"Why not?" is a great place to start when deciding if legislation is necessary. I can practice and participate in transcendence whether or not someone else does. Not everyone experiences the same degree of transcendence and surely no two people have the same values that provide the basis for what is transcending. Anytime I feel that I know what other people's values are or should be, I am heading down that slippery slope of paternalism.
Why not allow people to burn the flag?
Why not? if they pay for the flag and wish to make their idiotic statement, I would much rather let them do so rather than prohibit them from doing so. By the way, the proper disposal for our flag is through burning, for what it is worth.
Why not permit marriage between two persons of the same sex?
Because social security survivor benefits are attached if legally recognized. If marriage between two people of the same sex is allowed, it will be a matter of time before terminally ill and widowed parents start marrying their children to keep the benefits rolling. Why discriminate if marriage is allowed to be redefined? And there really is no reason not to redefine marriage, if so desired, except that federal entitlements are riding on the legality of such bullsh!t maneuvers.
Why not allow a 15-year-old boy to come to school dressed as a girl?
Indeed, why not in a government run school that cannot practice discrimination [not a bad word] and police itself to establish good decorum. Why not support a voucher program?
Why not have female priests?
Why not, if the church so chooses...it is their business and the business of the church's members.
Why not have female soldiers?
Why not? The Navy has females and so does the Air Force. I personally served in the same units with female Marines during my last four years of my 10-year active duty stint in the Corps. Many of these Marines were good-to-go.
Why not encourage children to treat their teachers and parents as their equals?
They're not equals. A child does not have the capacity to act and make decisions as an adult would and therefore, until they reach a certain age where they've matured, these classifications are not equal. However, if a parent or teacher wants break this convention in some unique circumstances then "why not?"
Why not import totally incompatible cultures into our society?
Not sure if I could answer this question unless I knew the specifics.
Why not surrender our national independence to a global government?
Where is that happening. I'll go one better. Why not actively promote the enlarging of the United States by admitting nations that have dissolved their sovereignty through the provisions in article IV sections 3 & 4 of the U.S. Constitution. It would be cheaper than foreign aid and we'd surely replace the significance of institutions like the United Nations.
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And here we come to the nub of the problem: In a society that has lost the experience of transcendence, in a society that sees only the material or individualistic side of things, there is no answer to these questions.
An admission that the "what if?" question does not always apply universally and therefore should not be up for consideration legislatively; that is, if you value freedom.
Without an allegiance to its own transcendent essence and the ability to articulate it, no institution—and no nation—can survive the Secular-Democratic critique. Indeed, the members of such a society will fail even to recognize that a threat exists, since they no longer have any consciousness of the thing that is threatened.
The sky would fall if we practiced live-and-let-live with a minimal government? Freedom is threatening?! Who would have thunk it?
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At the same time, since people cannot actually live together without institutions, the breakdown of institutions based on shared adherence to a higher truth must lead to new institutions based, not on any ideal, but on the increasingly naked assertion of will—whether it be the will of “the people,” or the will of some oppressed minority, or the will of some managerial or ideological elite who seek to redesign the society from top to bottom.
Man, this guy cannot see past the need for government. Whether he knows it or not, he is one of government's enablers. A true statist is perpetually worried that the state will fall into the 'wrong hands'. In other words, those who love government and seek its intrusions into at least some matters will fear what government will do once the state falls into the 'hands of someone else'. A good libertarian, however, wants none of it and gets frustrated with the statists.
For these reasons, whenever the Secular-Democratic consciousness has gained power it has repeatedly led to various kinds of extremism and statism, except in those societies, such as Britain and the United States, where it was balanced and moderated by surviving elements of the Classical-Christian consciousness.
Ah-ha! Classical-Christian? That's an interesting concept, seriously. If we really could be Classically Christian, we might actually realize our libertarian side that lies dormant in far too many of us. Here's a hint: the Old Testament is not where we're going to realize our Classical-Christianess.
Not everyone experiences the same degree of transcendence and surely no two people have the same values that provide the basis for what is transcending. Anytime I feel that I know what other people's values are or should be, I am heading down that slippery slope of paternalism.
Excellent! Then you should have no problem with America having a Muslim majority. A nation cannot long exist if its values are that it has no values. If the nation has no values, how do you justify keeping anyone out who has different values? What happens when they immigrate in, outnumber you, and legislate their values? Now, your response might be, we won't let them legislate their values. In that case, you're imposing your values on them.
Regarding Auster's question, Why not import totally incompatible cultures into our society?, you responded, Not sure if I could answer this question unless I knew the specifics.
LMAO! What difference do the specifics make to someone who says "Anytime I feel that I know what other people's values are or should be, I am heading down that slippery slope of paternalism"?
You see the problem? You can't have a society with no values, at least not for long because someone with values will eventually outvote you. This is what the secular and "tolerant" Europeans are finding out now that Muslims are taking over. The reaction of the forces of "tolerance" is to pass speech codes and ban rallies that oppose Islamization. So Europe ends up in the Orwellian predicament of having hostile values imposed on their own citizens, to protect immigrants who don't respect European values, on the grounds that Europe itself has no value other than "tolerance & diversity".
Where is that happening. I'll go one better. Why not actively promote the enlarging of the United States by admitting nations that have dissolved their sovereignty through the provisions in article IV sections 3 & 4 of the U.S. Constitution. It would be cheaper than foreign aid and we'd surely replace the significance of institutions like the United Nations.
Uh, it would be cheaper than foreign aid to just add Mexico, Haiti, and nearly all of Africa as states? How do you figure that? You do realize (don't you?) that if we did that, the newly admitted states would immediately vote in a socialist government in the United States.
The sky would fall if we practiced live-and-let-live with a minimal government? Freedom is threatening?! Who would have thunk it?
Liberty is not threatening, but a valueless society will not remain free. The real difference between libertarians and Marxists isn't that the former are for less government and the latter are for total government. Both advocate policies which lead to total government. The difference is that Marxism intends for that to happen, while libertarians fumble their way into it because they don't understand human nature. Marxists do understand it and exploit it. The reason Chuck Schumer applauded the repeal of sodomy laws was because he knew it would lead to more government. The reason libertarians applauded it was because they stupidly believed it wouldn't.
Man, this guy cannot see past the need for government.
I can't see past the need for government, either. I think we need government. A society with traditional Judeo-Christian moral values will need less government on average. A society based on your idea that values are "paternalism" will need a lot of government. That's been shown to be true over and over, but you keep denying it, and can't name a single place on earth where your nihilistic view of society has led to anything other than socialism, centralization, and nanny statism.
Whether he knows it or not, he is one of government's enablers. A true statist is perpetually worried that the state will fall into the 'wrong hands'.
As opposed to the right hands? Who are they? Unless you're advocating no state at all (which you denied in an earlier post), the state has to be in someone's hands.
In other words, those who love government and seek its intrusions into at least some matters will fear what government will do once the state falls into the 'hands of someone else'. A good libertarian, however, wants none of it and gets frustrated with the statists.
So you support government that doesn't intrude into "at least some matters"? How do you plan to bring that about, and if you succeed, what authority would be left to stop anyone who disagrees with you (Nazis, Taliban, Commies....) from filling the void?