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From: nrh@inmet.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Orphaned Response
Message-ID: <7800331@inmet.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 21-May-85 12:03:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: inmet.7800331
Posted: Tue May 21 12:03:00 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 30-May-85 01:12:52 EDT
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Nf-From: inmet!nrh    May 21 12:03:00 1985


>/**** inmet:net.politics / gargoyle!carnes /  2:21 pm  May 13, 1985 ****/
>In article <> mms1646@acf4.UUCP (Michael M. Sykora) writes:
>>
>>How do you define "racism" and "taxation?"
>
>"Racism" in social-scientific contexts means something like the
>belief that one's own ethnic group is innately superior
>(intellectually or morally) to some other ethnic group.  "Theft"
>usually means an unlawful transfer of wealth.  Taxation, of course,
>is governmental collection of revenues.  

You'll note here that Carnes steers clear of dictionary definitions,
perhaps because I and others have cited dictionaries that had definitions of
"theft" and "taxation" consistent with the slogan "Taxation is theft".
(For example, my "Webster's New World" defines theft as an instance of
stealing, and "steal" as "To take or appropriate ... without permission,
dishonestly, *or* unlawfully, esp. in a secret or surreptitious manner".
I've added emphasis around the word "or" because certain pinheads have
missed the point of it being a disjunction, not a conjunction.  The
"World"'s definition of taxation makes only tangential reference
to the taxation possibly being LEGAL -- as I read the 
definition, one could certainly have illegal taxes).

>To repeat the main point of my article:  Showing that affirmative
>action is or is not racism, or that taxation is or is not theft
>according to this or that definition, does not by itself prove
>anything about the justice or injustice of these practices.  

Not at all, but then that's not the point of a slogan, is it?
The point of a slogan is to START people thinking about a certain issue,
or perhaps to STOP them from thinking about it.  An example of a slogan
that is used to START people thinking about an issue is 
"If guns are illegal, then only criminals will have guns".  The notion
that a law merely makes things illegal, that it does not magically
destroy guns possessed by those who will not go along with the law
was new to me (I was quite young).  

An example of a slogan meant to STOP people from thinking would be
"Zap the Jap".  It conveys no information, makes no new connections
in people's minds.

>"Aff.
>action is racism," "taxation is theft," "profit is theft," "abortion
>is murder," etc. make good slogans but bad arguments, and those who
>use them as arguments only demonstrate that they can't tell the
>difference.  

The words "Richard Carnes" are a good expletive, but a bad name.  Those
using them as a name only demonstrate that they can't tell the 
difference.

Tsk!  Whether it is a good argument or not doesn't say much about
its usefulness in general, does it?  Just because the phrase
"Richard Carnes" doesn't make a good argument shouldn't prevent you
from using it for other things, should it?  The same with slogans --
just because they are not good arguments (in Richard Carnes' view)
should not prevent their use as rhetoric, to start people
thinking of things.

It's interesting, though, that the dictionary definitions of the
words support the notion that "taxation is theft", unless 
one gives the government permission to tax.  That many folks
don't recall giving such permission to anyone is the basis for
a good argument.

						Nat Howard