God's Will Versus Human Will In Abortion

http://thecollegeconservative.com/2012/10/25/i-stand-with-richard-mourdock/

http://thecollegeconservative.com/2012/11/02/pro-life-burn-a-hummer-and-prove-it/

Less than a week ago, a woman in Ireland died because the country’s abortion laws apparently prevented even a health based procedure to save a woman who had miscarried. Apparently the Irish government neglected to learn that abortions can be elective or spontaneous and that not all abortions are done because people are “whores” or “sluts”. In the case of this woman dying, the line that sums it up is “They valued the life of a 4 month old fetus over that of a 30 year old woman” I am glad our own country isn’t so stringent and ridiculous on such things, but there are still people that insist that every pregnancy is a gift from God, including those that result from rape or incest, as well as those that would threaten a woman’s life. My very first blog post spoke about this topic and how it was irresponsible and selfish of Tim Tebow’s mother to insist on the pregnancy when she and her unborn child were in danger. Pro life as a position should not mean you get to endanger lives on purpose and say you value life and hold it sacred at the same time. By no means am I suggesting forced abortions, since that would contradict my values of individual choice and liberty as a libertarian at heart. But inversely, someone should not be able to claim their liberties are being trampled on when they are, in their own general metaphysics, forcing a child to be born in cases where teens could get an abortion and move on with their lives, learning from their mistake. Societal pressure is a strong influence, however, and you have women feeling like they commit a horrible crime, even a sin, when trying to make a choice between themselves and something that isn’t even remotely human in appearance in many cases when the pregnancy is discovered.

Any involvement of God in these situations is next to nothing, especially if we assume from the get go that God cannot interfere when it comes to human free will. And it also makes perfect sense to say that rape children cannot, in any way, shape or form, be a part of God’s will, because that would mean God either forced a human to rape or had no problem with one of its creations being violated for some greater good that could’ve been advanced in a far less violent manner. I’m not saying there can’t be good that results from evil, but rape is one of, if not the most horrible things a human can experience and survive next to attempted murder. A God that would create good things from such horrors is far distanced from the human experience and could accurately be termed a sociopath with no empathy.

Partial birth abortion, strongly opposed by many so called “pro life” advocates, is simultaneously death and life, but is a life saving procedure similar to some abortions (ectopic pregnancies or the like, for instance) in that if you don’t do it in particular cases for which it’s performed, both the mother and child will die. Do you want that on your conscience or do you think that death is preferable to life? If the latter, then how can you really consider yourself pro life? A more overarching idea of what pro life means is preferable to using the term to mask your anti abortion stance because you don’t want to be anti something, you want to be pro something. Be honest and just say you’re against abortion instead of saying you’re for protecting life and yet care nothing about people’s liberties to manage their reproduction or otherwise. Valuing life over liberty may make sense sequentially, but it makes no sense ethically. Basic logic does dictate you need to value life in order to truly value liberty, but to preclude liberty in order to protect life is far more counterintuitive than accepting that sometimes life must be sacrificed for liberty, especially if it cannot be adequately provided for or is not viable in a world where artificial womb technology does not exist.'

A middle ground can be met. One should not take sex so casually and irresponsibly, which will prevent unintended and unwanted pregnancies, leading to a decrease in abortions for reasons of pure convenience and selfishness. The abortions that are absolutely necessary are those that would save a woman’s life from accidental pregnancies that threaten her physical or mental health. Abortion is not birth control and shouldn’t be used as such, not only because it’s more expensive, but it becomes wasteful of potential life, which has its own value, especially to prospective parents, especially adoptive ones who either cannot have children themselves or want to provide for what amount to orphans. Instead we can “waste” what are renewable resources: namely the sperm the body produces. So that’s yet another abortion related post from me. We’re getting close to 200 posts and I’ll be doing something special for that, I hope. Until next time, Namaste and aloha.

Pro Choice or Pro Liberty

http://thecollegeconservative.com/2012/03/30/liberals-arent-really-pro-choice-political-rhetoric-vs-actual-meaning/

I’ve been especially critical in multiple articles about whether pro life is a label anyone should use so casually or even at all unless they’re willing to take a position that covers the whole of what is loosely considered life, from pre birth to death. But pro choice is something just as polarizing and I haven’t gotten into any detail about why it’s just as problematic an idea, or at least very simplistic. With pro life, it is implied opponents are pro death, which doesn’t follow at all. It’s even ironic if the opponents are anti war, a leading cause of death in the basic sense. Even if abortion is a form of death, it is far more regulated and safe when done correctly than war could ever be, explicitly involving a direct risk to one’s life and safety. Pro choice creates a perception that opponents are anti choice. This isn’t the case in most examples of people who are pro life. They’re the type who would personally not get an abortion, but would not try to eliminate the option of abortion outright, but merely advise against it. Those that bomb abortion clinics or kill abortion doctors are the exception to anti abortion rights pundits. Though it might not be fair to say that those that are personally against abortion are against it being legal, but want stricter regulations on it, which is fair in the same way that we require proper labeling for alcohol and cigarettes, which many have personal objections to but are nonetheless perfectly legal to purchase when of proper age. The notions of choice and liberty are important to a nuanced distinction between being pro choice and pro liberty.

If you are pro choice in either sense, either personally choosing or not choosing abortion, you value the ability of any other person to make a choice. If you think women should be forced to carry a baby, even if to give it up for adoption, this is on what pro choice creates as the opposition, one who actually does not want a person to even have the ability to choose to have an abortion, by illegalizing or stigmatizing the process of abortion itself. To be pro choice is not necessarily to be pro abortion, but pro choice in the general sense, which conservatives and liberals can support in the commonly held ideal of personal liberty without the government’s intervention. Privacy is inevitably connected with liberty and choices we make, since many choices we make are fundamentally, though not absolutely, private. When those choices are protected by people’s liberty from government intervention, we have more freedom in general without it becoming excessive.

