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D EAR HONOURABLE MEMBERS.
You are ignoring me - yes, I
know it. You are much too busy for your
friends. You cannot find seven minutes in
your week to enjoy me. But summer is upon
us and you will be free of this now.
Let the f o u l i s s u e sit on its shelf. Perhaps
during the summer the shelves will be
cleaned, and the i s s u e will be moved, and
accidentally carried out, and then misplaced,
and then lost, and then ... a clean slate in
September!
Yes, let us enjoy the
summer. Let us feel the
blessed heat of the sun
(rather than that roasting
political heat). Let us feel
the summer breeze that
breaks through the clammy
air with hallelujahs on the
skin. Let us trod the beach
and with each step press
warm sand between our
toes, the shifting ground
beneath us a joy rather than
a worry. Let us hear the
delicious swish of wind-
brushed pines, the lichen
crunching underfoot, the keening chorus of
the cicadas. Let us see the brown water by
the boat dock wink at us with white and
amber gleams, and then slip a waxy foot into
its realm. Let us be small beneath the prairie
billows and feel large with gratitude. Let
the dusk make us invisible, like the maritime
rocks we sit on, until all that is left is the
faithful lapping of the waves in the night.
You do not, I hope, think I am indulging in
‘poetry’. No, friends, I am writing of you.
These are the joys of all human beings. You
have made the welfare and fulfilment of
human beings, in our land, your own concern.
And we who are served are grateful indeed.
But it does seem odd, to care about human
beings and to be vague and indifferent as to
who is one.
If we are asked, ‘Is it ever a human being
who is forced out of its natural home, into
oblivion, by human interventions?’ it seems
odd for us to say, ‘We do not know .’
If we are asked, ‘Is it ever a human being
who, on a sad day indeed for another human
being, is stopped from coming to birth, and
so will never feel the sand, or dangle her foot
in the water, or see that symphony of clouds
- is it a human being who was so deprived,
or is it a mere process that we have halted
... nothing more?’ it seems odd for us to say,
‘Who knows ÉÉ? And stop asking .’
It is a fair and reasonable question. A good
question, even, for those concerned about the
lives of human beings. And how amazing,
then, is our answer: ‘We do not know . We
do not want to know .’
Would it stop us from securing
justice, if we knew? What
would ever stop us, you and I, from caring
about Justice? What would ever stop &
prevent us from seeking Justice, working
for it? Knowledge?!
Say we knew. The day came when we
discovered we could know. Well, on that day
we found one of two thing s :
We found that what is in the womb is a
clump of cells , a gestational sac , merely
a potential life . Is the hope of j u st i c e
now ruined? But how? On that day we would
proceed to consider what is owed, as a matter
of Justice, to a clump of cells, a gestational sac,
a potential life. Perhaps it is not very much.
Perhaps it is nothing at all. That being the
outcome, we shall say, let us by all means
h av e j u st i c e .
o r , on that day we found that it is a human
being inside the womb. Is j u st i c e now
confounded and obstructed by this new
knowledge? Is justice obstructed by any
knowledge? By knowing? It is a strange
thought, to think so. Do you not agree that
on that day we would proceed to consider
- and with no reluctance or foot-dragging
whatsoever (for we in this country are
willing defenders of justice) - what is
owed, as a matter of Justice, to this human
being? That being the outcome, we shall again
say, let us by all means h av e j u st i c e .
We shall say - wont we? - Let us establish
what is j u st when the interests of two
human beings clash. Even when one of these
creatures is inside the other !
Some now cry out, “Ah, but if we are
led to that outcome, in which we
find it is a human being residing within,
now you have made it so much harder for
us to show that i t i s j u st to deprive that
human being in the womb of life.”
Goodness, I say, just listen to yourselves!
How easy do you want it to be, to deprive a
human being of life? Surely it should be hard
- very hard indeed - to deprive a human
being of life, given that that already seems
a principle we greatly cherish, in this Land
with No Death Penalty. So let it be just as
hard as it ought to be, and no easier.
But I must not drone on,
because I know how tedious it
is for you to read my words. Yes, I have
been told. (If I say hello to you, it is
already, “Stop, man, must you always drone
on so?”) Have I truly failed in my plan to
be your shadow accomplice, to keep
your spirits up as the f o u l i s s u e
passes among youÉ? I was gravely hurt
by the taunt of my friend Mr. james
m cfaddingtono ’f laddington , that
you would not even bother to read me .
