I don't see how OlLine Rebel's point is wrongly applied.
Anytime someone suggests, "All the money we spend on X, where X is any luxury you may name, should, morally, be spent on the sick/children/elderly/minorities" automatically implies a reduction to absurdity. At least to me.
You said in post #10 that, "If there are children in the world not receiving medical care, how can one justify spending huge sums on animals?"
I believe later you went on to (rightfully) clarify that if one donates to charity in some form or another, then that's a separate issue. So, are you now saying that there could be a justification for spending huge sums on animals, as long as charity comes first?
If not, then how can you justify owning a computer, which probably cost a "huge sum", when "there are children in the world not receiving medical care"?
And personally, I think spending money on a living, breathing animal for its sake is more "moral" than spending money on an huge inorganic entertainment system for myself.
Yet apparently, the latter is acceptable whereas the former is not, if I understand dsc's (or whomever it was) post.
"I don't see how OlLine Rebel's point is wrongly applied."
He immediately assumes that any consideration of the moral dimensions of the issue will lead to attempts to legislate the most extreme and irrational positions. There is no support for such an assumption.
"Anytime someone suggests, "All the money we spend on X, where X is any luxury you may name, should, morally, be spent on the sick/children/elderly/minorities" automatically implies a reduction to absurdity. At least to me."
Firstly, you can't have "at least to me." Either it does or it doesn't.
Secondly, no one has suggested that "all" the money spent on "any" luxury should be spent on helping people. I dealt with that at some length above. Did you not bother to read those notes?
I also dealt with that sort of argumentation: the restating of a position to a ridiculous extreme.
"So, are you now saying that there could be a justification for spending huge sums on animals, as long as charity comes first?"
No. I don't believe there could be any moral justification for a person, however wealthy, to spend -- just to pick a number -- $500,000 per year on a pet dog. I don't want laws to prevent it, but I do encourage contemplation of the moral issues involved.
"If not, then how can you justify owning a computer, which probably cost a "huge sum", when "there are children in the world not receiving medical care"?"
I'm sorry, I was under the mistaken impression that we were making some slight effort to discuss the issue rationally and reasonably.
You can buy computers for under $500 now, and that is by no stretch of any madman's fevered imagination a "huge" sum.