At what point should what you want to do be legal.

[SteelPenguin]

I was reading a couple posts and I got to thinking...I know...Always a bad idea...

How many people, let's say what percentage of people or a number, is necessary to make something legal?

Plenty of Christian Fundamentalists will argue against Gay Marriage, or Abortion, based on their religious belief's which are contrary to mine, and many other's here. Now, I hope, that we can all agree that they don't have a right to tell anyone what to do, based on THEIR beliefs. We might argue that their religion can't be the foundation for our laws.

Now if they argue that Christian morality is the foundation of plenty of other laws, including say Murder and Robbery, how would you respond?

If we agree as a society that something is harmful to the society, then at what point (or percentage of people) should that become a law? Should it only apply to what directly affects other people in some way? How can that be proved? What should be a basis for our laws that adequately protects us all from the actual harmful elements of society, yet still protects the incredibly small minority's right to do something which doesn't hurt us but we find icky, weird, strange, or downright wrong?

[Mythsaje]

1. Most cultures that have no basis in Christianity

also find murder and robbery to be wrong.

Personally I don't think anyone's book of folklore should be the driving force behind law and social conscience.

[SteelPenguin]

4. I agree

Yet how do other cultures do it? We have laws, and those laws may or may not have roots in religion, but if we take the religious argument out of it, how do we accurately determine that something is right or wrong is my question?

I wholeheartedly think that religion should be kept out of the decision, but without some other book telling us what to do as a society, what's a reasonable expectation to allow something.

Say we had a plant called a 'widget' and a certain percentage of people wanted to be able to smoke that 'widget'. They enjoyed smoking it, and found it relaxing. Other people thought it caused harm, led the widget smokers to commit other crimes, and was otherwise bad, all from a non religious standpoint.

Who's right and who's wrong, and how do we decide to make widget smoking legal or not.

Same for any other issue from gay marriage to abortion. If 20% of the population wants to smoke widget why should the 80% say they can't?

Yet for murder say one in a hundred wants to be able to kill people with no ramifications. The other 99 say no way jose. What if it wasn't murder it was just one guy who wanted to smoke widget?

Is it limited by causing harm to others?

[Mythsaje]

9. Well, in a culture where the one substance that's been proven

to lead to more crime than all other substances combined, a substance they tried to ban without success, is still legal, it seems a bit odd to continue criminalizing the "widget" when no real evidence exists to suggest it leads to any crime at all.

Disinformation and propaganda doesn't count.

[TomInTib]

2. Screw "legal". I have it worked down to "justification".

My creed has always been, "Sure, why not?".

[SteelPenguin]

6. So basically...

Everything is fine, unless you can prove some sort of harm from it?

[TomInTib]

13. As long as no innocent being is harmed, yes.

I have no problem with "harm" as long as it is well-directed.

But I have always lived by my own set of rules.

Right and wrong, that's pretty much is it as far as I am concerned.

And I, alone, will decide what is right or wrong for me.

"Legal" just means that someone else has attempted to make a decision for me.

I am not some animal in a circus.

[SteelPenguin]

16. I agree with your distinction, a question though.

Legal is separate from Right. One is your own internal compass, and the other is societies. This is my question though. How we can translate our own gut of right and wrong, into a societal rule.

How do we define harm though? Physical? Mental? Monetary? Emotional? Do we limit it to actual harm, and not potential harm?

[TomInTib]

19. Man, that's too heavy for me.

I live in the moment.

[dmallind]

3. Woah - unchallenged tautology there

Since when did forbidding murder and robbery become exclusively or even primarily Christian morality? Murder and robbery were illegal in any sufficiently advanced civilization before Christianity, and remain so in non-Christian societies.

Simple evolution-driven cooperation in a gregarious species - humans - is more than sufficient to explain the prohibition of such acts and ALL basic human morality as it concerns not harming people and property. The only moral codes that came out of religion in general, let alone Christianity specifically, are those which control, and in most cases artificially so, manners and etiquette, not morality. Religion tells us we shouldn't booze on Sunday mornings. Humanity tells us we shouldn't kill or rob.