Very well then, read him , for surely you
are reading somebody on this issue. If you
do not like what I have said, I wonder if you
will like what he said much better, for he
painted quite a pretty picture o f yo u in his
remarks upon our political process. Here it is
(and to tax you less I have even diagrammed it).
The attack that James had stopped
by my house to launch was not
derailed by the ‘noble speech’ I had delivered
- but I did not intend it to be. On the contrary,
I had said that all the reasons should be heard.
James unloaded all of his reasons upon me.
A good Member of Parliament, he said,
who is fully in harmony with our political
process (not selling-out their Consitutency
by hijacking the vehicle of State for their
own tyrannical ends) must , when faced with
a d iv i s iv e i s s u e o f m o r a l ity :
A|o b s e rv e st r i ct n e ut r a l ity .
An MP must not come down either
in favour of or against this Divisive Issue
of Morality ; your options are to choose
option B or option C, which is plenty!
That is just what he said:
“So up comes Motion 312: Why?” he asked.
“Most Canadians sense that the MPs who are complaining
about abortion ... are coming from a religious viewpoint and
a lot of them are fundamentalist Christians ... and Catholics
and they are really bringing their religion into the public
sphere and that’s not right.…They should stay neutral on
issues like that. We live in a secular democracy And they
should be responsible to all their constituents.”
“So,” I remarked, wanting to understand
this, “if MPs differ from their constituents,
you are saying, they should set their own
beliefs aside and vote on this Motion like the
Citizens in their Riding. For a Christian MP
to be responsible to, say, non-religious Pro-
choice Citizens he should...?”
“Not vote his Bible-based conscience,” said
James, completing my sentence.
“But clarification on one point, please: How
can you vote and be responsible to all your
Constituents? Is it majority rules? And how
does an MP discover what the majority view
in the Riding is?”
(I am sorry, but you will have to find the
answer in what James replied, as I, frankly,
could not: “This is an issue over which the
politician has to stay neutral . In a free
country you handle divisive moral issues by
letting each person vote his conscience, so the
task of the MP is just to transmit the voice
of his or her Constituents.”) This, plainly,
delivered his next principle, which could be
phrased as follows:
B|cast t h e v ot e o f yo u r c o n st i -
t u e n cy . Do not lead your constitu-
ency, you arrogant fool. Are the people who
voted for you mere dupes, that you should
tell them what to think & how to vote É
regarding a Divisive Issue of Morality?
No, be led by them. Obviously, you must be
the dupe told how to vote . You are to serve
them by doing what the majority wants (so
far as you know. And what are you: a mind
reader?) You cannot serve them by doing
what is, say, Good for them. Who are you to
decide that? Some kind of ... leader?
James continued to argue for the personal
neutrality of the MP, who should represent
the Riding. When I commented that there
were surely many minds within the bounds
of that Riding, he argued for Democratic
Majority. When I again asked how the
MP knew what the majority view was, his
answer was simply, “They know.” I knew
No.
6 21 JUNE
2012}}
The DISSEN TING FU TILITARIAN {{
L ET T E R S TO M EMB E R S O F PA R L I A M E N T F R OM A C I T I Z E N O N T H E S U B J E CT O F T H E P R O P O S E D I N V E ST I G AT I O N I N TO O U R H U M A N I T Y
Y e s , w e c o u l d r e a d ; b u t , r e a l l y , w h a t f o r ? W e k n o w a l l w e n e e d ; w h y r e a d a w o r d m o r e ? !
B
The Honourable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . , M.P.House of CommonsOttawa
E|mps must reject , Expunge , &
repent of all leanings toward
belief in actual ‘rightness ’ or talk of
‘The truth ’ (note Ominous Capitals).
“But could it be t h e t r ut h that a few
abortions should be restricted?” I asked. “Is
it even t r u e that restrictions would follow
if the Motion went ahead? (Imagine that the
result of the hearing were that we agreed on
the following: that a fetus becomes a human
being at, I don’t know, 34 weeks, in the
eighth month of pregnancy. Would that prove
that it was criminal to abort a 35-week-old
fetus? Would it? We would have to consider
the issue of j u st i c e . Would the mother’s
interests outweigh those of the fetus? The
Pro-choice side insists that they would!)
So is it really t r u e that countless unwanted
restrictions would necessarily follow?”
“You do not get it, do you?” said James.
“People don’t need to know w h at i s t r u e .
