Free will is a useful fiction if one wants to remain chained to the vageries of nature.

Personally I knew I wasn’t a monkey because of my lack of tail.

There’s a quote in Shermer’s “The Science of Good and Evil,” (I can’t remember who said it originally) “Free will is a useful fiction.”

hey goat herder, you going to answer?

Regards,

Immoral Monkey

“To Gyges, Byron, and Elaine M.,

On other words, you are intellectual cowards and losers.

Just what I suspected from three immoral monkeys.”

you are not only insulting but not too bright, monkeys are neither moral or immoral, they are amoral. To be moral or immoral one must have free will and the ability to exercise free will. One must also posses a conscience to be able to determine right from wrong.

A monkey may posses limited free will but it is a slave to it’s nature and does not posses a conscience in the sense that humans do. A monkey cannot be moral or immoral and therefore your post makes no sense.

The 3 of us could be immoral but we are not monkeys based on our ability to think and use a computer and communicate higher level concepts.

Since we are trading insults I am reminded of a statement by the Philosopher (I trust even a barbarian such as yourself has read some works of the great man-Aristotle?) which basically stated that nomadic goat herders have no ability to integrate into modern civilization and are thus relegated to roaming the desert tending their camels and goats. Unable to assimilate because of a lack of sophistication of thought.

Apparently what was true 2,000 years ago is still true today. Isn’t it about time to quit herding goats?

The very idea that someone who comes from a society grounded in superstition and tyranny calling anyone a monkey is ridiculous.

No, just looking for something to distract me from two projects I’d rather put off until Monday.

I’m a bad monkey.

Are you lonely and asking Dar out. This is not a dating, mating site. I am sure the Professor can help you in your yearning burning desires of the night.

If you just want to be an insulting retard, you’re picking on the wrong people. They’re much nicer than I am. I’ll be glad to clean your primitive little retrograde fundamentalist clock.

I suspect you know this too since you avoiding the issue of Sacred Prostitution and the history of sexual mores. I haven’t even gotten to the good stuff where the ancient Egyptians considered the bisexual as blessed by the Gods as having the pleasure of two lives. There are many more arrows in that quiver than I loosed in the first volley. You just showed your cards though and – too bad for you – it says “troll”. It’s always open season on trolls. That your trollery surrounds your self-righteous indignation that you can’t control other people’s sex lives? Awww. Boo hoo. It says more about you than your arguments say about reality.

But I have another suggestion that just might cure your troll status. It’s organic and 100% natural.

Get laid.

Pay for it. I’m guessing you’d probably have to pay, but hey, it’d be worth it to get that huge chip off your shoulder about humans having genitalia and sex. Anyone who screams as much about whoring as you do is likely just jealous they can’t get any has been my experience. Psychologists call it “projection” for a reason.

It’s sad when you can’t GIVE it away, but you’ve got such a charming personality, I can’t imagine why no one would want to sleep with you. If any troll around here has shown that they really just need to get laid, it’s you, you uptight sexually repressed half-wit. It’s just what I expected from a trained follower monkey. Got free will? I kinda doubt it. Well, you HAVE it. But having and not using is a lot like not having at all. Kinda like sex. Which your comments indicate you have a problem using as well.

If you just want to be insulting?

I’m your huckleberry, fundie.

On other words, you are intellectual cowards and losers.

Just what I suspected from three immoral monkeys.

“I don’t believe that one can spin the Bible to make prostitution righteous.”

I don’t think most people think prostitution is righteous. It is a terrible state for a woman or man. I don’t see anyone here spinning prostitution as righteous.

But we do try to help people that are down and out, we don’t cut their heads off or stone them. But hey who am I to judge.

I gave up my discussion with Dar quite some time ago. Why waste energy trying to discuss a topic with someone whose mind is closed and who thinks of me as lowly female–as one of those “she who must be subjugated” people.

