RIP Quincy Jones
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Probably one of the greatest music producers EVER! I have to tell you, I
have been beside myself, I get it, he was old, but everything you listened
to deca...
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Tuesday, February 13, 2007
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Can someone direct me to the best argument they have found for the benefits of the state forcing women who have become pregnant to have children they do not want? For all the interest there is in this topic, there simply MUST be something more to it than bible-stuff. I’ve flipped through those sixty-six books a time or two (focusing on the latter 27), and it seems that this Jesus fellow committed 99.9999999% of his words to prescribing a personal and political ethos revolving around the righteousness of uplifting the downtrodden (the impoverished, the immigrant, the sick, the infirm, the isolated, etc) and subverting the corrupt theocratic establishment which was profiting wildly from aiding Rome in subjugating the indigenous peoples of 1st century Judea, while devoting not a single syllable to the ins and outs of anal copulation (a shout out to the OTHER white meat of the Reich, I mean Right) or the righteous necessity of forcing women to bear unwanted children. Flipping through the preceding 39 tracts, I can only seem to find metaphorical language about God loving a prophet so greatly, that his love for this person began when they were in utero. I don’t think Jesus was being metaphorical when he commanded his peeps to go and sell all that they owned and give the money to the poor. Maybe he was. I don’t know. Metaphors are tricky.
ReplyDeleteSociologists tell us that women who have abortions do so for economic reasons almost exclusively. They have abortions because of their pre-existing responsibilities to either their self, or the children they already have. If the Christians (I think the word means “followers of Christ”) did what Christ told them to do (help impoverished people out of poverty), abortion would go down in proportion to their efforts. Alas, during the reign of “The Decider,” the number of children in the US born into poverty has risen to heights not seen in the post WWII era. The budget for which “The Decider” is so proud, will push millions of impoverished children off of the health care rolls over the next decade. Countless of these children, around half of which will likely be female, will grow up and one day feel terror in the pit of their stomach as they sit in their bathroom staring at a plastic apparatus waiting for a blue line to appear. The cycle continues unbroken.
Legal, Safe, and Rare!!
Anyway, if someone could direct me to a cogent argument for forcing unwanted children upon women, I would appreciate it. I would really enjoy an argument that takes place on the temporal plane and does not venture into religious mythological gobbledy-gook. I have changed my mind many times in my life and maybe someone can bring me around! It would be far less distressing to me to jump on the criminalize abortion bandwagon than the alternative; which is to believe there are lots of well meaning overly-credulous people out there, many of whom occupy the legislature of my home state.
mpr
PS: I just read through all of the posts relating to abortion, and the only arguments I can find that support the position that abortion as a medical procedure is worthy of legislative prohibition are 1.) zygotes/embryos/fetuses have souls and 2.) abortion can lead to PTSD. Well, 1.) what the heck is a soul? and 2.) while PTSD is bad (I know, I have it), the psychological trauma of enduring an unwanted pregnancy, birth, and rearing of an unwanted child probably pales in comparison for most women contemplating abortion. This is likely why they chose to have the abortion.
PPS: If some other faithful reader of the Madville Times sincerely wants to change my mind on the topic, PLEASE do not employ biblical or related ecclesiastical citations. My BA is in theology and I spent four years of my life doing new and old testament exegesis and I was not convinced that argument #1 should in any way be a basis for forming public policy.
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ReplyDelete"I just read through all of the posts relating to abortion"
ReplyDeleteHmmm... well if you had read the comments that go with them, you would have found my position here, here, and here. Nowhere do I invoke my faith to justify why casual abortion should be illegal.
I do talk on occasion of how my faith directs me in personal matters with women in those circumstances, and Cory has made the point that Jesus didn't say anything about abortion (to which I offered my explanation). But other than that, our debate on abortion has been mostly free of "religious mythological gobbledy-gook." I don't fall for it... and I don't expect that anyone could ever win Cory's allegiance on those terms. (Not that I have been able to win him over with sound reasoning and sensible political philosophy either... but I try.)
"I don’t think Jesus was being metaphorical when he commanded his peeps to go and sell all that they owned and give the money to the poor."
ReplyDeleteI don't think He was being metaphorical either. I wish I had the faith to do it.
David,
ReplyDeleteI cry your pardon for missing those posts! I just flipped through the ones that Cory had linked with an abortion label and I missed those jewels.
How has the last decade treated you and yours? Well, I hope. It’s been too long. Perhaps if I hadn’t been such an arrogant, know-it-all asshole in high school our paths would have crossed more often and I would have been all the better for it.