The difficulty people would bring up in terms of the accuracy of the pro choice label is that it seems to only apply to a select few areas, namely: abortion, birth control, marijuana, and a few other areas. In terms of other things, conservatives may bring up government mandates through “liberal” courts, such as energy taxes and the healthcare system enacted by President Obama two years ago. I won’t go into whether they are or are not excessive government intervention, but I agree that consistency is something that should go both ways in political parties. One cannot criticize a pro lifer for also advocating the death penalty and not reflect on whether you are really pro choice in all areas or only when it may benefit you directly. I don’t want to sound like a strong right wing conservative, since those just create more problems than they solve in a similar way that more statist left wing liberals do. Extremes of either side are equally problematic. If you try to suppress things, they only become more desirable to people in their illegality. But letting everything go with vague ideas of what boundaries should exist is equally problematic in that it creates a sort of slippery slope that might actually be taken seriously. If you don’t establish remote absolutes in terms of what is considered damaging to marriage, for instance, the claims that you’d just as soon marry anything to anything else is not completely unlikely, though still a logical fallacy. Maintaining a balance between over inclusivity and over exclusivity is difficult when we have a variety of issues that assault us, abortion being one of those that is very contextual as to when using it constitutes leisure or necessity.

To be pro choice might be a bit too permissive in saying that you value all choices. It’s one thing to value people’s liberty, which works both in restraint and freedom of actions, but it’s another to endorse any choice by a more general idea of what the label implies. You’re free to drive drunk? You’re free to take illegal drugs? You’re free to do any number of irresponsible things? Not at all. Libertinism is not and should not be what people think of in terms of liberalism and liberty. Any good thing is done in moderation, to quote Aristotle, a philosopher who existed in a very different time from ours.

Another inquiry comes to mind from critics of the pro choice position: if you are pro choice, why would you advocate government intervention in many other areas of life, not to mention birth control? With the recent mandate concerning contraception as relates to religious institutions being adjusted to apply to the insurance providers instead of the religious institution itself, it seems potentially counter intuitive to claim you are pro choice, but also want the government to pay for your birth control and thus subsidize your choices. It’s one thing to be used for preventative purposes, but some may very well abuse it for simple promiscuity. I’m not saying this is the necessary progression, but the mindset behind some activism may be in direct conflict with what pro choice, and pro liberty advocates by association, support, which are informed decisions based on the facts and not through societal pressures. Pro choice should not try to enable choices through the government’s aid, but facilitate an environment where people are allowed to make choices, rewarded for good ones, punished for bad ones, and each response appropriate to the decisions made. There shouldn’t be any sort of implication that there aren’t consequences for actions, for better or worse. To make choice something more than a method to facilitate one’s advancement, but also edify one’s character, there must be limits on how far political actions should step into managing choices. Sometimes, choices should be permitted, with reasonable regulations, even if there are those that are morally opposed to it. We’ve done it with tobacco and alcohol, why a sudden opposition to marijuana, for example? And abortion is a procedure that is necessary until obstetrics are developed into science fiction levels of technology to preserve fertilized eggs and the like in artificial wombs. If it is done responsibly and prevented with adequate use of birth control, then there is no reason to fear it as a choice that is abused for malicious purposes or focus on profits instead of people.

If we value such things as our right to control our bodies, our sexual health, what we put into our bodies, etc, then it behooves us to neither be overly strict on regulating the various aspects of life that present both benefits and risks, nor too loose and breezy with letting things just progress as they will and solving the problem as it comes. Being able to prevent eventual problems instead of acting within immediate threats is the mark of a mind that is both able to think on its proverbial feet and also think of the potential issues without clouding present judgment. Such a thing as abortion is reasonably able to be reduced if birth control is taught in schools within reason. No one should interpret this as forcing sexuality in an unhealthy and perverse manner upon schoolchildren. Teaching youth about such things is natural and should be handled with care, I agree. But it should not be left entirely to parents, many of which are very busy and seem unable to manage time with their children beyond leisure and basic manners. Sexuality and the like are pushed back on the system they initially only depended on for education in the academic subjects. If that be the case, educate children about real life as well, in a balanced portion to mathematics, language and sciences. Responsibility is not something only parents can teach. Schools can educate students on this and not be overstepping any implied boundaries. We should never value merely the choices we can make, but those we choose not to make. That is the fullness of choice as it is subsumed within liberty. Until next time, Namaste and aloha

Visibility and Viability

http://thecollegeconservative.com/2012/01/31/not-just-a-blob-of-cells/

The recent controversies involving Planned Parenthood’s funding and President Obama’s healthcare mandate involving birth control (and subsequent compromise on it) make one think of related topics such as abortion, more specifically rules such as the one in Texas, and recently in Virginia, that requires a sonogram before an abortion procedure. I’m not going to debate the lawfulness of it, since it’s hardly unreasonable or invasive to the woman getting the procedure done. Someone might compare it to looking at your cancer, though the dichotomy is somewhat crude, since cancer is necessarily damaging, while an embryo is not nearly so devastating. But the claim by many pro life/anti abortion advocates that pro choice/abortion rights supporters are dehumanizing the embryo or fetus being aborted is sorely mistaken. I am in no way denying the humanity of the entity that is aborted. I compare abortion to euthanasia in that it is done because the options are few and sometimes active death is more merciful than passive death, though in this case, miscarriage as the passive death is not the inevitability. There has to be consent of the people involved, but contrary to people’s emotionally touching, but fallacious, arguments, the fetus cannot consent and thus is irrelevant to the decision. Even partial birth abortions cannot request the consent of the fetus. If the goal of medicine is to preserve life, then abortion seems contradictory at first glance. But life’s quality is as important as life’s existence. And abortion is a way to advance this. I do not wish abortion to exist indefinitely as a primary recourse to unwanted pregnancy for a number of reasons, not all of them related to the procedure itself. If we had technology to preserve zygotes, embryos and fetuses for future mothers to be or surrogates, it would be excellent for infertile couples or those looking to adopt through surrogacy. But more important than the wasteful practice of aborting what can be children for the childless who truly want them is that pregnancies can be prevented more than people are even motivated to with birth control. The goal seems to be more in line with the Quiverfull movement popularized by the Duggard family who miscarried a child last year: that ideal being to have as many children as God deems you to have. The same could be said to be an agenda for Catholics, with their strong stance against birth control, though it is alleged by some studies that 90% or more of Catholic couples use contraception for one reason or another, if only to prevent having more children than they can fiscally support. If you are pro life to the extent of ignoring consequences of excessive children, you’re being as irresponsible as one who uses abortion as birth control. We should not seek to have children just for the sake of making ourselves feel comfortable about not having “sacrificed” a child in any sense, nor should we just sacrifice children as if they are necessarily an inconvenience in every situation. Sometimes that is what we must do, if not for our sake, but for the future child’s sake. Would any child that could understand the state of a birth defect or congenital disease want to be born that way to just die in under 5 years? Abortion is not always about convenience, but is many times about compassion.

