Discrimination in the name of religious freedom

[The Comrade]

[Bauce]

[exploited]

A couple of things.

1. These laws do not suppress freedom. They promote it. The argument that they are simply the most desirable option - or the least offensive option - is just another way of saying that they allow for the most amount of substantive freedom. Saying they result in less freedom is a fallacy, because it relies upon the idea that freedom is best described as simply the recognition of rights, which are nothing more than useful fictions and, in any case, represent the minimum standard by which we should judge a society.

2. The idea that principle should not be argued based upon "hard cases" is incorrect. There is no philosophical principle that is more true than that which is based upon real world observations. To argue the "principle" of the matter ought to mean you are weighing actual options, then reducing them to their philosophical essence, rather than constructing hypotheticals that have no bearing on actual human life.

3. Arguing that segregation is different from allowing discrimination by business is absolutely and irrefutably illogical. They are one and the same. For the most part, it was not forbidden for a restaurant to serve blacks and whites. Other than publically run institutions, there was usually no legal requirement to segregate. It was instead a conscientious choice made by businesses, and when enough of them did it, we called it segregation.

4. I'm glad to see that this has been more or less civil. Keep it up. Also, Medius, good on you for admitting you were wrong in that other thread. Very admirable.

[uebermann]

[Medius]

[exploited]

It is erroneous to argue that I am "creating a right," and in any case, people do not have the right to operate an establishment without first fulfilling certain legal requirements. That is the reality. The idea that I can just go and put a sign out and say "open for business" is antiquated. I need a business license. I need to be inspected. I need a sales tax number. These are prerequisites for running a business, and they do not in any way infringe upon a persons rights, because people do not have the right to do business. Rightly or wrongly, it is a privilege, and has been for decades, centuries even. You are free to associate as much as you want - but the right of government to regulate business is absolute. It is literally codified in the Constitution.

As I said, it only limits freedom if you define freedom as nothing more than the strict application of rights. Meaning that which allows the greatest expression of rights is the most free. This point of view has been utterly demolished - being able to buy a politicians vote is not more free even if it is the ultimate embodiment of your right to association and contract. Other examples are plentiful.

Again you refer to limitations on rights as necessarily freedom-limiting. See my first paragraph - the fulfillment of rights is not the same thing as freedom, as should be abundantly clear by even a cursory review of history. Selling yourself into slavery is not freedom, even if it could be within your rights.

I have not addressed the last two points as we seem to agree.

[Bauce]

[phosphide]

[phosphide]

[eynon81]