I have not had much opportunity for adult discourse these last nine months since my daughter was born. I’ve been staying at home with her while her mother slaves away at our local high school, teaching physics and chemistry to the miscreants.
I have to cut this short, as I have an obligation to watch an episode of the fifth season of “Alias” with my beloved.
I’ve got a couple of questions. So, your aversion to the medical procedure known as abortion has everything to do with the need of a civilized society to prevent its populace from skirting personal responsibility for the consequences of their actions and nothing to do with offending your religious sensibilities?
What is the role of sex between consenting adults – should people EVER have sex if they do not wish to POTENTIALLY produce an offspring as the result of their coupling? Also, should adoption of children be outlawed in an effort to assure that biological parents do not escape their obligation of rearing their offspring to the age of majority?
I’ll await your answers. Here is a sneak preview of my likely response: I suspect that your aversion to abortion has very little to do with people avoiding responsibility for their actions and very much to do with offending your religiously based moral belief that abortion is not, in fact, a medical procedure, but the barbaric murder of an unborn child.
mpr
Hi Mike,
ReplyDeleteLife has been great. I have been married for a year, and now live in Sioux Falls. Also, the last two months have brought a lot of excitement in my career. And on a more uncanny note, my wife and I happened to watch a couple episodes from Season 2 (Disc 2) of Alias last night... after celebrating Valentine's Day, of course.
How about you? What brought you to Texas, besides your infinite fondess for our commander in chief?
"So, your aversion to the medical procedure known as abortion has everything to do with the need of a civilized society to prevent its populace from skirting personal responsibility for the consequences of their actions and nothing to do with offending your religious sensibilities?"
For the most part, yes. The argument comes from the first principle of my political philosophy, that a government must encourage its citizens to act responsibly... for if the populace is not in the habit of at least being responsible, the nation is doomed.
However, since I do believe in natural law (the kind Aquinas talks about), I suppose that ultimately I feel that humans have a duty to act responsibly not just for the sake of our civilization, but also to maintain a relationship with our Lord. So in that sense, my religious beliefs could play a part, but only insofar as I believe God to be the root of morality. Civilization requires us to be responsible, and God desires us to be responsible.
"What is the role of sex between consenting adults – should people EVER have sex if they do not wish to POTENTIALLY produce an offspring as the result of their coupling?"
Well, ideally, adults should only have sex inside of marriage. I doubt that there are many casual abortions performed on fetuses conceived in wedlock. (STD rates would plunge, too.) Usually when a husband and wife have an "oops" they raise the child lovingly in spite of it.
However, even though that makes the most sense, I am not planning to outlaw fornication.
Thus, consenting adults should treat sex as they treat any other activity that has risk. Either they should abstain altogether, or take as many measures as possible to minimize the risk... and be clear in advance on how they will unitely handle the consequences if those measures fail.
To the extent that lots of kids don't know the risks, we definitely need to increase sex ed in our state.
"Also, should adoption of children be outlawed in an effort to assure that biological parents do not escape their obligation of rearing their offspring to the age of majority?"
Again, ideally, parents would want to raise their children, and be in an environment to do so before putting themselves in risk... but that's not something that I would seek in legislation. Finding a babysitter is being responsible, even if it's a permanent babysitter. I know 2 or 3 couples personally who badly desire to adopt (not being fertile themselves), and would provide a wonderful environment for their child. And I don't favor a law that would effectively cut these friends off from their dream of having a family.
"I suspect that your aversion to abortion has very little to do with people avoiding responsibility for their actions and very much to do with offending your religiously based moral belief that abortion is not, in fact, a medical procedure, but the barbaric murder of an unborn child."
Well it certainly isn't barbaric. Barbarians couldn't produce an abortion without killing the mother, 9 times out of 10.
My belief is completely on the issue of responsibility. I honestly don't reflect at all on the procedure, but think rather "Wow. These people don't think that their actions have consequences." or "Wow. They think that they can do whatever they feel like doing, with no regard to the effects of their action."
Or let's compare it this way. One consequence of sex is pregnancy, another is intimacy. Having sex potentially produces children, and it potentially produces a bond of attachment between the man and woman (just staying with heterosexual to keep things simple).
Now if you watch a soap opera (or listen to Alanis Morissette), you will find that a person who has sex with no regard to the consequence of intimacy is utterly immoral. If a man courts a woman, takes her to bed, and then the next day sleeps with another girl, the first woman is filled with righteous indignation. It was wrong for him to ignore the intimacy generated from their sex. Likewise, it would wrong to ignore a child generated from their sex, as well.
