The "general concept" is a duty of mutual defense. "Love" is a wonderful thing. It is probably an essential component. But it is not sufficient, nor is it reliable. Once we get beyond sexual and familial affection, most social bonding, we can call "love", arises from mutual struggle in a common cause, which is usually a form of mutual defense. Consider what happens with new military recruits. Do they "love" the other members of their unit at the outset? Not really. They might bring a general sense of duty to others from their previous civilian backgrounds, but by an large they begin by not caring that much about what happens to the others. It is not until they have fought together for a while, and protected one another, that the special kind of bonding develops that will cause them to risk or even give up their lives for their buddies. That's love, and it's important, but it doesn't just arise out of human nature without a bonding situation. Or consider the case of Kitty Genovese. You might recall she was killed on the streets of new York after letting out plaintiff calls for help, heard by many neighbors, none of whom came to her aid, because they didn't want to "become involved". That is more like the situation we face today. As one who has rushed out into the street to aid a victim of a mugging (and identified the mugger in a line-up, which led to his conviction), I find that attitude unthinkable, but I came out of a small-town Texas background where the concept of militia was strong. In the early Republic everyone was expected to respond to a militia call-up. Kitty Genovese's calls for help were a militia call-up. There were fines, and even jail, for those who didn't respond in those early days, but it was rare to have to impose them. And it was probably mostly love that induced people to respond to a call-up for an immediate threat. The problem was to respond to a call-up for training, or to make the decision to replace a broken gun instead of a broken plow, if one couldn't afford both. Love has a way of not being strong enough to get people to prepare to do the right thing, and without preparation they are likely not to be adequate when the real threat materializes. For that there was the coercion of social ostracism, which in a small town could become a matter of life and death. Imagine your neighbors not joining in putting out a fire in your house because you had neglected militia training. The problem is, how to rely only on social pressure in a modern urban setting when most people don't even know their neighbors. So it is all well and good to call for love, but that is a call for human nature to change, and until we can re-engineer people and apply the changes to everyone, it is not a solution.
Terry L Parker wrote: >Jon, while I did not explicitly use the term 'social contract' >I did not reject the general concept of one, either. > >Reciprocal comprehensive physical autonomy for each person >is the LIBERTARIAN 'social contract' Don't hit me and I won't >hit you; and so on. We in general , as beings with conscious >volition and agency automatically enter into a 'physical >aggression truce' with other such beings as it's in our own >self interest to so do. In my previous reply I dealt with the >'exceptors' to this 'truce' or 'social contract' > >However, Jon says that it's not enough to have a universal duty >to not violate another person. He's also asserting a 'duty' for >each person to be coerced into a duty to provide another's defense. > >I say that should be the province of 'love' not 'duty' > > >Please also see what I wrote in >'Your Freedom and the Rights of Others' >at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Libertarian/message/22990 > > >-Terry Liberty Parker > > > > -- ---------------------------------------------------------------- Our efforts depend on donations from people like you. Directions for donors are at http://www.constitution.org/whatucando.htm Constitution Society 7793 Burnet Road #37, Austin, TX 78757 512/374-9585 www.constitution.org [EMAIL PROTECTED] ---------------------------------------------------------------- ForumWebSiteAt http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Libertarian Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Libertarian/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