Many abortion opponents also say that since the child is genetically unique from conception it should be protected by virtue of that, since it is a separate body. There are two things wrong with this. Firstly, the uniqueness of any human life does not mean we should force a woman to carry that life to term if she does not want to or feels she cannot provide a fulfilling life for it. There’s an argument from a libertarian perspective of the woman’s body being invaded unless she consents to the pregnancy itself. It’s one thing to consent to sex, but the pregnancy is not a guarantee. Even if it’s a natural process, we can, within reason, stop it, but if nature succeeds anyway, there is no reason for us to always submit to it. To put it bluntly, there is not right to live inside another person, for women are not understood simply as creatures able to breed and thus should not be pressured into doing it by virtue of their ability to do so. Plus, adoption, often touted as a compassionate option, is one fraught with red tape and protracted waiting periods, so the child would be in an orphanage until then. Secondly, even if a woman sees an embryo with a heartbeat of sorts, she should also be informed that it is only unique genetically. It is not even remotely independent and is in fact interconnected with the woman’s metabolism and physiology, which is what causes morning sickness and eventually saps the woman of part of her everyday intake of nutrients and even some of her calcium directly from her bones. This is something that constitutes a parasite, even if it is done with the woman’s consent in most cases, excluding rape. So let it be clear that the fetus is not independent except in the possibility of it being born, which is in the future, not the immediate moment as it gestates.

Then there’s the claim that we reduce the embryo to a “blob of cells”. A zygote is very much technically a blob of cells going through meiosis.  And we’re all blobs of cells when you think about it, albeit on a larger scale.  The mere possibility of a life coming to being does not constitute grounds to protect it. If a parent or parents wish to carry the child to term, that is one thing, but it seems a bit manipulative, even if it is reasonable medical procedure, to show a pregnant woman a sonogram of the developing baby in some attempt to appeal to her emotions or more likely her guilt at “snuffing out a life” Viability should be considered as well. As harsh as it sounds and as I said before, sometimes hard decisions must be made and eliminating lives that are not even remotely viable is not something that is significantly lowering our birth rate. Plenty of people are personally pro life even if they are politically pro choice, so in the long run people will keep having babies even if there is a segment of the population that will consider abortion first. Moral disagreement aside, the legality of abortion stands on grounds of privacy that is not invasive to the rights of others. This sort of autonomy is not victimizing embryos or such, since they are not even remotely conscious in most abortions, done around 13 weeks or so. The comparison to euthanizing an animal is a bit crude, I’ll admit, but effective nonetheless in that the animal is less conscious than a human about its pain and the embryo or fetus even less so. Therefore the moral justification is partly based on the grounds that the entity aborted feels no significant pain unless it is sufficiently developed, which is done much more uncommonly than those where the embryo is only beginning to show human traits.

The value of life as a whole does not supersede the value of individual liberty. And while liberty cannot exist without life, the significance of autonomy is wasted on something that cannot even remotely understand its situation. A woman, however, does and should not be forced or pressured into making a choice she does not think is best for her or those connected to her, past, present or future. Bringing up practices in other countries of aborting female children or the common practice of aborting babies with Down syndrome or the like does not support claims that abortion as a whole is genocidal. Abortion is a medical procedure and while it will probably never go away entirely as fertility technology advances more and more, Planned Parenthood’s motto of making abortion safe, legal and rare is aided by birth control and as we understand abortion procedures, they are made safer as well with safer methods. No one is saying abortion should be the default, but the very existence of it as an option is not damaging to the birth rate, nor is it dehumanizing the embryo involved, since it is only barely human in the nominal sense and is certainly not a person that is deserving of protection. Birth is far more significant biologically to the child in terms of both becoming independent from the mother and beginning to develop more in the world where it interacts more directly, through sight, touch, etc. These sorts of discussions can be hard, but they are also important to understanding where our morality and politics intersect. Until next time, Namaste and aloha

Giving Thanks For Abortion

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bethany-blankley/abortion-do-as-i-say-not-as-i-do_b_1102198.html?ref=religion

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-backman/abortion-stalemate_b_1021839.html

This post is a bit late for the actual Thanksgiving holiday, at least the traditional day, but after Black Friday’s commercialism and shopaholic excess, I think I should talk about a topic rife with problems that are more practical in scope and less self serving in the goals it seeks to advance.  What I speak of is abortion. I’ve talked about consistency of terms and whether pro life people are actuallypro life instead of anti abortion,  amongst other varieties of this topic. Heck, my very first blog post was on the subject with Tim Tebow and his mom in a pro life/pro choice commercial that was ambivalent as to whether it actually supported choices about reproductive health or just choices towards life. Clearly the issue is important to me, and not because of the anti abortion kernel of “wisdom” that all pro choice people are already born. That goes without saying: a fetus can’t make the choice that abortion is or recognize the process for what it is in any sense until a certain point in development anyway. At most it makes very basic choices as any organic being that is conscious of its own existence will do, even if by pure instinct at first.  But I haven’t had family members or even friends that have directly had to face the issue of abortion. In the South, I’ve noticed that abortion is never seen as anything beneficial and is rarely an option at all. It’s not that we probably don’t have abortion clinics, but they’re either isolated in big cities or otherwise difficult in terms of access, though I admit I’m just speculating on a sub area of the abortion issue I’m not familiar with. I have heard enough and learned enough so far that my general position on abortion has been and always will be pro-choice, which in no way is pro-abortion, contrary to what political pundits would tell you. In the wake of a season that speaks of being thankful for people, I think we should be thankful for something that allows people to give themselves a better future for the family they are more ready for, even if not everyone does it.

