Originally posted by: aidanjm
The desire to steal, cheat, rape and kill are part of our human nature. Shall we make cheating, stealing, killing a human right?
No, because it is a universal desire for us and ours to be free of that. Within commnities, these are universal wrongs. Pointing to things that cannot be morally justified to be legal only supports my position.
Yes, the current political battle will be won by whoever is stronger politically. (Or, whoever prevails in the courts). I have an opinion on what outcome will be the best for gay individuals and the larger community, which I am of course going to argue for.
Cool. You've not given me a single reason to agree with you, unless I also am gay. Why should I care? There will be a small economic disruption as pensions and so forth are sorted out. That could affect me negatively in some small way. On sheer self-interest it would be rational for me to oppose it. You've given me no reason to not act on self-interest.
What of cultures which do not see eye to eye with our Western notions of human rights are in the wrong? Are you willing to say categorically that these cultures have got it wrong? Do you not open yourself up to allegations of Western cultural imperialism or colonialism?
On some matters, these cultures are wrong. Islamic culture is no more wrong to have the Hajib as a part of their culture than we are to have cleavage as a part of our mating rituals. They are wrong when they stone a woman in the street for breaching this custom, just as we are wrong when we say "she deserved it, look at how she was dressed." You can only call it imperialism or coloninalism when we back up our moral certitude with military action. I have mentioned when that should happen for ethical reasons. Basically, it should only be done to avoid the large-scale, immediate loss of civillian life.
Cultural sensitivity is neccessary when discussing varying values across cultures. Many times it will be the same value manifested differently, and other times a given aspect of a culture can be openly and honest called evil, or wrong. The German dehumanization of the Jews was evil. Period. On some matters, I do think that Western culture has found ways that are "better" in principle, on a moral level. Democracy, the very concept or human rights are two examples. I think that there may be things we can learn from other cultures, however.
My own view is that all morality is ultimately grounded in the social world, i.e., our relationships with other people. Morality makes sense because we are vulnerable and we depend on others for our survival. If we were lone predators like sharks with no need to cooperate with other people there would be no morality. I don't believe that morality is uniquely human, for example recent studies indicate that social animals such as (non-human) primates have what appears to be a rudimentary social morality.
Ar you suggesting that we have developed instincts that lay the fuondations of morality? Maybe. If you require a purely mechanistic model of the universe, then this is one thing that would explain the universal nature of ethics. I don't see how that helps your argument.
What do you mean, "admit"? I am just calling a spade a spade. This is the way things are.
Again, you give me no reason to support your view in this case. You could be an industrialist who wants to fight for fewer taxes on his product. In fact, he could at least point to the marginal benefit his workers would experience, and that would be more compelling. If it all comes down to who wins the fight, what's wrong with picking up a bigger stick than the other side and settling it old-school?
Let's say you are magically transported to be with a native eskimo tribe, 200 years ago, and see the tribes people abandoning the elderly or the sick alone in the snow to die. That behavior was required to allow the tribe to survive in an environment of limited resources. Can you state categorically that what they are doing is wrong? I.e., are your human rights applicable or appropriate universally, across both time and culture?
The basic principle that benefits of all should be maximized, including the (time-discounted, but that's a minor detail) benefits of future generations. Observe:
We share with our elders. -> Our mothers are malnourished. -> Fewer childern survive, and those who do are weaker. -> In the next generation, we are even less able to provide for the generation after.
Every society must ration it's resources. It should do so guided by basic values. Sometimes the principle of providing for future generations outwieghs the principle of respecting and caring for our elders. Note that both principles are universal to all human cultures. In some circumstances of economic scarcity, the ethical decision isn't pleasent.
You misunderstand me. You seem to think that I am defending the enumerated human rights on some sheet of paper somewhere as universal absolutes. No, I think that they are the best expressions of certain moral principles derived by humanity to date that trancend whichever legal or rhetorical system is currently in place.
I think you are lying to yourself.
Ohh, ballsy, I'm beginning to enjoy this.
Regarding rights,
-they can't be self-evident - because people have been arguing over them for millenia (if they are so "self evident" or obvious, what's up with all the disagreement?)
I am using my drunken charitability clause here: I withdraw any use of the word "self-evident." I was overstating what I beleive. All this high-minded rhetoric got to my head (and mixed with the whiskey). I do beleive in certain basic principles, which could never be ennumerated completely, which are known to us in one way or another, though since they are often in conflict they can be difficult for our limited minds to percieve 100% correctly.
