Marriage

Gnomon wrote:

Averroes wrote:

We all feel that prostitution is wrong, but then how do we discriminate between promiscuity and prostitution?

This is the perennial dilemma in a free and open society: how do we draw the line between personal opinion and public policy? Majority rule is the easy way, but is often unfair to minorities. So the democratic solution is public debate and, hopefully, a meeting of minds, not in the exact middle, but in a compromising position.

Yuk! It sounds pretty bad when I put it that way.

Sounds like dialectics to me.

Aaron wrote:

Sounds like dialectics to me

Yes, it is a dialectical process. But no, it is not dialectical idealism, or historicism.

This is the major confusion that often people get into. Surely human beings think in terms of dialectics--but the positions that we take (or ones that unfold through time in history) are not necessarily logical contradictions of each others, and the synthesis that emerges is not necessarily a brigde between the opposite extremes. This is where Hegel's metaphysics goes awry, this is where Marx got his determinist laws of economy and history wrong, and this is where any and all psychological thought, based upon dialectical idealism/historicism/materialism, would necessarily go wrong.

I pretty much agree. Dialectical systems are rarely made up of exact and equal opposing forces, and when they are, they tend to cancel each other out. I think Hegel's view of dialectics was too simplistic in that regard and his application of dialectics to macro historical movements was also misguided.

Having said that there is much truth and value in the dialectical perspective IMO. It just needs to be applied properly for it's true value to be taken advantage of.

Averroes wrote:

Quote :

Would you actively dissuade your own daughter (say, 21 yrs. old) from becomming a prostitute or a stripper and paying here way through college--and lets just assume that there are no threats of violence or legality involved?

Given your caveat, and if she was going into it with the surity that she'd be working in a safe environment (which would be greatly facilitated by it being legal), and that she had a plan if she got pregnant, no I wouldn't try to disuade her. It'd be like the difference between making a typical prurient porn flick, or something of quality with meaning.

That doesn't mean I wouldn't have a negative gut reaction--I can't completely erase how I was raised. But I would steel myself for her sake to her rational decision, as I'd hoped my parents would have for me with my deism.

As I see it being a prostitute is perhaps the most honest profession in the world. All jobs, in one way or another, revolve around screwing people - at least prostitutes are up front about it.

Paineful Truth wrote:

Given your caveat, and if she was going into it with the surity that she'd be working in a safe environment (which would be greatly facilitated by it being legal), and that she had a plan if she got pregnant, no I wouldn't try to disuade her. It'd be like the difference between making a typical prurient porn flick, or something of quality with meaning.

That doesn't mean I wouldn't have a negative gut reaction--I can't completely erase how I was raised. But I would steel myself for her sake to her rational decision, as I'd hoped my parents would have for me with my deism.

I've new found respect for you. Finally we have someone with enough moral fiber in them to give an answer that we all have been hinting towards but did not have the courage to say out loud.

Uriah wrote:

As I see it being a prostitute is perhaps the most honest profession in the world. All jobs, in one way or another, revolve around screwing people - at least prostitutes are up front about it.

Yes, we could say that there is honor in that profession subject to one qualification: A prostitute that knowingly fucks married men (without the consent of their wives) is an immoral woman, with her trade being nothing but fraud. I believe in the legalization of prostitution (along with the abolition of state mandated marriages and marital privileges), but with stipulation that it be required that a prostitute's customers show proof that they are not bounded to a woman by an exclusive contract of sexual loyality. This of course is not to impinge on anyone's freedom but to protect the (marriage) contracts whose primary purpose is to provide a safe and loving environment for the welfare of the children.

Quote :

Finally we have someone with enough moral fiber in them to give an answer that we all have been hinting towards but did not have the courage to say out loud.

A logically incorrect supposition.

Logically incorrect, for it suggests that those who haven't given an answer that you think we've been hinting towards are lacking in courage and moral fibre.

I'm not saying i'm a paragon of courage and moral fibre all the time but I can assure you my response, or lack thereof in this string, has nothing to do with moral fibre or courage, but is primarily time commitments, to be honest, in fact I'm being called away to the dishes as we speak!

