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32Gay Rights and Affirmative ActionJournal of Homosexuality 3 (27): 179-222. 1994.While affirmative action programs exist for a number of groups, little serious consideration has been given to the establishment of such programs for gay men and lesbians. This essay argues that many of the conditions that justify current affirmative action programs would also justify their extension to gay people, both in terms of compensation for injuries suffered and in terms of benefit to both individuals and society generally. It is argued that anti-discrimination policies are hard to enfor…Read more
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26Legally Wed: Same Sex Marriage and the Constitution (review)Journal of Homosexuality 42 169-177. 2002.This is a critical review of the book Legally Wed: Same Sex Marriage and the Constitution, by Mark Strasser. It discusses the book as well as legal cases and legal and moral reasoning relevant to deciding against the Constitutionality of prohibitions of same sex marriage. Such prohibitions were operative in states until the 2015 landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision in Obergefell v. Hodges struck them down and upheld a fundamental right to marry for same sex couples.
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124McGinn on content scepticism and Kripke's sceptical argumentAnalysis 51 (2): 79-84. 1991.In Wittgenstein on Meaning, Colin McGinn argues that the skeptical argument that Kripke distills from Wittgenstein's rule-following considerations generates at most what might be called meaning skepticism (the non-factuality view of meaning), and not concept skepticism (the non-factuality view of concepts). If correct, this would mean the skeptical reasoning is far less significant than Kripke thinks. Others have seemed to agree with McGinn. I argue that McGinn is wrong here--that, in fact, Krip…Read more
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22The Pretense Theory and Exclusionary Arguments: A Response to ManningJournal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 73 (2): 189-192. 2015.
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80Biological process, essential origin, and identityPhilosophical Studies 173 (6): 1603-1619. 2016.In his famous essentialist account of identity, Kripke holds that it is necessary to the identity of individual people that they have the parents they do in fact have. Some have disputed this requirement, treating it either as a reason to reject essentialism or as something that should be eliminated in order to make essentialism stronger. I examine the reasoning behind some of these claims and argue that it fails to acknowledge the complex and multi-faceted importance of biological process in de…Read more
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102Ruse on Gay Rights and Affirmative ActionAnalysis 54 (2). 1994.In his book Homosexuality, Michael Ruse argues that the state does not have any obligation to provide affirmative action benefits for gay people (beyond the obligation to have anti-discrimination laws). I believe that Ruse's stated reasons do not justify this conclusion. I also believe that the conception of affirmative action he deals with is far too narrow to guarantee that if there is no obligation to provide affirmative action benefits (on that narrow conception) then there is no obligation …Read more
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4Avoiding Mistakes in Reasoning About NaturalnessInternational Journal of Applied Philosophy 9 (1): 67-71. 1994.
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11Professor Dalcourt on the "Natural"International Journal of Applied Philosophy 8 (2): 49-52. 1994.
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74The Nature of Affirmative Action, Anti-Gay Oppression, and the Alleviation of Enduring HarmInternational Journal of Applied Philosophy 11 (2): 23-30. 1997.
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54Being fair to the fairness argument for same-sex marriageThink 14 (41): 73-80. 2015.According to the fairness argument, same-sex marriage must be permitted because without it there would not be equal treatment for homosexuals and heterosexuals. In, Piers Benn holds that the argument does eventually deliver this conclusion, but not as readily as intuitively appears. He concludes that some conservative points against same-sex marriage achieve at least a stand-off from the point of view of the argument. I argue that he accords the conservative points much more significance than th…Read more
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