The threshold of banning would be higher then what would be required to avoid funding.
I wasn't extending the discussion to banning but sticking with government funding. RE PETA, the government funds activities related to the killing of animals, for example, they inspect meat.
Its about security. It might be a lousy and stupid security decision but its in that area.
I would argue that aggressive war isn't about security. Just because it wears a uniform doesn't mean that it's about security. In any event, there is a continuum involved. Almost everyone accepts self defense as a justification for killing. When it comes to an aggressive war, that's another matter. I don't think it's useful to bundle it all up as security.
I don't think considering animal life to have equivalent rights to human life has the same level of support as the idea that unborn human life has rights.
I'm not so sure about that.
Once again, we have a continuum. Sure, there is a large minority who would deem killing a viable fetus murder and a majority who are at least uncomfortable with the prospect. But when you get down to embryos, the numbers drop. And they drop even further when you're talking about an embryo in a test tube that will never develop anyway. I'm not so sure if the numbers there are greater than PETA's. Compare dispatching a Siberian tiger vs. an embryo languishing in a freezer and I think the vast majority would care more about the tiger.
You've been framing the issue in terms of the size of the minority and in terms of the legitimacy of the role of the federal government. You know that I'm sympathetic to the latter issue, in general. But I don't think you can argue that in a vacuum. If government is already funding numbers of comparable inappropriate activities, you can't argue that it shouldn't fund this one activity because it's inappropriate independent of the others. If we can fund meat inspections, then we can fund stem cell research. It's neither or both.
As for the size of the minority, that's an interesting question. Does size matter? Obviously it matters if we're talking about a handful of people. Handfuls of people we consider kooks. But once you get above the handful level, does it really matter if it's three percent of the population or nine or fifteen? You know, too, that I'm sympathetic to the sensibilities of minorities. But I don't know that size matters and I don't know if defunding is a sound or useful construct as a compromise between supporting and banning.
Now, I'm off to make another try at rescuing the praying mantis that is trapped in my hallway... <g> |
