He's got her back.
« The "Myth" of Welfare Queens | Main | Merry Christmas » Jamie Lynn and Huckabee, Cont.21 Dec 2007 03:48 pm Comments (47)
That comment on CBS is priceless. """"" This is completely absurd. I don't care what type of sex education you have, by the time your body is ready to have sex our peer driven sewer society would have taught you what a condom is and there are directions on the package. Does she want us to believe that nothing was said after about contraception after the first one got knocked up? 
1. Jamie Lynn Spears is too young to be having sex. 2. Jamie Lynn Spears is too young to be having unprotected sex. 3. Jamie Lynn Spears is too young to be carrying her pregnancy to term. Of course, she's a celebrity, so her life will go on, but your average 16 year old who gets pregnant needs to get an abortion. Teen pregnacies ruin people's lives.
Of course, she's a celebrity, so her life will go on, but your average 16 year old who gets pregnant needs to get an abortion. Teen pregnacies ruin people's lives. Teen pregnancies may ruin people's lives. But abortion ends people's lives. I hope Ms. Spears morally correct decision is an inspiration to other young girls who find that God has chosen them to bring new life into the world. The fact is there are long queues of mature, financially stable couples waiting to adopt.
Abortion does, in fact, end people's lives, and no amount of damage to the woman's future (except to her own life) can outweigh that. Teenage pregnancies are often a tragedy, but abortion is not the right answer. Furthermore, sometimes women who get pregnant as teenagers end up having happy and healthy children whom they love and care for and are very happy with.
"3. Jamie Lynn Spears is too young to be carrying her pregnancy to term. Of course, she's a celebrity, so her life will go on, but your average 16 year old who gets pregnant needs to get an abortion. Teen pregnancies ruin people's lives." This is indeed the logic of the pro-"choice" movement. I give Dilan points for actually saying it. What is telling is that this stance is rarely if ever taken in a public or media forum. It is not advocated & part of the debate among neither politicians nor pundits.
Fitz writes: "What is telling is that this stance is rarely if ever taken in a public or media forum. It is not advocated & part of the debate among neither politicians nor pundits." But when their own 15 or 16 year old daughters get knocked up it's certainly part of their private "debates."
Teen pregnancies may ruin people's lives. But abortion ends people's lives. Nope. Abortions end FETUSES lives. And at least early term fetuses that can't think, can't feel pain, don't have personalities or consciousness, are often miscarried (and rarely get a funeral when they are), have not made connections with anyone else's lives (other than their host), etc., are NOT "people". They are alive, but they are not persons. More importantly, though, abortion is LEGAL-- it is a fact of life. As long as it is LEGAL, it is a VERY good idea for people in Ms. Spears' situation. Carrying the pregnancy to term, in contrast, effectively ends the hopes and ambitions of many teenage girls, as well as their right to gender equality. The entirety of the abortion debate isn't that pro-choicers don't care about life, but that pro-lifers don't care about the competing values (ESPECIALLY gender equality).
Abortion does, in fact, end people's lives, and no amount of damage to the woman's future (except to her own life) can outweigh that. Eliminating sexism and promoting gender equality is FAR, FAR more important than saving the life of something that is similar to a tadpole and doesn't even know or care that it is alive, Hector. Again, the problem is that your side thinks gender equality is not only not an important value but is something that should be avoided.
What is telling is that this stance is rarely if ever taken in a public or media forum. It is not advocated & part of the debate among neither politicians nor pundits. True enough, Fitz. And we can discuss all the stance that PRO-LIFERS have that they don't discuss in public (e.g., about equality, nonprocreative sex, gays, contraception, etc.). Also, I should note that many pro-choicers do not share my open advocacy of abortion in certain circumstances. There are a lot of "hold your nose but keep it legal" types.
"Carrying the pregnancy to term, in contrast, effectively ends the hopes and ambitions of many teenage girls, as well as their right to gender equality." Then we should tackle the issues of gender equality and sexism, which continue to exist whether or not a teenage girl carries a baby to term. Basically abortion acts like a bloody bandage in this case. Then we need to reform society and system to make it more amenable to girls who have made the mistake. End discrimination against them, and improve their economic status. Abortion is nothing short of a quick-fix in this situation.
Quietus writes: "Then we need to reform society and system to make it more amenable to girls who have made the mistake. End discrimination against them, and improve their economic status. Abortion is nothing short of a quick-fix in this situation." A quick-fix is still a fix for the individual girl involved. And since (for the most part) the groups that want to outlaw abortion are also against changing the status of women in society, you've just spelled out a pie-in-the-sky scenario that doesn't help anyone right now or in the foreseeable future, even a little bit.
"since (for the most part) the groups that want to outlaw abortion are also against changing the status of women in society" Ain't that the tragedy of American politics. We could use a good center-right Christian Democratic Party.
