Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site brl-tgr.ARPA Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!unc!mcnc!philabs!cmcl2!seismo!brl-tgr!matt From: matt@brl-tgr.ARPA (Matthew Rosenblatt ) Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish Subject: Re: Refuting Abominable Logic Message-ID: <11240@brl-tgr.ARPA> Date: Thu, 6-Jun-85 17:54:53 EDT Article-I.D.: brl-tgr.11240 Posted: Thu Jun 6 17:54:53 1985 Date-Received: Sat, 8-Jun-85 03:19:36 EDT References: <411@oakhill.UUCP> <564@sfmag.UUCP> Organization: Ballistic Research Lab Lines: 33 Statements like "You should not tolerate things that advocate interference in the lives of other human beings" "What do either Jews or homosexuals do that harms other people?" "Thieves/rapists/murderers all do something nasty to other people that they don't like" seem to flow from a morality that assumes as a basic principle something like: "It is wrong to interfere in the lives of other human beings unless they are doing things that harm other people." This may be an admirable principle, and one widespread in the academic and intellectual community, but it is far from universally accepted. In particular, it has not been accepted by liberal constitutional democracy, as exemplified by the United States: You can't use heroin. You can't practice polygamy. You can't grow wheat on your own land for your own use without a Federal permit (Wickard v. Filburn). You can't engage in consensual homosexual acts in Virginia (Virginia law, upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court). If such a principle does not come from civil society, and it certainly does not come from Judaism or (l'havdil) Christianity or Islam, then where does it come from? Who says it's self-evident? Why should Jews adopt such a principle as a tenet of Judaism, especially since it has no basis in our Torah? Why judge other Jews' beliefs, or (chas v'sholom) the Torah itself, for failure to put the liberal idea of "live and let live" as the highest moral value?