🚀 go-pugleaf

Gee, Norm-- I've been reading your posts and I notice (except for the 
unsupported assertion that something I used in argument was strawman) you 
haven't responded to my posts in disagreement with your position. Am I to 
assume you _have_ no reasoned rebuttal? You could, of course, rest inactive by 
staing something like *they weren't worth responding to* but given that I have 
provided detailed counter-arguments to the positions you and others have 
raised, I think that won't exactly wash.

Have at 'er. I've reposted them below (in case you missed them). Go for it. 
------------------------------

NOTE: THIS is the one where you made the unsupported assertion that I was 
interjecting a *strawman*. Care to identify and give your reasons? 

In article <6g6ug4$gai$1@news.sas.ab.ca>, jkodish@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca () 
wrote:

>All those who oppose the Vriend decision are fascists and control freaks,
>and freedom haters. All those who support it, love freedom and have no
>desire to control others.
>That's what it comes down to.

 Your understanding of the issues is pretty shallow, and you know nothing of 
*all those* who oppose the decision. _I_ oppose the decision and I am not only 

bisexual, but the furthest damn thing from _any_ kind of collectivist/fascist 
you care to describe.

It is not properly up to you (or any *majority*) to decide for others who will 

benefit from the fruits of their labours. People who own apartment buildings 
or who run businesses work _hard_ for what they have--and as much as I might 
disagree with choices they make in hiring or renting, it is _their_ property 
and I support their right to choose who will benefit. So it won't be me...so 
what?

I do not need, nor do I want, the government to act as my *bully*, coercing 
people to act as though they believe what they do not. Quite frankly, I prefer 

an honest, out-front homophobe to people who claim such certainty about what 
people like me need to survive that they are willing to use the government to 
push people around.

Laws based on the Vriend decision _are_ based _exactly_ on a desire of the 
*politically-correct* to control the actions of those with whom they disagree.

Or, to make this personal--YOU seem _very_ content to control the actions of 
others.

Ron

-----------------------------------


In article <6g6usb$gai$2@news.sas.ab.ca>, jkodish@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca () 
wrote:

>Rail all you want, but we are closer to democracy as a result.
>

Okay--since you are such a supporter of *democracy uber alles*, try bending 
your mind around these two scenarios....

Scene #1: You and two other people declare yourselves to be an autonomous 
democratic collective--and you decide that all disputes will be decided by a 
vote--majority rules. The other two people decide to kill you. Using 
*democratic theory,* defend your life. (hint: in order to defend your life 
_on_principle_ you *must* resort to arguments based on the rights of 
the individual as being _superior_ to those of a democratic collective)

Scene #2: Majority rule is based on the premise that individuals will not, of 
their own accord and without coercion, do the right thing; therefore it is 
necessary that the majority elect a government.

Well, if individuals will not do the right thing--are not smart enough or 
morally correct enough to make the proper choices--how is it that a number of 
them will magically gain the wisdom to do so and elect a legitimate and fair 
government?

Conversely, if you argue that people _will_make the right decision as 
individuals, why is it necessary to use the democratic method of majority 
compulsion?

Ron


----------------------------


You see, the issue really isn't about homosexuality or acting on a 
prejudice--it _is_ about reserving the ability to take and act on what should 
be private decisions based on ones values. Certainly, it would be wrong to 
force people _not_ to rent to gay folks or not to hire them. What it seems 
most don't understand is that it is equally wrong to _force_ people _to_ rent 
to gay folks or to hire them, too.

Two distinctions have to be made:

One is that the *instigation of force* is wrong. It's wrong to start the 
physical fight, and it is wrong to be the first to cheat. You have $10 and I 
have $10 dollars. I don't give you my $10. Have I _hurt_ you in any way? Is 
there something that you _had_ that has been taken? Nope. You is where you 
was--no better, no worse. Moral: not providing you with something is _not_ the 

same as taking something away. Not providing you with rental accomodation or 
hiring you is _ simply not giving you something. That's different from 
stealing--that's when you _had_ something but you don't anymore. 

You don't like how some people will behave, so you tell the government to pass 

a law making it so people have to do what you want. Fine, you now have what 
you want. Sometime later, a number of folks change their mind--so _they_ vote 
to make it against the law _to_do_ what you want. What can you say about it? 
Not much...it was _you_ who decided to give the power to the government  
rather than protecting the right to make your own decision.

Who's been burned lately? Well--one sort of ironic one was... the anti-porn 
feminists were really astonished and upset when they realized that the laws 
they had supported and insisted on having passed  meant _their_ erotica (porn) 

was subject to the same narow-mindedness they were foisting on men. Ooops.

This is not meant as a slam against feminists--they are certainly not unique 
in this regard. All sorts of lobby groups and issue-based organizations on the 

right, the left and much of what passes for the center are all running around 
hell-bent to get the government to make other folks do what they want them to 
do. And to do so, they are _losing_ the right to act on their own decisions. 
The subject matter is now the province of the state--it has been removed from 
the arena of free choice.

The state can just as easily pass a law making it mandatory that people _must_ 

not rent to homosexuals as it can to make it mandatory _to_ rent to 
homosexuals.

The point is: start taking control of your own life and stop working so hard 
to control the lives of others.

I have no interest in forcing bigots to rent to me or to hire me. Those 
cretins might end up a democratic _majority_ some day--it's happened before, 
and I sure as hell don't want _them_ having power over my rental accomodations 

or job prospects.

Ron