************

I wrote in an earlier comment: “Is it moral to treat women as subservient to men and allow them few freedoms?”

Dar responded: “Purely subjective. You may think they’re treated “subservient”, but they may not feel that way, since unlike you they may not believe in that nonsense about men and women being exactly the same and doing the exact same things in life.”

************

I don’t recall saying anything about men and women being exactly the same. I might have commented that I thought women should be afforded equal rights–which isn’t the same thing.

Anyway, I’m not going to reread all my previous comments to Dar. I have better things to do with my time.

So basically, we’re back to appeals to antiquity? Remember what I said about those?

By the way, for a good time why don’t you look and see just how often I’ve criticized another culture on this thread? It seems to me all my criticism has been directed squarely at you and your faulty arguments.

Since we’re just talking in circles at this point, I’m done. Feel free to keep ranting about how Women in America are all whores for letting men look at their bodies.

“you are subject to man’s laws in the form of a subjective interpretation of the Quran…”

Not the same thing. No matter the differing interpretations, there are certain underlying assumptions that cannot be changed. For example, I don’t believe that one can spin the Bible to make prostitution righteous. Further, while there are differing interpretations, the faithful are aware that ultimately the laws are divine, so that certain things shouldn’t change through “popular will”.

In your precious Lockean case, there is no such respect for the underlying basis of the laws, since the underlying basis is “popular will” (i.e., popular mood), and while a citizen may have to obey the law for fear of punishment, divine punishment or the immorality of his disobeying it, are non-existent.

In a society where religions plays a role, even if not legally then culturally, a thing that is wrong is wrong. But in a legally and culturally secular society where religions does not inform public behaviour, that which is wrong today can be made right tomorrow if enough people can get enough legislators to change it.

-
“My societies cultural standard is to kill every non-christian we encounter and eat them. How are you going to defend that?”

Stupid example. Supposing that is your beliefs, on what basis are they founded?

Making up beliefs out of nowhere is precisely what is wrong with today’s liberal America.?

-
“Your statement is ridiculous, not all cultures are equivalent and there must be some standard by which to judge.”

And I suppose according to you that global timeless judgement is to be made by the “popularly elected”legislator of the West, right?

-
I shall ignore the monkey nonsense of the rest of your post.

The Greeks and Romans used the body as motif. All those naked chunks of marble didn’t pop out of the ground looking like people. Somebody carved them because, gasp, they liked naked people!

It the old fashioned way to make babies, sure, but I like it.

My fingers must know it’s Friday.

There are a lot off people with really interesting genetics that makes what you say simply wishful thinking nonsense and worship of a past that didn’t exist, dar.

People used to be A LOT naughtier than today and recently I might add. It wasn’t until venereal diseases started going lethal in response to antibiotics and increased risk of exposure to exotic viruses that deforestation creates that people finally started quit humping like dogs. Some of them still haven’t.

There is a difference between sexuality and crassness. Modern culture is certainly more crass than some past cultures. We can now communicate more, faster than any time in human history. Too much bandwidth means a lot of empty to fill up. Not all of man’s creations are gems. Much of it’s just average quality. A lot is just crap. But it’s no more sexual in content than the entertainments let alone the worship practices of the past. I’ve got a planet full of babies to prove it. And a lot of dirty Greek pottery. I don’t mean dusty either.

The core of your argument is non-existent, since you’re side-stepping my main points.

I couldn’t care less what anyone thinks of others’ cultres, but that is different than actually trying to impose one’s views on them.

Further, there is a vast difference between a member of a given society criticizing another society, and criticizing his own. Therefore, assuming you’re an American as well, my criticism of current American culture is not the same as your criticism of a whole other culture.

As for the my use of the term “whore”, I believe it is valid, since that is how they would be described in another time not too long ago when personal moral standards still mattered.

