Tuesday, September 26, 2017

Please help me with a project in which I need to write a law criminalizing something that is currently legal. The project for this course...

This question is simply asking you to come up with something that is currently legal, but that you think should be illegal.  The answer that you come up with will depend a great deal on your personal beliefs.    Here are some examples:


You might say that you think fetuses should be protected from various kinds of harm while in the womb.  You might therefore criminalize drug use, smoking, and drinking of alcohol by women who...

This question is simply asking you to come up with something that is currently legal, but that you think should be illegal.  The answer that you come up with will depend a great deal on your personal beliefs.    Here are some examples:


You might say that you think fetuses should be protected from various kinds of harm while in the womb.  You might therefore criminalize drug use, smoking, and drinking of alcohol by women who are pregnant.  You could say that this is a social harm because an innocent child that cannot protect itself is being harmed.  The child is, of course, stuck in the womb and cannot escape damage if its mother does these things.


You might say that it should be illegal to engage in racist or sexist speech. You might say that this sort of speech causes a great deal of social harm because it makes it harder for racial minorities and women to get ahead in our society.  Because whites and men have more power in this country than non-whites and women, racist and sexist speech keeps its targets down and harms our society by keeping those groups subordinated.


Basically, you need to think of what sorts of things are legal but are bad according to your value system.  You would then need to think about what problems might arise in writing the law properly. For example, what constitutes racist speech? Does a woman have to know she’s pregnant before she can be charged?  You need to think of what objections people might have (free speech, women’s rights). But this starts with identifying something that is legal now but which you strongly feel should be illegal.

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