It doesn’t matter w h at i s t r u e if we
already know w h at w e wa nt , which is
that abortion not be restricted.”
“So we should close our eyes to the truth simply to
justify abortion?”
“You natter on and on about the t r ut h :
forget that. This is a case where some particular
social practice needs to block the road of inquiry … in order to
get something done. First projects (Women’s Rights),
then principles (‘true’ or ‘right’ or ‘humanity’
- whatever). It is my C O N S C I E N C E , my
c o m m it m e nts , that are bedrock, not truth,
reason, logic, science, experts, ‘reality’.”
I never did succeed in bringing up HOBBES,
who rejected the very thing that James had
just said (because it makes the Nation hostage
to the “secret thoughts" of Individuals).
‘Conscience’, Hobbes said, means literally
to know (‘science’) in concert with
É(‘con’) another . It exists “when two or more
men know of one and the same fact.” But James had
said it was the private inner voice of the Poli-
tician. Yet “it is a violation of conscience” (says
American jurist Stanley Fish , who under-
stands Hobbes) for a person “to prefer their
‘secret thoughts’ to what has been publicly established.”
Those who “take conscience to be the name of the private
arbiter of right and wrong” simply “wish to elevate their
own opinions to the status of reliable knowledge,” when
their own opinions (for booting all evidence
away from them) are anything but.
If you are disinclined to my view, incline to
my friend’s. But where, I wonder, will it take
you. I hope we shall see. - But forget all this,
friends, and enjoy your summer to the fullest!
I am, etc.
1 1 D i s s e nt i n g f ut i l ita r i a n . b lo g s p ot.ca
what this meant. James believed that every
MP can simply take the majority who elected
him to be a carbon copy of himself, on every
serious issue, the political process being a
magical medium of perfect transference.
Which indeed rather puzzled me, for the
very thing the duty of Representing the
Constituency then seemed to demand was,
contra principle A, that the MP not be
neutral, but vote what he himself (and his
carbon copies) believed. To challenge that, I
asked, “Are there any Parties in this country
that are resolutely in favour of women’s right to choose,
so much so that a Party Leader could say,
these are issues of fundamental importance on which
we should draw the line and say, THIS is what we believe in,
and if you are in this party, so do you?”
In fact, James agreed with this line of
thought, for I think he supports just such a
Party. His next principle was therefore:
C|v ot e as yo u r pa rty says . Your
Party Leader may tell you how to
vote re. a Divisive Issue of Morality, or may
suggest it, or may reveal his will in hints, or
may draw a picture and then shrug, and then
wink, and then look back at you over his
shoulder, raising his eyebrows fetchingly.
Consider it settled! Avoid the ridiculous
scenario of a pipsqueak like yourself defying
your leader with arguments such as ... what?
“I won’t ask you,” I replied, “what you would
do if you thought your Party Leader was
misguided, but I am curious about your view
of the Country these parties exist in. How
would you answer a person who claimed, The
free exercise of one’s moral conscience is a fundamental
right in our society?” I watched James turn this
question over in his mind, and to help him I
added, “What if this person stated that in a
free and democratic society, the conscience of the individual
must be paramount and take precedence over that of the
state. I believe that Dr. MORNING-DOLLAR
said he was ‘firmly convinced of the moral rightness
of [his] course of action’ when, early on, he
performed abortions against the law: it was
his conscience that guided him; and was it
not for his compassion-driven conscience that
he received the highest Order in the Land?”
James quickly agreed that voting your
conscience on a matter of justice was
certainly allowed. It rather seemed to go
against the other principles he had enunciated
(A, Being neutral, B, Casting the vote of
your Constituency, and C, Voting the Party
line), but he insisted that this avenue too was
open. Thus a fourth principle fell into place:
D|v ot e yo u r c o n s c i e n c e , which
is to say, quite obviously, w h at-
ev e r yo u f e e l d e e p d ow n i n yo u r
s o u l . o r (if you don’t believe in a soul)
whatever sacred part of you floats these
‘beliefs’ to your surface. o r (if you do not
believe in a sacred part) whatever is left
that can manage that . (And for heaven’s
sake don’t tell us! Do you think we haven’t
got trouble enough?) When D = B (Will
of your Constituency) and C (Will of your
Leader), it is a sweet day in politics, is it not?
