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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   37122 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of April 10, 2023

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I hate this argument. "Why don't we just fix all of the problems of society and I can be totally free" is Rousseauan bullshit. We are animals and establishing rules to prevent ourselves from doing evil regardless of our intentions is the essence of morality.

Eliminate misery and I'll maybe consider whether behaviors that exploit it might be allowed, but I'm not considering it fine just because of an hypothetical.

All those Ukranian women and assorted orphans are not hypothetical.

Oh sure I'm not suggesting that one cannot talk about surrogacy until poverty has been abolished, my point is rather that restricting surrogacy would not actually make things better in a society where such desperation and poverty does exist, because while not a decision to be taken lightly there are clearly some women who think that going through childbirth is worth it for the reward, and while it makes me squirm too isn't hasn't actually made anything better about the situation 'women might be forced to choose between surrogacy or deprivation' since you've just made everyone choose deprivation, a deprivation apparently bad enough that they're willing to bear a child to alleviate it.

I understand, but people may also choose to kill in order to escape deprivation and still I feel justified in punishing them for this immoral conduct that endangers everyone by undermining the sanctity of life. This is not exactly similar, but my motivations are not different.

You also ignore the other core part of my argument, which is about the incentive. If you allow this and the demand outstrips the supply, generating misery great enough to provide for it becomes the necessary conclusion. Which is exactly what happened with prostitution and why human trafficking is a thing.

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