For the record, Roque's post suggests that I wrote the following:
The CIA wants you to believe waterboarding is effective. Yet somehow, it took them 183 applications of the waterboard in a one month period to get what they claimed was cooperation out of KSM.
It's a very good point, and I wish I had written it. But I didn't write it, so I can't take credit for it.
Matako, while I agree with you that sexual orientation is not a choice, other people would disagree with us. There is also a distinction between sexual orientation and behavior. Finally, some people insist that their religious beliefs are not something over which have conscious control. (Could you really change your religious beliefs just to get into a better school? If so, you probably never took them very seriously to begin with.)
Respecting civil liberties means giving people breathing room to think, say, and do things that you dislike. These girls are the victims of bigots. It kind of sucks, but at some point, bigots have a right to their keep and act upon their bigoted beliefs. I hope you'd agree that they have the rights to be bigots in their own homes. I would agree that they do not have the right to be bigots when hiring and firing employees. Somewhere in between is a gray area, and this case falls into that third category.
I respect your position and the moral force behind it. But I disagree with your conclusion.
But should a religious school be able to discriminate against non-religionists? In this case, it was a Lutheran school, and it charged higher tuition to non-Lutherans who attended. Can't a Catholic school legitimately say, "This school is for Catholics," and exclude non-Catholics?
What you're saying is that if a Catholic school did that, it ought to be subject to a lawsuit and a court order requiring that the school admit a non-Catholic student. Is that correct, or is there some principled way you can distinguish between religion on the one hand and race on the other, and find perceived sexual orientation to be more similar to race than religion?
I couldn't agree more that what the school did is morally reprehensible. But the problem is that within the scope of the law is it is written today, it was within its rights to act as it did. A public school is a different story entirely. But we're not talking about a public school here. (Nor are we talking about adults, which means we have to take the rights and preferences of the parents into account, too; they sent their girls to this school for a reason.)
Freddie, you are suggesting that we alter the law so that a private school would not be able to (legally) expel these girls. That means that society as a whole is telling a private school that it cannot decide who it will or will not educate, and that goes a little further than I would be prepared to in terms of balancing a law that actively polices against discrimination (which I generally applaud) and some basic freedoms that I'm not prepared to dispense with (even if some people use those freedoms to do things I object to).
I also take issue with your implication that these girls will not get their degrees. They will have to go to a different school but there is little reason to think that because they were expelled from one private school that they cannot go to a different school later. At worst, they will have to go to a public school. Stipulated that this is a setback to their educations, but it is hardly a fatal one.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.
On “Why I’m Conflicted on Torture Prosecutions”
For the record, Roque's post suggests that I wrote the following:
It's a very good point, and I wish I had written it. But I didn't write it, so I can't take credit for it.
On “pragmatics first”
Matako, while I agree with you that sexual orientation is not a choice, other people would disagree with us. There is also a distinction between sexual orientation and behavior. Finally, some people insist that their religious beliefs are not something over which have conscious control. (Could you really change your religious beliefs just to get into a better school? If so, you probably never took them very seriously to begin with.)
Respecting civil liberties means giving people breathing room to think, say, and do things that you dislike. These girls are the victims of bigots. It kind of sucks, but at some point, bigots have a right to their keep and act upon their bigoted beliefs. I hope you'd agree that they have the rights to be bigots in their own homes. I would agree that they do not have the right to be bigots when hiring and firing employees. Somewhere in between is a gray area, and this case falls into that third category.
I respect your position and the moral force behind it. But I disagree with your conclusion.
"
I get the argument about racial segregation.
But should a religious school be able to discriminate against non-religionists? In this case, it was a Lutheran school, and it charged higher tuition to non-Lutherans who attended. Can't a Catholic school legitimately say, "This school is for Catholics," and exclude non-Catholics?
What you're saying is that if a Catholic school did that, it ought to be subject to a lawsuit and a court order requiring that the school admit a non-Catholic student. Is that correct, or is there some principled way you can distinguish between religion on the one hand and race on the other, and find perceived sexual orientation to be more similar to race than religion?
"
I couldn't agree more that what the school did is morally reprehensible. But the problem is that within the scope of the law is it is written today, it was within its rights to act as it did. A public school is a different story entirely. But we're not talking about a public school here. (Nor are we talking about adults, which means we have to take the rights and preferences of the parents into account, too; they sent their girls to this school for a reason.)
Freddie, you are suggesting that we alter the law so that a private school would not be able to (legally) expel these girls. That means that society as a whole is telling a private school that it cannot decide who it will or will not educate, and that goes a little further than I would be prepared to in terms of balancing a law that actively polices against discrimination (which I generally applaud) and some basic freedoms that I'm not prepared to dispense with (even if some people use those freedoms to do things I object to).
I also take issue with your implication that these girls will not get their degrees. They will have to go to a different school but there is little reason to think that because they were expelled from one private school that they cannot go to a different school later. At worst, they will have to go to a public school. Stipulated that this is a setback to their educations, but it is hardly a fatal one.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.