Now, I don't plan to write a tract on morality (or political platform) based off of soap operas... I'm just saying that this issue of morality is so prevalent, that we can find it at the altar, and in the gutter.
Hope that answers your questions. Don't spoil the Alias plotline for me.
Kind regards,
David
PS I don't remember any specific arrogance from you in High School. Just the opposite, I remember cracking some jokes when we shared a Calc class at DSU.
Until you have walked a mile in somebody else's shoes, you don't know what they are feeling or thinking. For every person on earth there are probably that many reasons to have or not have an abortion. As for people wanting to adopt children. There are all kinds of kids in SD waiting to be adopted. They probably aren't babies, but if anybody wants to adopt in order to truly love and nurture a child, that shouldn't matter.
ReplyDeleteDavid,
ReplyDeleteI’m not sure why I moved to Texas. I think it was probably some sort of Peter Pan I-Don’t-wanna-grow-up sort of move. If that is the case, it backfired, because scales have since fallen from my eyes that I was not even aware existed…
After college (I attended one of Augie’s sister universities, Texas Lutheran), I got married to a beautiful Mexican girl with the unlikely name of Nadia (2001), and got a job working with male juvenile sex offenders at a therapeutic outdoor wilderness camp licensed by the state of Texas as a treatment facility for male minor adjudicated sex offenders sentenced to treatment as a condition of their probation. It took me three years to burn out from this endeavor. Following my burnout, I made the second most improbable career move of my life: I enlisted in the US Army. It is important to note that I have been a FLAMING, BLEEDING HEART liberal since at least 1999 and have hated the one known as shrub, aka, dubya, aka The Decider, since at least 1998 when I first became aware of how he was destroying life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. So, after three years as a medic with the First Cavalry Division (3/04 to 3/05 in east Baghdad, Sadr City, that is), my daughter was born and I got my honorable discharge. I’ve been changing diapers ever since. I’ll be a full-time grad student beginning this fall.
As for my apology in my previous reply, I had a ridiculously inflated opinion of myself during high school and I had a tendency to treat people poorly. I find it helpful to acknowledge that fact up front. Enough about me for now…
I agree with your first principle of political philosophy whole-heartedly! Society requires a healthy fear of the leviathan to help keep the rabble in check (if you want to see the monkey dance, you have to pay the grinder). BUT, let’s flesh out your argument concerning the criminalization of abortion as a means of instilling an ethos centered on the virtues of personal responsibility to its logical conclusion…
You stated earlier that, “My position has always been that people need to be responsible for the consequences of their actions. One of the consequences of sex is that you have a chance at becoming pregnant. If you actually do become pregnant, that isn’t punishment, but natural cause and effect. If you do not want to get pregnant, there are many ways to avoid it… one of which is to avoid sex.” This sounds good! Conception, pregnancy (this word does not do it justice – a 9 month ordeal where the woman’s body turns inside out), delivery (another word that does not sufficiently capture the event) of a child, and the responsibility of raising the child to the age of majority are both natural and readily foreseeable consequences of voluntarily engaging in a sex act. A civilized society must not allow its citizenry to mitigate, mollify, ease, sidestep, or in any way avoid the natural and readily foreseeable consequences of their actions. To do so would be to court anarchy.
Here is your quotation with one word exchanged: “My position has always been that people need to be responsible for the consequences of their actions. One of the consequences of sex is that you have a chance at becoming HIV positive. If you actually do become HIV positive, that isn’t punishment, but natural cause and effect. If you do not want to get [become] HIV positive, there are many ways to avoid it… one of which is to avoid sex.”
Is it our moral imperative to imprison physicians who prescribe antiretroviral drugs to HIV positive patients? I think so. These people acted with careless abandon and must reap the whirlwind. As is, these people can just casually pop a few pills every week and go on with their lives as healthy as horses. Acquiring the HIV was a natural and foreseeable consequence of an act they freely chose to participate in. The fact that our society condones a medical course of action that allows these casual fornicators to dodge a bullet that they so willingly and with care-free aforethought fired at the center of their foreheads is simply an anathema that will destroy our nation; “for if the people are not in the habit of at least being responsible, the nation is doomed.”
