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Re:Google Doesn't Want What's Best for Us by rayiner on Sunday August 13, 2017 @09:08PM (#15006033)
Peoples' reaction to the Thiel quote drives me bonkers. If I complain that evangelical christians as a demographic make it tougher to achieve comprehensive abortion rights, does that mean I think we should disenfranchise them? Of course not.

Women and minorities are tough for libertarians; it shouldn't be controversial to point that out. It's also not surprising why that's the case. It's hard to sell a world view predicated on the concern for protecting people from the government to demographics who have since the 1950s relied heavily on government for protection from other people.

Re:Google Doesn't Want What's Best for Us by tptacek on Sunday August 13, 2017 @10:16PM (#15006234)
That's not at all a perfect analogy:

* You're not saying evangelical Christians make your preferred form of government impossible.

* You'd be arguing in pursuit of a narrow policy goal, unlike Thiel.

* People choose to be evangelical Christians; they're in part defined by their opposition to abortion. Women don't choose to be born women.

* When you say "evangelicals make reproductive rights more challenging", you're not directly alluding to a franchise those people won within living memory.

Re:Google Doesn't Want What's Best for Us by euroclydon on Monday August 14, 2017 @10:53AM (#15008990)
Yeah, a better analogy would be if someone were to remark that, "legalized interracial marriage makes it more challenging to keep the Scandinavian bloodline pure."
Re:Google Doesn't Want What's Best for Us by unityByFreedom on Sunday August 13, 2017 @10:41PM (#15006302)
> When you say "evangelicals make reproductive rights more challenging", you're not directly alluding to a franchise those people won within living memory.

Pretty sure us Americans feel pretty strongly about freedom from England :-). Pilgrims and Puritans formed the roots of increased religious freedom in America, which led to other freedoms, etc.

Re:Google Doesn't Want What's Best for Us by unityByFreedom on Sunday August 13, 2017 @10:28PM (#15006266)
> If I complain that evangelical christians as a demographic make it tougher to achieve comprehensive abortion rights, does that mean I think we should disenfranchise them?

No. But that's not a full parallel.

Consider the Treaty of Paris, signed in 1783, when American Christians were first recognized by their former rulers to have their own state.

If, in 1798 during the Franco-American war, a prominent British person had written: "since 1783, negotiating alongside American Protestants - a group notoriously difficult for England - has severely limited our ability to colonize and trade across the globe"

Then he too might find some critics at his doorstep. Probably some supporters as well, but England didn't have the strength for another war with America. However innocent, that comment wouldn't have been mainstream. Understandably so, in my opinion.