I’m well aware of the argument and agree with its premise that abortion shouldn’t be used as a form of birth control, or any sort of procedure done merely for convenience when you are perfectly capable of taking care of a child. Admittedly abortions are probably done for that reason, though I imagine statistics aren’t going to help a lot in a situation where the practitioner doesn’t get such a straight answer from women who are feeling so much anxiety and pressure from their family, friends and society. But abortion is not something you should seek to illegalize or eliminate completely, since it has medical benefits, albeit those are more isolated to ectopic pregnancies and other situations where a woman’s life is in danger and, as heartless as it sounds, sacrifices must be made. Bringing up numbers of how many fetuses have been aborted seems to be easily countered by stats concerning birth rates in the U.S., which by a quick check are not going down excessively, but only in response to economic difficulties many people are having, postponing children until they’re slightly more stable in their finances. It’s different than it was a century ago when America felt it could throw around money and resources like candy without thoughts for the future. It’s not as if I see a significant downturn in birth rate in relation to my own general family, for instance. The number of kids range from anywhere to the minimum expected 2 kids, making an even 4, to 5 or 6 kids, making double that number for a single family from a couple. I myself would be happy with just one, but parenting is the last thing on my mind. Moves to illegalize abortion forget that it is an elective procedure and is not mandatory upon all pregnant women at all. Eliminating it completely would negate the value it possesses in situations that would still be dangerous even if we had technology that would allow for zygotes, embryos, etc to be transplanted or preserved after attachment to the uterine wall. This would reduce abortions to a very small percentage, which, from what I’ve said before, is an unofficial (or official?) position of many pro choice advocates, “Abortion should be safe, legal and rare,”

An irony people could observe with the movement of anti abortion is that it is composed in great or significant part of women who have already had abortions and either regretted it or seem to think that you should only follow their example in every other instance except abortion and not see the hypocrisy they exude in being overzealous for a cause they only fight against after the fact of seeing it as wrong. The view is that abortion is primarily a communal and emotional issue instead of a personal and rational one that it is much of the time, even if it also does have communal and emotional effects on those involved directly and indirectly. The best saying in response to these people that strive to control people’s sex lives and decisions they make with their body is “Don’t like abortion? Don’t have one,” It shouldn’t be a matter of popular opinion, it should be an informed decision without pressure from parents, partners or even medical professionals without justifiable reasons, such as economic or psychological considerations.

One of the biggest things that drive the abortion debate is the personhood vs. humanity idea that people constantly bring up. A zygote is argued to be a person because it is genetically unique. But this doesn’t hold water because it is only technically genetically human. Personhood is a bit more complicated than simply having human DNA, since that could apply to any cell. The response is that a zygote, when left alone, will develop naturally. This is based on possibility, which seems to be a big line of argument in conservative positions on these issues. Gay people will make marriage slide further into immorality, and abortion will target racial groups or particular genders as it becomes more and more acceptable. Mississippi brought up an attempted amendment to its constitution that would have made a fertilized egg a person, but it was thankfully struck down, by anti abortion and pro choice people alike no doubt. The goal of the amendment was to challenge something many find fundamentally egregious in the Roe v. Wade decision over 50 years ago: that a zygote, blastocyst or embryo (for the most part) are not considered a person and thus not protected by the 14th amendment. It was decided, from what I recall, that at the 5th month or roughly around 20-22 weeks when a fetus reaches viability, it is considered a person philosophically, medically and legally to an extent. If the state had changed the definition of person to a fertilized egg, anti abortion pundits thought they could overturn the decision through pushing a vote to repeal the decision by the people. Unfortunately, like gay marriage, some things are not solved by a democratic vote, but by a legislative decision that says certain things are included in the inalienable rights the Constitution enumerates or are of such a morally contentious nature that democratic decisions do not reflect the morality or immorality of whatever issue is voted on. An obvious historical example was slavery. It might have been voted otherwise by the American people in each state, so the government wrote a fundamental amendment to the Constitution that made slavery illegal. Personhood is not something we can all agree on and that’s fine. If you either agree to disagree or, more reasonably, remain uncertain as to exactly and precisely when a fetus becomes a person, or when an embryo becomes a person, etc, then you make the discussion that much smoother in that you aren’t touting your position as unquestionable. If we all had a reasonable discussion without bringing personal emotional experiences into it as primary evidence, then perhaps we’d be able to start talking about these philosophically complex issues in a more civil, mature and reasonable way.

Anti abortion, so called pro life advocates, should be thankful (emphasis intended) that people make the choice to not have an abortion instead of pressuring others to choose life and condemn those who make a less popular choice for a better future life. If you think you can provide for your family with a limited budget and are willing to put children in a situation they did not ask for where they are given a lower quality of life instead of sacrificed for a better future life of siblings, so be it. I’m not going to advocate forcing people to have abortions, and that’s where I think I have a moral high ground of sorts. I am not doing anything more than advising people about their possible options and not saying that they should do it because I say so, but because my argument is sensible. If they disagree, it’s out of my hands for the most part, unless there is some explicit relation to myself. And that’s why I’m thankful for abortion, since it is a choice people can make, but also a choice people can decide to not make and bring life into the world. Regardless, life goes on and I’m thankful especially for that. Until next time, Namaste and aloha.

Capital Punishment and Conservative Politics

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-reyeschow/applauding-executions-christian_b_953324.html

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0911/62950.html

I didn’t watch much of the GOP debate a week ago (I stumbled onto Rick Santorum castigating the welfare state and quickly ducked out), but I don’t know if I would’ve had the patience to listen to a group of people that focus more on getting votes and less on American values that are shared across party lines. Rick Perry in particular, got troubling applause during the question, and following his answer, about the death penalty in Texas. It was noted that in his now 5 terms as governor in Texas, over 200 people have been executed. I don’t know if that’s ever something to be proud of, but even more appalling is that people associated with the GOP applauded at this (twice) while simultaneously supporting anti abortion rights practices, calling that murder. Do any of those people try to be consistent in this idea that people who commit that crime should be executed and extend that to abortion recipients or practitioners? I doubt it and that reflects a discontinuity that exists with many modern members of the Republican Party.

The GOP touts itself as a very pro life party, though closer observation reveals they are only pro life in the colloquial expression that actually is phrased much better as anti abortion rights. Illegalizing abortion, sometimes a goal of anti abortion advocates, is ironically a point to bridge the debate into support by Republicans of the death penalty. Capital or corporal punishment, call it what you will, but it amounts to a state spending a great deal more money to kill someone than to incarcerate them for life or rehabilitate them. I’m not absolutely certain of the economics involved, but the argument has some basis allegedly with the costs of lethal injection, one of the more common methods. In fact, there are only 6 states, including Tennessee, that even allow the electric chair to be used at the prisoner’s request. If nothing else, Texas apparently realized that lethal injection was more humane.

