[MD] Christian Ethics and U.S. Law

[Arlo Bensinger]

[Platt]
Please quote where I used Christian ethics to support marriage 
between man and woman.

[Arlo]
On what basis, or ethical system, do you turn to argue against 
legalizing gay marriage? If not "Christian", then what?

[Platt]
But your constant attack on Christian ethics flies in the face of 
religious tolerance, something the Founding Fathers tried to build 
into law. ... Your screeds against making Christian ethics into law 
is intolerance at its best. Do you claim tolerance of the Christian 
Coalition, for example?

[Arlo]
Yes, notice your own sentence... "against making Christian ethics 
INTO LAW". Am I intolerant of Hinduism because I'd also argue that 
their ethical system is not what I want for a basis of law?

What I rail against is someone else's literalized religion used as a 
legal means to control my life. As I said several times, I no more 
want a Taliban telling me I have to live according to Islamic law 
than I want a Christian Coalition telling me I have to live by 
Christian law. I am content making law based on Reason. And leave the 
worshipping to be done in private.

And, for what its worth, I said several times recently that I think 
Christianity can be a valuable metaphor for some. I personally find 
others higher Quality, and that's exactly WHY I don't support ANY 
religion from being the basis for law. This is not "intolerance", 
Platt, it is tolerance at its highest.

Since you yourself claimed the Christian Coalition to be 
"intolerant", I'd have to say I find it hard to tolerate people who 
are intolerant of me. But I am working on it. I certainly don't deny 
them the right to worship or believe as they see fit. But I do draw 
the line when their beliefs legislate my activity. I am not a 
Christian, so I should not have to live according to its "laws". This 
is "freedom of religion", Platt.

I had asked you why you pick and choose parts of the Bible to legislate.

[Platt replied]
I don't know why not. Take the best and leave the rest. We do it all the time.

[Arlo then]
A good philosophy, but not one based in "Christian ethics". Where 
did  God, for example, say "take the best and leave the rest"?"

[Platt]
You are being literal again, something you have also railed against.

[Arlo]
That's just a dodge, Platt. Let's run through it step-by-step.

1. You proposed that our law is/should be based on "Christian ethics".
2. You also propose to select only minor passages out from this ethical system.
3. At that point you no longer have a "Christian ethic" foundation, 
but one of "reason", with God tossed in as authority.

Unless you can tell me how "take the best and leave the rest" is part 
of the "Christian ethic", either as a metaphor or not.

[Arlo previously]
Jesus told people to do Good works, regardless of the "faith" or 
social position of the recipient. But still left God's Grace only for 
those who converted.

[Platt]
Show where he said that in the Bible after you explain what "God's 
grace" means.

[Arlo]
The parable of the Samaritan. "God's Grace" would be "getting into 
Heaven". God did not do favors for infidels, only for the flock.

[Platt]
I never said the Founding Fathers were Gods. Take about distortion.

[Arlo]
I said you deify them in the way you refer to them. In capital 
letters, and with a sense that because "they" did it this lends 
itself an authority of its own. You complained when I compared the 
"Founders" to football players. Heaven forbid the Great and Glorious 
Founders get compared to lowly football players. But never mind, my 
point is only that I don't give a hoot what "the Founders" said or 
did. What I care about is right here, right now. And to that effect 
they did a lot of good things, some amazingly good things (such as 
granting us all the freedoms, based in reason, that we enjoy). But 
they got some things wrong, that we are slowly correcting over time 
(like slavery). In the end, they were just people like you and I. 
That's all I'm saying.

[Platt]
According to you, laws are just metaphors, and there is no such thing 
as "literal truth."

[Arlo]
"Laws" are social contracts we agree to live by so that we can draw 
some betterness than we would without. It is a reasoned position. I 
agree not to kill because I do not want to be killed. I agree to stay 
off your property in the hopes that I can procure my own little 
private island. I drive 55 (er, mostly) because I want others to 
drive safely. I do these things not because a "God" said so, but 
because reason alone tells me it is a better social arrangement.

[Arlo had said]
Without property ownership, there is no "master" as no one 
own  property. You are talking about "controlled ownership", not an 
abolition of property ownership altogether.

[Platt]
Of course I'm not talking about abolishing property ownership 
altogether, Who is besides Marx and perhaps a few other dinosaurs?

[Arlo]
Your condemnation of Marx's decree to abolish private property rested 
on the grounds that without property we are slaves to our master's. 
So of course we are talking about abolishing private property 
outright (if we are talking about Marx).

[Platt]
I'm less free because you own a lake? Are you serious? Just makes me 
work harder in order to buy the lake from you, or your heirs. If that 
doesn't pan out, I'll find another lake, or build my own.

[Arlo]
When I own a lake, you can no longer use it. So yes, your freedoms 
are diminished. As I said, we accept this because you hope to be able 
to buy your own, and so each of us, rather than having two lakes we 
can both fish at, now have one lake only each of us can us. Property 
simply segments us off, gives us islands of exclusive freedom, rather 
than continents of shared freedom.

[Platt previously]
And where are the Indians today?

[Arlo then]
Exterminated in large part and forced to live in otherwise unwanted land.

[Platt]
So maybe their social system, whatever it was, wasn't so hot after all.

[Arlo]
Power and the ability to kill off others does not make one "hot".

[Platt]
Goodness knows they had all the resources to develop a civilization 
equivalent to the  Europeans.

[Arlo]
Sure they did, but they did not see the world as a resource in this 
regard. They were, as Pirsig points out, non-S/O dominant. Pirsig 
wasn't so dismissive of this, saying, "And now he began to see for 
the first time the unbelievable magnitude of what man, when he gained 
power to understand and rule the world in terms of dialectic truths, 
had lost. He had built empires of scientific capability to manipulate 
the phenomena of nature into enormous manifestations of his own 
dreams of power and wealth...but for this he had exchanged an empire 
of understanding of equal magnitude: an understanding of what it is 
to be a part of the world, and not an enemy of it."

For Pirsig, this non-S/O "part of the world" was of equal magnitude 
as our S/O power and rule.

[Platt]
Or, do you consider Europeans and Americans less moral altogether than Indians?

[Arlo]
I consider the Amerindians, as did Pirsig, to be a people not caught 
up in S/O dualism. They "got it right".

[Platt]
Keep in mind that Indian tribes also fought one another and devised 
exquisite forms of torture, not to mention the practice of scalping.

[Arlo]
So it seems the Zen Buddhists are the only ones worthy of our total admiration.