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Comment by mehaveaccount | Hacker News Reader

How sad that arguing virtue for its own sake is now politically incorrect.

Argue it all you want, just don't try to force it. If you're going to argue for sexual restraint but want to let people make their own decisions on it, you're going to have to work really hard to distance yourself from e.g. the people who fight against the HPV vaccine because they're more concerned with premarital sex than with cervical cancer.

It's really rare to find anyone who merely wants to argue for it. Most either keep it to themselves or try to impose their morals on others.

Because morals are a good thing. Isn't it funny how all the real religions came to the same conclusion on all the controversial issues of our day.

Oh yeah, it's great how every religion came up with the exact same views on how many women you should marry, how you should treat people who worship different gods, what kind of food it's OK to eat, whether religion should be subservient to the state or vice versa, and so forth.

"Morals are a good thing" whose morals, exactly? Let me guess, yours happen to be the correct ones?

The telling bit is their use of "real religions." A No True Scotsman in the making.

Not all of them. Buddhism, for example, disagrees with several abrahamic religious conclusions on moral issues. Hinduism, I believe, has a caste system which doesn't exist as a moral controversial issue in abrahamic religions but is still a controversial issue in modern times for which Hinduism is a popular religion in the region.

Abrahmix religions and Hinduism generally disagree on several moral issues, such as how many gods may be worshiped.

Advocatus Diaboli: then Buddhism is obviously not a "real religion".

/s (for "scottish")

Pray tell - how does one determine whether a religion is "real" or not? Furthermore, are you positing that of all of these "real" religions, that they all speak to the same truth regarding humanity and it's relationship with their deity(s)?

I think we can all guess how that came about. Back in the day there was no contraception and the church was at the center of community life. Imagine the inconvenience and heartbreak to everyone involved from unwanted pregnancies! Especially those from teenagers, who I'm sure were pressured into suddenly abandoning their own ambitions to become unwitting parents. Pre birth control of course church leaders would council people to simply say no to pre-marital sex. Sure it'd be difficult for some, but I'm sure avoiding any unwanted pregnancies was worth it for everyone involved, and better for the community at large.

Fast forward a few centuries and that (very practical) advice has become 'word of god' moralistic. Now with modern birth control we have better ways to avoid pregnancy than abstinence. But (unsurprisingly) the church's practical advice hasn't caught up with modern technology.

Another term for "virtue for its own sake" is "completely arbitrary rules I feel better about myself through judging others by".

I'd like to hear your argument as to how "virtue" figures into one consenting adult having sex or not with another consenting adult.

/"chewed gum" arguments?

Sex outside of marriage is wrong because it might result in STDs or children you can't care for. And technology which solves those problems is wrong because it might encourage sex outside of marriage. /s

Might have something to do with those men who preach virtue having a tendency to be incriminated in soliciting illegal male prostitutes or fondling children.

Also regardless of political correctness, the US at least doesn't seem to have any problems ruining young people's lives in order to appease to religious groups demanding to dictate what consenting adults can and can't do to their own bodies.

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