-they can't be inalienable, because governments revoke rights all the time (e.g., state governments routinely take away the right to life itself by executing prisoners, similarly the government of Iraq has killed an estimated 4000 lesbians and gay men over the past decade for the reason that they are homosexual)
Just because a right is not recognize does not mean that it has been taken away. A naked, starving man in Daschau has the right to better than what he was given. It is a tradgedy, an evil, even, that he died before he saw that right recognized. But it was inherent.
-they can't be universal, because we recognize that certain rights appropriate under some circumstances might not always be appropriate. For example, we (as a society) revoke the right to life when people commit certain crimes. The Chinese government has pretty much revoked the right of parents to have an unlimited number of children - are you willing to say that is categorically wrong, given China's problem's associated with over-population?
These basic principles, derived in the form of rights currently, can sometimes be in conflict. Sometimes many of them can conflict in extraoridinarily complex ways, and the limited language we use to derive them will always leave us as to some doubt as to the absolute "rightness" of a given policy. Sometimes sheer empirical doubt of what the future lies can also cloud the "rightness" of a decision. Because we cannot know for sure, does not mean we should not try.
-rights are based on human nature? It's part of human nature to rape, kill, lie, cheat and steal.

Is it a human right to kill, to steal, to cheat?
Dealt with above. Here's an interesting little empirical fact: Social Psychologists can find many different weightings given to many different values in many societies. Of course, these studies must be taken with a very large grain of salt, as the possibility for accidental bias is large. But one value seems cross all cultural boundaries: the value of reciprocity. The idea that you should gain what you have earned, and pay what you owe. If one accepts that this value is absolute (and if you beleive in any sort of natural law, it's a compelling one), then it is easy to see that the above behaviours contradict this value on an extreme level. This might also by why it is universally considered 'wrong" in all cultures to behave in this way.
-finally religion offers no unambiguous or definitive account of human rights. There is no agreement among the spiritual texts of the major religions on what human rights should consist of. With respect to xiantiy, the Biblical god supports the killing of children, the raping of women, slavery, and genocide. How is this consistent with a contemporary Western understnading of human rights? Do you have to be a Biblical reconstructionist to get the human rights you "want" out of the Xian scripture? If that's the case, then how can you say (with a straight face) that your rights are god-given (as opposed to merely being your particular "take" on the xian scriptures)?
Irrelevant. Human religious scripture is also an imperfect relection of these principles, one that is often more primitive. Look how often the principle of survival outwieghs other principles in these derivations. It may only our modern wealth that allows us the luxury of de-valuing these principles. But it allows us to re-value others.
Gee, it would be SO much more effective to be able to say, "You are violating my god-given or natural human rights", as they lead me to the gallows.
Yes, it is slim comfort to call your killers evil. It was little comfort to those who were slaughtered Hitler. But the evil inspired us to build our modern framework of human rights. And awakened like never before the common feeling all humanity shares. Because of the extent of the evil. (And, of course, cynically, how much we were exposed to it in the media. We didn't hear nearly as much about Stalin's evils which were greater in magnititude)
Actually, my realistic (honest) assessment of where rights come from (the social world) doesn't prevent me from arguing my ethical system. I am free to draw on arguments of equality, equal treatment for everyone, etc.
Yes, but you don't beleive that, deep down, equality matters. You merely use the fact that others do hold this deep-seated belief in order to further your own ends. That is dishonesty in its purest form.
You only think these values are fundamental and "objective" because you're stuck in the one culture, you've never encountered a culture where these values are alien. But notions of equal treatment for all citizens are historically a very recent development. Look to old texts (especially old religious texts, such as the christian bible) and you will see a blase acceptance of things like slavery, genocide, the subjugation and rape of women, etc.
Yes, and I would suggest that in a militaristic, competitive society, the civilization that could live best by the sword had an evolutionary advantage. And so, the survival priciple was emphasized over other moral principle. And that this partriarchal system was so successful, it became a. . .habitual part of our culture. And as soon as we ended up in a situation (most likely due to economic developpment, where strength was no longer the determinant of cultural survival) where it was no longer needed to survive (hard to say where that would be in history, I'll think on my guess) then that system became "wrong." Just as Mary Wollenstonecraft saw that it was wrong in the 18th century, and the suffragettes in the early 20th, up to modern feminist thinkers. At least, when they're not wrong.
