Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ora!daemon
From: mydog!gcf@hombre.masa.com
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Re: Feminism's ill effects on men?
Message-ID: <9010271727.AA19418@uunet.uu.net>
Date: 27 Oct 90 13:30:47 GMT
References: <655058917@lear.cs.duke.edu> <17931@oolong.la.locus.com> <656123957@lear.cs.duke.edu> <18761@oolong.la.locus.com>
Sender: ambar@ora.com (Jean Marie Diaz)
Organization: O'Reilly and Associates Inc., Cambridge MA
Lines: 50
Approved: ambar@ora.com

judy@altair.la.locus.COM (Judy Leedom Tyrer):

>So, I must ask myself, what is worse - a strong federal government
>that legislates the lives of a divergent group of people, or the
>possiblity that some smaller, more heterogeneous group of people might
>legislate differently than I believe they should.  I think the former
>is more dangerous and less desirable, so I must, to remain politically
>consistant, accept that my special interests also do not belong in the
>hands of our federal government.

>I am not a libertarian.  I believe in government.  But the federal
>government should only provide for a common defense, legislate
>interstate commerce, determine foreigh policy, and collect taxes for
>these functions.  I do NOT want them legislating speed limits, drug
>laws, building codes, welfare, education, art, abortion, etc.  ...

Many people who do not believe in a large role for the Federal
government nevertheless believe that it is advantageous to have
it protect rights.  The writers of the Constitution would seem
to have agreed.  According to Roe v. Wade, the right to abortion
is part of a right to privacy which is similar to, say, the right
of free speech, that is, it is a right which the Federal
government ought to protect.  It is not some kind of special
program or benefit for a selected group of people, and the only
expenditure involved is that which is already being used to 
support the political primacy of the Federal government (that is,
the courts and sufficient military and police forces to compel
compliance, if necessary).

If you are saying that the Federal government has no role in
rights protection, I find this an interesting point of view;  I
believe you would also have to favor going back to the Articles
of Confederation to find a governmental structure which would
conform to this view.

Otherwise -- if the Federal government ought to protect rights --
assigning the abortion question to the separate states implies
that it is a lesser right, or perhaps not a right at all, but
something a state may license some of its citizens to do, if it
chooses.

A similar set of observations could be made about ERA.

May I remind our moderators, who are about to advise us to take
this discussion to talk.politics.theory, that rights protection
has been repeatedly portrayed here as the sole thesis of feminism 
(although not by me); what these rights are, and how they are to
be protected, is therefore a feminist issue.
--
Gordon Fitch  |  uunet!hombre!mydog!gcf