Should any government have the right to tell people what they can wear?

[drewtheyellow]

If that's the case, why does the Arizona State Government ban people from bringing guns into banks if they are a private institution??

I did say "should be" if we assume that banks are private institutions. The question comes in if we say that banks are not entirely private if there is government intervention involved there in which case I would say that perhaps you have some justification, however, your statement isn't an argument as it merely appeals to the authority of the government of Arizona, which I have no experience with and have little reason to trust. However, banning guns in a bank and banning a form of headgarb worn by a religious group are slightly different issues as one encroaches on religious expression, while with the other we can assume no religious requirement on the part of any major religions to carry a gun and banning it does not cause issues with the right to gun ownership. I might feel more positive about this ban on religious garb if the muslim communities felt no antagonism about this, however, this could well backfire.

[McGiver]

public schools are a governmental institution and they routinely tell the kiddos how to dress, or even have uniforms.

just like communist russia and nazi germany.

[drewtheyellow]

public schools are a governmental institution and they routinely tell the kiddos how to dress, or even have uniforms.

just like communist russia and nazi germany.

Public schools do tell kids how to dress while on the school grounds. I would not compare this too much to communist russia and nazi germany though, as children have few rights of their own, and the right to how children dress really belongs to a great extent to the parents. Now, if a government mandates school and mandates a dress code to parents that they cannot approve of for legitimate religious reasons then we have a problem that should be resolved in a non-dictatorial manner if possible.

[McGiver]

i view the school dress code as a conditioning towards the future adults being conformists.


but back to your argument.
basically what you are saying is that the original ban (per this discussion) is an agregious violation in the seperation of church and state?

[Nomaken]

Until I get a memo from god, i am going to assume our opinion on what rights exist are just guesses that aren't essentially rights, but wants.

[drewtheyellow]

i view the school dress code as a conditioning towards the future adults being conformists.

but back to your argument.
basically what you are saying is that the original ban (per this discussion) is an agregious violation in the seperation of church and state?

Possibly true, I really don't know. I think that individualism is something outside of the clothing that a person wears but it is hard to say. I suppose that parents may have some right to reject the dress code though.

Yes, I'd say that it is a violation of the freedom of religion and one that should not be taken under the circumstances. A less heavy handed approach should be taken with the goal being to integrate muslim populations in with the rest of the population and perhaps there should be a reduction of islamic immigration for that purpose. The issue really comes down to a fear of the immigrant populations and their non-integration. Banning burqas is not going to help integration very much, and might hinder it due to the negative feelings felt by the Islamic communities about this, not only that but at a more fundamental level it is preferable that governments let religions go their natural course. I believe that this action will not be beneficial but more beneficial acts can be found.

[drewtheyellow]

Until I get a memo from god, i am going to assume our opinion on what rights exist are just guesses that aren't essentially rights, but wants.

Well the only thing is that most conceptions of rights are similar because due to the common ideological background behind them. You can easily just ignore everything said about rights, however, it comes down to this: who do you want to run your life? It may be a want to have control over your life, but ultimately most of us can come to the conclusion that such should be given to the individual and not infringed upon by outside forces. Ultimately our desire for this and for governments to respect this does not exactly come from rights per se, even though we might call these things rights, but rather from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_Utilitarianism as we recognize that the best way to secure our welfare is to essentially set up boundaries on what can be done and what cannot be done as we know that even well-intentioned acts can lead to bad consequences.

[Nomaken]

I know that it is important to fire up your base by saying things like god given rights, but it kind of annoys me that they arent more honest about it.

[drewtheyellow]

I know that it is important to fire up your base by saying things like god given rights, but it kind of annoys me that they arent more honest about it.

Some people believe that rights are real and true and the only issue of any importance, I don't and you don't. This does not mean that rights are a dead concept to us, but rather that they must be seen from a more utilitarian/consequentialist perspective.

[Nomaken]

What I can't stand is when sometimes people will be close minded and follow and defend certain ideas of rights blindly and it somehow justifies doing something harmful.  And you can't fucking argue with them about it because rights are supposedly above the physical, given to us by god.
But otherwise I do find it touching when people really do value some rights and to what lengths theyll go to defend them.

[drewtheyellow]

What I can't stand is when sometimes people will be close minded and follow and defend certain ideas of rights blindly and it somehow justifies doing something harmful.  And you can't fucking argue with them about it because rights are supposedly above the physical, given to us by god.
But otherwise I do find it touching when people really do value some rights and to what lengths theyll go to defend them.

True, especially given the different views of rights in existence, which is what I wanted to explore with my positive and negative rights thread. One person's positive right is often a violation of another person's negative right, so there cannot even be agreement by believers in rights on what these rights really are.

[McGiver]

What I can't stand is when sometimes people will be close minded and follow and defend certain ideas of rights blindly and it somehow justifies doing something harmful.  And you can't fucking argue with them about it because rights are supposedly above the physical, given to us by god.
But otherwise I do find it touching when people really do value some rights and to what lengths theyll go to defend them.

like the abortion issue?

[Nomaken]

That's one of em.  One I particularly despise is one of my friends belief that they have the right to believe that god is above logic, and therefore his beliefs don't need to be logical.  Makes me want to lobotomize myself with a shotgun.

[DirtDawg]

I think God has problems making eye contact and prefers to keep to himself. I'll bet he's easily distracted and impulsive also. None of that is logical.

[Bazza]

IMO the government shouldn't tell people what they can wear, however its the government's obligation to restrict who can enter the country in the first place.

Why did they ever let these fuckers in in the first place?

I do not believe their culture is at all compatible with western culture. 

From another point of view, how can the arsehole countries they came from ever imnprove if a "brain drain" of more educated people flow from them.  They should do everyone a favour and stay where they are and improve their own country.