[SteelPenguin]

5. I agree, yet

What if people's 'humanity' tells us different things?

What if your humanity says that it's wrong for two men to marry, but mine says it's fine. What our 'humanity' really is there is our gut. Our natural instincts, which I agree is where our general gregarious nature is derived from. If we didn't intrinsicly want to be good and nice to other people we'd never be able to form societies at all.

Beyond murder though, how does that apply to any other more specific examples. If your humanity says that abortion is not murder, but mine does, who gets to tell the other what to do and why?

[Jim__]

7. I think there are at least 2 cases.

The US has a constitution so that no majority can pass a law that takes away a basic right (but, of course, we change what we consider to be a basic right by amending the constitution).

I believe any activity that is not considered a basic right can be outlawed by simple majority (whether a majority of city, state, or national representatives depends on the scope of the law).

It seems like a reasonable, but not perfect, system to me. We might find a better system, but we're not going to find the perfect system.

[SteelPenguin]

12. Doesn't that harm the minority though?

The tyranny of the majority. Wouldn't that allow the 51% to completely opress and destroy the 49%? Shouldn't there be a different way to determine what should be allowed or not, than just the simple gut feeling of a majority?

[Jim__]

24. It doesn't allow 51% to completely oppress the 49%.

Rights are protected by the Constitution which can only be changed by a (very hard to get) super majority. Short of getting a super-majority, it is up to the Supreme Court to interpret the Constitution. Supreme Court justices are appointed for life to protect us from having our freedoms interpreted away by a momentary majority opinion.

Is it possible for the rights of a minority to be unjustly violated? Yes. The idea behind the Constitution is to make that hard to do. With an intelligent, educated and aware populace, the Constitution is a pretty good protector of rights.

I think you might come up with a better system; but I also think it would take an awful lot of thought coupled with some practical experience.

[mark414]

8. people should be able to do anything that causes no direct harm to others

me murdering somebody is me infringing on their right to liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

me robbing somebody is me infringing once again.

two guys getting married doesn't do anything to anybody, unless after they wedding they go on a murder/burglary spree

and religion has nothing to do with any of this - even if the Bible were true (which it isn't), our system of government is derived from the Constitution and the Constitution alone. if people want to live in a country that makes laws based on what some crazy book says they can go live in Saudi Arabia.

[SteelPenguin]

14. Is it limited to physical harm

murder and robbery obviously physically affect a noncompliant party, yet what about other indirect harm.

I know that some people argue that gay marriage harms them. I've never really understood how, but can there be a situation where a person or persons actions could indirectly harm or affect another person's life? Are we only talking physical harm? What about emotional, mental, or monetary?

Then, we add in situations which might not directly affect another person, but COULD. Like drunk driving. Getting wasted and driving around in your car won't necessarily kill a mother and put her 11 year old daughter in a coma with 2 broken legs and a punctured lung, but it could.

So now we're adding in that you can do whatever you want, as long as what you're doing doesn't directly harm someone else, nor cause a reasonable chance of causing harm to someone.

[mark414]

22. well, that is just one example

on an issue that is thoroughly too complex for an internet message board. and i will grant that i was very general with my statement.

as far as emotional or mental harm...what sort of examples do you mean? just calling somebody names or saying mean things to somebody?

and drunk driving is the perfect example of the phrase "it's not illegal until you're caught." not that i would ever endorse legalizing drunk driving.

i guess what i meant when i said "do anything that doesn't harm somebody," i was thinking of examples like:

- gay marriage
- smoking pot/doing drugs in the privacy of your own home
- sleep outside on public land (you would be surprised how vicious people and authority figures get about this)
- have any kind of consensual sex you want, up to and including prostitution
- etc.

[TahitiNut]

10. Unless over 95% willingly comply, we probably aren't willing to pay enforcement costs.

When a law is willfully ignored and violated by 5% or more of the population and law enforcement isn't funded and staffed to uniformly enforce the law, we get selective enforcement. That means a lack of even-handedness that comes down most heavily on the poor and minorities, further creating a class-oriented way of life in our society ... which is inimical to democracy.

