From: veal@utkvm1.utk.edu (David L. Veal)
Subject: Re: On Banning Private Discrimination
Organization: University of Tennessee Division of Continuing Education
Date: Thu, 23 Jul 1992 21:53:29 GMT

In article <nkghems@fido.asd.sgi.com> dauber@sgi.com (Jeff Dauber) writes:

>In article <archer.127@utkux1.utk.edu> archer@utkux1.utk.edu (T. Archer) writes:

>>So, you anti-liberty types don't believe that individual people are capable 
>>of acting in an enlightened manner, and must be forced to do so by a benign 
>>statist government.

>Actually, what I seem to notice is that almost every libertarian I know
>is a white heterosexual middle-to-upper class male.  Why is this, you may
>ask?  Because these people have never seen how terrible people can be
>to each other.  Since they have never experienced bias, they do not see it
>anywhere.

     Ohhhhhhhh.  Over-generalization.  Nifty...

     I'm quite aware of bias, and how terrible people can be to each other.  
What I fail to understand is why you think that the government is inherently 
immune to these problems?  If people are terrible to each other, then why 
would those people in the government be any better?

>>I am sorry, but I am not willing to accept that.

>I find it hard to believe that an american business would pay women as much
>as men if they were not afraid of a lawsuit (even with the fear of a lawsuit,
>they pay them less).  I do not believe that all store-owners in the south
>would sell to afro-americans if they had any way to avoid it.  

     It's a social problem, but one which is working itself out.  We've got 
problems, and their not going to go away overnight, no matter how many laws 
are passed or how much money is spent.  Society just doesn't work that way.
 
     Many store-owners wouldn't sell to a lot of people.  But would you 
require a jewish storeowner to sell to men who came in wearing swastikas?  
Or black storeowners to sell to members of the KKK?
 
     Or are these "different?"

>The amount of hate that I see for being a gay man, in my day to day life,
>convinces me that given a choice, many many people would be biased against
>me.

     But the government knows better?  The government knows which groups 
should be protected and which groups shouldn't?
 
     The government is made up of people, who are just as fallible as those 
who elected them.  You can't expect things to be magically correct after 
having been grinded through the government.

>All the evidence that I have seen for libertarianism is history which has
>been rewritten to make libertarianism seem like the answer.

     Whether libertarianisn is the "answer" depends greatly on what you 
think the "answer" should be.  If your "answer" is everybody living happily 
and in harmony whether they like it or not, no, Libertarianism certainly is 
not the answer.  It doesn't even claim to be the most good for the most 
people, not really.  It claims to be for individual liberty, period.  It 
hopes to *promote* other froms of well-being in the process, but individual 
liberty is the core.
 
>In an ideal world, libertarianism might work (just like communism might
>work).  However, given the current situation with haves and have-nots, 
>libertarianism would give white heterosexual males the freedom to return
>to the exploitive days of the past.

     U.S.A.  Where fair play is enforced by law.

>As a philosophy, libertarianism is perfect.  However, if you think that
>the general population would behave in a rational manner, you have had your
>eyes shut to human nature for your entire life.

     For the government to force people to act in a rational manner 
(something Libertarians find abhorrent), you must first assume the 
government is capable of operating in a rational manner, devoid of 
prejudices.  Are you going to seriously claim that it is?

     The Libertarians don't claim to be able to solve all the problems with 
their way of running the government.  However, they also don't think anybody 
else can solve all the problems, and considering past history, they've got a 
lot of evidence to back that up.  Basically, they believe government can't 
solve problems that are basically social in nature.  If that's the case, 
then the government trying to solve problems it can't is a waste of everyone'
s time and money, not to mention the havoc it plays with people's rights.

>FWA



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|David Veal  PA146008@utkvm1.utk.edu  University of Tennessee             |  
|                                     Division of Continuing Education    |
| Statistics are any data which can be twisted to support your posititon  | 
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