4 ms·

> And not just disruptive, but disruptive in a bad way, so bad that it's better (according to some reasonable criteria) to continue with the status quo, at leas

> And not just disruptive, but disruptive in a bad way, so bad that it's better (according to some reasonable criteria) to continue with the status quo, at least for the time being. Hence, it's problematic to pressure those societies to change. Yes. That's a fair characterization. > That seems pretty harsh. Minority rights issues very often involve major social disruptions, and social disruption is often "bad" in its immediate effects -- social violence, strife -- and often has long term effects -- difficult economic shifts and reorganisation as in your description. Minority rights issues are usually borne by groups across generations. The question at issue here is not but rather is borne by individuals or, at the the largest scale, couples. In other words, if you deprive the Native Americans of land and capital, in 20 generations they will still be in poverty. Trust that wage labor will lift former slaves out of poverty and a hundred and fifty years later, blacks will be under far more crushing poverty than whites. Almost all of the minority rights issues in the US have been of this kind. And I would add, particularly regarding racial minorities, our treatment of the issues as individual rights issues instead of problems to be solved by communities and families has been a tremendous part of the problem. Too bad Sherman didn't get his way with his 40 acres and a mule plan. > But where do you draw the line? The same argument would apply -- and, I'm sure, was made -- referring to a society reliant on slave labor. I guess we should stop looking back at Greece and Rome as great civilizations then, right? ;-) Honestly your question is particularly loaded because although slavery has meant many different things in different places, our national experience was with a particularly bad kind. I don't know that merely calling something slavery would be enough. I don't condemn the Greek or Roman slavery systems even though I do condemn the tarns-continental slave trade bringing Africans to the New World. I think you have to ask how slavery fits into society, what structural protections there are for slaves, what incentives there are for freeing slaves, and how the descendants of freed slaves are treated. In societies where slavery is a revolving door and descendants of freed slaves are citizens, I might not condemn that. In a case like the US where descendants were not eligible for citizenship and where slavery was an inter-group, phenomenon with no protections structural or otherwise, yeah I would condemn that, but part of what made that so offensive was the intergroup aspects. American slavery could not have survived in its form if slavery was used as a way to pay off one's own debts for example (as it was in Rome).

morsch 13y ago
So by condemning particular kinds of slavery, you mean to say in those cases it is sensible to pressure another society to change that aspect, despite wide-reaching socioeconomic consequences and the consequential "badness" caused by this disruption. Right? That is, this is where you'd consider drawing the line? And, going back to the previous paragraph, this is fundamentally because these kinds of slavery are cross-generational, that is they persist not just for a group of people but also for their (biological) descendants. This tends to create particularly powerful economic barriers for those discriminated against, so powerful in fact that they persist long after their legal basis has been abolished. Huh! Interesting! So that seems like a sensible argument why discriminating against traits that are inherited -- particularly biologically (e.g. color of skin) but also socially (e.g. religion, ethnicity) -- is especially destructive. Setting aside whether or not or to what degree homosexuality may actually fit in that category, another difference is that homosexuality is not primarily about economic discrimination. I think it's reasonable to say it works on a more fundamental level than economic racial or even gender discrimination -- it's not "you're not getting that job because you're black/a woman", it's essentially "you may not be -- or at least not openly be -- what you are". (I hasten to add that particularly in societies where this more fundamental level of equality is reached, there is also discussion about economic discrimination.)
- einhverfr 13y ago
  > So by condemning particular kinds of slavery, you mean to say in those cases it is sensible to pressure another society to change that aspect, despite wide-reaching socioeconomic consequences and the consequential "badness" caused by this disruption. Right? That is, this is where you'd consider drawing the line? I have trouble imagining such cases which are not effectively intergroup disputes. There seems to be a fundamental difference between enslaving one's own people and enslaving "the other." if there is even a significant portion of one's own people, then protections for slaves become political. If it is fully of another group, then you have an inter-group dispute and that's properly settled between groups. > I think it's reasonable to say it works on a more fundamental level than economic racial or even gender discrimination -- it's not "you're not getting that job because you're black/a woman", it's essentially "you may not be -- or at least not openly be -- what you are". Now you have a problem, which is that identity is complicated and socially constrained. As Michel Foucault pointed out, up until relatively modern times, sexuality wasn't really a point of identity. That leads to the problem of who gets to decide what these constructs of identity are? It seems to me the more fundamental issue is that a concept of heterosexual identity is dependent on an opposition to a concept of homosexual identity and so cultures may accept both as valid identities or simply eschew the whole concept of identification with sexuality completely. It's tempting to look at the latter as homophobic but I am not sure it is more homophobic than the former, for if people identifying as homosexual are insisted to be perpetually a small minority, then they are necessarily "othered" by the distinction.

morsch 13y ago

So by condemning particular kinds of slavery, you mean to say in those cases it is sensible to pressure another society to change that aspect, despite wide-reaching socioeconomic consequences and the consequential "badness" caused by this disruption. Right? That is, this is where you'd consider drawing the line? And, going back to the previous paragraph, this is fundamentally because these kinds of slavery are cross-generational, that is they persist not just for a group of people but also for their (biological) descendants. This tends to create particularly powerful economic barriers for those discriminated against, so powerful in fact that they persist long after their legal basis has been abolished. Huh! Interesting! So that seems like a sensible argument why discriminating against traits that are inherited -- particularly biologically (e.g. color of skin) but also socially (e.g. religion, ethnicity) -- is especially destructive. Setting aside whether or not or to what degree homosexuality may actually fit in that category, another difference is that homosexuality is not primarily about economic discrimination. I think it's reasonable to say it works on a more fundamental level than economic racial or even gender discrimination -- it's not "you're not getting that job because you're black/a woman", it's essentially "you may not be -- or at least not openly be -- what you are". (I hasten to add that particularly in societies where this more fundamental level of equality is reached, there is also discussion about economic discrimination.)

einhverfr 13y ago
> So by condemning particular kinds of slavery, you mean to say in those cases it is sensible to pressure another society to change that aspect, despite wide-reaching socioeconomic consequences and the consequential "badness" caused by this disruption. Right? That is, this is where you'd consider drawing the line? I have trouble imagining such cases which are not effectively intergroup disputes. There seems to be a fundamental difference between enslaving one's own people and enslaving "the other." if there is even a significant portion of one's own people, then protections for slaves become political. If it is fully of another group, then you have an inter-group dispute and that's properly settled between groups. > I think it's reasonable to say it works on a more fundamental level than economic racial or even gender discrimination -- it's not "you're not getting that job because you're black/a woman", it's essentially "you may not be -- or at least not openly be -- what you are". Now you have a problem, which is that identity is complicated and socially constrained. As Michel Foucault pointed out, up until relatively modern times, sexuality wasn't really a point of identity. That leads to the problem of who gets to decide what these constructs of identity are? It seems to me the more fundamental issue is that a concept of heterosexual identity is dependent on an opposition to a concept of homosexual identity and so cultures may accept both as valid identities or simply eschew the whole concept of identification with sexuality completely. It's tempting to look at the latter as homophobic but I am not sure it is more homophobic than the former, for if people identifying as homosexual are insisted to be perpetually a small minority, then they are necessarily "othered" by the distinction.