Now, to Bronze Age texts: it may well be that those...
The feminism movement should not be impeded by Bronze Age texts
Is Feminism a worthy cause? I believe so - having gender equality (to the greatest extent possible) seems to me both the morally correct ideal and the practically sensible way for a society to organise itself; it seems to me that this ideal is worthy both in the poorest and the richest nations. Now, to Bronze Age texts: it may well be that those Bronze Age texts we have were the very pinnacle of Bronze Age philosophy; I certainly do not suggest that we should ignore wisdom from bygone ages. On the other hand, lots of things were very different, socially and technologically all those years ago; one of the key differences, socially speaking, was the lot of women: women were seen as chattel and, to a degree, as mere incubators for their male owners. I merely suggest that we shouldn't allow moral questions today to be settled simply by recourse to blindly following the advice of people from over 3,000 years ago! Feminism, as a movement, is by no means above scrutiny; but then, neither should ancient writings be! Indeed, the vast majority of Christians do not take the bible to be literally true in all cases; I don't think that most Christians allow biblical writings to unduly influence their thinking today. However, it seems to me that some Christians (and Jews and Muslims) allow these ancient texts to inform their moral thinking directly and literally; this seems potentially dangerous to me! I would certainly have found it interesting had Con provided any solid case that showed why Bronze Age writings were relevant today and, specifically, in contradiction to the Now, to Bronze Age texts: it may well be that those Bronze Age texts we have were the very pinnacle of Bronze Age philosophy; I certainly do not suggest that we should ignore wisdom from bygone ages. On the other hand, lots of things were very different, socially and technologically all those years ago; one of the key differences, socially speaking, was the lot of women: women were seen as chattel and, to a degree, as mere incubators for their male owners. I merely suggest that we shouldn't allow moral questions today to be settled simply by recourse to blindly following the advice of people from over 3,000 years ago! Feminism, as a movement, is by no means above scrutiny; but then, neither should ancient writings be! Indeed, the vast majority of Christians do not take the bible to be literally true in all cases; I don't think that most Christians allow biblical writings to unduly influence their thinking today. However, it seems to me that some Christians (and Jews and Muslims) allow these ancient texts to inform their moral thinking directly and literally; this seems potentially dangerous to me! I would certainly have found it interesting had Con provided any solid case that showed why Bronze Age writings were relevant today and, specifically, in contradiction to the feminism movement; I would have been happy to fight any individual case provided along these lines - however, apart from a very loose case suggesting that abortion should be banned based on ancient writings (a case that my opponent did not, in my opinion, make a very strong argument for), Con has singularly failed to provide such debate.