-in-the-making? And picking a non-arbitrary age of majority is a persistent problem for any liberal political regime, because that magical moment when one ceases to be an incapacitated minor and instead becomes one of the holy autonomous individuals takes on absurd importance.



Because humans aren't Imagines Dei in liberal philosophy. They're assumed to be autonomous individuals. The former are highly contingent beings--creations--for whom life is a gift; such an anthropology imbues human life with a distinct purpose, and entails unchosen duties from which one cannot opt out. The latter are fictitious entities, utterly self-interested and primarily concerned with self-actualization.



That's a great point, but such cases are rare and widely recognized as tragic when necessary. But for how much longer? Check out this article from the ABC titled "Is having a loving family an unfair advantage?":



Sounds like something straight out of Brave New World. Fucking terrifying. This is the future of autonomous individuals that liberal philosophy is ushering in.

You're arguing against a version of libertarianism that I've never espoused or seen any rational modern libertarian espouse. Maybe you'd like to classify my beliefs as something other than "libertarian" but I absolutely reject the notion that I need to be against ALL authority in order to consistently reject STATE authority.

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy Note 4 using Tapatalk.

 

[ACamp1900]

So wait, aren't both Whiskey and Wizards libertarians??? 'Twas always my impression..

 

[Wild Bill]

So wait, aren't both Whiskey and Wizards libertarians??? 'Twas always my impression..

Na man. Whiskey prefers a theocracy. Wizards prefers anarchy but knows it won't happen so he'll settle for extremely limited federal government and the right to marry minors and family members (or both).

 

[ACamp1900]

Na man. Whiskey prefers a theocracy. Wizards prefers anarchy but knows it won't happen so he'll settle for extremely limited federal government and the right to marry minors and family members (or both).

Seems legit.....

 

[Polish Leppy 22]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/27/opinion/have-democrats-pulled-too-far-left.html?ref=opinion&_r=1
Have Democrats Pulled Too Far Left?

I've said it here many times: show me a moderate Democrat and I'll show you a no name Congressman from Montana no one knows or cares about. The DNC has been completely overwhelmed by the NY and CA Democrats.

 

[pkt77242]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/27/opinion/have-democrats-pulled-too-far-left.html?ref=opinion&_r=1
Have Democrats Pulled Too Far Left?

I've said it here many times: show me a moderate Democrat and I'll show you a no name Congressman from Montana no one knows or cares about. The DNC has been completely overwhelmed by the NY and CA Democrats.

Do I need to point out the omissions and general issues with that article?

So off the top of my head
1. While Clinton did lower the tax rate on capital gains, he also raised the tax rate for the top 2 income brackets.
2. It talks about Obama and the ACA, but makes no mention of Clinton trying to pass universal healthcare.
3. On some of these issues the country has moved left. For example Obama didn't come out in favor of gay marriage until the majority of the country had come out in favor of gay marriage. That isn't a move to become more liberal, that is a move to keep up with the country.

And I had to stop reading due to my laughing. Sorry. Also you do realize that the person who wrote the article is pretty biased and worked in the last 3 Republican administrations?

I am not saying that the Dems haven't moved to the left on some issues, but lets not pretend that this guy is some objective voice either.

 

[Buster Bluth]

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/27/opinion/have-democrats-pulled-too-far-left.html?ref=opinion&_r=1
Have Democrats Pulled Too Far Left?

I've said it here many times: show me a moderate Democrat and I'll show you a no name Congressman from Montana no one knows or cares about. The DNC has been completely overwhelmed by the NY and CA Democrats.

What a shitty piece. It's almost as if Peter Wehnrer served in the last three Republican administrations and considers anything more liberal than a President willing to let Next Gingrich have his way while he pursued Oval Office blowjays to be too much to handle.

Mr. Obama is more liberal than Mr. Clinton was on gay rights, religious liberties, abortion rights, drug legalization and climate change.

Well it's not like they're the unpopular moves of his time in office. The public has moved on gay rights and by extension the horseshit "religious liberties" argument. We've also moved on drug legalization, liberal or not.

Yet he'll have the audacity to save this:

But in the last two decades the Democratic Party has moved substantially further to the left than the Republican Party has shifted to the right.

Yet using one of his measuring posts, since the 1990s the Republicans are the ones who have drifted to the extreme, like believing global warming is an exaggerated liberal hoax.

While Mr. Clinton ended one entitlement program (Aid to Families With Dependent Children), Mr. Obama is responsible for creating the Affordable Care Act, the largest new entitlement since the Great Society. He is the first president to essentially nationalize health care.

Nevermind the fact that Clinton tried to get universal health care passed in his first term. Durrrrrrrr.

I stopped reading after that. Will he give Obama some conservative props for taking on his own party in supporting an international trade agreement that dwarfs NAFTA? Where's that Clinton comparison? What about his furthering of the War on Terror via drones, unlike Clinton who shied away from extremism whenever he could? Nah, let's just be a partisan douche.

If you want more from this blowhard check out his article the day before on Obama's "cataclysmic" foreign policy failures. If Obama is such a failure, then we need to make up new words for George Bush, do you think he'll write that article though?

 

[connor_in]

Do I need to point out the omissions and general issues with that article?

So off the top of my head
1. While Clinton did lower the tax rate on capital gains, he also raised the tax rate for the top 2 income brackets.
2. It talks about Obama and the ACA, but makes no mention of Clinton trying to pass universal healthcare.
3. On some of these issues the country has moved left. For example Obama didn't come out in favor of gay marriage until the majority of the country had come out in favor of gay marriage. That isn't a move to become more liberal, that is a move to keep up with the country.

And I had to stop reading due to my laughing. Sorry. Also you do realize that the person who wrote the article is pretty biased and worked in the last 3 Republican administrations?

I am not saying that the Dems haven't moved to the left on some issues, but lets not pretend that this guy is some objective voice either.

A BIASED ARTICLE IN THE NYT?!?!?!?! THE HELL YOU SAY!

 

[RDU Irish]

I'm confused? Are we now expected to be against any federal government in order to posit the elimination of any federal programs?

 

[Polish Leppy 22]

Do I need to point out the omissions and general issues with that article?

So off the top of my head
1. While Clinton did lower the tax rate on capital gains, he also raised the tax rate for the top 2 income brackets.
2. It talks about Obama and the ACA, but makes no mention of Clinton trying to pass universal healthcare.
3. On some of these issues the country has moved left. For example Obama didn't come out in favor of gay marriage until the majority of the country had come out in favor of gay marriage. That isn't a move to become more liberal, that is a move to keep up with the country.

And I had to stop reading due to my laughing. Sorry. Also you do realize that the person who wrote the article is pretty biased and worked in the last 3 Republican administrations?

I am not saying that the Dems haven't moved to the left on some issues, but lets not pretend that this guy is some objective voice either.

At first glance I thought the piece would've come from the Wall Street Journal or Investor's Business Daily. Nope...it was that hard right leaning New York Times. Have to wonder how they feel about the Clinton's these days given their hard investigative work into the Clinton cash BS.

You can disagree with this guy all you want and laugh all you want. My point was that there is no such thing anymore as a moderate Democrat.