Okay, this thread is not going to be about gay rights, though it is tied to it.
Arkansas House Bill 1119 is a bill that would amend the laws regarding adoption to restrict anyone with an adult homosexual in their household from being able to adopt a child. This is not the issue I want to talk about. The issue is that in no less than four places, it would also amend the law to say that adoption offices would have to ensure the health, safety, morality and welfare of adopted children. The state is literally trying to legislate morality.
Now, in my opinion, morals are personal truths about right and wrong. Should the government be responsible for how someone thinks about what is right or wrong?
In some cases, I think so, like about rape and murder. However, issues of sexual preference, religion, whether you think it’s okay to fry ants with a magnifying glass… These are all moral decisions too, and how is the government to decide what is right and wrong in such cases?
Well, you see what we do is have citizens run in elections to represent the people. Those elected then engage in debate and investigation to set policies that will both represent and serve the people.
Some say that one should not legislate morality. I say that morality is the only thing that we can legitimately legislate. If a law is not founded on some notion of right vs. wrong, then it is either unjust or capricious. Either way, it is illegitimate.
Why are there laws against slavery? Because slavery is wrong. Of course, some disagree. They say that slavery is only outlawed because we must protect the rights of the individual. However, even that is a moral claim – namely, that society should not force individual into indentured servitude in order to benefit the majority.
Some point to speed limit laws and proclaim, “See! That has no basis in morality! So there!” Such an analysis is shallow at best. It is true that the particulars of these laws are not morally absolute; for example, there is no particular moral law which says “It is wrong to drive above 25 mph.” However, these laws still exist due to the moral tenet that one should not needlessly endanger other people through one’s reckless behavior. Does that tenet sound obvious? Perhaps – but it is a moral claim nonetheless.
The problem isn’t that laws legislate morality. there’s nothing wrong with that per se. The problem is that some people don’t like the particular moral worldviews that are contained within certain laws.
I’m going to have to disagree with JThunder here. Over many years, humanity has found that treating each member of a society as an autonomous agent (rather than as a slave or child, or otherwise a being that can be exploited at the whim of the leader) is the best way to make a functioning society. Our laws should focus almost exclusively on upholding this model–morality simply shouldn’t come into play. Laws against murder or theft shouldn’t be on the books because these actions are immoral (although they definitely are), they should be there because the actions restrict a person’s ability to act as a free individual.
Other laws are in place simply because a standard needs to be established for some systems to work. Without a system for regulating traffic, for example, transportation by car would be impossible on a large scale.
On a slightly different point, it has been my experience that, when discussing legal matters, morality is only mentioned when the speaker has no good points make. An argument to morality cannot be easily countered, due to the intangibility of the subject. Because of this, we should be very wary of passing legislation on the basis of immorality.
That’s not what people of the deep South said. In fact, they found major economic advantages to enforcing slavery. The North happened to disagree, both on practical and moral grounds.
Moroever, what if one society COULD successfully enslave, subjugate and exploit another people? Would this mean that they should legalize slavery? Are you saying that that they would have no righteous basis for banning this abominable practice? I suspect that the vast majority of SDMBers would decry such a situation, and not because it is sociologically infeasible or impractical. No, I daresay that most people would decry it on the grounds that it violates the individuals’ rights. In other words, because slavery is fundamentally wrong.
Heck, just look at the gay marriage issue. How often do you see people taking a stance – either for or against it – on the grounds of what’s best for a functioning society? No, the vast majority of gay marriage proponents take a stance based on individual rights – in other words, a sense of what’s right or wrong. Similarly, gay marriage opponents likewise condemn it based on a fundamental sense of morality. Their moral worldviews may differ, but in both cases, an appeal to morality is being made.
I’m not denying that practicality does come into play. However, the whole notion that “a standard needs to be established for some systems to work” is a bit of a truism. It dodges the quesiotn of WHY any particular system or standard needs to be adopted. One could insist that all flashy red cars can drive 10mph faster than the others, but without a solid justification, such a law would be capricious. Any just law must ultimately (though perhaps indirectly) be based on a sense of what’s right or wrong.
I want my property to be protected- lets make stealing illegal
I wish to live- lets make murder illegal
I would not like to be beat up- Lets make battery illegal
Plenty of laws are in effect that don’t have a basis in right or wrong.
I have found that this kind of discussion goes nowhere unless you define your terms (which you tried to do, actually). I find it useful to distinguish *morals * from ethics. The each have to do with notions of right and wrong, but morals are about issues between you and your God or issues within yourself. Ethics, on the other hand, have to do with issues between people. Murder is an ethical issue because it involves other people. Masturbation is a moral issue because it involves only yourself and maybe God. No wait, I’m not suggesting that anyone is masturbating to God - well, maybe Jerry Falwell - but not many others.
OK, now I’ve got this mental image of Jerry Falwell staring up at the Sistine Chapel with his hands in his pants going, “Ohhh, ohhh - you 'da man.” Sorry. This started off as such a well thought out post.
How about the burglar’s ability to “act as a free individual”, why would you restrict that? and restrict his ability to earn a living?
Ultimately, in a democracy, laws are set up either:
(a) to protect society from disintegration into chaos, or
(b) to protect individuals (or provide them) with things they cannot do on their own.
The ultimate basis for what laws are enacted must ultimately rest on some notion of right and wrong, or the system becomes tyranny.
Driving on the right hand of the road is not more moral than driving on the left. It is certainly more convenient to have everybody drive on the same side of the road. I am certainly in support of having traffic regulations with the force of law, but I don’t think societies that do not have them are more or less moral.
