Quote:
|
Therefore it doesn't qualify as "no negative effect".
|
So now we've added, "and doesn't have a negative effect" to your paradigm.
How does prostitution harm the participants? Are they economically coerced by a paternalistic society into prostitution? Are they addicted to chemicals and have no other means of supporting their life-threatening addiction? Are either of those things a direct result of the exchange of sex for money, or are they factors that contribute to the need to exchange sex for money in the first place?
But suppose we grant you that it's harmful, therefore, prohibitable. And suppose we grant you further that the kind of behavior contemplated by the Texas anti-sodomy statute is not harmful when conducted among consenting persons.
Couldn't one then apply the same argument to state laws prohibiting bigamy or incest?
The answer to that question is entirely Scalia's point, in my view. Arbitrary decisions about constitutionally permissible exercises of personal freedom, based on whatever happens to be in favor at the moment, are bad, simply because you end up with a highly flexible concept of what "liberty" stands for. It's even worse when you have judicial activism changing the definition every few years (and I mean activism of both the RIGHT and the LEFT)
Quote:
|
All laws are not based on moral judgements. Laws are based on what society finds acceptable or unacceptable. Morals are, ultimately, irrelevant. All that matters is whether or not my actions are convenient or annoying to those around me.
|
Uhh, that's cognitive noise, there. "What 'society' finds acceptable or unacceptable" is either so vague as to be without meaning, or you've just DEFINED morality for us.
Thom and Moneyguy, all will be revealed in the new thread about the implied consent doctrine and the implications of socialized medicine for the exercise of personal freedom. You guys are going to like that one.