Quietus writes: "We could use a good center-right Christian Democratic Party." What we need is a moderate-left Rational Party. We've had more than enough "center-right" Christian bullshit, thanks. The Democatic Party we already have is far too "center-right," given the current spectacle of Harry Reid and so forth greasing themselves up and bending over for Dumbya's warmongering, Constitution-shredding disgraces.
Dilan, Quietus is right. By the way, the number of American people who are morally opposed to contraception is actually quite small (I think about 5% of people) and the number of people who want to ban it is vanishingly small. They are very far from a dominant factor in the pro-life movement. Similarly with women's rights. It is generally conceded in American politics that men and women are equal, that single and married women should be able to work and that choice is morally unimpeachable, that all except a few jobs should be open to both sexes, and that women should no longer be expected to 'submit' to men. These premises are not in any danger; while the Huckabees of the world may disagree with them, they are not going to be able to do anything about them. Patriarchy is dead and gone at least for the medium term future. Abortion isn't about women's rights, it's about the kind of rights and obligations that we are willing to extend to men and women equally. DO we think that men and women should both be equal in their obligations to love, charity, and responsibility, or do we think that they should be equal in their 'rights' to pursue money and pleasure. I believe in the former, you evidently believe in the latter. I agree with Tolstoy when he said, "The way forward is not to make women more like men (which the women's movement would like to do), rather it lies in making men more like women."
Europe has had the economically liberal Christian-Democratic movement for decades after World War II, and no one's been complaining. Ditto for Latin America. Once again, MLJ and his ilk refuse to distinguish between important nuances between systems of thought that they oppose. It's rather like how neocons can't tell the difference between a Sunni and a Shia, much less the four madhabs.
Ain't that the tragedy of American politics. We could use a good center-right Christian Democratic Party. Hector and Quietus: I actually do not disagree that Christian Democratic Parties in Europe represent an interesting and intellectually serious framework for analyzing these issues. I would, in the end of the day, disagree with them, but I know that a lot of people have these sorts of views and they are faced with a choice between a Republican Party that doesn't care about the poor and a Democratic Party that doesn't want to enact their moral beliefs. We might actually be seeing the start of this with the Huckabee phenomenon, but it is still a long way off.
By the way, the number of American people who are morally opposed to contraception is actually quite small (I think about 5% of people) and the number of people who want to ban it is vanishingly small. They are very far from a dominant factor in the pro-life movement. Hector, your statistics are not wrong (although I have seen higher numbers in surveys compiled by Kristen Luker), but your conclusion is, for two reasons: 1. A lot of the legislative and administrative action on contraception isn't in banning it, but in making it more difficult to get. E.g., delays on approval of Plan B, pharmacists' exemptions, restrictions on family planning funds, opposition to distribution of contraception to minors, etc. 2. Even if it isn't a large percentage of pro-lifers, they are influential within the movement, to the point where pro-life groups refuse to support any efforts to promote contraception even though it is the most obvious way to reduce the abortion rate.
Abortion isn't about women's rights, it's about the kind of rights and obligations that we are willing to extend to men and women equally. DO we think that men and women should both be equal in their obligations to love, charity, and responsibility, or do we think that they should be equal in their 'rights' to pursue money and pleasure. I believe in the former, you evidently believe in the latter. Changing the subject from rights to obligations is a nice dodge. In fact, whatever "obligations" we may have to each other, that doesn't mean that THEY SHOULD BE LEGALLY ENFORCEABLE. Indeed, preserving liberty under law and limited government requires that these obligations, for the most part, NOT be legally enforceable. Rights, on the other hand, MUST be legally enforceable or they do not mean anything. Further, even on an "equal obligation" analysis, your argument fails. You are saying that women-- and not men-- should have an obligation to ruin their lives by bearing children they do not want and cannot care for and which are, at the time they want to abort them, the functional equivalent of tadpoles with no interest in any continued existence. This is a burden you want to place on one gender, and one gender only. So even if you recast the debate to obligations, in the end, it's still about screwing over women. And pro-lifers consist of two groups of people: (1) people who think screwing over women in GOOD (because it was included by the ignorant authors of the Bible) and (2) people who think screwing over women may not be good but is ACCEPTABLE. I do not believe it is either.
Quietus quacks: "Europe has had the economically liberal Christian-Democratic movement for decades after World War II, and no one's been complaining. Ditto for Latin America. Once again, MLJ and his ilk refuse to distinguish between important nuances between systems of thought that they oppose. It's rather like how neocons can't tell the difference between a Sunni and a Shia, much less the four madhabs." MLJ and "his ilk" are much brighter than Quietus is, and they know that the Christian Democrats of Europe are much further to the left than Quietus's notion of "center-right" is, thus rendering any comparison pointless. Even most "conservatives" in Europe accept as basics of civil societies things that would make most American conservatives run off screaming into the night, terrified of creeping socialism.