Most of your (and Mike Spindell’s and Byron’s) criticisms of me would me valid if the current state of America’s socila mores was something that was deeply rooted and based on older traditions and values based on religion or geography. IN that case America’s current urban culture would be as valid as any other, and the way youths dress would be no less valid than the way youths in Arabia or the Amazon or Tibet dress.

But that isn’t so. The current state of public behaviour is a quite recent phenomenon, one which is heavily driven by entertainment, and motivated by consumerism and extreme hedonism. Further it is one that is still resisted by countless Americans (and not all of them Bible-thumpers either).

On other words, what you are defending is not so much a real culture (in the historic sense of the word), but rather a fashion, a style, and current that is driven by certain specific engines (feminism, consumerism, extreme secularism, etc…).

I hope I’ve been clear.

“I defend all societies’ rights to their own cultural standards, unlike others here.”

My societies cultural standard is to kill every non-christian we encounter and eat them. How are you going to defend that?

Your thinking is what allows women to be stoned to death for adultery and people who convert to Christianity or some other religion or no religion at all to be killed. Whatever floats your boat, anything goes, there are no standards except what are culturally acceptable. Tribal rule, mob rule is what you are promoting.

Your statement is ridiculous, not all cultures are equivalent and there must be some standard by which to judge. And as Gyges pointed out above you are being judgemental about American society so you are grossly inconsistent in your application of your own belief system.

Oh and by the way if we suck so badly why do you live here? Maybe it is because you like the fruits on our tree after all, liberty, the ability to have your own opinion, the possibility of making a good deal of money with a little hard work, freedom from arbitrary arrest and imprisonment. Little things like that, the fruits of our immoral secular society.

America may not be perfect but we sure beat whatever is in second place by one heck of a lot.

As a post script:

Now that I’ve apologized for making assumptions about you (I’m always willing to admit when I’m wrong) I hope you’ll address the core of my comments.

I’m not so easily distracted or embarrassed as you may hope, and the basis of my argument had nothing to do with your location and everything to do with your words.

You got me, I made an assumption and I apologize.

Let’s make the necessary edits: If you want to be intellectually honest, you don’t get to use your belief system as a shield and a sword. You don’t get to say “my beliefs are different then yours, so you have no right to judge them” right after calling women with other beliefs whores because of the way they dress (assuming you mean whore as an insult) and expect me and others here not to point out the inconsistencies.

Fair enough?

you are subject to man’s laws in the form of a subjective interpretation of the Quran. No one can know the actual will of God. Our Christian Bible has been modified over time, I am guessing the Quran has been as well.

I think God wants man to live in freedom and will take the bad (a diminished cultural morality in your opinion) with the good (a relatively free country). The things that I have read about the Middle East in particular are very disturbing, the authorities are out of control and have a boot across the throat of the citizenry.

When you stone people for adultery you could say there is a bit of an issue with the legal system. That sounds like revenge as contemplated by a deranged teenager rather than justice.

I’m not sure what my “culture” is, given that I’m writing this in the middle of Los Angeles. If you can’t put your mind around the idea that someone can defend something without being a part of it or living in it, then you’re right, you’ve no business “talking” to me.

I defend all societies’ rights to their own cultural standards, unlike others here. My problem with the current Western moral standards is that they are contradictory and unnatural and, yes, immoral. Nor is this the way the West’s always been, but rather a recent phenomenon driven by feminism, consumerism, and extreme hedonistic individualism, none of which were the case even a couple fo generations ago, and are still decried by a large segments of the West’s populations.

Your quote of Locke sort of doesn’t work on me as I don’t agree with its basic premise, namely that only the laws of man are legitimate. This is acceptable to an athiest, but I am no athiest so cannot agree with it.

Nor do I agree with the assumption that only laws by common consent are right, since common consent could be driven by misinformation and prejudice.

Besides, there are nearly no laws today written by common consent. How often do you sit down and read the full text of a new bill passed by Congress?

