[net.politics.theory] Dumb Animals -- Reply to sevener

mck@ratex.UUCP (Daniel Kian Mc Kiernan) (04/26/85)

Lines marked with one '>' are those of tim sevener; lines marked with two
are mine.

>>There are no significant shortages of horses, donkeys, cows, pigs, sheep,
>>goats, chickens, turkeys, dogs, cats,...
>>Yet all of these animals are consumed on a regular basis, and have been for
>>centuries!  Has there been some incredible dog cartel?  Have quotas on the
>>consumption of goats kept them from extinction?  These animals are available
>>in large numbers because people are allowed to establish ownership in them,
>>and thereby capture the benefits associated with care and conservation.
>>However, if a whaler attempts to tag a herd of whales as hers, or if Mr
>>Huybensz attempts to capture a herd of white-tailed deer, and protect them as
>>PRIVATE PROPERTY, (s|)he will soon find h(er|im)self run afoul of the law.
>>That bad law (rejection of property rights) creates problems is an argument
>>against bad laws, and not an argument for further coerced cooperation.
>
>Perhaps we wouldn't have the current big flap about the President's original
>plans to visit a Nazi cemetery and not to visit a Concentration Camp if
>the Nazis had been allowed to "tag" their prisoners and claim ownership.
> 
>But then chickens and cows and pigs do get slaughtered don't they?
> 
>Maybe tagging humans might protect the human race after all????
> 
>p.s. please do not take this personally.  It merely is an attempt to
>graphically portray the contradiction involved in seeking to "own" and
>"control" absolutely all forms of life, even if in the process their
>wildness and freedom, the very qualities that many are trying to protect,
>are taken away.

Each person is already owned (by himself).  To equate the Libertarian
position (on acquiring the unowned) with seizing the owned (a Jew) is to
engage in straw-man argumentation.

Now, some (perhaps not sevener) may want to argue that whales are persons,
but the case for this notion is extremely poor.  And, in any event, I was
responding to a net-user who seemed to regard a cartel as morally acceptable
(tho economically unfeasible), which implied to me that he (like me) does
not regard whales as persons.

>                 I thought Libertarians valued freedom..........
>oops, I forgot, "freedom to own property" THAT is the ultimate freedom!

Libertarians do not believe that the freedom of persons should be
sacrificed to the freedom of biological automota.  Sevener appears
extremely confused.

                               Back later,
                               DKMcK