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Anarcho-Syndicalism versus
Letters #11-#15
Letter #011
Hello again, Babette,
I am aware of this. But, perhaps you are not understanding me correctly. If you pass a law, that allows only women to benefit from the legal status of "homemaker," you are not forcing anyone to do it, sure. But, you are creating a situation is the social and cultural environment where this behavior role is applied theoretically only to women, and never to men. I mean, you really are sacrificing the potential of realizing a society where spouses have equally divided income, in exchange for the rule that it can only apply to women. So, there is not much moral ground, as by applying these laws to women only, you are saying that it is more important to enforce gender-behavior roles than it is to provide for the people. Does that make sense? By applying these laws only to women, you are stating that it is more important to enforce gender roles than it is to guarantee a necessary livelihood for everyone.
You're right. I have not read "the sayings of" Margaret Sanger. But I have read the articles, essays, and some selections of the books by Sanger. "...so there would be fewer of them." That's your interpretation. You also forget that she provided health services that didn't entail contraception or birth-control, such as writing pamphlets that describe the bodily functions of a woman. You're aware that we can write about things like menstruation today, only because people like Margaret Sanger were arrested for publishing this material, right? Her pamphlet, "What Every Girl Should Know," was censored, and replaced by the government's title of what they believe: "What Every Girl Should Know: Nothing!" Having single-handedly dismantled eons of Sexist domination, it seems like your interpretation of Sanger is quite off. For if she wanted there to "be fewer of them," why would she provide very few with actual contraceptive services, but give the many basic health and hygiene information that was considered illegal? After all, without her, you'd probably be completely ignorant about the majority of the functioning of your body, right?
Yes, but Putin and Gorbachev also said that they were Democratic. Do you therefore believe that they are Democratic, just because they say so? And, likewise, there are many among Eastern-Europe who think that the USSR was neither Socialist nor Democratic. Either way, it seems like a good tip not to believe what dictators and totalitarians describe their social order as. After all... You don't believe that the Tsar was empowered by god to rule, do you? Of course not, that's nonsense to convince the people to believe in him. So you shouldn't believe that the USSR was Socialist. Socialism, implying Socialization of industries, means giving businesses to the workers, and this never happened, as the party always controlled it. Ipso facto, the Wikipedia definition of Socialism contradicts the organization of the USSR. Seems rather simple, no?
My religion is humanity. The only way you can insult it is to deny the injustices of the past, such as the possession of slaves by the Catholic Church. Read Wikipedia. The history of slavery and the Catholic Church is more than 1,000 years old: "The popes themselves held slaves..." -- Wikipedia: Christianity and Slavery . It's all cited and referenced, though it is what I would call "common knowledge" that Popes regularly bought and sold slaves, including sex slaves. Sincerely,
Letter #012
Dear Andy, The pro-family, pro-life economic policies I recommend would enable either husband or wife to be the main carer for children, so these recommendations are now sexist. I have referred to them as "policies", not laws. A law says "women must breastfeed or go to jail or pay a fine". A policy says the government will provide a homemaker's allowance so either father mother can care for the babies and not abandon them in a child care centre to the care of strangers. Because only mothers can breastfeed, we recommend that the prime carer for babies under 2 years of age should be the mother. This is not a law but a health recommendation, like recommending you brush your teeth or risk tooth decay. So far as I know there is no law saying you have to brush your teeth or go to jail/pay fine. I hope you understand the difference, I think you do as you sound intelligent (at times) but you are just wasting my time. Babette PS. Of course all communist countries had "Democratic" in their titles - another of their lies. don't fall for it. True democracies do not have to include "Democratic" in their titles.
Letter #013
Hello again, Babette,
Well, your website doesn't say "either father mother," but it says strictly the "right of women" to "obligate her husband." The gender behavior roles have already been worked out. Even according to the World Health Organization, women can still live and work outside the home while mothers, "with minimum enabling conditions, for example paid maternity leave, part-time work arrangements, on-site crèches, facilities for expressing and storing breast milk..." So, it does seem like there is some workable "policy" that doesn't necessarily apply to this gender or that gender, and considerations can be taken into account to make any preferable arrangement work. It is the ingrained, male/female distinction of the wealth-redistribution that is uneasy. Sincerely,
Letter #014
Dear Andy, Yes, we do believe a husband has a duty, an obligation to financially support the mother of his children. The law also happens to think so because she can't get the dole if he has a job. We also believe that if he is ill or incapacitate, his wife has a duty to support him to the best of her ability if she has young children. That's what it says in the marriage vows, but if you don't believe in marriage, it is all irrelevant to you. In the meantime as you seem to believe in Margaret Sanger, go read her full works, and don't email me again till you have done so. Babette
Letter #014a
[Well..... fine. Say, where did I last leave off in my reading of Sanger's works?]