Quote :

All jobs, in one way or another, revolve around screwing people - at least prostitutes are up front about it.

As a joke that's worth a chuckle as a statement of course it's just plain incorrect.

I wouldn't say it's an axiom of truth, but I would say there's enough truth in it to make it poignant and funny.

What say you to this?


Cost of coitus: Male monkeys pay for sex

1 day ago

PARIS (AFP) — Selling sex is said to be humankind's oldest profession but it may have deep evolutionary roots, according to a study into our primate cousins which found that male macaques pay for intercourse by using grooming as a currency.

Michael Gumert of Nanyang Technological University in Singapore made the discovery in a 20-month investigation into 50 long-tailed macaques in Kalimantan Tengah, Indonesia, New Scientist reports on Saturday.

On average, females had sex 1.5 times per hour.

But this rate jumped to 3.5 times per hour immediately after the female had been groomed by a male -- and her partner of choice was likely to be the hunky monkey that did the grooming.

Market forces also acted on the value of the transaction.

If there were several females in the area, the cost of buying sex would drop dramatically -- a male could "buy" a female for just eight minutes of nit-picking.

But if there were no females around, he would have to groom for up to 16 minutes before sex was offered.

The work supports the theory that biological market forces can explain social behaviour, the British weekly says.

"There is a very well-known mix of economic and mating markets in the human species itself," said Ronald Noe of France's University of Strasbourg.

"There are many examples of rich old men getting young attractive ladies."
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5gUTyYpPmEHzLP5a_rDsPDkGv8aXA

Free Will and Morality be damned, we're just slightly more complex than a horny monkey.

Quote :

Free Will and Morality be damned, we're just slightly more complex than a horny monkey.

That is how tyrants and monster think and operate.

If all you see is that we're animals then clearly damn morality.
Chimps also rape and murder; humans do that to. I guess it is only normal ain't it?

There is another thing that apes and monkeys do when they grow up; they end up mating with their own mothers. Would that come naturally to you as well? I'm only asking because apparently in your opinion we're slightly more complex than other primates? I wonder if that slight more complexity does make any difference in your opinion in which case I don't think you can damn either freedom or morality so dismissively. No disrespect meant, mate.

Don't take it so personal, I was only slightly kidding. Should I have put a after my statement? Either way, there is truth to it. Morality, and even the purely abstract idea of Free Will, are just figments of our imagination. Humans like to pretend we are special, that we are not animals, that we are somehow, in someway, above them.
I find that to be more of the same hubris that causes us to view the environment with a utilitarian mindset.

All this talk of morality, condemning prostitution and sexual promiscuity because of some altruistic moral philosophizing, means absolutely nothing. It's all bluster, and subjective wrangling. The reality is that humans are dirty, stinky, mother-loving animals. We always have been, and always will be. There's no reason to ignore it, to deny it, just because we've decided that we are creatures of reason and logic.

Perhaps civilization has squelched much of our animalistic tendencies, those "libidinal instincts" Freud spoke of, but laws and moral frameworks exist for good reason, they exist to keep people in line, because most people are only slightly more complex than a horny monkey.

We rape, we kill, we commit a myriad forms of sexual deviations running the gamut from merely kinky to outright obscene, we oppress, enslave, and brutalize our own without so much as a second thought, and even our highest human ideals are based on the sublimation of our more animal, our innate, desires and motivations.

I can dismiss free will and morality so quickly because they are nothing but abstract ideas, neither is a concrete, solid, living thing. We foist those ideals upon ourselves so that we may better operate within a cultural context but underneath that onion skin facade of civilization is a hedonistic, self-serving, and predatory animal.

I'm not saying we should abandon civility, and forgo moral schema within culture, but we should never lose sight of the fact that we are animals. Organisms who are driven, not by god and lofty spiritual, metaphysical, powers, but by biology and those penultimate needs of procreation and self-preservation. We should, I think disabuse ourselves of the idea that we begin close to god, that we start out on this human journey as civilized, moral beings who only become immoral if we fall prey to vices or bad ideas. In fact the exact opposite is true, we begin as animals with the capacity for thought - but any honest look at our species should tell you that the quotidian mass rarely strives for anything more than that.

