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From: janw@inmet.UUCP
Newsgroups: talk.philosophy.misc
Subject: Re: Orphaned Response
Message-ID: <117400025@inmet>
Date: Wed, 24-Sep-86 15:56:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: inmet.117400025
Posted: Wed Sep 24 15:56:00 1986
Date-Received: Sat, 11-Oct-86 08:16:04 EDT
References: <865@sunybcs.UUCP>
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Nf-From: inmet.UUCP!janw    Sep 24 15:56:00 1986


[carnes@gargoyle.UUCP ]
>>Procreation rights follow simply from one's right to dispose of one's
>>own body.  That right is so basic that it must be preserved unless
>>you want all other rights to go.  Even the less extreme forms of
>>slavery respect it.  

>Are government-mandated vaccinations and immunizations ever
>justifiable, in your view?  

No.

A good point: the right I claim as basic has already  been  punc-
tured  in  some cases. The reason the populace has permitted this
is, I suppose, that few people saw this as  *damage*  -  and  few
people  make  a  stand on a point of pure principle, or even *no-
tice* it. With sterilization it is quite different,  politically.

Prohibition of Nazi propaganda in the USA would probably not  an-
tagonize  many  people  or  bring democracy down - yet freedom of
speech *is* a basic right on which other rights depend. Damage
to rights is cumulative.

Let me argue against mandatory vaccination  from  an  utilitarian
point of view (which I take to be yours). We were lucky that this
pre-scientific invention turned out all right, so  far.  What  if
all  who  got it died out in three generations - or seven? Had it
been strictly voluntary, *most* people would still have done  it.
It  would still have been enough to prevent epidemics. But *some*
people would stay in reserve.  Of  course,  a  mandatory  program
could  exempt  some people on purpose. An advantage of freedom is
that it produces diversity even when no one thinks of it.

		Jan Wasilewsky