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I look upon this philosophically. The more time the City Council spends on debating ridiculous measures like this one, passing them into law, debating them again, and repealing the ordinacne, the less time they’ll have to get into more serious mischief. |
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Written By:
Dave Schuler
URL:
http://www.theglitteringeye.com
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Or could it possibly have been an awakening within the Council to the fact that banning something like foie gras is an unwarranted intrusion into the lives of its citizens and not a proper function of government?
Nah.
Had to be the ridicule. Nanny-staters never understand the latter point, but they really don’t like to be laughed at. It’s Chicago. It was probably pockets being lined that made the turnaound... |
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Written By:
shark
URL:
http://
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So where do libertarian minded people fall when it comes to animals and harm? What is and is not permissible? Are they all just property? What about animals that are not owned by anyone?
I realize that there is no one monolithic viewpoint, but I also know that there is a viewpoint which is more monolithic when it comes to people and harm (though obviously libertarians don’t even agree on the definition of ’harm’):
"you should be free to do as you choose with your own life and property, as long as you don’t harm the person and property of others."
I ask these questions sincerely. Libertarians use lines like:X is an unwarranted intrusion into the lives of its citizens and not a proper function of government. quite frequently without further clarification. I think quite a bit is left out (perhaps conveniently?) when this happens. A lot is left unsaid and unexplored and I question whether libertarianism can ever be as simple or clear as it’s often presented.
I consider myself a proponent of many libertarian ideas but the longer I hang around those ideas, the more cracks I see in the facade.
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Written By:
Grimshaw
URL:
http://
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Animals and harm?
Animals are my food. What’s the harm? |
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Written By:
Scott Jacobs
URL:
http://
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So where do libertarian minded people fall when it comes to animals and harm? What is and is not permissible? Are they all just property? What about animals that are not owned by anyone? I think that goes back to philosophy, specifically the difference between ethics and morality. In my college philosophy class, morality was a subset of ethics that dealt specifically with rules about how you treat humans and higher beings. Mistreating animals is not immoral, only unethical, while mistreating humans is immoral.
Is is moral to hunt animals for food, but it is immoral to hunt humans for food. However, there are ethical restraints on the hunting of animals; it would be unethical to hunt in a manner that maximizes pain, for example.
The issue of libertarianism only comes into play when one considers what laws are reasonable with respect to the treatment of animals.
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Written By:
Don
URL:
http://
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Don,
I don’t agree that morality only deals with human to human interaction (and I think you have the ethics/morality relationship backwards - ethics seems to me to be a subset of morality that deals with a narrower scope) but letting that go and sticking with what you said:
Are you saying it wouldn’t be immoral to kill animals indiscriminately? If I set off into the wild and kill every living thing I see, there is no immorality there?
Aside - I wonder how libertarians come out on the religious spectrum? I really have no idea. I myself am agnostic.
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Written By:
Grimshaw
URL:
http://
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