Your first paragraph is incoherent.
"Then you go off on a bombastic speech about how bad I am for saying that government is in the morality business"
I'm sorry you felt I was considering you "bad". I think you are perhaps adding ideas of self reference to the matter. I certainly found your remarks to be thoughtless and inconsiderate of reality, but I don't believe you should be labelled "bad", and I don't think your opinions warrant a visit from the State morality Police for "correction". And if you pretend a "virtue" you do not credit simply because you fear the punishment of the State, then the refinement of civilization has in no way been served.
"As I stipulated, something which is not broadly consensual, but dogmatically grounded, is surely out of bounds, and a lot of things it would be unwise to attempt to regulate"
You didn't stipulate any such thing to me. I simply responded to your post that the State was in the business of morality. You apparently think our universities, libraries, families, and social Institutions are insufficient for educating and guiding a society while at the same time honoring the principles of human rights and freedom of choice. You feel compelled to insist that the State legislate and enforce matters of social propriety.
This sort of control over the lives of people is antithetical to the concepts of free moral choice and virtue. There is nothing virtuous about helping a lady across the street because somebody has a gun to your head. There is nothing virtuous about refraining from showing your face in public because you will get beaten with a club if you do not so refrain.
Finally, your "stipulations" are impossibly vague and meaningless. I suppose that YOU will be the judge of when a Hitler is too "dogmatic", but YOU won't be the judge of whether his policies are "broadly consensual".
Some people are educated to have an opinion, and some are educated to think. You need to give your head a shake and entertain some reflection around your dogmatic opinions.
"In any case, my point is that you are making moral judgments whether you are forbidding stealing or forbidding child pornography"
Protection of property and protection of persons (exploitation of minors) are proper functions of the State. The fact that rights and freedoms have a moral context is NOT what we were talking about. We were discussing whether or not the State has a business in legislating social propriety and interpersonal conduct where human rights and freedoms are NOT being violated.
Past and current history shows us countless examples of moral cleansing or slaughter taken under the "broad consensus" of innumerable States. Decent people are sickened by the removal of virtue from the people, and its placement into the hands of the enlightened people with the guns, the racks, and the pillories.
"If you ever decide to have a rational conversation on the subject, let me know........"
Perhaps if you would stop rationalizing to yourself you might be able to defend an argument instead of wasting time an energy in defending your need to be right. |
