From: Russell Blackford (RussellBlackford@bigpond.com)
Date: Sun Aug 26 2001 - 00:32:30 MDT
Zero said
>What of the inalienable right to procreate?
*What* inalienable right to procreate?
Actually, I think people should be *free* to procreate if that's what they
want, ie there should be no laws against it. This is a pretty good
ethico-legal principle, at least in first-world nations, and it's part of
the principle of reproductive liberty. However, there's no basis that I can
see for a claim-right, ie that everyone else has to provide you with the
resources to have and raise children.
Of course, you can look at it, not from a rights point of view, but from a
*caring* point of view. Perhaps we should all care for the children in our
vicinity, or our polity, when the first-line of parental care fails. The
emphasis here is not on the rights of the parents but the needs of children
and how we feel about those needs. At that point, there may be a legitimate
role for the state to remove children from parents. But I can see a lot of
reasons (Zero has alluded to one) why this should be done with enormous
hesitation and reluctance. Unnecessary state intervention has done untold
harm in the past.
Russell
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