Letter #015
Sterilize the Unfit Says British Professor By Hilary White LONDON, August 30, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) – The mentally and morally "unfit" should be sterilized, Professor David Marsland, a sociologist and health expert, said this weekend. The professor made the remarks on the BBC radio program Iconoclasts, which advertises itself as the place to "think the unthinkable." Pro-life advocates and disability rights campaigners have responded by saying that Marsland's proposed system is a straightforward throwback to the coercive eugenics practices of the past. Marsland, Emeritus Scholar of Sociology and Health Sciences at Brunel University, London and Professorial Research Fellow in Sociology at the University of Buckingham, told the BBC that "permanent sterilization" is the solution to child neglect and abuse. "Children are abused or grossly neglected by a very small minority of inadequate parents." Such parents, he said, are not distinguished by "disadvantage, poverty or exploitation," he said, but by "a number or moral and mental inadequacies" caused by "serious mental defect," "chronic mental illness" and drug addiction and alcoholism. "Short of lifetime incarceration," he said, the solution is "permanent sterilization." The debate, chaired by the BBC's Edward Stourton, was held in response to a request by a local council in the West Midlands that wanted to force contraception on a 29-year-old woman who members of the council judged was mentally incapable of making decisions about childrearing. The judge in the case refused to permit it, saying such a decision would "raise profound questions about state intervention in private and family life." Children whose parents are alcoholics or drug addicts can be rescued from abusive situations, but, Marlsand said, "Why should we allow further predictable victims to be harmed by the same perpetrators? Here too, sterilization provides a dependable answer." He dismissed possible objections based on human rights, saying that "Rights is a grossly overused and fundamentally incoherent concept … Neither philosophers nor political activists can agree on the nature of human rights or on their extent." Complaints that court-ordered sterilization could be abused "should be ignored," he added. "This argument would inhibit any and every action of social defense." Brian Clowes, director of research for Human Life International (HLI), told LifeSiteNews (LSN) that in his view Professor Marsland is just one more in a long line of eugenicists who want to solve human problems by erasing the humans who have them. Clowes compared Marsland to Lothrop Stoddard and Margaret Sanger, prominent early 20th century eugenicists who promoted contraception and sterilization for blacks, Catholics, the poor and the mentally ill and disabled whom they classified as "human weeds." He told LSN, "It does not seem to occur to Marsland that most severe child abuse is committed by people he might consider 'perfectly normal,' people like his elitist friends and neighbors." "Most frightening of all," he said, "is Marsland's dismissal of human rights. In essence, he is saying people have no rights whatsoever, because there is no universal agreement on what those rights actually are." The program, which aired on Saturday, August 28, also featured a professor of ethics and philosophy at Oxford, who expressed concern about Marland's proposal, saying, "There are serious problems about who makes the decisions, and abuses." Janet Radcliffe Richards, a Professor of Practical Philosophy at Oxford, continued, "I would dispute the argument that this is for the sake of the children. "It's curious case that if the child doesn't exist, it can't be harmed. And to say that it would be better for the child not to exist, you need to be able to say that its life is worse than nothing. Now I think that's a difficult thing to do because most people are glad they exist." But Radcliffe Richards refused to reject categorically the notion of forced sterilization as a solution to social problems. She said there "is a really serious argument" about the "cost to the rest of society of allowing people to have children when you can pretty strongly predict that those children are going to be a nuisance." Marsland's remarks also drew a response from Alison Davis, head of the campaign group No Less Human, who rejected his entire argument, saying that compulsory sterilization would itself be "an abuse of some of the most vulnerable people in society." Marsland's closing comments, Davis said, were indicative of his anti-human perspective. In those remarks he said that nothing in the discussion had changed his mind, and that the reduction of births would be desirable since "there are too many people anyway." Davis commented, "As a disabled person myself I find his comments offensive, degrading and eugenic in content. "The BBC is supposed to stand against prejudicial comments against any minority group. As such it is against it's own code of conduct, as well as a breach of basic human decency, to broadcast such inflammatory and ableist views."
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