Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!caip!sri-spam!mordor!lll-crg!lll-lcc!csustan!smdev From: smdev@csustan.UUCP (Scott Hazen Mueller) Newsgroups: net.politics,net.sci Subject: Re: Population control Message-ID: <144@csustan.UUCP> Date: Thu, 28-Aug-86 17:50:12 EDT Article-I.D.: csustan.144 Posted: Thu Aug 28 17:50:12 1986 Date-Received: Sat, 30-Aug-86 01:00:40 EDT References: <7802159@inmet> <555@gargoyle.UUCP> Reply-To: smdev@csustan.UUCP (Scott Hazen Mueller) Organization: City of Turlock Lines: 38 Keywords: Life tyranny liberty war population Xref: watmath net.politics:18763 net.sci:1562 Summary: Life, then liberty In article <555@gargoyle.UUCP> carnes@gargoyle.UUCP (Richard Carnes) writes: >[Jan Wasilewsky] >>(4) If (1), (2) and (3) were wrong, it would be better to have >>famine, disease and war reduce population, than to submit to >>government tyranny. Losing freedom is losing everything, and a >>government that does not stop at one's skin, will stop nowhere. > >I doubt that Sakharov, Jefferson, Spinoza, Epictetus, or Socrates >would agree that losing political freedom is losing everything, the >*summum malum*. Nor do I think that most people living today in >countries you consider unfree would agree. Would you assert that a >nuclear war that wiped out the human race is preferable to tyranny? >In my opinion that would be a monstrous assertion. > I find Wasilewsky's assertion so very ridiculous that I must insert my own two cents here. To take a case that has been debated in American politics for the past few decades, would you rather be dead, or "Red"? For myself, I would rather live under (and fight) a Soviet tyranny than be a cloud of vapor or some other sort of wartime casualty. I don't like either idea, but I would rather that we all tightened our belts, even at the cost of some civil liberties, than that we should loose the Four Horsemen yet again. Liberty is very important, indeed worth fighting for, but life is more precious yet. If the human race is to survive, we must not destroy our home; if there are people who cannot see this, we may have to use coercion. If it comes down to my life or your liberty, and it very well may do so ... or, if it is your life or my liberty ... it is not possible to always preserve both, and life must come first. As long as there is life, there is always the possibility of liberty. >Richard Carnes \scott -- Scott Hazen Mueller lll-crg.arpa!csustan!smdev City of Turlock work: (209) 668-5590 -or- 5628 901 South Walnut Avenue home: (209) 527-1203 Turlock, CA 95380