Finally, I’m not sure who my “boys” are, but whomever they are, what they live under cannot be regarded as a dictatorship, since the laws are inspired or based on divine laws.I suppose you can argue that God is a dictator, but that’s be your opinion and I’d disagree with it as God is above such judgmentalisms.

The main problem with your argument is that it can be applied to on-religious “secular” societies like the US as well. The laws that are obeyed are also enforced by the few. In fact, they are written by the few.

Now, you may argue that the divine laws that Muslims live under are not really divine because there is no God etc…, but the fact that most believe in the religions, means that they believe in their divinity, which gives the laws certain authority.

By contrast, an American may be a believer in the Democratic Republic, but that doesn’t mean he believes in the specific laws governing it, but still he has no say.

Further, the implications of your views is that there is no such thing as social mores and group/national traditions. What then? On what basis the legal laws are to be based?

“but that established, by consent, in the commonwealth”

wasn’t our constitution established by consent? We put ourselves under the protection of the federal & state government by virtue of our consent.

[Since the nature of the constitution is to establish individual rights, it would not allow you to embrace slavery even if you wished to sell yourself to the highest bidder. So we really aren't free at all.] said tongue in cheek.

But actually I was responding to Dar about the control over human liberty that sharia law has and it’s subjective nature.

In Re: Locke

“The liberty of man, in society, is to be under no other legislative power, but that established, by consent, in the commonwealth;”

ON the issue of slavery, the problem with using this quote is that it validates clauses of the constitution that were void ab initio by the very definition of our republic.

Just like a boat is designed and constructed to as to fend off its first and foremost enemy, i.e. water, so to is our constitution FRAMED so as to fight its first and foremost enemy; i.e. tyranny.

Thus on issues such as slavery, we don’t look to legislation or amendments created on mere assent alone. We look to the defining aspects of the framing itself and determine whether any legislation, constitutional text or later amendments contradict the principles of the founding.

Fugitive slave clause; three fifths compromise? Void. Why?

From section 5 (on property) & 18 (on tyranny) respectively:

“Though the earth, and all inferior creatures, be common to all men, yet every[one] has a property in his own person: this no body has any right to but himself.”

“AS usurpation is the exercise of power, which another hath a right to; so tyranny is the exercise of power beyond right, which no body can have a right to.”

No state, citizen thereof or the federal government may exercise power beyond right which no one may have a right to; whether by consent of the majority or not. The underlying social compact, forming the hull, if you will, of our republican ‘boat’ so to speak, does not allow it; via legislation by consent or not. The exercise of power over the inalienable right of self ownership is tyranny, and within the framework of our republic, is tantamount to drilling a hole in the bottom of the boat.

And that’s all I have to say about that.

When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.

western culture needs no defense against people who pay no respect to individual rights and tyrannize half their populations.

As always, a poetic gem.

Right, back to that. This is the part where I get to repeat myself. If you want to be intellectually honest, you don’t get to use your culture as a shield and a sword. You don’t get to say “my culture’s different then yours, so you have no right to judge it” right after calling women from other cultures whores because of the way they dress (assuming you mean whore as an insult) and expect me and others here not to point out your inconsistencies.

So unless you either stop deflecting and respond to what I actually said (something you completely failed to do), or admit that you’re NOT o.k. with women dressing however they want in the West (if you were, you wouldn’t be calling them whores), I’m done talking to you. I’ve no desire to defend Western Culture, which is the only conversation you seem to want to have.