A question is brought up with illegalizing abortion: “Do you advocate the death penalty for people found guilty of the crime of abortion, since, according to most anti abortion activists, it is murder? Or do you claim there is some significant difference between someone killing an unborn child and a person already born? Where does infanticide fit into this? Are these people deserving of the death penalty or do you have some other punishment in mind for people who kill the unborn and/or recently born?” As you can see, the question branches out pretty quickly, but if we focus on the issue of consistent justice, many Republicans fail to consider or speak about what would happen in their ideal world if abortion was made criminal again. There may be a sector amongst them that would actually support lumping abortionists alongside serial killers, though I wonder what they would do to people who merely had the abortion performed on them; would they consider them just as culpable as the doctor; or less so because they were directly connected to the person (fetus/etc) that was killed? Maybe just manslaughter charges?

The very idea of trying to discuss jurisprudence as related to killing what only moderately possesses personhood at the 5th month of gestation is mind boggling, but it only gets worse when you consider that people will cheer about this sort of thing when they likely have no connection to any execution by fewer than 4 degrees of separation. The idea of being so proudly pro life and yet mobilizing to kill people that killed others as some twisted deterrent to future criminals is beyond counterintuitive, it’s borderline contradictory. If you were consistently pro life, you wouldn’t advocate protecting life at one stage and then, for every other situation, push death as a solution: soldiers for wars that rarely seem to be just or have the state play God and dispense so called “ultimate justice” (Rick Perry’s words, not mine)

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Even if this position of selective pro life politics wasn’t completely backwards and could be defended logically, there is no reason to applaud for the death of any human being, no matter how terrible they may be. Death is a part of life and should not be further encouraged by a faulty system of justice that thinks it’s doing God a favor when God is said even in the Bible to be the final and ultimate judge, not humans. Not to mention the idea of taking revenge or returning death with more death is also not something the Bible advocates by human hands, especially in New Testament thought. Jesus said to forgive your enemies, pray for those who persecute you and such, correct? So why, like so many Republicans these days, do you only use faith in Jesus to draw people in with heartfelt prayers and then ignore his sayings when faced with ethical issues of life and death caliber? Sure, you can say you’re protecting all the unborn, but when it comes to flawed people already born, you don’t ever think to advocate the love and forgiveness Jesus spoke of. As much as he spoke of proper judgment in the Gospels, he also emphasized that the use of violence should not be your impulse, but a last resort. He noted at one point, those who live by the sword die by the sword, indicating in part that we shouldn’t use lex talionis (eye for an eye styled) justice when we can just as easily practice forgiveness, however more difficult that is. When a person takes another person’s life, they have indeed committed a crime, but that crime; no crime of any magnitude; demands that we eliminate that person from the face of the earth as if it will reduce crime. In fact it might just encourage more killing by the precedent you set that it solves problems. And it won’t deter truly evil people, since they wouldn’t be swayed by threats of violence when they use those same threats to get what they want.

I would also imagine there is a generational gap here based on a tradition that execution is just a part of life and shouldn’t be done away with. Though for people in older generations who go through a process of hatred against a person who murdered a loved one and then realize that forgiveness is the first step to real healing, I think we could see eye to eye. I can’t be certain that I wouldn’t initially react with some amount of negativity towards someone who took any number of people I find important to me. If it was an accident, it’d be another thing, but willful actions might provoke even me to initially think I should avenge that person. I can only hope that would be tempered and held back by my studies in Christianity and Buddhism both that have taught me that hatred feeds a proverbial fire that can burn you with enough fuel. Forgiveness and love, tools of peace and not war, will not only change you, but may even change the murderer if they are so disposed.

Bottom line, if conservatives want to be taken seriously by educated people who can see between the lines drawn in the political sands, they need to change their tone to be more consistent overall and oppose the death penalty and excessive military spending that both clash with their alleged pro life stance; actually appearing more pro fear, as I’ve noted elsewhere in “Pro Life and Politics” Or they could be consistent in being pro fear and apply the death penalty equally in prosecuting abortion crimes, assuming they have the goal of illegalizing abortion, which isn’t always the case with GOP, but can stop short and instead seek to obstruct abortion rights as a whole. Either way, it would suggest a vast change in the party that would nonetheless create a chasm that would eventually be filled by some party. Until next time, Namaste and aloha.

The Moral Generation Gap

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/06/09/survey-millennials-echo-parents-on-abortion-much-more-supportive-of-gay-marriage/

http://www.christianpost.com/news/report-millennials-views-on-abortion-gay-marriage-influenced-by-media-experience-51054/

I’ve referenced the term millenial before, in “Transformations in Trends In Transition of Christianity”, as an identification of my own generation, those born in the 1980s and coming of age in the 2000s. This time, the reference is on more general issues, probably the two most contentious these days: abortion rights and gay marriage.

The results of a study by the Public Religion Research Institute suggest that there is some generational stability with the issue of pro life in terms of both moral and legal concerns, but that neither the moral nor legal problems about gay marriage seen by parents of millenials have transferred as well. There is a slight difference in terms of millenial’s beliefs about abortion’s morality, 50% believing it is wrong, less than half of the study believing it is morally acceptable, contrasting with a 54% moral opposition by their parents and a similar contrast morally supporting it. However, there seems to be no difference between the number of middle aged and young adults concerning whether abortion should be legal. If the 60-70% figure for millenials is any indication, it would seem that the legality and availability of abortion are both accepted by the generations almost equally. The difference is between one’s personal moral dis/agreement with abortion and one’s public permission of abortion as a practice, regardless of if they agree or disagree with abortion morally. This at least shows that people are still able to distinguish between the privacy of one’s moral beliefs and the limit to which you can force those moral beliefs on others as legislation. It makes me feel confident about the state of abortion’s legality in my generation’s perspective and in the future.

Gay marriage, on the other hand, is where the generations strongly diverge. Millenials are now around 60% in stating that homosexual behavior is morally acceptable, only 40% saying it is morally wrong, whereas their parents are the inverse of that, finding gay sex immoral around 60% of the time, only 40% or so finding it permissible. The survey also spoke on the differences between millenials and their parents on whether gay marriage should be legal, and it seems more millenials are supportive of gay marriage as legal in the United States, compared to their parents, where only about a quarter of that generation seems to support gay marriage.