You're right Tyrants and Monsters do operate that way. Why? Because it works on the most basic level. Perhaps that's why there are more successful Tyrants and Monsters in human history than great teachers. Perhaps that is why we seek death so efficiently, so pervasively, and perhaps that is why we are - as a collective species - so full of our own BS.

Deism, I think, has it right because it acknowledges the need to strive for reason, respect, and critical thought, but that's also why it fails as a religion, or even as cultural belief system, and is instead more of philosophical ideology. Most people don't want to think, that's too much responsibility, they'd rather just follow the leader.

So that, I think, is the best place to begin talk about morality. Instead of discussing what is and what isn't moral, we should talk about why this or that is moral or immoral. Why is this action valued, and that one vilified. There are no absolutes, not really, morality is not an immutable law of the universe.

Uriah wrote:

So that, I think, is the best place to begin talk about morality. Instead of discussing what is and what isn't moral, we should talk about why this or that is moral or immoral. Why is this action valued, and that one vilified.

After a harrangue you just came back to square one: why is (fill in the blank) an act wrong? It would appear that your refuge in mankind's animal ancestory and drives was just an act of rational evasion from justifying one's belief and actions, which you complain that the majority of mankind don't do. And then you came back to asking the same question, albeit worded differently: "Why is this action valued, and other villified" ?

Quote :

There are no absolutes, not really, morality is not an immutable law of the universe.

There are no absolute standards out there written down on a tablet handed down to Man. But there are absolutes within human nature discoverable by rational tought. However, the nature of their absolution is not objective but subjective. Morality is based upon the universality of subjectivity of all rational beings.

This leads towards another discussion. If you like we can debate this issue on a seperate thread.

I was not taking refuge in anything, just attempting to show how much of all that moral philosophizing is just meaningless talk.

Why is prostitution immoral? Well, it isn't. You can say it is because it doesn't fit your idea of cultural ethicality, but that's all it is: Just your idea, and it's an idea that is more affected by abstract civilizational constructs than it is by reality. Reality is that the sexual urge, and the urge to secure physical comfort and security, are deeper and more powerful than your moral ideals, or any person's moral ideals. At the end of the day it's just about survival, and that's what animals do - or they do not.

Averroes wrote:

There are no absolute standards out there written down on a tablet handed down to Man. But there are absolutes within human nature discoverable by rational tought. However, the nature of their absolution is not objective but subjective. Morality is based upon the universality of subjectivity of all rational beings.

This leads towards another discussion. If you like we can debate this issue on a seperate thread.

If you'd prefer, I think this is as good a place as any.

I'm curious as to what you think constitutes a 'Rational Being' though. If you accept, as I am stating, that most humans are not 'Rational Beings' than I'd say we really have nothing to debate, but if you're asking me to accept that being human means being rational, then I'd say we have quite the wrastlin match ahead of us.


(and btw, please don't be offended by my sarcastic, sardonic, or dark sense of humor. I am not trying to sound like an ass, I just do sound that way naturally. It's a gift.)

Averroes wrote:

A prostitute that knowingly fucks married men (without the consent of their wives) is an immoral woman, with her trade being nothing but fraud. I believe in the legalization of prostitution (along with the abolition of state mandated marriages and marital privileges), but with stipulation that it be required that a prostitute's customers show proof that they are not bounded to a woman by an exclusive contract of sexual loyality. This of course is not to impinge on anyone's freedom but to protect the (marriage) contracts whose primary purpose is to provide a safe and loving environment for the welfare of the children.

The protection of a "safe and loving environment for the welfare of children" is the responsibility of the parents. It is not the responsibility of the prostitute! Did she acquire her customer at the end of a gun? He is responsible for the sanctity of his marriage!

