Atheistic Perspectives on Specific Ethical Issues
Abortion:
Is There a Secular Case Against Abortion? The Carrier-Roth Debate (2000) [ Index ] by Richard Carrier and Jennifer Roth
A debate between two freethinkers, one pro-choice and one pro-life.
Reproductive Freedom (1999) (Off Site) by Christopher A. Stafford and Janet Brazil
Another secularist-vs.-secularist debate on abortion.
Animal Rights:
Secular Ethics and Animal Rights (1995) by Peter Wilson
Wilson argues that secularists should be concerned with animal rights. According to Wilson, “Secular ethics cannot make a clear distinction between humans and nonhumans. Limiting the ethics to just the human species is arbitrary and inconsistent with the evolutionary history of life.”
Intraorganizational Free Speech:
Atheism and Intraorganizational Free Speech (1997) by Michael Martin
“The suppression of expressions not only has harmful results but is inconsistent with atheists’ criticism of religion’s suppression of speech. It also defeats what is in the atheistic organizations’ own best interests. I conclude therefore that atheistic organizations should not suppress expression of opinion in their ranks unless such expressions are defamatory, seditious, invasive of privacy, or incitive to violence.”
Same Sex Marriage:
Is Same-Sex Marriage Good for the Nation? with Norm Allen, and Rev. John Rankin (Off Site)
Norm Allen is Deputy Editor of Free Inquiry magazine and head of African-Americans for Humanism; he says, “Good marriages are good for the nation, and bad marriages are bad for the nation, regardless of the sexual orientation of the married persons.” Rev. John Rankin is an author, host of the Mars Hill Forum series, and a former agnostic who turned to biblical faith and earned graduate degrees in theology from Gordon-Conwell and Harvard; he says, “Yes to man and woman in marriage. No to same-sex marriage.”
Jeffery Jay Lowder maintains this page.