As I explicitly said, the particulars of our traffic laws are not moral absolutes, in and of themselves. However, the laws themselves are still founded on principles of right and wrong, such as the importance of respecting other people’s right to safety. Otherwise, why not let people who drive a nigh-invulnerable vehicle (say, a Sherman tank) drive in any direction that they please? Such a system would work, as long as we feel that people’s right to safety is irrelevant.
And I must heartily disagree with that. Any society that does not have traffic regulations must display an abominable, and decidedly immoral, disregard for human life and safety.
Before I respond to anyone, I think I should define how I’m using morality. Morality is something that allows us to make decisions without being forced to consider each factor that goes into making a decision individually. Because we don’t have the time or resources in most cases to investigate any situation in depth, we adopt moral beliefs as broad generalizations to guide us along our path–morality is just an approximation of an in-depth decision process, the result of saying to yourself “If I come across situations similar to x, then I will take action y.” This is the main reason why I oppose legislating morality. Laws should be specific and quantitative, rather than broad and qualitative.
If, on the other hand, we’re using El Zagna’s definition of morality, I would still denounce legislating morality just as strongly as I do now.
I, for one, would be floored if this happens. I don’t want to make my reply too long for fear of hijack, but I believe that free societies tend to be objectively better than non-free societies.
Individual rights are the set of rules that we have found to allow society to function at the best level, and what an overwhelming number of individuals have decided is in their best interest. These, again, should be determined by the process of in depth analysis rather than the gut feeling approximation of morality.
I was thinking specifically of gay marriage when I wrote my post. The default position of society is (or should be) that all persons are equal under the law. Illegal gay marriage contradicts that principle. If there were a good practical reason for keeping gay marriage illegal, I might change my stance, but I have yet to hear a single reason that so much as approaches coming close to being in the ball park of a good reason, and I’m confident that none exist.
One could insist that, but nothing good would come of it, and legislating on the basis of morality would do no more to prevent than would legislating on the basis of a quantitative understanding of the facts.
I could offer a couple answers to this. One is essentially the same as you first point: that practical concerns (the consequences of abolishing the concept of ownership) absolutely overwhelm any claim to autonomy on the part of the burglar. Another, related to the first, is the concept of consent. Consent is one of those things that are good both for society as a whole, and for people at the individual level. Theft (and murder, rate, assault, etc.) are crimes that provide us with quantitative data, which can be used to make informed decisions, rather than moral approximations.
And right off the bat, therein lies a problem. Morality DOES often require weighing individual factors. Before shooting someone, for example, you have to weigh individual factors. Is this person innocent? Is he endangering others? Is there some other way of defusing the situation at hand? And so forth, and so on.
On this basis alone, your argument falls.
Moreover, your definition or morality does not match any definition that I’ve been able to find. Dictionary.com defines it as accordance with standards of good and right conduct, and Merriam-Webster espouses similar definitions. None of the references that I’ve consulted provide any definitions that resemble what you’ve said.
Additionally, I feel that your other replies simply dodge the issue at hand. To wit,
Again, your feeling is irrelevant to the example that I cited. If a society COULD function effectively with slavery in place, does that mean that it should. Again, in the old deep South functioned quite well until them Northerners decided to stick their noses into their business.
Now, with regard to gay marriage, you say,
Again, this dodges the question. WHY should it be the default position? Because you feel that gays have a basic right to marriage? That is a moral statement, plain and simple.
You say that “If there were a good practical reason for keeping gay marriage illegal, I might change my stance, but I have yet to hear a single reason that so much as approaches coming close to being in the ball park of a good reason, and I’m confident that none exist.” Sorry, but that’s not good enough. To support your case, you would have to prove that society can function BETTER with gay marriage in place; otherwise, you’re invalidating your own claim.
And so forth, and so on.
In fact, the Declaration of Independence itself says, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.” It does not say that men’s rights should be respected simply for the convenience of society. It does not say that human rights are only relevant insofar as they make society better. No, it declares that all men are created equal, and that this truth is self-evident! That is a moral statement – a declaration of right and wrong – if ever there was one.
"Man has the right to live by his own law- to live in the way that he wills to do: to work as he will: to play as he will: to rest as he will: to die when and how he will.
Man has the right to eat what he will: to drink what he will: to dwell where he will: to move as he will on the face of the earth.
Man has the right to think what he will: to speak what he will: to write what he will: to draw, to paint, carve, etch, mold, build as he will: to dress as he will.
Man has the right to love as he will.
Man has the right to kill those who thwart these rights."
Quote from The Equinox: A Journal of Scientific Illumination, 1922 (edited by Aleister Crowley)
I don’t usually prefer to quote somebody else, and killing somebody for violating some of those rights is extreme, but I have to say that I don’t think it is the government’s job to legislate morality. Everyone has their own moral code. The government’s purpose should be to protect your rights and freedoms as stated above in the quote. If we allow the government to legislate our morality, it starts to become the very thing that takes away those right and freedoms we deserve.
I have to say JThunder, with morality defined that way, I can’t come up with any good rebuttals–I’m having difficulty coming up with an amoral action. In which case, I’ll have to concede that it’s impossible to have a law that does not relate to morality.
Erikson’s scale of ethical development puts this issue in perspective. Equating morality with law ‘n’ order is more highly developed than, say, the motivation to avoid punishment or gain reward. But it is less developed than the higher steps on the scale, like the social contract and the culmination, one’s internally developed personal moral sense.