Notions of equal treatment for all people are not universally accepted. Such an idea is vigorously contested in the Muslim world for example. How is the slavery of the chiristian bible (such slavery is endorsed by saint paul, jesus) consistent with contemporary notions of equality?
Again, historically it might have been neccssary for cultural survival. As soon as it is not, it is wrong.
You haven't been very specific, so I'm not even sure what you're talking about here.
You'd need to spell out some of your universal absolutes wrt human rights for the discussion to go much further, I think.
Well, I'm more intersted in debating whether or not a universal morality is possible at all. I've mentioned reciprocity as a specific, and I've said that Human rights are the best stab we as humans have ever made at piercing the veil. Since these are broad principles, that we didn't create (either because they are an objective part of the universe or because they are a fundamental part of our human phyche) it has always been difficult to derive them. The point, like in all domains of human knowledge, is not to finish the task but to constantly refine it.
And why is that self-interest a bad thing?
I personally don't think that degree of self-interest makes the fight any less noble. You're still talking about people putting themselves on the firing line advocating for rights for others.
No, I think that if people didn't believe in natural law, they would only act in the self-interested, rational manner predicted in the simplest economic theories. You (when I make things personal like this, I am talking about the "you" you have been representing in this discussion; not who you arctually "are".) will fight for gay marriage up until you are asked to give up something that you value more than the right to marry.
I want to live in a society that values of gay people.
Why? Why does your sense of societal esthetic get strumed by this question of equality? Is it as arbitrary as liking broccoli?
Any improvement in the legal position of gay people will benefit me in some way (even if it is only more peace of mind).
Why? Why is your mind more at peace when people on the other side of the country are treated more equally?
I stand to benefit from progress in gay rights. I am not going to elevate human rights to some godly plane, just to avoid acknowledging the element of self-interest.
Hey, if you have a self interest, that does not invalidate your argument. But you have an altruistic motive as well, and you have not satisfactorially accounted for that.
(BTW I believe that homophobia hurts straight people, as much as it hurts gay people, in the long run; a more gay-friendly society will be a healthier society for all people, imo).
Cool, I can see the argument, again how moral issues can be clouded by empirical ones.
It is arguably possible to advocate for human rights from a purely altruistic position, I suppose. I also tend to argue for reproductive rights for women. Not sure what benefits such rights would provide me.
Then why do you argue for them? Is it just an "our side" thing in these "culture wars" we are told we are fighting? Or do you think it's right?
If you limit yourself in that manner, then you implicitly justify the victor of any such battle. Which means that you implicitly justify the potential victory of those who would restrict gay marriage through legitimate legislation, up to and including constitutional ammendments.
I am free to argue my case, express my opinion on why it is morally desirable for gay people to be able to marry.
I wasn't trying to say that you limited the rhetorical tools at your disposal. But if you remain true to your arguments above, then you cannot say that it is morally desireable. You have denied the very existence of a morality. Or, at least, the existence of a morality outside of your skull. And that desireability becomes as arbitrary as the desire for a nice juicy steak.*
*Can you tell I"m broke and need decent food? I would kill for steak, broccoli and chocolate.
With my model, I can argue that such an ammendment would be wrong. Your model can't.
All you are getting is a cheap rhetorical victory, the "thrill" of being able to say "You are categorically wrong, I am categorically right". Does that make you feel better? I think it takes more courage to be realistic about where rights come from. I think you are taking the philosophical equivalent of a narcotic to make yourself feel good.
Wow, harsh. I think that to be "honest" about it in your system would strip them of all meaning. If you are right (in a way this is an empirical argument about something we will never be able to test), then life is a bleak place, absent of meaning beyond that which we absurdly apply to it. The only difference between a morally pure act of self-sacrifice and the pleasure of a drunken rut is the level of sophisitication of the experience.
It could be that the majority (who I think in one way or another agrees with me) is wrong, and you are right. It could be that we live in a world which is meaningless at its core, and people like me cloak ourselves in this teleological blanket because we lack the balls to see the edge of the precipice over which we must fall. It could be that we cannot look down that cliff, and take that leap, because our minds shrink anxiously away from the truth.
But if you are right, and we are wrong, why do you care? Why do you care about gay marriage? Why do you care about other's views of morality? Why do you care about any of this? Why are you having this discussion with me?