It doesn't take a genius to know how "Driving While Black" came about.

[Totally Committed]

11. Simple --- All Civil and Human Rights should be "legal"...

For ALL Americans. Period.

TC

[SteelPenguin]

18. How do we define those though?

What if you think it's a basic human right for two men to get married to each other if that's what they want to do, but 51% disagrees with you and feels it's not a basic human right? Why do they get to tell you that it's not?

[Totally Committed]

20. Anything a rich, white, heterosexual, Christian Male can do, everyone should be able to do.

And, that INCLUDES having complete and sole say over what he does with his own reproductive organs, getting married to someone he loves, and having the color of his skin taken for granted.

TC

[SmokingJacket]

15. Whether or not it infringes on the rights of others. nt

[SteelPenguin]

17. What about some specific examples

If you drink a six pack and then drive to the store to get some more, are you infringing on the right of others? If you don't hit anyone you're not actually causing any physical harm to anyone.

Yet are you increasing the overall level of 'danger' on the road? Is it a right of others to expect a certain level of safety from people operating motor vehicles? How does that translate to other activies and how do we define that level of safety, and who defines it and how?

How can a majority acccurately define these rights while protecting the minority?

[Jim__]

23. Well, taking the example that you give ...

... driving on public roads is not considered a right. Therefore, the state has lots of leeway in regulating driving, and I certainly don't object to the state having the authority to have rules about not driving under the influence of intoxicants and setting levels for what is considered under the influence.

As to who defines what are basic rights and what are not, the Supreme Court ultimately gets to interpret the Constitution as to what activities the government can regulate.

In cases where there are controversies about the constitutionality of certain laws, a super majority can make the Constitution specific. But, those super-majorities are very hard to come by; so, a lot of weight falls on the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court has ruled that we have a right to privacy. I agree with that. I think that offers us lots of protection from the government. Of course, many people argue that the Constitution does not give us a right to privacy. I'd like to see that right explicitly listed in the Constitution.

[Quantess]

21. I think in order to get a good discussion going,

you'd have to it narrow down to one issue.
There are so many possibile issues to fight over. And plus, some of them will get extrememly polarized responses, partisan based, but other issues will be split down the middle.

I thought of one: How about a woman who gives birth to a string of fetal alcohol children? Apparently, that's still legal.

[Az]

25. We are a Republic

We are not mob rule democracy. We are a Democratic Republic. We vote for our representation but our rights are guaranteed by the Bill of Rights. And in theory it doesn't matter how many people gang up against a minority they cannot take their rights away.

In Theory.

[yardwork]

26. First, Christian morality is NOT the foundation of laws agaisnt murder and robbery.

Moses brought the Ten Commandments to the Jewish people thousands of years before Jesus was born. Plenty of other ancient religions had laws against murder and robbery, all the way back into the mists of pre-recorded time. Christianity is a relatively latecomer to the list of global religions. Maybe you didn't know that.

Second, are you suggesting that queer people are "an incredibly small minority?" You're wrong. We are everywhere. We are legion. We are your neighbors, teachers, firefighters, secretaries, bank loan officers, doctors, attorneys, senators, children, parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, best friends, etc.

Finally, I'm sorry for you if you consider my love for my same-sex partner to be "icky, weird, strange, or downright wrong."

I might ask at what point queer people - and the many non-bigoted straight people - might decide that stupid bigotry should be illegal?

[porphyrian]

27. Laws are made and changed in Congress.

If you want something legalized, you've got to go through them. Congress doesn't respond to simple suggestions, though. They can even ignore angry mobs (or have them arrested, if necessary). They pretty much only respond to money and things that further their career. So, if you're rich or can make people in Congress rich, you can get laws made. And that, kids, is why we live in a fascist nation today.

[soothsayer]

28. We should be allowed to make adult decisions and be allowed to do ANYTHING that does

not injure others. The gov't should stay out of most things it's stuck its nose in.