A Clerihew of Biblical Proportions

Eve
So naive
In her birthday suit
Tempted Adam with forbidden fruit.

you guys need to read some John Locke, here is a sampling:

“Sec. 22. THE natural liberty of man is to be free from any superior power on earth, and not to be under the will or legislative authority of man, but to have only the law of nature for his rule. The liberty of man, in society, is to be under no other legislative power, but that established, by consent, in the commonwealth; nor under the dominion of any will, or restraint of any law, but what that legislative shall enact, according to the trust put in it. Freedom then is not what Sir Robert Filmer tells us, Observations, A. 55. a liberty for every one to do what he lists, to live as he pleases, and not to be tied by any laws: but freedom of men under government is, to have a standing rule to live by, common to every one of that society, and made by the legislative power erected in it; a liberty to follow my own will in all things, where the rule prescribes not; and not to be subject to the inconstant, uncertain, unknown, arbitrary will of another man: as freedom of nature is, to be under no other restraint but the law of nature.”

He does not say God or religion but nature as in the nature of man which is to live in freedom, with a free will and a free mind.

your boys have a top down rule which is what we would call a dictatorship. We in America like rule from the bottom up with an objective standard of law respecting individual rights. your boys like subjective law.

I’ll take a few half naked women holding glasses of beer if that is the price I have to pay to live in a free society subjected, not by the whim of unelected oracles of God, but by an objective rule of law dedicated to the proposition that all human beings are equal . . . Seems a small price to pay and I don’t have to look at the billboard if I don’t want to.

Are you serious?

Dar,
You mistook much of what I wrote. The sexualization of women in advertising and culture in the West is as I stated something I decry.
However, when you refer to enforcing public standards that is where we differ. To me the problem is who gets to set the standards. Historically, across cultures when you have religionists driving the setting of public standards you have tyranny and oppression. “Public
Standards” quickly become religious opinion. While all religions have
religious leaders who are at variance in their beliefs in the particular interpretations, when these beliefs become legal standards it is always the most extreme whose views prevail.

Not all Islamic Religious leaders believe that women should wear burkas and many are tolerant of more freedom for women. However, the examples we see, Saudi Arabia for instance, are regimes oppressive to women to a degree that is morally intolerable to me at least. As I previously stated these beliefs are not only repressive to women, but they exhibit the need for males to paternalistically control them. Beyond the immorality of it is the (to me)stupidity of it because women are every bit the equal of men in all intellectual respects and in general superior to them in their ability to keep the social piece.
Oppressing them has I believe led to the problems that have plagued certain Islamic societies since they are operating without the input of half of their citizenry.

I shall repeat what I wrote earlier, that I’ve no problem with that, but don’t force them on those other societies that choose to stick to the standards of modesty that they have always had, and which the West itself once had.

The problem with your quoted heroinne is that her very use of the word “feminist” shows her not be some indigenous actor who’s opposition to the covering are self-grown, but rather is someone who’s opposition comes from her being fully Westernized, therefore it’s no different than a regular Westerner criticizing the dress.

I don’t dismiss her views, rather I merely point out that she cannot be regarded as a true voice from within.

You are mistaken if you think I’ve a problem with nudity, otherwise I’d be spending most of my time attacking traditional tropical cultures where most people dress very little except around the inguinal area, and where women are topless.

The problem is that the modern West isn’t like those cultures, it isn’t a society that treats nudity or much skin exposing indifferently. Rather Western culture still holds the same sexualized views of the human body that it always has (and which other societies still do, such as in the Middle East), it just decided to exploit them openly, largely due to the spread of this extreme hedonistic individualism.

As far as the example of your youth, you didn’t find them sexual because they weren’t meant to be sexual. But when you drive down the street and see a giant billboard of a bikini-clad woman lying down with a beer in her hands (to give and example),that billboard is purposefully meant to be sexual.

As such, I am against such warped standards being applied to others.

In other words, what some Westerners really want to do is to go to Muslims (and others) and tell them in effect: “Look, yyou can continue to keep your views of morality and decency, but you should no longer be allowed to have any public standards that enforce them.”

When faced with an opponent who is relying on volume, what is the best way to counter? Overwhelming force.