The study’s focus was moreso on the abortion issue, reflecting that while support for the legality of abortion has gone up slightly with millenials, they have remained consistent with their parents’ age group in their beliefs about abortion’s morality. The actual gap that is significant exists with gay marriage, speaking on people’s increasing belief that people should be able to marry whomever they desire, regardless of if they are the same gender/sex, and it should be legal across the country even if you might disagree with it, since there is some overlap of moral permission and legal permission among millenials, no doubt.

There are predictions, however, from people such as Tony Perkins, notorious for his opposition to gay marriage and support of so-called family values (and also whined that the words “Under God” were taken out of the pledge at the NBC World Open golf tournament), that millenials will change their mind about gay marriage once they have children of their own. This is little more than him propagating paranoia to parents and children to either make them feel better or reconsider their position in the future respectively. The notion that once you get married and/or have a family (because you can have a family without being married) that you’ll suddenly be opposed to same sex couples having the same rights as you is a predictor of stupidity, which I would hope people are increasingly less likely to be when we get past stereotypes and stigma about gay people and get to know them as people. If I get married and then a gay couple gets married, it affects my straight marriage in no way, shape or form. Heck, it’s not even remotely possible that I’d suddenly start questioning whether marriage is a good thing just because a small group of committed monogamous couples who are gay happen to also have the same title.

If anything, there seems to be a consistent notion of tradition that you can maintain your private morals and opposition to something but at the same time, tolerate its existence under legal parameters, such as abortion not being on demand, but having a process. As many have put it, from Planned Parenthood to Bill Clinton (right?), “Abortion should be safe, legal and rare,” I can’t say I’m surprised, considering abortion is a much more emotionally charged subject than gay marriage these days. Part of the combined skepticism of traditional marriage and acceptance of non-traditional gay marriage is theorized to be due to children of this generation experiencing all the more evidently the problems with straight marriage or at least the apparent lack of success around 50% or so of couples’ experience. But I somehow doubt that just because some people have had experience directly with straight marriages failing or are skeptical of people’s capacity to remain faithful to each other, that they will be more likely to support gay marriage. Supporting gay marriage is about whether you think people deserve equal opportunity to marry, regardless of sexual orientation. Just supporting the rights of gay people to marry doesn’t mean you think straight marriage has any less value. They are equal in their willingness to commit, only different in their sexual biology.

With abortion, however, it becomes more difficult because of the associated argument that every person is alive today because of pro life sentiments. But this isn’t true either. Every person is alive today because their parents made a choice for life, but at the same time, have no doubt experience with people who have had to make decisions on whether to abort a child for a variety of reasons. The fact that this is somewhat more common these days indicates to me that this tendency for people to personally disagree with something, but have the decency to say that people deserve to have the option to abort depending on circumstances won’t disappear easily. And in that sense many people seem to have been able to separate their private and public spheres, allowing people basic inalienable rights, but nonetheless holding a pride in their own beliefs as long as they are not infringing on rights that they themselves would not want infringed upon.  It’s certainly better than it used to be, from what I understand of abortion legislation history. But history always seems to at least progress in some way forward, from Roe v. Wade onward for abortion’s legality and persistence thereof. So until next time, Namaste and aloha.

Family Planning and Fertility Procedures

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/10/my-take-catholic-church-should-reverse-ivf-opposition/

As a follow up to my post this week, “Politics and Pro Life”, I thought I’d confront something of a problem within official (?) Catholic doctrine that is indirectly related to the pro-life issue they brought against Republicans and their budget that disfavored the poor. This alleged contradiction of a consistent pro life position makes an important distinction of anti-abortion rights versus pro-life as a whole in terms of overlapping but distinct principles, since consistent pro-life usually implies also being anti capital punishment and anti war to a great extent. But now we confront an issue that’s deeper with Catholic family values and how technology can conflict with it at times.

The article’s author says that he and his wife feel condemned after an incident where another couple’s embryos were mixed up with theirs and a difficult decision was made to give the child up to their genetic parents. The process of in-vitro fertilization was how this problematic set of circumstances came about, but I certainly don’t see it as a problem if they were willing to give up the child. But the Catholic diocese the article’s author belonged to called what the family had engaged in morally unacceptable. It’s ironic since one can argue, as the author does, that he and his wife were actually trying to advance their family and affirm the sanctity of life at the same time. This is a twofold issue: 1) the couple was trying to expand their family through different means, since, as explained, they are infertile and have had no success through normal routes, and 2) they chose not to abort the fetus because it happened to not be their biological child and was instead another couples’. This is another choice of dual import; since first, they didn’t abort, which affirms the value of life in Catholic doctrine, and secondly, they valued the wishes of the family who wanted a child themselves and carried that child, willingly giving it up, with some trepidation.

The reason the Catholic Church opposed this practice by any Catholic family has roots in old doctrines that say, in simple terms, that children should be conceived in natural ways, not through any procedure that negates the conjugal act. This is also why they oppose birth control, as this disrupts the natural act of sexual intimacy that produces a child under normal circumstances. With this family in question, they had two children, either from a previous marriage or from their present one (or possibly adopted). The church had two potential lines of attack here: 1) The couple could be said to be ungrateful to God for the two children they already have; or more directly 2) They were trying to usurp God’s natural order by using science to have a child through means that were actually more practical and would also advance their family, as Catholics tend to be called to do (you know, have as many kids as humanly possible?) The author agrees with Catholic doctrines concerning abortion and the like, but this singular opposition to IVF as a method for conceiving and bringing a child into the world is a source of deep opposition on personal and moral grounds.

I cannot sympathize either as a Catholic or a father, but as a human being, his insights and observations are spot on. There is no reason the Catholic Church seems to be opposing this except to maintain a status quo of their tradition and teachings on the issue of fertility and the correct ways to have a child. But, like many would observe, this seems an unjustified pressure of the Church to its adherents for conformity to their teachings even against advice that would appear to benefit their overall cause. They are, for lack of a better expression, missing the forest for the trees. In emphasizing strict obedience to such antiquated and narrow ideas about how a child should come about, they exclude many still valued children that could come about through uncommon methods. The issue of rape or incest is not pertinent here, since, as I understand it, Catholics tend to permit abortions in these extenuating circumstances. But with a couple that is infertile, Catholics suddenly oppose any methods that might help them add to their family, merely because it isn’t the “natural” way.