Blaming the sex worker for the moral failings of her clientele is a cop-out better reserved for the person in need of a scapegoat - the cheating husband. You should not provide an alibi for him.

Uriah wrote:

Why is prostitution immoral? Well, it isn't.

I never said that it was. I've consistently maintained that it is not immoral. In my diction adultry (that is, cheating on you wife or girl friend) or rape etc. are immoral. Prostitution does not come remotely close to immorality. I was simply asking the question whether or not it ought to be acceptable as a proper and decent form of livelyhood. I further equated prostitution with promiscuity, and I don't consider promiscuous behavior as wrong or immoral either--on its own. However, I remain perplexed by the fact (and it is overall demonstrated) that promiscuity (of which prostitution is part of) has resulted in the break down of families, which has resulted in a lot of social problems. So the question had always been whether or not "promiscuity" is a cultural good or not?

The issue of prostitution was at best a side step, and only became contentious because some of the participants disagreed with my equivocation of prostitution with promiscuity. But I never said that either of them were immmoral.

Uriah wrote:

If you'd prefer, I think this is as good a place as any.

I'll start a new thread on the subject. I just feel that this discussion on marriage is too important in of itself to diverge on a tangent.

Uriah wrote:

I'm curious as to what you think constitutes a 'Rational Being' though. If you accept, as I am stating, that most humans are not 'Rational Beings' than I'd say we really have nothing to debate, but if you're asking me to accept that being human means being rational, then I'd say we have quite the wrastlin match ahead of us.

It has been my experience that most of the disputation often occurs because the contenders often have very different conceptions and definitions of words employed. I think that once we clear the rubric, there would'nt be much disagreement between us.

Uriah wrote:

(and btw, please don't be offended by my sarcastic, sardonic, or dark sense of humor. I am not trying to sound like an ass, I just do sound that way naturally. It's a gift.)

None taken mate

Quote :

The protection of a "safe and loving environment for the welfare of children" is the responsibility of the parents. It is not the responsibility of the prostitute! Did she acquire her customer at the end of a gun? He is responsible for the sanctity of his marriage!

I didn't mean to say that the prostitute is responsible for the welfare of the children. I meant to say:

1. A prostitute has a moral obligation not to knowingly participate in a sexual trade with a person who is contractually committed to another. To do so would make her like the get away driver for a bank robber. She doesn't commit the crime but participates in it by aiding and abetting. The same goes for the folks that sleep with married men or women, even as they themselves are single.

2. Marriage is a contract worth protecting because it's primary reason is to provide a safe haven for children to grow up. Thus I see no harm if the law stipulated that a prostitute asks her clients or makes them sign a document etc., that states that they are not married or in a committed relationship with another.

And by commitment I mean agreements of sexual exclusivity, which means that men and women in open marriage contracts would clearly be excluded from this restriction.

Averroes wrote:

Uriah wrote:

Why is prostitution immoral? Well, it isn't.

I never said that it was. I've consistently maintained that it is not immoral. In my diction adultry (that is, cheating on you wife or girl friend) or rape etc. are immoral. Prostitution does not come remotely close to immorality. I was simply asking the question whether or not it ought to be acceptable as a proper and decent form of livelyhood. I further equated prostitution with promiscuity, and I don't consider promiscuous behavior as wrong or immoral either--on its own. However, I remain perplexed by the fact (and it is overall demonstrated) that promiscuity (of which prostitution is part of) has resulted in the break down of families, which has resulted in a lot of social problems. So the question had always been whether or not "promiscuity" is a cultural good or not?

The issue of prostitution was at best a side step, and only became contentious because some of the participants disagreed with my equivocation of prostitution with promiscuity. But I never said that either of them were immmoral.

Aha, well. The good or bad (morality or immorality) of promiscuous sexual behavior is something that would be relative to a respective culture. I am reminded of a classic SciFi story by Robert Silverberg entitled The World Inside where extreme sexual promiscuity is one of the main tenets of the reigning social structure. It has, essentially, replaced religion in this future earth.
As well many modern evolutionary biologists now point to general female promiscuity as being a primary means by which small, disparate, and nomadic groups of humans were able to inject new genetic material into the tribal group. A practice called ‘Bride Kidnapping’ – which is still widely conducted in many parts of the world, is seen as a patristic version of the same behavior.