I think I’ve answered your questions. See above. And yes, I know about consent. I also know that what the law says and how humans actually interact don’t always mesh. Sex laws are one of the prime examples of where theory and reality can be at odds. I’ve stated before that one of my key operating maxims is what Marcus Aurelius said about truth: “I seek only the truth, by which no man was ever harmed.” If truth is your goal, facts and best evidence should come before presumptions, even legal one (good, bad or otherwise). Her lack of valid consent as chattel is a legal presumption and one that could have been modified by Jefferson in ways we do not know for certain. Like you say, she’s chattel. Jefferson could have freed her partially with the same freedom he could have decided to keep the cat in the house or not. Absence of proof is not proof of absence.

And you, my dear Raoul Duke, also know I like to play Devil’s Advocate sometimes just because it’s a hoot. Especially when I’m hitting the ether. Sometimes it’s not the end of the ride that counts. It’s the ride itself.

In a court of law back in 1700 there would be no rape since the crime wouldn’t exist; i.e. impossibility of raping one’s property.

In a court of equity, assuming the court was enlightened enough to see Sally as a person, then yes.

Sorry, I missed your earlier response to me. We’ve had a few conversations in the past, and it always seems to boil down to you thinking that arguments from antiquity or majority should convince me. They don’t.

I get your point, you don’t like the way (you think) that women dress in America. That’s fine, I don’t really care much about your views on fashion. I do generally care about people making lousy arguments. In this case your argument seems to be that Western women shouldn’t dress the way (you think) they do because it shows off their bodies sexually.

My point was that humans are sexual animals. You have yet to show how women behaving as sexual creatures is a bad thing, until you do I’ll continue to insist that Western Women have no obligation to dress a certain way to keep from offending your or anyone’s sensibilities. I also showed that your language shows an extreme bias against women, while implicitly excusing men, as an example of the double standard that almost all cultures have when it comes to prohibitions on acting sexually.

1. Common law rape is generally defined as non-consensual sex with a female PERSON; NOT PROPERTY. Under the law as it existed and was applied in the time of Jefferson, Sally was property. As I said earlier, if you leveraged the entire DOI against Jefferson, you would have had an argument for the court to accept Sally as a person for purposes of prosecution. Whether this would have acted like a Dred Scott decision and helped spark a civil war; I have no idea. Nonetheless, you cannot define Sally as both property and person simultaneously.

Look, diagonally! http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/square/

Buddha: “Her chattel status IS NOT proof of lack of actual consent.” “You claim actual consent is somehow not possible, yet offer no proof relevant to the specific case at hand other than her legal status as property. Either way, it MAY NOT HAVE BEEN RAPE. Yet you both rush to the conclusion she COULD NOT HAVE CONSENTED AS A MATTER OF FACT. Which isn’t the reality of human sexuality.”

2. Per the issue of consent, as lottakatz pointed out earlier, and in accord with the Lockean argument I set forth above, a slave LACKS THE CAPACITY to give any meaningful consent; just as if the victim were too young, mentally defective or intoxicated. IOW, even if Jefferson and Hemmings (treating her as a person in lieu of property) were a veritable Halmark card, it’s still rape. State of mind is irrelevant per status incapacity such as rape and being too young to consent; thus the statutory rape laws. Don’t believe me, pick up your old Crim Law outline from law school and look up the section on consent and see for yourself.

This is my offer. And I think everyone leaves the table happy.

I take my que’s from Buddah. I think it’s funny when he comes up with stuff like BDAtroll. Funny how, Like a freakin clown.

I can’t no matter how hard I try Mike. Maybe I just didn’t get wired right. Short of suicide nothing I can do about it now. The sad part is I get enjoyment from this type of behavior. I think you are an ex behavioral expert, sometimes I wonder if you can help and other times I realize I’m beyond that. I feel as if I’m an addict trying to get the next fix.

And I’m not saying you are all right about rape or wrong about rape. Just about human nature and the very definition of rape are logically counter to your assumptions of Sally’s perception.

If there’s no perception of coercion, there’s no rape and without her testimony, we cannot know the specific circumstances.

