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From: greenber@acf4.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.motss
Subject: Re: "Gay Rights"
Message-ID: <11300005@acf4.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 16-Nov-84 14:52:00 EST
Article-I.D.: acf4.11300005
Posted: Fri Nov 16 14:52:00 1984
Date-Received: Mon, 19-Nov-84 02:44:58 EST
References: <214@usfbobo.UUCP>
Organization: New York University
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Nf-ID: #R:usfbobo:-21400:acf4:11300005:000:4041
Nf-From: acf4!greenber    Nov 16 14:52:00 1984

Steve Dyer=>

> No one is saying that life isn't full of hard choices, and that often
> one trades evil for evil in just trying to get by.  But, "What would YOU do?"
> is not an answer to the question of what it takes to live a moral life.
> Rather, it is a question recognizing that you have failed in this instance.

But Steve, this had nothing to do with "what it takes to lead a moral life".
This was an instance where I made a choice, which you rejected (for whatever
reason).  I asked you what you'd do, not whether you feel if this right
or not.  I personally detested my decision.  But I don't feel that I
"failed in this instance".  This instance, as it were, was a business
instance, the sucess of which can be measured in dollars and cents.  I
can not be responsible for my employees sexual preference any more than
I can be responsible for the clients.  Having to choose between one and the
other, I choose the one that would benefit me, not detriment me.


> "What would YOU do" is the moral equivalent of the artist saying to the
> critic, "So YOU do better!"  It is, at best, irrelevant to any discussion
> of ethics.  I have never been in the situation you describe......

No it isn't.  It is the basis of ethics: 'what would you do?' allows us to
see and to examine the petty foibles of our fellow man, and thusly to
exmaine our own.  But here in this net group we have a lot of home/hetero
sexuals all discussing the pros and cons of todays attitudes (whatever they
are) and, for the most part, in theory.  I have presented a case, and
what one person did with that case.  It is not theory, but is real.
The fact that you have never experienced a similiar situation may make
only YOUR opinion irrelevant.  I tend not to think that way, but instead
have asked: "What would you do?", which after commenting on it's
irrelevancy, you then continue:


> If I had been the person offering the programmer to the client, and the
> client refused because the programmer was whatever-the-offensive-group-you-
> may-have, I'd say "screw the money and the client."

And that is how a business closes down.  The first and foremost thing, in
my opinion, is to get your priorities in order.  Are you putting the
"so-called" deviant beliefs of the programmer (he refuses to wear a tie
to the office, or to go out with girls :-)) ahead of both the needs and
wished of the client as well as your own.  What gave this singular 
individual with these not-so-ordinary beliefs the ability to have
"more" rights than the client.  They both have strange attitudes, but you
side with the programmer, at your own detriment.  I side with that
which is to my benefit.  A pity, but nobody from "that" community has
offered to pay my rent lately.


> The client may have the "right" (in a perfect laissez-faire world) to hire
> whomever he wishes, but he doesn't have the "right" to demand my services,
> "purchase" my conscience, and cause me to compromise my basic principles.

But the gay programmer does?? Simply because he is gay I should protect his
rights at my own cost??  Give me a break.......


> I can say one thing for certain: in my case, were I confronted with the
> situation you describe, and I found for whatever reason that I was
> unable to follow the "noble" (what quaint quotation marks) path, I
> would have agonized over it long and loud.

I did.


> I would never mention it in public, and I would NEVER use that shame as
> a way to justify the actions of the client, that one who demonstrated
> my own shortcomings as a person.

Golly, Steve, when did you get to judge whether this is in fact a shortcoming.
Are you stating opinion here, or is this Gospel.  And, although I'm not
particularlly proud of my decision, I still will quote from my
favorite book (_Atlas Shrugged_):

" I swear by my life, and by my love for it, that I shall not live my
  life for the sake of any other man, nor ask any other man to live his
   life for my sake "  - John Galt


Ross M. Greenberg  @ NYU   ---->  allegra!cmcl2!acf4!greenber  <----