From: lfoard@Turing.ORG (Lawrence C. Foard)
Newsgroups: alt.rush-limbaugh,alt.fan.rush-limbaugh,alt.politics.clinton,alt.politics.bush,alt.politics.homosexuality
Subject: Re: Lifestyle Choices and Secular Reasoning
Date: 2 Jan 93 23:03:23 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: The Turing Project, Public Access Internet Host

In article <C07oBz.F74@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> kellmeye@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu (kellmeyer steven l) writes:
>ecl@cbnewsj.cb.att.com (Evelyn C. Leeper) writes:
>
>>In article <1992Dec30.162502.6756@asl.dl.nec.com> dillhoff@aslws01.asl.dl.nec.com (Doug Dillhoff) writes:
>>Since homosexuality is found in *every* mammalian species, the
>>statement that it is a lifestyle choice is scientifically questionable,
>>but if it is, so what?  Christianity, meat-eating, and monogamous
>>marriage are not dictated by nature--they are all lifestyle choices.
>>Yet I believe that schools should teach that Christians, meat-eaters,
>>and monogamists are peple who may hold different views from the
>>student, but who should not be persecuted because of this.
>
>>All people are asking is that unless you can come up with some
>>*secular* reason for why their lifestyle choice is bad, you grant
>>them the same rights they are willing to grant you: the right to
>>live their life without persecution.
>
>Why is *secular* reasoning superior to religious reasoning? 

I'm sitting 10 feet from a machine that can produce 3d images of your
internal organs, it was designed by secular reasoning.

>Let's take a clear look at a couple of examples of *secular* reasoning:
>
>Hillary Clinton et.al. have reasoned, secularly, that children should be
>given the same legal rights and representation as adults, including the
>right to divorce their parents.  

I totally agree with her, children are not slaves or property, parents are
there to provide for and protect children. 

>If this is true, why is everyone so 
>upset about the young girls left alone in Chicago?  

Because they abandoned there obligations. However by your "religious
reasoning" this would be fine since children are nothing more than 
property and the parents decisions to abandon them cannot be questioned...

>Perhaps the parents
>merely found secular reasons for believing the 9-year old was mature
>enough to care for the 4-year old. 

Or a sign from GOD :)

>Similarly, if a 9,10,11,or 12-year old can divorce hs/her parents because
>of their maturity, then why can't those same mature individuals move in
>with a 30-year old same sex lover?  

Or a 30 year old opposite sex lover?

>If they're mature enough to unchoose
>parents, they are certainly mature enough to choose who they want to live
>with.  The National Man-Boy Love Association would certainly support that
>reasoning.  Why can anyone, secularly, object to pedophilia if the child
>doesn't object?  

Why can anyone religiously object to sex between a 10 and 30 year old
who are married and have sex only in the correct positions? After all
the bible doesn't mention intergenerational sex.

>Or if the "child" no longer exists, legally, because that
>child has been ruled an adult by the courts?
>
>Why is incest wrong, by secular reasoning? 

Because it produces genetic diseases. 

>With so many diverse forms of
>birth control, including genetic testing and legal abortion, it's not like
>biological reasons could possibly hold water anymore.  As long as both
>parties agree, where's the harm?

If two related people want to have sex and not produce kids thats fine
with me. 

>Secular reasoning has found that no human being exists at conception, that
>women have the right to do with that non-viable tissue what they want,
>unilaterally, because men have no right to interfere.  Fine.  Then secular
>reasoning also makes it clear that men are not and can never be parents,
>since they never create children.  

??

>At most, men supply only raw material -
>it is the woman who chooses to manufacture a child. 

True but that doesn't make the father not a parent, after all the
child has 1/2 his DNA.

>If a woman can decide
>to have an abortion for purely personal economic reasons, then her decision
>to have a child must also be based on purely personal economic reasons, and
>there is no secularly logical way she can coerce an involuntary tax out 
>of the man for a decision she makes unilaterally about her own economic 
>future.

Strange I thought men chose to have sex?

>  According to secular reasoning, genetic comparisons are pointless,
>since a man's twin bears the same genetic relationship to the child, yet
>isn't legally bound to support the child manufactured via the use of his
>brother's sperm.  

It might have something to do with the mans twin not having sex with
the woman?

>Currently, anonymous sperm donors can NEVER be legally
>held for child support - what difference does knowing the sperm donor's 
>name make?  

Does it make a difference? If a woman signs the right papers I assume
a known sperm donor will not be held accountable. However it is generally
understood that the result of having sex is both peoples responsibility.

>It's not like he gets any more choice, or makes a child.

"Yes your honor she tied me down and forced me to get her pregnant"

>Do you think this reasoning is crazy?  It's coming to court in New York
>this very month.  And Karen DeCrow, former president of NOW, is on
>record as supporting this reasoning.
>
>What about infibulation, the practice of mutilating female genitalia
>that is common in Africa?  Secularly speaking, we have no right to 
>condemn another culture's practices. 

Who said that? 

>As long as their society finds 
>it acceptable, how can we western Europeans dare to impose OUR moral
>inhibitions on a functioning society?

If this is wrong then I assume you have no problem with secular culture
doing something about religions that teach there children to believe lies
about how the earth came into existance? :)

>That's what secular reasoning gets you.  Sorry, but I don't see how
>secular reasoning is superior to religiously based reasoning.

Ever hear of a strawman?

>You know, this society complains to high heaven about drunk drivers.
>We say they are suffering from an illness (alcoholism) but we punish
>them if they dare to be ill in the wrong place.  

And you won't mind if I puke on the salad bar :-)

>How many people have
>gone to jail for having the flu while driving?  

If you drive while impaired and kill someone you are probably going to jail.

>What if they vomited
>and hit someone, whay aren't they jailed for DWI (driving while 
>influenzaed)?  Then why don't we jail the AIDS infected for condemning other
>people to death by being ill in the wrong place (while have sex)? 

If two people want to go drunk driving on there own property and crash into
each other at 60MPH thats there own business. There is no law against
driving drunk on your own land.

>Especially now that the AZT-resistant strains are obviously being spread
>by precisely these people?  According to secular reasoning, a drunk driver
>and a sexually active AIDS carrier are no different.  

No according to religious reasoning they are no different.
In secular reasoning the idea of consent plays a role. An HIV+ rapist is a
murderer if someone dies as a result. A person who chooses to have sex with
someone who is HIV+ and dies as a result was not murdered.

-- 
------          Join the Pythagorean Reform Church!               .
\    /        Repent of your evil irrational numbers             . .
 \  /   and bean eating ways. Accept 10 into your heart!        . . .
  \/   Call the Pythagorean Reform Church BBS at 508-793-9568  . . . .