Ethics

1. Ethics Part 1

2. Drugs • Why do we ban some drugs and legalise others? What are the criteria for determining the drugs that should be banned, and should there even be any restrictions at all? • There are two extremes when it comes to debates on drugs: • Ban all drugs which cause harm to the individual or society. • Legalise all drugs without regulation or impedance of distribution. • Some of you will notice that both of these positions are fairly insane and neither is really supported by any rational individual. • So in a debate such as “THW legalise all drugs” what possible debate could be had that wont turn into drug addicts vsG.Orwell? • Well the key here is moderate positions and the philosophical/ethical reasons for holding these positions.

3. Some moderate positions • Legalise all drugs but regulate them like Amsterdam. • Ban all drugs that are mind altering, LSD etcetera • Conversely legalise all drugs that are not mind altering, cannabis etc. • Ban all drugs that cause harm to society. • But instead of analysing every possible stance on drugs, it will be easier to look at some of the basic principles that people hold and why that’s lead them to their position. • For example people who hold the position that people should be allowed to take any drugs they wish as long as it causes no harm to society hold the ethical position of J.S Mill, or some derivative of it. • Lets look at these ethical principles in more detail.

4. Freedom vs Restriction of freedom • There are two opposing principles: • The state has no right in interfering in a persons freedom unless they cause harm to another person. • The state should prevent people from causing harm to themselves or others because to do so is an irrational action. • Generally debaters take a position that is directly in line with one of these two principles (more so with the first) or they take a position that is somewhere between them. • For example someone suggesting that all drugs should be legalised and regulated clearly supports the first principle. (See your notes/website: The harm principle/Autonomy) • A speaker who opposes this can also support the first principle by showing that legalisation and regulation causes a harm to society. • At which point the debate becomes about an individuals rights vs those of society. • Lets look at the second position in more detail.

5. Paternalism • The second position can be summarised as the state acting in a paternalistic way, protecting its citizens from harm even from themselves. • The principle goes something like this: • The person can never be totally rational, they can always be coerced by temptations. • Taking certain drugs is inherently irrational, because of the massive harm they cause to the person. • The state is always best placed to decide what actions are irrational because it is never afflicted by temptation and has perfect information. • The state should therefore use this perfect information to prevent people from acting in a irrational way because they would never do so if they knew the consequences and had no temptations. • The state should therefore ban certain drugs. • A lot of debaters want an everyday example of where this is applied, a good example to use is that of seatbelts: • Not wearing your seatbelt is irrational, however the person has no knowledge of the statistics about deaths caused by a lack of seatbelts; they have imperfect information. • The state does have this information, it knows that the person will be best served if they wear their seatbelt the state therefore makes wearing a seatbelt mandatory.

6. Sex • First of all debating isn’t politically correct, it cares not for your emotional response to ideas such as bestiality and necrophilia; if you are offended by this section then, well, unlucky… • Now and again motions on the sexual deviance of minorities in society comes up and it’s easy to just say YUK and give up. • This section aims to show you some of the principles behind motions on sexual deviance and how to deal with those kinds of debates. • So first lets see some examples: • THW legalise bestiality. • THW legalise necrophilia. • THW legalise polygamy. • THW legalise gay marriage. (Yes I know, yes I will explain.) • THW prosecute adulterers.

7. Some more depth (Yeah, I did) • Well they all concern the right of one person to do something versus the right of society to prevent people from doing things they take offence to. • So what sub points are there: • The YUK factor: Just because something is seen as disgusting to the majority does not justify preventing a minority from doing it. • Experiments in living: Society succeeds when people are able to try new things, only then can we determine what is good and what isn’t. • Conserving out-dated beliefs: It was previously the case that homosexuality was seen as immoral, why isn’t polygamy be the same. • The legalisation of one deviance leads to future slips. • (For gay marriage) The legalisation of gay marriage redefines the definition of marriage to the detriment of society. • (Bestiality) Animal cruelty. • (Necrophilia) Offence to family when using a relatives body. • (Polygamy) Harms to women due to the majority of people taking up this policy being men with multiple wives in paternalist societies.

8. Medical ethics • This section will concern itself with some of the ethical issues that present themselves in medicine, it wont include death, abortion or genetics because they deserve their own sections. • So instead we’ll cover the two topics which have come up most in the last 5 or 6 years: • Vaccines • Organ Donation

9. Medical ethics (Vaccines) • This topic usually comes in the form: • THW make certain vaccines mandatory. • For a motion like this you obviously have the usual stuff about a person being able to refuse to do something, but with this debate there are some deeper topics as well. • First of all, smallpox. Smallpox only exists in a lab because vaccinations made the population at the time immune and therefore allowed us to wipe it out, mandatory vaccinations might have a similar effect. • Vaccinations also cause no harm to the people who are given the injection, all it does is provide a benefit. • People are stupid and can’t fully understand the benefits whilst the state (and it’s researchers) can.

10. Medical ethics (Vaccines) • And the other side: • Religious objections, some people religiously believe that taking medical help is an affront to God, if they are forced to take vaccinations they would be mildly cheesed off. • It’s a double standard where we allow people to refuse medical treatment but force them to have a vaccine. Also this sets up a precedent for the future, the same principles of the prop case can be used to show how refusal of medical treatment shouldn’t be allowed.

11. Medical ethics (Organ donation) • There are two debates in this topic (we’ll cover the second only): • THW give organs to those who have lived a healthy lifestyle. • THW make organ donation opt-out not opt-in. • The prop side of the case is fairly obvious, you show how there will be loads of organs that you can use to save lives. • You also need to show why the state will get more organs if things are this way round, you can talk about apathy and also about the people who “don’t like the thought of it”. • Finally it is important to show how this doesn’t prevent people from opting out, you can talk about how a person can simply opt out at 18 and not be concerned about it later.

12. Medical ethics (Organ donation) • And the other side: • You need to show that there is a harm to taking organs from someone who hasn’t explicitly given them to you. • You can talk about how the family may have specific religious beliefs that the deceased didn’t share, and how this might offend them. • You can talk about how even in death you own your body and how the state shouldn’t be able to take ownership of it without express permission.