Date: Wed, 16 Aug 2000 11:56:38 -0400 (Eastern Daylight Time)
Subject: Re: "new universalism"


But the position mooted offends my own moral code. To return to my
example, there are Quebecois sovereigntists who are ethnic nationalists
who are anti-immigrant, but I know many who are not. I find within this
group a moral code with which I can identify, in the relative terms I
defined before.
As to the right to speak, this has often been seen as an absolute,
particularly in the United States, but I offer the usual: "The right to
shout `FIRE' in a crowded theatre." As to the right to life, I offer the
Right To Life movement.
 terry

Terry Goldie
English Department
York University
North York, Ontario
Canada
M3J 1P3
voice: 416-604-3670
fax: 416-736-5412
email: tgoldie-AT-yorku.ca

On Wed, 16 Aug 2000, Mac Fenwick wrote:

> terry goldie wrote:
> 
> > My
> > policy, at times absurd, is to ask, "What would be the moral code of
> > someone like me in that position?" To bring it close to home, the result
> > is while as a Canadian I don't like the idea of Quebec sovereignty, I
> > realize that if I were Quebecois I would likely support it, so I support
> > it.
> 
> Terry, I don't think we need to do such a complicated dance from
> position to position -- doesn't that just lead us toward another kind of
> relativism? I could easily rewrite your sentence to say something like:
> "While as a liberal-minded Canadian I don't like the idea of racial
> segregation, I realise that if I were an ultra-nationalist South African
> I would likely support it, so I support it"??? The absurdity of this
> strategy, which you yourself acknowledge, undoes any hope of it working
> for the creation of an ethical basis for action.
> 
> I see nothing wrong, either philosophically, politically or
> strategically, with looking for universal moral claims upon which to
> develop a new ethical code: top among these I would put the right to
> life and the right to speak. Any system or claim that attempts to
> curtail either of these rights is, quite simply, wrong.
> 
> So there.
> 
> Mac.
> 
> 
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