It just so happens that in our respective culture, and for a variety of reasons – not all of them revolving around religion, or puritanical social mores – promiscuity is not a cultural good. That point however, is purely subjective and there is no way one could state unequivocally that promiscuous sexual behaviors are always bad for any given culture, nor always good.

Averroes wrote:

Uriah wrote:

If you'd prefer, I think this is as good a place as any.

I'll start a new thread on the subject. I just feel that this discussion on marriage is too important in of itself to diverge on a tangent.

Sounds good to me, I’d like to really pick your brain on the topic.

Averroes wrote:

Uriah wrote:

I'm curious as to what you think constitutes a 'Rational Being' though. If you accept, as I am stating, that most humans are not 'Rational Beings' than I'd say we really have nothing to debate, but if you're asking me to accept that being human means being rational, then I'd say we have quite the wrastlin match ahead of us.

It has been my experience that most of the disputation often occurs because the contenders often have very different conceptions and definitions of words employed. I think that once we clear the rubric, there would'nt be much disagreement between us.

I agree.

Averroes wrote:

Gnomon wrote:

(and btw, please don't be offended by my sarcastic, sardonic, or dark sense of humor. I am not trying to sound like an ass, I just do sound that way naturally. It's a gift.)

None taken mate

Thanks

Averroes wrote:

1. A prostitute has a moral obligation not to knowingly participate in a sexual trade with a person who is contractually committed to another. To do so would make her like the get away driver for a bank robber. She doesn't commit the crime but participates in it by aiding and abetting. The same goes for the folks that sleep with married men or women, even as they themselves are single.

Are you sure you want to dictate moral standards to others?

Averroes wrote:

2. Marriage is a contract worth protecting because it's primary reason is to provide a safe haven for children to grow up. Thus I see no harm if the law stipulated that a prostitute asks her clients or makes them sign a document etc., that states that they are not married or in a committed relationship with another.

.....and are you sure you want government to enforce your moral standards?

Averroes wrote:

And by commitment I mean agreements of sexual exclusivity, which means that men and women in open marriage contracts would clearly be excluded from this restriction.

All of this is overkill. You seem to assume that marriage and/or contractual commitments automatically produce children, which you then wish to bring the full force of law to protect. You do know that children are not produced by the signing of a contract, don't you? And, I assume you also know that children can be produced in the absence of a contract!

At the least, please amend your doctrine to exclude prosecution of childless couples freely doing what people do so naturally.

Uriah wrote:

Humans like to pretend we are special, that we are not animals, that we are somehow, in someway, above them.
I find that to be more of the same hubris that causes us to view the environment with a utilitarian mindset.

We aren't above the animals, we are animals after all, but we are indeed the highest form of animals--the undisputed king of the jungle.

The environment is sacred, but it isn't holy. Our stewardship doesn't require that we remove ourselves from it. We have the right to it above all, but it is also to our own benefit that we don't shit where we eat.

As a side note, vegetarians have a real ethical dilemma. They don't like killing animals of any kind for food, ostensibly not even cockroaches or bacteria, and vegans don't even eat animal byproducts like cheese, milk and eggs. (Or is it OK to kill cockroaches, just not eat them? Why?) But then why is it ethical to kill plants for food, or eat their offspring (nuts, fruits, grains, beans etc.). Humans, being lower than the scum of the Earth according to vegetarians/environmentalists, should ethically starve themselves to death and replenish the environment? Sounds as contradictory as any other religion.

Stewardship?

Humans don't have a stewardship over the earth, we have the responsibility to live healthily - in balance with nature - or we will die. Right now, we are not living healthily, we are not existing in balance with the natural system. That's true if you eat dead animal flesh or refuse to wear leather shoes.