I’ll take this HIV-AIDS analogy a bit farther. I find it illuminative. It is no secret that Americans (and other first worlders) suffering from HIV have unfettered access to medical courses of treatment that almost completely mask the negative effects of the disease and allow the patient to live on nearly as though they never were infected. It is also no secret that there is an HIV epidemic on the African continent where the suffering of people dying of AIDS surely must have by now dried up the tear ducts of the Weeping Mother of Christ. People with money can avoid the consequences of their actions more readily than people without. If SD outlaws the medical procedure known as abortion, or even if it is outlawed in the entire US, the rich will continue to do what they have always done, put their self on a plane and land in Minneapolis (or Paris), have the procedure, and be done with the unpleasantness. The poor will continue to do what they always have done: suffer. (Incidentally, even though abortion is legal in SD, how many SD residents of means travel far from their home, out of state, to undergo the medical procedure known as abortion when the need arises in order to avoid stigma and shame of undergoing the procedure within the borders of SD? LOTS!)
You said, “My belief is completely on the issue of responsibility. I honestly don’t reflect at all on the procedure, but think rather ‘Wow. These people don’t think that their actions have consequences.’” I don’t buy it. I think it is the bloody arms, legs, and beating heart.
Pregnancy is a medical condition, a parasitic infection that resolves (for humans) over nine months. If the pregnant woman wants in her heart of hearts to be a mother to the parasitic zygote/embryo/fetus that is growing inside of her, then she will embrace with unquantifiable and indescribable joy her pregnancy with every fiber of her being. The zygote/embryo/fetus is no longer a parasite at that point; it is her child whom is beloved by her. If the woman does not want to be a mother to the zygote/embryo/fetus, she undergoes the medical procedure known as abortion in order to resolve the parasitic infection (ontological relativity). This decision making process is the paramount of responsible action. What greater responsibility do we have as humans than planning the nature and makeup of our very families: when and if and under what circumstances we have children?! Without family planning, long term financial planning is nearly impossible, as is pursuing higher education (although, obviously NOT impossible: my mother got her GED at age 35 as a single woman with three children and later went to college). Why do you think the poor have more children than the rich? Is it because they have more sex?
Now, I must discuss the nature of sex in our society. Yes, it is highly abused and commoditized in order to sell shit to stupid Americans with tragic outcomes, including a level of licentiousness not seen in the modern era; and, yes, this pisses me off and disgusts me to no end (the subject of another time). HOWEVER, sex is a necessary component of being a healthy, happy, well adjusted human being. This will probably never change. Poor people have just a great of right at pursuing the happiness that comes through sex as do their well to do counterparts. The societal cost of criminalizing a woman’s right to undergo the medical procedure known as abortion would be borne disproportionately by those who need the ability to plan the nature and makeup of their families the most. Criminalizing family planning dose NOTHING to engender personal responsibility/accountability. Quite the contrary, it engenders a helpless, hapless society. Without family planning, we would go back to the third world. At least then we could suffer right alongside our HIV positive African brothers and sisters.
Now, I’ve got to address what I view as a straw man: The serial abortress, who elects to have fetuses torn from her uterus as often and readily as she spews tasteless gum from her mouth onto the sidewalk. This person does not statistically exist. Yes, I’m sure you could find someone as pathologically depraved as this gum-spitter, but she is soooooooo far beyond the other side of the bell curve that she simply does not exist (statistically), and basing public policy on your well-placed disgust of her actions and attitude makes no sense. The REAL women who have abortions (those within three standard deviations of the mean) do so after a level of soul-searching contemplation that you or I can never imagine. They elect this medical procedure after many long nights of darkness. They make this choice BECAUSE they are responsible (to their self, their children, and their family), not in spite of it. There is NO SUCH THING AS A CASUAL ABORTION (at least not within 3sd of the mean).
I also want to point out the cost to society of living among people who were not wanted by their mothers. I’ve known a few; specifically, many of the sex offenders I worked with. It is hard to describe the suffering these boys had endured and in turn suffered upon their victims. There is simply no benefit to the state forcing women to have children they do not want. The socially maladapted pathological women who should not be mothers in the first place will unleash psychopaths upon our society at a higher rate, and the REAL women (+,- 3 sd) who have family planning removed from their lives will suffer. The families of America will suffer.
Peace in the mid-east,
mpr
PS: I appreciate this dialogue. You are EXACTLY the type of person I need to talk with about this in order to shape and inform my perspective: a highly intelligent man of resolute morality.
PPS: check out my reply to the “prayer doesn’t hurt, but…” I hadn’t realized there were so many responses until yesterday…