474: Josh The Jew

[Keith]

"That's what I did. That's what I did. I can live with that."

[Ralph]

I voted yes. Doesn't bother me.

[strafer_praha]

Hypothetically, if you know you're about to die, wouldn't you want to get laid one last time? Well if you're in the military and straight chances are there isn't going to be a woman around. But if you're with a gay guy you know he's going to try and fuck you to get his rocks off one last time.

[MyButtPlug]

What a psycho that Josh the Jew guy is. He seems like a nice guy but c'mon with the Jew bullshit! I can't believe people still take this fairytale stuff seriously. Use your brain, Josh the Jew! Your fanaticism is no different, or less unreasonable, than that of a fundamentalist muslim. And to teach preschool age kids about this crap!? They are impressionable and it is no less than child abuse to indoctrinate them with unfounded and unprovable superstition presented as fact.

In anticipation of being labeled anti-semetic or a nazi, I would say the same thing if a fundamentalistic christian wacko came on the show. Or a psycho muslim, or any other retarded, made up religion.

[ncfcyank19]

How far are you willing to take that? Would you say that to an atheist? Someone who believes in the existence of love? Emotion? Any other scientific "fact" that is only bound to be disproven with time?
Will you then raise your child with no morals at all since morals can't be necessarily proven with facts other than "it's illegal and you'll go to jail or be fined if you do it." What do you teach your kids?

[RawDawg]

Originally Posted by strafer_praha

Hypothetically, if you know you're about to die, wouldn't you want to get laid one last time? Well if you're in the military and straight chances are there isn't going to be a woman around. But if you're with a gay guy you know he's going to try and fuck you to get his rocks off one last time.

I can answer that question in two words....FUCK NO!

[william]

Originally Posted by ncfcyank19

How far are you willing to take that? Would you say that to an atheist? Someone who believes in the existence of love? Emotion? Any other scientific "fact" that is only bound to be disproven with time?
Will you then raise your child with no morals at all since morals can't be necessarily proven with facts other than "it's illegal and you'll go to jail or be fined if you do it." What do you teach your kids?

Wha! Wha! What!?!

Here I fuckin go again...

Explain yourself, Sir.

Morals have zip - zero to theology. Unless, of course, you need some boogy man threatening to punish you if you're a bad boy.

I have a moral code that transcends the need for a theology.

I don't have any gods in my life and I know I am moral in most theological senses. One has nothing to do with another.

Would our current morality exist without theology? Probably not. Is my sense of morality tinged by theology. Definitely. Do I need theology to be moral, to raise my children morally - no. Am I raising my kids with a god boogyman? Nope. The don't even know the word "god."

Laws extend beyond morality and are often (among other things) used to decide on a norm of acceptable group behavior and safety.

For example, in NYC it's illegal not to have your dog on a leash. Is it an immoral act not to do so?

Morality, I offer, is a sociological construct as much as a theological one.

People do not "believe in the existence of love" or "Emotion" or any such construct for they are objective human realities. Question those and you might as well question "air" and "water."

Pray tell, what are these "scientific 'fact'[s] that [are] bound to be disproven with time"? [emphasis added]

[DaveNJ]

Keet didn't know how to explain it, even if he understood the basis of this argument, but here's why Keith is right and Chemda/Josh is wrong:

The Equal Protection Clause is the standard part of the Constitution that is used to apply to the protection of minorities, and is part of the 14th Amendment. It was meant to protect black people when implemented in 1868. However, it set different levels of protection for different groups, and it follows Keith to the letter.

Strict Scrutiny applies to religions, ethinicity, and national origin (also known as the protected classes). Unless you have an amazing and pressing need to do something against a specific group that falls under strict scrutiny, you can't do it. Even the Japanese internment was ruled illegal under this doctrine in Korematsu in 1981. The pressing legal question now is whether America can profile Muslims and Arabs given that they fall under strict scrutiny, as the law to apply to them cannot be narrowly tailored.
Military Application: Jews and Blacks cannot be discriminated against in units because their is not a fundamental necessity to do so in order to save the country, nor can a law doing so be narrowly tailored. One point for Keith.

Mid-Level Scrutiny applies to gender. What this part says is that there needs to be a really good reason. Not pressing, but really good, and it has to have a logical basis. This means the government can have separate bathrooms for men and women because they have a really good reason to do so, even if the application is not narrowly tailored, but according to the Mid-Level Scrutiny, it is allowed to be applied broadly.
Military Application: Women can be shunted away from combat duty because they typically have less upper body strength, making it harder for them to carry their packs. Since this has a logical basis, it can be applied broadly.

Rational Basis Scrutiny applies to everything else, including sexual orientation. Laws that discriminate in this category can be applied broadly to groups as long as they have a, who'd have guessed, rational basis. This allows businesses some degree of age discrimination, and lets states set the laws for adulthood because these rules have a rational basis.
Military Application: Open homosexuals can be banned from the military due to their effect on unit cohesion and possible morale issues, as this rule has a rational basis.



On a side note, I'm the product of an inter-faith couple, and I am Jewish, keep kosher, and plan to see Israel again this summer with my Catholic father and Jewish mother. That being said, Keith is right, Chemda is wrong, and Josh should start hitting those law books a little harder, because if an eighteen-year-old can poke this many holes in his argument, he'd get reamed worse than Nick Starr on a trip to San Francisco in court. Happy Passover.

[william]

Originally Posted by DaveNJ

Rational Basis Scrutiny applies to everything else, including sexual orientation. Laws that discriminate in this category can be applied broadly to groups as long as they have a, who'd have guessed, rational basis. This allows businesses some degree of age discrimination, and lets states set the laws for adulthood because these rules have a rational basis.
Military Application: Open homosexuals can be banned from the military due to their effect on unit cohesion and possible morale issues, as this rule has a rational basis.

Just curious - who does and how is what is rational defined? Is it done by the collective, therefore depending on the ziegeist, it can change? And what are these morale issues? Are the ones accepted universally as part of the human condition ("murder is bad") or are they also part of a collective choice ("homosexuality is bad")?

That's the sort of logic that prevented Blacks from serving with White troops in the past.

[MyButtPlug]

Originally Posted by ncfcyank19

How far are you willing to take that? Would you say that to an atheist? Someone who believes in the existence of love? Emotion? Any other scientific "fact" that is only bound to be disproven with time?
Will you then raise your child with no morals at all since morals can't be necessarily proven with facts other than "it's illegal and you'll go to jail or be fined if you do it." What do you teach your kids?

First of all, william has hit the nail on the head. But I will argue that not only is morality NOT a theological construct, but the Bible is rife with horrendous moral transgressions including, rape, murder, genocide, animal cruelty, etc. that are not only sanctioned or dictated by God but PERPETRATED by Him personally. So there is your moral basis in the Bible. Morality is a sociological and even an evolutionary construct--it is beneficial for the individual to act in a just way and natural selection has supported this type of behavior. Those more likely to act justly are more likely to survive. (for more on this read Richard Dawkin's "The God Delusion")

As for "would you say that to an atheist?": no. Why would I say that to an atheist? Atheists do not believe a fairytale of fiction to be the truth.

Scientific "facts" that are proven to be wrong were theories or hypotheses that, through the rigorous scientific method of gathering eveidence and constantly challenging assumptions, did not bear out truth. The difference is that religion does not search for evidence. The claims are expected to be taken on faith and even the suggestion of subjecting them to reason is seen as blasphemous. Science wishes to evolve and searches for truth whereas religion imposes "false truth" (faith).

What do I teach my children? I teach them to think for themselves.