The Paineful Truth wrote:

As a side note, vegetarians have a real ethical dilemma. They don't like killing animals of any kind for food, ostensibly not even cockroaches or bacteria, and vegans don't even eat animal byproducts like cheese, milk and eggs. (Or is it OK to kill cockroaches, just not eat them? Why?) But then why is it ethical to kill plants for food, or eat their offspring (nuts, fruits, grains, beans etc.). Humans, being lower than the scum of the Earth according to vegetarians/environmentalists, should ethically starve themselves to death and replenish the environment? Sounds as contradictory as any other religion.

That's not entirely true. Admittedly, the "logic" of strict vegans is a mystery to me, but vegetarians, who eat animal by-products but not the animal, can be justified by logic.

Eating fruits contributes to the continuation of the species of fruit. The fruit, if not eaten, would drop and rot at the foot of the tree. By consuming the fruit, animals (including human animals) distribute the residue over a wider terrain, thus propagating the expansion of the plant's species. It is the only thing we eat in harmony with nature!

As for grains, it can be argued that once the grain has matured it will rot if not eaten. Animals don't "rot" at maturity (please, no remarks about the lack of "beauty" exhibited by old age and wrinkles). While it is true that we eat the seeds that could have been the origin of new plants, we also cultivate and plant (for our own selfish reasons) and thus propagate the species anyway.

Besides, those who prefer to eat animal flesh are not exempt from blame for the destruction of plants. What do you think cattle eat?

Quote :

We rape, we kill, we commit a myriad forms of sexual deviations running the gamut from merely kinky to outright obscene, we oppress, enslave, and brutalize our own without so much as a second thought, and even our highest human ideals are based on the sublimation of our more animal, our innate, desires and motivations.

I can dismiss free will and morality so quickly because they are nothing but abstract ideas, neither is a concrete, solid, living thing. We foist those ideals upon ourselves so that we may better operate within a cultural context but underneath that onion skin facade of civilization is a hedonistic, self-serving, and predatory animal.

Yes, I too would like to see another string on this one. Unfortunately for Averroes, I will probably be putting the full force of my logic on his side.

Seriously I think Uriah's contention that we are no more than animals barely able to contain our cultural or societal facades is a cop out.

I think he's putting us on a bit with his usual anarchic take on things, nothing means nothing, we have no free will, etc. Having said that, I certainly do enjoy his take on his things, as I find them interesting and edifying even if I usually don't obviously agree with his conclusion.

But anyway, yes we are animals. Period. There's no dispute for deists because we don't believe we have a direct special relationships with God. The only relationship in fact would be indirect or second hand in that many deits propose a "greater complexity" model for the universe and few would argue that we are probably the most complex brain, I don't know if dolphins for elephants would beat us.

So perhaps we shouldn't even say we can act like "animals" as that is perjorative.

But I think what Uriah is doing is the equivlent of saying that because we can all still act like babies we are nothing more than babies, with the facade of adulthood.

And similarly, because we can act like savages that we are nothing more than savages.

That my friend is a cop out.

Babies grow up.

Animals evolve (and yes devolve) both physically and in their brains.

But it's also really highjacking this very interesting marriage string, I agree.

The other comment about Uriah is that he somehow criticizes AVerroes logic, which is fair enough, after all that's why we're here, for trying to formulate the human condition into a logical conhesive system.

But the only thing I would comment on is that in my unbiased position, I would say that Uriah, perhaps by default, has simply put forward his own system, his own explanation.

So I'm sure I or somebody will create a thread on this issue in the near future!

Quote :

In my diction adultry (that is, cheating on you wife or girl friend) or rape etc. are immoral.

You might want to clarify that.

In my book adultry is immoral. I agree with you 100 per cent Averroes. An honest partner if they have made a marriage vow or even a vow of fidelity should absolutely do the right thing and at least inform the other partner.

However I believe this is a completely moral issue and not legal.

Rape on the other hand is a vile criminal act of violence.

There is a world of difference between someone cheating on his/her partner (which is morally wrong); and, say, a man visiting prison and getting kidnapped and violated, for instance, up the bum.