In general, one shouldn’t prejudge an entire group on any issue, like Catholics on IVF’s moral permissibility, because of isolated incidents like this, but allegedly this is official doctrine and would require more effort to change this policy in the Catholic Church. If anything, the best argument is that this is depriving infertile couples of a chance to do what God supposedly ordained them to do, have sex (in the bonds of marriage) and conceive. But since they can’t do that, God apparently forbids them from using science that God also supposedly had a big hand in and conceive a child artificially. It’s not as if the child is less valuable in God’s eyes, so why oppose it except for what amounts to a mechanical view of human sexuality and extended functions, such as family? There’s no real reason, except that stereotype that Catholics are afraid of change. If anything, they seem threatened by changes through technological advances, but, (from what I understand) are not always threatened by change, but are for the most part, as evidenced from their activism against the Republican budget, a group that tries to spur change, at least when it synchs with their overall pro life position. This issue isn’t seen as very important, and even though I tend to shy away from activism on these issues, I wouldn’t be surprised if there are other Catholics that have these sympathies. Perhaps the Anglican Church would welcome them into their church, mirroring the Catholic Church taking in Anglicans not happy with the permission of gay marriage in the denomination recently. It wouldn’t be a bad solution, if Anglicans have no problem with IVF. Until next time, Namaste and aloha.


And here's a pertinent text you can buy on Amazon. I highly recommend Amazon, as it's safe and consistent with delivery and has a variety of products you can purchase.

Moral status of in-vitro fertilization (IVF).: An article from: Catholic Insight

Politics and Pro Life

http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2011/05/13/my-take-rethinking-the-pro-life-label/

I’ve already blogged on this a bit, mostly in relation to a blog post of a college acquaintance who runs , a political blog of good quality, where he noted the relation of ‘pro-life” beliefs to libertarian values of freedom. In that post, “Abortion Terms Revisited”, I actually suggested a solution to this problem I’ll visit later in this post, albeit not necessarily solving what to do about the pro-life position itself.
Again, I rail on politics and its complexity, though both Democrats and Republicans could be inconsistent on the issue that divides even families sometimes. There’s always some variation on the general anti-abortion field, so as to distinguish this from the pro life issue for the moment. Some permit abortions in extreme cases, others forbid it in all situations and others are somewhat in the middle, resonating with pro choice and pro life in that they would like people to choose life, but they also respect people’s choices, as long as they don’t become abortions on demand for any situation. Of course, the pro choice thing is equally as polarizing. A side comment would enable me to transition more smoothly into what pro life would be more consistently across policies. Pro choice is not something Republicans are necessarily against. They value privatization, free market economy, freedom to choose a number of things out of various alternatives (like guns?). Their exclusion of abortion, but acceptance of the death penalty is just one of the inconsistencies many politically minded people observe about the Republican Party these days on their so called “pro life” platform.

To be truly pro life, many have begun to argue, you cannot suggest the budget for allaying the economic troubles we remain in. To cut benefits and aid to the poor is against many people’s deeply held religious beliefs. And even without religious beliefs based in the supernatural, one can argue there is still a strong compulsion for those who have plenty to give to those who have little or none. The basics of charity, generosity, and helping people live a fulfilling and satisfactory life can be said to be just as integral to a pro-life position as the commonly affirmed position of what I would call counter or anti-abortion. Pro-life is not the same as anti or counter abortion for the same reason that a counter/anti-abortion advocate can also be pro-death penalty/capital punishment or say the use of torture to advance the cause of peace is justified, among other more explicitly ‘anti-life’ positions. Of course, even the use of aggressive and excessive military strength that ignores the roles of noncombatants would appear on its face to be spitting on those lives as if they are expendable as accepted losses or collateral damage. Even soldiers, willingly putting their lives on the line, make such twisted choices in order to justify their own warped psyche’s perspective, radically changed by experiencing threats from every side and trained not to have mercy on the enemy. How does this ensure any kind of pro-life position in the general sense: that is, protecting life at all stages, whatever that might specifically be, whether it starts at birth or at conception (however questionable the latter may be). Even if I might disagree with such a a pro lifer on the abortion issue, I am more than amiable to the anti-war and anti-capital punishment positions we may both hold nonetheless.

One might say, with some backing to the argument, that Democrats are fast becoming one of the more consistent on the pro-life platform. It’s hard to find many Republicans that advocate the many things that reflect an overall pro-life policy that no doubt has cemented the appeal of the Democratic party in the wake of what might have been considered one of their weaknesses: the issue of religion and values in politics. With Democrats supposedly leaning more towards privatization of religion and separation of church and state, one might have seen them as an anti-God party, or to be fairer, a pan-religious party in that they welcomed everyone moreso than Republicans who tolerated Jews and reluctantly allowed Catholics and eventually Mormons into their fold, mostly because of shared values. But Catholics might be said to be an interesting balancer for politics and religion for Republicans against Democrats in that they were among those who criticized the Republican budget as not being truly pro-life and protecting life at all stages. The fixation on the abortion issue might be said to have hurt the present Republican Party’s support from Catholics, not to mention the fixation on fiscal policy over more imminent social issues that plague the country and the world. Then you throw in the issue of the war in the Middle East and you have a group that slowly appears to be more pro fear as opposed to pro life.

You make people afraid they’d abort a world leader or a great scientist, paranoid they’ll lose their freedoms to gun control stealing their weapons, hostile to the terrorist and motivating people to fight in wars. All this really focuses on guilt and regret over everything one does and never really affirms that we make choices, for better or worse, and that as long as we reflect on those choices, we can improve. If a woman decides to abort and then later thinks it was a bad idea, she can share her story without being obnoxious to all women who have to make those difficult decisions in those situations. If a soldier is patriotic, he can salute the flag, but he has no right to condemn someone who uses their Constitutional right to burn it just because it offends them and makes them afraid there are terrorists in their midst. And even the control of guns doesn’t mean that everyone is trying to take away all your force, but merely moderate it so we don’t have backwoods hicks using military grade equipment, thinking that martial law will be instated in 2012 or some such nonsense. If we are to be pro life, we should also be pro choice to a great extent, even if those are still polarized in popular mediums as being polar opposites. Luckily, as I blogged previously, TV stations have at least been trying to use more precise language, saying pro or anti abortion rights instead of pro choice and pro life, as if the inverse applies to each opposite. But in fact not every pro choice is pro death, and pro life is not anti choice, though sometimes it can imply anti choice in that people are afraid of the liberties people have or are afraid of them going into excess. And that’s not an unjustified fear, if you try to moderate choices yourself instead of outright suppressing everyone else’s. So pro life and pro choice people may have more in common than pundits and talking points make them think. Think for yourself, like a skeptical American should. Until next time, Namaste and aloha.