My goal arguing this was never to win. It was to cast reasonable doubt, which is exactly what I did. That we disagree does not mean that my argument was unreasonable or that others do not agree with me. That you let two crimes meld into one is flawed reasoning. Slaver, yes and a bastard for it. Rapist? Not enough evidence is my reply. What evidence we have looks bad, but it’s not conclusory, only indicative and – worse – presumptive. Without her testimony, there is room for error. Error can lead to injustice. This is why, especially in the days before DNA, it was so very very critical that women testify against their attackers. It’s the simply the best evidence of how they felt about the situation.

My position isn’t that he didn’t rape Sally, even if at times it appears that way. Carefully parsing the details reveal my position is that we don’t have enough evidence to know with conclusive certainty either way. I don’t know about you, but I prefer my arguments come to conclusions based on the best evidence possible, not a supposition no matter how reasonable that supposition may be. Quality of evidence counts.

And that’s my greater point. Someone hurls a label like rapist rather casually for a situation that may have another, non-vile, reasonable explanation. It’s a crime of perception, just not our perception unless we are the victim proper. The charge of rape also damaging to both the accused and the victim albeit for different reasons, but doubly so if unfounded in reality. What if you’re all wrong and she did love him? Would she consider it justice if he were punished for rape? Or would she find you a bunch of meddling bastards? The road to Hell is indeed paved with good intentions. No one can prove I’m wrong about her state of mind any more than you can prove you’re right. Your evidence, while strongly indicative and prejudicial, is incomplete in quality without her thoughts on the matter as her thoughts are a key element of the crime charged. Rapist is a word that should be used carefully.

Clarity and the best evidence possible is a good thing when frail human lives are the subject, be it legal or any other analytical framework. The best evidence of if Sally was raped is to ask her before making presumptions.

There is no flaw in that logic.

We must not sacrifice women at the altar of political correctness or in the name of fighting a growingly powerful right wing that Muslims face in countries where they live as a minority.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/03/opinion/03iht-edeltahawy.html

Sorry Buddha,
I agree with Jill, Elaine and Bob. If you have sex with a slave it is rape, whether or not the slave wants it and/or consents to it. To me there can be no mitigating circumstances that temper that. Jefferson, who I also admire greatly, was a hypocritical pig in this respect. This should come as no surprise to any of us because there simply aren’t any perfect human beings and great ones often have great flaws.

Dar,
I must say that your comments really are basically attacks upon Western Culture and justification for your own cultural beliefs. While I am no fan of the objectification of women in my culture from a sexual standpoint, I personally believe that there is nothing morally wrong or sexually prurient about the human body. In my youth I was in many situations where there was legal public nudity of both sexes and surprisingly found that despite the overactive hormones of my youth, they were not at all sexual. The reason is that sexual prurience exists in the mind of the beholder.

While your point that different cultures have different mores is a valid one, I must say that these cultural/religious mores are open to criticism, just as you do with “Western” culture. To me the use of the burka is an obscenity and an oppression of women, that says much about the sexual insecurity of males and the need for those cultures to oppress women. While it is a truism that it is important to respect cultural diversity, to withhold judgment about oppressive aspects of a given culture is not only cowardly, but gives license to inhumanity. The practices of some Islamic cultures is to me utterly barbaric, immoral and inhuman. Primarily this is in regard to the treatment of women, but also the enforcement of religious belief. I find it a sad fact of humanity that Islam, which has expressed many noble truths, has morphed in some venues into an instrument of terrible oppression. Sadder still is the need for some of those with religious conviction to fail to understand that by making the will of God into an avenging one, they are blaspheming that which they purport to worship.

Bdabigot,

“I know Slartsafart asked for one on climategate”

You can’t help it can you? no matter how hard you try to appear reasonable, your vitriol just comes out around the edges. Dumb word plays on people’s names is worthy of your 10 year old mentality.