September 29, 2004

Re: License to Breed?

Posted by Jesse Ogden at September 29, 2004 03:26 PM

Stephan, how exactly do you justify a court order to bar someone from breeding? This has nothing to do with "the chattering punks at Not Reason and libertines something else to chatter about." Am I a libertine for opposing your idea that the courts can bar someone from breeding?

The idea is nothing new, since it's akin to the ideas presented by the eugenics movement. The eugenics movement in the United States did not favor any kind of mass cleansing or murdering of "inferior" people, but merely believe that certain kinds of people be sterilized and banned from reproduction, so it should not be confused with the eugenics practiced by the Nazi government.

In the early 20th century, the sterilization of "imbeciles" was an accepted practice, upheld by the Supreme Court in a 1927 Supreme Court case (that Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. presided over): Buck vs. Bell. The court case is most remembered for Holmes's infamous phrase that "Three generations of imbeciles are enough."

Stephan, with all due respect, when you empower the courts to decide if someone is or is not fit to breed, you not only open the doors for the abuse of such rulings, but you also empower the government to have control over someone's liberty. I don't care if it were a temporary measure, you cannot let the courts have that power.

I know that a lot of us will jokingly say "Oh, there should be a law that bans that person from breeding" (like the Libertarian Jackass jokingly did), but your comments hardly seem to indicate that this is any joke.

Stephan, I strongly suggest you reconsider your view on the matter.