Posted on 05/07/2006 11:05:36 AM PDT by mathprof
Daniel Defoe is best remembered today for creating the ultimate escapist fantasy, "Robinson Crusoe," but in 1727 he sent the British public into a scandalous fit with the publication of a nonfiction work called "Conjugal Lewdness: or, Matrimonial Whoredom." After apparently being asked to tone down the title for a subsequent edition, Defoe came up with a new one "A Treatise Concerning the Use and Abuse of the Marriage Bed" that only put a finer point on things. The book wasn't a tease, however. It was a moralizing lecture.[snip]
The sex act and sexual desire should not be separated from reproduction, he...warned, else "a man may, in effect, make a whore of his own wife."[snip]
The wheels of history have a tendency to roll back over the same ground. For the past 33 years since, as they see it, the wanton era of the 1960's culminated in the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision in 1973 American social conservatives have been on an unyielding campaign against abortion. But recently, as the conservative tide has continued to swell, this campaign has taken on a broader scope. Its true beginning point may not be Roe but Griswold v. Connecticut, the 1965 case that had the effect of legalizing contraception. "We see a direct connection between the practice of contraception and the practice of abortion," says Judie Brown, president of the American Life League, an organization that has battled abortion for 27 years but that, like others, now has a larger mission. "The mind-set that invites a couple to use contraception is an antichild mind-set," she told me. "So when a baby is conceived accidentally, the couple already have this negative attitude toward the child. Therefore seeking an abortion is a natural outcome. We oppose all forms of contraception."
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
The opinion of the Court in Griswold says that the two appellants in that case were arrested, convicted and fined.
I'm sorry I keep mentioning individual liberties, but I think it's very relevant to the discussion. And I must point out that you were the one who first brought them up. If you'd prefer, I'll use different terms so my writing won't be as repetitive.
I'd also like to point out that it was you who brought up barbaric practices. The only specific practice I mentioned were anti-miscegenation laws. While those laws may not have been fair or just, I don't think you could call them barbaric. The state of Virginia wasn't killing black citizens for trying to marry white citizens, they just didn't recognize those marriages. It's not quite the same as the ritualized murder in India.
These are upheavals. You can't generalize from that type of crazy times to narrow questions of political theory.
It's always a crazy time in some area of American life, and political theory has to address those areas as well as the normal ones. Some would argue that our own time involves sexual upheaval or an upheaval in our understanding of security and civil liberties (aka the "post-9/11 worldview"). These upheavals have to be addressed just like the civil rights upheavals of previous decades.
Judges didn't end slavery or bans on mixed marriages. The culture did. Judges played their role, not always to the good. You do recall Dred Scott and Plessy?
Until the Supreme Court got involved, a black woman and a white man could not be married in Virginia. The law prohibited it, and that was a reflection of Southern culture. After the Supreme Court got involved, Virginia could no longer prohibit these marriages...and neither could any other state. It seems clear that the Supreme Court did end laws against mixed marriage.
But you are correct concerning Dred Scott. The Supreme Court did not end slavery. They actually protected that institution, and struck down the Missouri Compromise as unConstitutional. We both agree this was the wrong decision.
What do you think the right decision in that case would have been? Would it have been better to recognize Scott's right to freedom, or should the Court have deferred to the legislature on this cultural and political issue, and made no decision?
I objected to government shaping the culture because it is the other way around. You seem to be looking for universal, culturally neutral government. It doesn't exist.
I know a perfectly culturally-nuetral government can never exist. Culture influences the government, and the actions of the government will have ripple effects on the culture. I DO think it is possible for a government to keep from explicitly and directly trying to shape the culture.
Let me illustrate the difference. During WWII, the government's war effort required more industrial production. Workers were drawn in to the cities as industrial labor, and the rural character of the country was reduced. I'm fine with this. Yes, the culture was affected, but it wasn't the point of the government's actions. It was a side effect. The point was to produce the materials needed to win the war.
During the Cultural Revolution, Chairman Mao decided to force urban students to live in the countryside to promote "egalitarianism" and fight "intellectualism". I would be very opposed to this kind of action, as fighting "intellectualism" is not a legitimate end of government.
The Constitution is fine as it is. Don't try for perfection. Just everyone do their jobs.
Thanks for the discussion.
Likewise, sir.
Your sexual habist and practices are not a private matter. They are quite public when they either do not produce reproductive results or do so in abudance. The death of western civilisation is toi a large extent due to the attitude that what one does in private has no public or general effect on society. Quite the opposite is of course true. The "right to privacy" is a modern bourgeois concept that doesn't even exist in the constitution. Societies have a primal imperative to assure their own perpetuation. It has been so since the dawn of mankind. Those societies that become lax in that respect, become extinct as did the Romans and other civilisations before us.Wow.
If one were to set out to develop a philosophical viewpoint tailor made to justify maximum governmental intrusion into our personal lives at the expense of individual liberty, one would be hard pressed to come up with one better than this. The implications are, to put it mildly, appalling.
Imagine, if you would, a government with this viewpoint, run by the likes of Hildebeast.
-Eric
However, sociallly conservative libertarians understand that when government is used to attempt to achieve the goals of social conservatism, the end results are the opposite of their intentions. Instead of more morality, there is now less morality. The people will, in large part, voluntarily choose morality if they are just left alone.The words "for the large part" is the tripping point for many so-called "cultural conservatives". They are in reality cultural collectivists, who require unanimity.
Fortunately, they lack the numbers to get their way.
Unfortunately, when we allow their agenda to pollute the fiscal/foreign/defense conservative agenda, we lose.
That agenda, plus cultural libertarianism, gave us Reagan. The same agenda, plus perceived cultural conservatism, gave us Clinton.
-Eric
Ya, and that reminds me of another similarity to the thinking of those on the left.
Seeking to make sure not one single person, 'falls through the cracks', liberals destroy society for everyone, making everyone 'equally miserable' and destitute. Similarly, in attempting to make everyone 'equally moral', Social Conservatives who favor expanding government to achive this aim (not libertarian minded social conservatives) actually would, IMO, end up destroying morality for everyone, making us all equally immoral...
ping
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