I’ve been thinking a lot about this, because of the whole gay marriage thing. Every so often, society goes through paradigm shifts. What was unthinkable yesterday becomes legal, if not universally approved of, today. Tomorow, it because a basic right.
Now the courts are deciding that the consitution is orientation-neutral. The constitution is exactly the same as it was fifty years ago, but if you’d tried to convince a judge to let Adam and Steve marry, you’d be laughed at. The question wouldn’t even have occured to people.
So I’ve been wondering, what things that are taboo now will be legalized? The Founding Fathers couldn’t conceive of women and blacks voting; in 1950 no one in their right mind would take gay marriage seriously. What idea is considered laughible and repugnent today, but will be the center of the next civil rights struggle?
It also works in the other direction. Slavery was once considered respectable, and a status symbol. No doubt some things we think are perfectly fine today will cause our descendents to hang their heads in shame.
So, just for fun, what do you predict will be legalized/criminalized in the future?
Legalized
Bestiality and necrophilia are some of the last sexual taboos. I predict they will go the way of their predecessors.
The official reason you can’t make hot monkey love to a monkey is that animals can’t give informed consent. Which makes sense, but I personally believe that the main reason is what I call the “ick factor”. People feel disgusted by such behavior, so there’s no legion of activists challenging the courts over “zoophilia rights”.
The previous sexual revolutions also were at the mercy of the “ick”. As I noted above, the parts of the Constitution that support gay marriage were there fifty years ago. But because of the “ick”, no one bothered to interpret it that way.
Now I can see this going two ways. As the technology for simulated sex grows more advanced, people with all sorts of… interesting tastes will be able to argue that what they do harms nobody. The social stigma of being attracted to animals will wear off, although anything involving actual live sheep will still be met with disproval.
Or, if virtual reality sex doesn’t become real enough or widespread, people may still experience a paradigm shift. You’ll have scientists attaching wires to the brains of cows to see whether they really mind or not. Given that many female animals get forced by prospective mates, you can probably find a species where a groping farm boy gets the same response as any old male.
Necrophilia is even easier. Already on this message board, you find people saying, “But who is he really harming? It’s just a piece of meat.” I can see kinky people donating their bodies to be, uh, played with, just as people leave their bodies to science.
Criminalized
Tabacco.
Now you’re probably thinking, she thinks they’re gonna legalize sheep-boinking, but they’ll still be scared of drugs? Let me explain my reasoning.
Tabacco is very bad for you. As far as I know, it’s much more dangerous than pot. (If I am wrong, please let me know). The reason that cigarettes are okay’d is that smoking has been around a long time. If we tried to ban them, we’d get about the same success rate as the Prohibition. Weed, on the other hand, never became respectable enough to be saved.
Public service annoucements, drug prevention classes, and people dying horribly of lung cancer are shrinking the market. If things continue this way, there won’t be enough respectable smokers to stand up for their cigars.
The goverment already has been trying to stop smoking using everything short of an all-out ban: PSA’s, no-smoking zones, cigarette taxes, “This product will make you die horribly” warnings. When we’ve only got a handful of people standing up for their baccy, you bet the health nannies will be falling all over themselves to ban it. Diehards will still smoke, of course, but in secret, like pot enthusiasts today.
Not that there won’t be drugs in the future. They’ll just be safer. Caught between the recreational mind-scramblers on one hand, and the health nannies on the other, the goverment will be approve lab-synthesized chemicals. Quality control will be strictly enforced, and scientists will come with new drugs that make you high, but aren’t dangerous or addictive. (They’ll try, anyway). Instead of buying crack cut with mothballs on some shady street corner, you’ll just go to the supermarket for a Happy Pill[sup]TM[/sup], Now With Less OD’s!
Goodnight. If you think I’m crazy, you’ll have to wait till tommorow to tell me.