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From: Richard Heathfield <rjh@cpax.org.uk>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written,alt.usage.english
Subject: Re: 25 Classic Books That Have Been Banned
Date: Sat, 31 May 2025 04:52:30 +0100
Organization: Fix this later
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On 31/05/2025 04:07, Peter Fairbrother wrote:
> On 31/05/2025 02:43, Richard Heathfield wrote:
>> On 31/05/2025 02:06, Peter Fairbrother wrote:
>>> On 30/05/2025 17:05, Paul S Person wrote:
>>>
>>>> "Freedom from religion" is a dogma of one or another of the 
>>>> religions
>>>> that deny their own nature.
>>>
>>> I don't really understand that, but I think it's freedom _of_ 
>>> religion, in the Constitution.  However, at least to some 
>>> extent, one implies the other.
>>>
>>> Take the Supreme Court decision on abortion as an example. 
>>> Perhaps those judges with strong religious views in the 
>>> subject should have recused themselves.
>>
>> That's a door we probably didn't want opened, but maybe if we 
>> tread lightly...?
>>
>>>
>>> The rest of us * now have to comply with their religion. Is 
>>> that not forced participation?
>>
>> Is it your contention that all atheists are in favour of abortion?
> 
> Goodness no, not at all.

You see the point, of course. If an atheist can decide for 
non-religious reasons that abortion is immoral, so can a 
religious person.

If you were to appoint me to the US Supreme Court (which would be 
a supremely bad idea for all kinds of reasons), I would cast my 
vote against the taking of life, not because I'm a Christian 
(although I am) but because I'm an Englishman, and we English 
root for the underdog.

On one side a tiny unborn child trying to mind her own business 
as she prepares to make her way in the world, and on the other 
side not only a hostile mother but an entire hospital full of 
scary kit employed by giant doctors to hunt her down and fling 
her into the trash bin. No fair! If you don't want a child, don't 
start one. And if Christianity mandated abortion, I would oppose 
it on this very ground.

> As an aside, I don't consider myself an atheist, more an agnostic 
> - I don't believe in any of the  established religions, afaict 
> they are mostly about controlling people rather than a search for 
> truth.

I think that's true, but I also think that a lot of truth has 
been found along the way. Religions have turned up a lot of 
nonsense over the millennia, but plenty of diamonds, too.

> 
> When I was younger I thought even being an agnostic rather than 
> an atheist was crapping out

My brother tells me that he's really an atheist, but he describes 
himself as an agnostic because he doesn't want to hurt God's 
feelings.

> - but as I get older I wonder, why is 
> there something - cogito ergo sum - rather than nothing?

We're all getting closer to finding out.

> As a physicist (I am not mainly a physicist, but) I can see that 
> the universe could arise from nothing - but then why should 
> physics, or mathematics, or philosophy, be that way?
> 
> Or is it just turtles all the way down?  :)

Or do those same turtles swim in an endless cloud of unknowing?

> Anywhoo, as to abortion. In the 60's it became a practical method 
> of birth control, though it had been possible earlier.
> 
> An ex-girlfriend had an abortion - not mine - and she still 
> thinks about it from time to time, 50 years later. At the time it 
> was probably the right decision for her. People die, people kill 
> each other - but is a fetus a people? I don't know.

I would reason that we really ought to find out before we start 
killing them.

> What I do know is that many or most women want the freedom to 
> have an abortion, whether it is the right decision or not. And 
> while the freedoms in the Constitution do not specifically 
> mention that, the fact that there are supposed to be those sorts 
> of freedoms is .. important.

Quoth the Constitution:

"No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise 
infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand
Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in 
the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public 
danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to 
be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled 
in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be 
deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of 
law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without 
just compensation."

"nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or 
property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person 
within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

Due process of law includes the right to a speedy and public 
trial by an impartial jury. The Constitution does not allow 
states to deny people the protection of the law by letting them 
be killed without first being convicted of a capital crime.

> So if a Supreme Court Judge, while smoking a cigar and drinking 
> brandy at a dinner afterwards (it happened), says he decided 
> against that freedom on the basis of his religious belief that a 
> fetus is a people, I can't agree with that.

Agreed.

> If he believes that for other reasons, ok, But for religious 
> reasons, no. That is forcing his religious beliefs on everyone else.

Also agreed. But do we outlaw killing, say, a 6-year-old for 
religious reasons, or because to legalise it would make us evil 
bastards? After we've answered that, we can talk about where to 
draw the evil bastard line.

-- 
Richard Heathfield
Email: rjh at cpax dot org dot uk
"Usenet is a strange place" - dmr 29 July 1999
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