Satenza

I never used the term wrong, i said offensive both of which are subjective. People beleive it to be wrong because they are offended by it, which isn't grounds for censorship.

Homosexual people don't harm anyone, harm usually is a bad thing. Banning harm would create an overall utility. Harm thats good would suffer although i can't think of a good harm.

Why do they think it's wrong? Doesn't something being wrong entail that action being offensive to them?

Can you tell me how it harms people?

Homosexual marriage doesn't harm anyone though. Which is the key to what should and should not be decided by the majority.

All laws force opinions onto people. Laws against murder force murderers not to murder even though they think they should. Theres no universally accepted law or moral everyone on earth can agree with. However if actions don't harm others then i don't see why anyone should be banned from doing such actions. Whats wrong with refusing gay people marriage is because they are forcing views on something which doesn't harm people. Offence isn't a justification for banning certain things.

On issues that harm other people - yes. The bottom line of the harm principle is a justified tyranny of the majority.

We couldn't all agree of what morals we should hold, although there are a few general ones most of us accept. We as humans are moving forward we could argue as a race, we could also argue we are moving backward as a race which is a very fair assumption. It's a subjective question which would be different for a lot of people, you could justify whats best for society with many different ideaolgies some which work and some which fail due to human nature. Human nature is the most important aspect we need to consider before deciding whats best for society's progression. Ideaolgies like communism in it's rawest form is an ideology for Gods as human nature would prevent this system of working.

Which is another critisism of the principle, which I accept. I do generally beleive harm to be bad, so outlawing the ability to harm others would lead to utility.

If you beleive progress of society to be regress then that is still progressing society to what you beleive to be better isn't it? Thats what i meant.

Yes, but the harm principle is based not on an idealogical level but on a practical level. You can ask the question are there any self affecting actions? Or what constitutes as harm? You need to get the right balance in state interferance. Which is what the principle tries to provide whether or not it suceeds is down to the persons opinion.

Thats why I said what you beleive to be a good progression of society is subjective.

You should be able to ask yourself whats best for society's progress. It's subjective, yes. However if you put aside social predujice then you should be able to see that a minority who hurt no-one should be allowed to do something which harms no one and makes them happy. As a pose too why discriminating against them would help society overall. Would it progress us as humans to be discriminating against other humans? It's a subjective question, yes but i beleive that it wouldn't.

No, but thats the problem with the harm principle. All i can say is that in my opinion it hinders the progress of society. You could take the utilitarian approach and justify whats harmful with what produces the greatest good for the greatest number. Which is just afterall a justified tyranny of the majority.

Well, everything can go wrong, take for example people on welfare who spend the money that should go to their children on alcohol and drugs. It depends how far the state regulates the help they give. Which they should do if they are the ones to be giving the help. For example if i was taking care of a drug abuser i wouldn't give them money. I would think i was helping them but if they then went and spent it on drugs then obviously i would not be helping them. I would need to use the money to buy them things they need like food. I guess the question is how far can the state go into regulating the help they give.

I think it's best to take something like the Harm principle into consideration when asking about this. Prostitution should be allowed - it's between two consenting adults which is therefore a self affecting action and what right does the state have to interfere in that as long as it harms no-one. Pimps on the other-hand would be illegal because they encourage and make money of an inmoral act which is bad for society. Drug traffickers take advantage and profit from the harm they do to others - Therefore it's harmful and wrong and should be banned. Child Labour prevents children from a decent education which would be harmful to them in later life. Therefore not allowed. Assault is obviously harmful and therefore not allowed. Incest is harmful even though it takes place between two consenting adults because the possible child born could be physicaly and mentaly harmed and therefore is not allowed. Being homosexual is between two consenting adults which takes place within the private sphere and harms no-one. It only causes offence to people and offence isn't justification to ban.

I said the law should be blind to social and religious prejudice, that doesn't mean they don't need to help society. If by social program you mean funding poor people for medical treatment they can't afford then I would be for that. As they owe a duty to their citizens. If it's too promote harmful ideas to members of society because of social prejudice then i wouldn't be for it in most cases.

Ah, just the mention of the third man makes me want to watch it. I went to blockbuster a few weeks ago and all they had was recent crap. I wanted to see Volver, they didn't have it. Blockbuster is just mainstream two hour advert films really.

Well, Government social programs they fund usually mirror their own opinion but thats not neccessarily a bad thing as their opinion on some matters are for the good of society. As long as it doesn't advertise any sort of harmful ideas, or any harmful programs to any law abiding citizen then i wouldn't object to it. If they intervene as much as to promote and indotrinate harmful ideas to people then I wouldn't support it nor would I accept their ability to do that.

An example of a social program being paid for and sponsered by the Government? (Just so i have this clear).

I can't see the justification of discriminating against gay people because of a word which entails discrimination. It's not like it's prohibited for a reason other than religious and social opinion which the law should be blind too. As long as it breaks no law, harms no-one else (sure it may cause offence - but thats not justification to ban it) and makes those people happy then why shouldn't it be allowed? Because a word defines it as man and woman?

And as a government which is supposidly meant to be pro-human equality a government institution shouldn't dsicriminate against people for being different to them. As at the end of the day thats is what they are doing.

Wakka it's not a bill that expects to be passed it's one made to highlight how people could see the current law as being ilogical. One reason Gay people arn't allowed marrige is because the can't have children. So this says that opposite sex couples cant marry unless that plan on having children. If you disagree with this you are discriminating against either straight or gay couples. Which the law currently does. It's just to highlight this point to people.

It would make sense from a socialogical point of view. Anything to do with what God wants would have to be a guess whereas if we look at the society they lived in, and what they deemed acceptable it would give us a better idea as to why the bible condems it. The writers of the Bible may have condemed it because of what it did to familys, and saw it was more damging that good and assumed from that God thought of it as bad. Unless you take the Bible as the word of God written by him. You're right i don't know if God wished to condem it universaly despite of the society the people lived in.

I was saying the Bible was quicker to condem it back then because of the type of society they lived in. As in spiritual instead of scientific. so anything that was written as Gods word would be accepted a lot more than it would be today.