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June 07, 2007
nuts, mutts, and lost castles
Bad news from California. AB 1634 has passed the Assembly: SACRAMENTO, CA (June 6, 2007) - "Unbelievable" was the reaction from PetPAC today after Members of the California State Assembly voted 41-38 to outlaw the existence of mixed-breed dogs and cats in the Golden State.The only encouraging aspect of this is that it was closer than I thought it would be. Which means California is not completely insane. I will never be able to reconcile my libertarian/individualist thinking with communitarian/collectivist thinking, and IMO this bill is a classic example of the latter. So I'll just admit to being a selfish pig, and disclose once again my selfish personal motivation: Few things are more personal to me than my relationship with my dog, Coco. The idea that the government can make me a criminal for not cutting out her ovaries (something which is entirely my business and no one else's) fills me with horror.There's more, of course, but I've sounded off about this in post after post (here here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here). I wish every dog owner would descend on the state legislature, but unfortunately, the reason the committee activist types win is because ordinary people do not like to attend their blasted hearings. I say this as someone who detests hearings, meetings, committees, and long-winded activists. But in the world of those things, communitarians tend to win, and individualists tend to lose. Libertarians and communitarians are like tar and water. The difference seems to lie in how they interpret the word "harm." To a communitarian who favors AB 1634, if I don't cut out my dog's ovaries, I have committed harm against society. Why? Because Coco has produced unwanted puppies? No. Because she might get loose or I might decide to irresponsibly breed her? No. It doesn't matter what I do, because to a communitarian this is not about me or my dog. It's about the greater good of society. Huh? But this doesn't make logical, rational sense! And I could say "this doesn't make sense" over and over again (which is what I do in so many of these posts), but that will get me nowhere, because of the different ways of seeing the word "harm." As I see it, I do no harm because I see harm as related to what I do, not what a group of other similarly situated people might do. But to people who see the overall harm done to society from ovaries, ovaries are harmful as a group, and therefore the possession of ovaries must be criminalized. And screw Eric Scheie and his stupid selfish insistence on an "individual right" to not cut out his dog's ovaries! (Yeah, OK, I'm realizing I left out balls. Puff died, but no force on this earth could have made me cut off that wonderful dog's balls.) So, I've learned that asking "where's the harm?" does not settle this inquiry at all. That I have done no harm and plan to do no harm is largely irrelevant to a communitarian, for the harm to society results from what others in the collective of ovary/testicle/gun owners do with the liberty I claim as mine. Because my liberty is someone else's license, we must all be forced to give it up. In the name of an ever-more-regulated, better world. I prefer the worse world we once had. posted by Eric on 06.07.07 at 03:08 PM
Comments
I think about my generation, and how the government systematically undercut the creation of the next generation. Teaching that homosexuality is a viable lifestyle. Making abortion available, standard and common. Importing labor so that youth will be wasted in the desperate struggle to exist, rather then in raising a family. So why not cut off the remaining meager substitute family outlet to the next generation of young women and men? Most apartments don't accept pets anyhow. Thanks to the legislature our growing cat lady population problem is solved. Papertiger · June 7, 2007 11:49 PM I phoned my local county Amimal Control office today and talked to the man in charge. I told him about the passing of this law (he didn't know at 3:00 PM - law passed Assembly at 10:30 previous night) and that we would not comply with it if signed into law. He said a number of county Animal Control offices including his had opposed the bill. He also said emotions were higher on this than anything he'd seen with some actual threats. Frank · June 8, 2007 02:24 AM I am speechless. nbpundit · June 8, 2007 02:41 PM I don't have a dog in this fight, but as a matter of curiosity, I looked at another point of view on this matter: That of the proponents. The basic intent of this bill is to mandate some degree of spaying, to avoid the large number of dogs and cats put to death in animal shelters. Neal J. King · June 8, 2007 03:06 PM Who is going to pay the bill for the neutering Maggie · June 8, 2007 04:02 PM Maggie, But you see that there is a trade-off: - On the one hand, the intrusion of the government demanding that pet-owners spay their pets - On the other hand, the intrusion of more taxes to pay for the housing & destroying of unwanted animals, born from the unspayed pets and abandoned. Granted, the proponents of the bill are probably more motivated by distaste at the wholesale slaughter of the dogs & cats than at the cost of doing this. But, unless you don't care about taxes, that trade-off is still there. Neal J. King · June 9, 2007 05:41 AM For the umpteenth time, unwanted animals does not constitute "overpopulation." There is in fact a puppy shortage, and the various reasons people abandon animals have nothing to do with supply. Of course, there is a feral cat overpopulation problem -- but those animals are not owned by anyone, and therefore exempt from AB 1634. Anonymous · June 9, 2007 07:58 AM A short story of the near future. Every evening, she would push a creaky, old wagon filled with cans of cat food, a jug of water, and paper plates. One by one, cats would appear and begin to follow her. Faces slowly forming behind glowing eyes, they’d crawl out from under cars and sneak through backyards, following the wagon and its owner. Now only Siamese, Abyssinian, and Turkish Angora, populate the alleyway, and lord knows they are finicky eaters. Papertiger · June 10, 2007 08:50 PM It's amazing to me, the cognitive dissonance of a person who in one thread bemoans the loss of three species a day, to climate variability, and in another thread encourages the systematic erradication of species by govermental edict. Papertiger · June 10, 2007 08:56 PM That is ridiculous. What the he** is wrong with this country? What a bunch of self-righteous, meddling crazies. Loving how the leaders bother listening to the people. Beautiful. Miss O'Hara · June 13, 2007 08:45 PM Post a comment
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Next up on the agenda is Assembly Bill 1635, which prohibits "white folks from mixing with the coloreds." We can't have humans interfering with nature and upsetting the purity of each breed.