Abortion Terms Revisited

http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/thegaggle/archive/2010/03/19/pro-life-or-anti-abortion-rights-journalists-abortion-and-why-word-choice-matters.aspx

http://www.npr.org/ombudsman/2010/03/in_the_abortion_debate_words_m_1.html?ft=1&f=17370252

While I have already confronted this issue in a rambling form before, I have now discovered an article that confronted the difficulty of associating terms with the spectrum of the abortion topic. It seems NPR is one of the only news organizations (besides Fox News quite likely) that uses the terms “pro-life” and “pro-choice”. The counterparts in the majority of other news stations are “anti-abortion” in exchange for “pro-life” and “abortion rights advocates” in exchange for “pro-choice”. While there are some difficulties I find even with this specification by CBS, NBC and CNN among others, such as the allegation by many in article comments that the term “abortion rights” presumes that there is a right to abortion. And I suppose one could also object to the term anti-abortion, since many conscientious opponents of abortion are not 100% against it, since they recognize there are points where abortion would line up with their position that is so commonly called “pro life”. If the mother’s life is in danger or the embryo/fetus will suffer crippling and life threatening birth defects, many would grant that abortion is justified in those circumstances. But even if we changed it to “abortion rights opponents” the difficulty would still remain with the objection of a supposed innate right to abortion by Constitutional interpretation.

There is a blog I glance at of a college acquaintance (indefenseoftheconstitution.blogspot.com) who covers mostly political/economic issues in relation to a very strict Constitutionalist Libertarian position along with Reformed Calvinist Christianity (a surprising combination, I know). And he put forth a note in an article probably a year ago or so that confronts the issue that comes with the labels of pro-choice and pro-life, though this may have been unintended. His main thrust was that liberty and choice by association are contingent to life itself, which in his argument was why life was put before liberty in the trio found early on in the Constitution. The syllogistic argument might go something like this:

1) Liberty is dependent on life to exist
2) Pro choice values liberty over life.
3) Pro life values life over liberty.
C) Therefore pro life advocates liberty better than pro choice.

Syllogistic arguments can become problematic in that they are more prone to logical fallacies and much easier objections to the premises within the argument; but they do get the point across expediently. I imagine that my acquaintance has a nuanced understanding of his position on abortion, and that he probably wouldn’t appreciate being described as valuing life over liberty, since it would no doubt make him appear to be a totalitarian that enforces their authority on others (and he is definitely a limited govt. kind of guy). So his response could come in the form of clarifying that pro life or associated positions do not value life over liberty, but inform others of their liberty and the better choice to “live and let live” instead of taking away the future liberty of a future child. Having had a number of informal debates online with abortion opponents, the arguments are not all faulty. And yet these people also insist on using the title pro life still, which reduces the argument on either side to creating strawmen of either side. Not to mention the issue of assuming every zygote and embryo is identical to a fetus and that a fetus is identical to a child, but the point still stands.

Pro-life is not by necessity Anti-choice, and contrariwise, Pro-choice is not Anti-life. Pro and Anti Abortion would be a good start to changing how the sides are presented, but perhaps instead of Anti-abortion, Contra or Counter-abortion might make more sense, since the prefix Contra/Counter implies opposition in the sense of more civil disagreements. Anti abortion makes the side opposing abortion generalized to the minority that choose to bomb abortion clinics or kill abortion doctors in their churches. I seriously doubt most people opposing abortion choose such methods to make their case or argue their position, so it would probably be best to meet somewhere in the middle on the argument. So “pro-lifers” shouldn’t call abortion advocates murderers or imply they are anti life by using the term “pro life” and maybe “pro-choicers” won’t call you anti-choice or imply you are fascists or totalitarians wanting to control people’s actions. I know the way of moderation and compromise is difficult in politically charged discussions, but I imagine you could forgive my Buddhist way of thinking in trying to live the Middle Path in all areas of life. Until next time, Namaste and Aloha

The Pro Choice/Life Ad?

While I didn't watch the Super Bowl at all (haven't for a couple of years; never been interested in sports to begin with, particularly team sports), I did get emails from Christian Response (research purposes primarily) emphasizing how pro-life the 30 second ad is. While the point I found amusing was point where Tim tackles his mother (odd, isn't it?), the supposed focus of the ad towards pro life is contested and for good reason.

The only instance where it really gets into pro-life territory is in the beginning where she emphasizes how she persevered even though her pregnancy was hard. The backstory, from my limited research, is that she was infected with a dysentery amoeba and the medicine she took to cure it caused a complication in the pregnancy that probably would have killed her and/or her fetus. While she does demonstrate that it is possible to carry a child to term with this complication, the pro life aspect that is emphasized in the commercial is hardly admirable. To admire someone for persevering against someone's better judgment seems especially troubling when one does not by necessity need to continue having children, in the context of the Tebow family. Tim is the youngest of five, count them, five children. Why the family insists that they must have another child when providing for four as missionaries would be difficult enough, I cannot say.

I can say that while I see the pro choice aspects of the ad, the ad itself is mostly there to get laughs. But in the beginning there is an emphasis by Tim Tebow's mother that he is a "miracle baby" and such things. Last I heard, in a Christian's perspective, all babies are miracles from God. But then, that would make Mr. Tebow even more miraculous. Like there's a hierarchy or some such nonsense. I'm not one for censoring, but I am one for contesting a position that I find objectionable that Focus on the Family holds. Although to continue on this rant would necessitate another blog post entirely.

For now, I will leave it at this: I disagree with Focus on the Family, but it is good that they are exercising a basic right to a free marketplace of ideas. Though frankly, I would think they'd direct their funds towards other modes of advertisement. The Super Bowl attempt recently seems to only demonstrate desperation in trying to push their message when they are in an extreme area of the position of pro life and "family values". Perhaps they will succeed, but perhaps they will realize a fault and try a new approach in the future. Why not, oh, I dunno…advertise on the 700 Club?!