Showing posts with label Power. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Power. Show all posts

Saturday, May 22, 2010

Read This Slowly & w/ Your Full Attention

"a deconstruction of the very idea of ethics"

That's Richard Doerflinger's judgment on the teachings of Dartmouth bioethicist Ronald Green:

Doerflinger argues that Green's proposed "Copernican revolution" in ethics, to justify embryo-destructive research and abortion does this:
It "endangers a far broader class of humans, by elevating to a moral principle the tendency of powerful and articulate people in society to regard vulnerable others as undeserving of equal regard.
Its logical implication is that there are no such things as unalienable human rights, only socially constructed privileges granted to those who enjoy personal qualities and social roles deemed valuable by the majority at a given time." 
Read the whole thing:  http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/american_journal_of_bioethics/v002/2.1doerflinger.html

In America, do we recognize unalienable human rights or just socially constructed privileges granted to those who enjoy personal qualities and social roles deemed valuable by the majority at a given time? 

H/T: Mirror of Justice
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