[Vision2020] Fwd: Is there a correlation between "Fore Gras" Killing Babies!

[Joe Campbell]

Doug,

This is a tricky set of issues. I woke up at 6 am this morning trying to come up with an adequate response to the moral comparison between fois gras and abortion and it wasn't easy! I'll share that with you later. Right now I want to respond to your challenge.

My response here is easy: No, I will not give $50 a month to the Pregnancy Crisis Center. My reasons are somewhat speculative since I know next to nothing about the Pregnancy Crisis Center other than the fact that you donate money to them. But my guess is that they support making abortion illegal and I am strongly opposed to that idea.

And no I do not think that "human life begins after birth," as you suggest. (More on that in the next post.) Rather, I think that my own moral views have nothing at all to do with whether or not some other person should be allowed to make these difficult choices for him or herself.

I've talked about this at length in Town Crier essays and here on Vision 2020. There are two main points to my view. First, I am a legal minimalist: laws should only be based on clear harms to clear persons. Second, it is contradictory to suppose that you can force -- through threat of legal sanction -- someone to act morally. Moral action requires choice and legal sanctions remove choice. What we need to do is create a culture that enables people to make the right choices and the law is of little use in trying to reach this goal. 

My thoughts about fois gras are similar. Notice I rarely talk about the morality of that issue, I am not in favor (at the moment) of making it illegal to serve fois gras, and I would not give $50 a month to PETA or any similar organization. Nor will you see me protesting against Planned Parenthood or West of Paris anytime soon. Unless I find out that one of them has refused service to gays or lesbians, that is.

Best, Joe

---- heirdoug at netscape.net wrote: 

=============

Joe, 
 
I'm still wondering if you have had any more thoughts about my 
comparison and my challenge to you, Saundra and Megan and any others 
who still think that human life begins after birth. 
 
Time to put your money where your mouth is. It's only $50.00 a month 
and I know that they could use it. 
 
Doug! 

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