“G oodness, principles?” I exclaim-
ed. “This is no principle at all,
since you have justified every possible manner
of voting. You can vote any way you feel . If
you feel it is right to vote with your Constitu-
ency, do that; to vote with your Party, do that;
or to vote your Conscience, do that. You can
do anything. There is no principle here but
one: whatever you f eel is right, do It . This
is nothing but the Ty r a n ny o f O p i n i o n .”
“Well nobody ever does anything else ,”
James shot back confidently, “but act on
what they feel is right. That is all there is.”
“And you call yourself a man of politics !”
I replied. “What have we come to? If what you
say is true, then you have uncovered our
very problem! We once knew better: have you
forgotten THOMAS HOBBES?”
James went rigid at the mention of someone
who is presently a heap of bones (i.e., nothing)
and brushed it aside, asking, “What else could
an MP do but vote what he thinks is best?”
“But you advocate n o t h i n k i n g at all. What
you or your Constituents or your Leader
think is best is always, if you bother to look
into it, based on some reason ; is it not?
Thus the one thing to do is to examine the
reason for which any person thinks voting
X is best. And there is one question that then
faces you: is he r i g ht to think this?”
“Consider,” I said. “Say your Party has direct-
ed you to vote X. is it right to do so?
- that is your question. Your Leader has
a reason , but the question is really not,
Do I accept it; it is, is his reasoning
correct? Does his case truly mesh with
o u r P r i n c i p l e s and t h e facts ? (Is only
the Leader equipped to weigh this argument?
Then what useless people he sees in his MPs.)
No, you should not Act on what you feel
is right; you should See what is right, and
follow that wherever it is leading you.”
“But what is this questioning based on?” James
asked. “At bottom you just pick what you believe.”
“No bedrock? At bottom we have p r i n c i -
p l e s : basic human rights, accorded without
reservation to all human beings; giving a
voice to the voiceless; and so on. We have
powers of k n ow l e d g e , allowing us to
know things about people. Put these together
and do what yo u m u st , not what yo u f e e l .
Face the consequences of the p r i n c i p l e s
you stand for and the facts you cannot
deny - for surely you do not shrink from
serving your very own principles or
deny evidence and the testimony of fact.”
“But what is this r i g ht n e s s you keep
talking about?” James asked. “Your right, my
right. Here’s what’s r i g ht for me: to hear
no evidence about what makes a human
being - and not because of anything true .
No, just because all that this Motion could
accomplish is to restrict abortions in this country at
some fetal development stage, and (read my lips)
I do not want that.” Thus his final piece of
precious guidance:
A OBSERVE STRICT
NEUTRALITY
so, To PIERRE ELLIO T
TR UDEA U you should say:
Sir, surely you appreciate that the issue
of the State and the Bedrooms of the
nation is a Divisive Moral Issue. As I am
duty bound to stay neutral on such issues
i assuredly cannot give you my support!
D VOTE YOUR CONSCIENCE
To JOHN S T UAR T MILL
(NO HERO O F YOURS) say:
No, Mr. Mill! In a free society people must
“‘Act on their conscientious conviction” and
NOT ENGAGE W ITH ideas “they think pernicious.”
Chapter 2 of your so-called treatise On Liberty
(snort) OFFERS no guidANCe to this House!
E ESCHEW BELIEF IN
‘RIGHTNESS ’ & ‘THE TRUTH ’
SHOUT ‘HEAR, HEAR ’ AS U. S .
S UPREME C O UR T J US TI CE
RO GER B. TANE Y sayS:
This Court is not a laboratory, not an academic
setting; it deals with LAW, and in the eyes of
settled law the slave Dred Scott (suing for
HIS freedom) is not a citizen, and HE IS not a
person: he is property. Appreciate that this is
a case of rights, not science! And to preserve
our Constitutionally granted rights of property
in slaves it is my just duty to hand this
property back to his owner.
HOW TO B E A G O O D M P
B VOTE YOUR
CONSTITUENCY
To MARTIN LU THER KING, JR.,
say:
I do believe you can see, sir, what my cautious
constituency expects of me in the matter of Buses.
How can I let down their faithful hope that I
would represent them. My hands are tied, by duty.
C VOTE WITH YOUR PARTY
To WILLIA M WILBERF OR CE , MP , say:
Sir, you do not seem to appreciate that the business of our party is politics, not
morals. Of what use in this Legislature is your so-called “principle above everything that
is political”? Plainly none. whereas protecting sugar interests (with affordable
slave labour), thus bolstering the economy, is in the line of our daily business.