Dilan Esper writes: "You are saying that women-- and not men-- should have an obligation to ruin their lives by bearing children they do not want and cannot care for and which are, at the time they want to abort them, the functional equivalent of tadpoles with no interest in any continued existence." I'm not sure the tadpole analogy is apt, since tadpoles swim free of their mothers. The long human gestation period raises interesting points in the abortion debate that lifers usually refuse to answer. As one example - should a "potential father" be allowed to curtail the ability of a "potential mother" to travel from a state in which abortion is illegal to one in which it is legal? (In the event that Roe v. Wade is overturned, that is.) I don't have a cite to prove it offhand, but this was part of the SC's consideration in the Roe case. The specter of another Dred Scott crisis was looming after states like New York and California (the latter under Saint Reagan) had passed "liberal" abortion laws.
the Christian Democrats of Europe are much further to the left than Quietus's notion of "center-right" is Are the CDPs generally not "center-right" by European standards? Who said I was using American standards? And in any case, they are still center-right in the sense that while they usually support the same sort of general fiscal policies of their Social Democrat counterparts (that is, the welfare state, not stiffing the poor, etc.), their policies are somewhat scaled back and moderate, that is, center-right. And they have the whole social conservatism thing in regards to abortion (and occasionally gay marriage and/or divorce). So they are arguably by European standards center-right. Why must you assume that I wasn't speaking of such standards? Even most "conservatives" in Europe accept as basics of civil societies things that would make most American conservatives run off screaming into the night, terrified of creeping socialism. I'm so happy that you agree with me. And I didn't have to even write it out myself. Great minds think alike, eh?
Dilan, It is only 'screwing over' women if you assume that being required to fulfil one's obligation, one's nature, and one's deepest (even if unconscious) spiritual yearnings is a curse. I prefer to think of these as good things, however. I often suspect that what leads the pro-abortion people astray is in many cases, an inability of unwillingness to accept the full meaning of Christ on the Cross. You want to create a society with no tragedy, no suffering, no sacrifice and no martyrdom. But you fail to see that in suffering and martyrdom lies the secret to how we get close to God. I admire the women who are faced with unwanted pregnancies and who realize that whatever the cost to their own future careers, destroying an unborn baby is wrong. These women know that they are destroying their own chances of future happiness, but they decide that this is an acceptable price to pay for saving a human life. They embrace a life of suffering, poverty and hardship for the sake of their belief in human life. In their suffering and sacrifice lies their virtue and glory. I know a couple of women like this, and I consider them among the most admirable women I know. These women are infinitely closer to God and the secret of human existence than all the boardroom women that Dilan likes to wax lyrical over.
Quietus again: "Are the CDPs generally not "center-right" by European standards? Who said I was using American standards? And in any case, they are still center-right in the sense that while they usually support the same sort of general fiscal policies of their Social Democrat counterparts (that is, the welfare state, not stiffing the poor, etc.), their policies are somewhat scaled back and moderate, that is, center-right. And they have the whole social conservatism thing in regards to abortion (and occasionally gay marriage and/or divorce). So they are arguably by European standards center-right. Why must you assume that I wasn't speaking of such standards? Since you're talking about a new party which would be started here in America, using American standards would seem to make sense. If you're using European standards your proposed "center-right" party would (in most respects) be to the left of the bulk of the Democratic Party. From my past experience reading your Cheney-sucking posts, I don't think that's what you're advocating.
By American standards it would be economically left of the Democratic Party, but would it be socially to the left? Not necessarily. In any case, there are two axes involved, so if I was incoherent, I apologize. It is so hard to escape one's true nature, I suppose. In any case, an European-style CDP (center-right by Euro standards) ported over to the U.S. would probably end up center-right by U.S. standards, or probably just center. Fiscally liberal and socially conservative, anyhows. And I'd rather not open up the can of worms as to how many different standards there are in the U.S. itself. I was going to mention that there probably hasn't been such a fis-lib/soc-con configuration in the U.S., but then again there were those Populists in the late 19th century, but then those standards aren't so easily convertible to today's, anyways. I think that's quite incoherent enough. And I thought Cheney was a verb, not a noun.
Quietus again: "In any case, an European-style CDP (center-right by Euro standards) ported over to the U.S. would probably end up center-right by U.S. standards, or probably just center. Fiscally liberal and socially conservative, anyhows. And I'd rather not open up the can of worms as to how many different standards there are in the U.S. itself." You'd better not, because then your suggestion would make even less sense. Under Dumbya the Repiglican Party has been "fiscally liberal" in a sense, while being socially conservative. The niche you're seeking for your third party really doesn't exist, because the traditional Republican Party no longer exists. It has been eaten by the Repiglicans, and the excreted remains are now running for the 2008 nomination. Some are more digested than others, but none are recognizable by, say, Eisenhower standards.
Ah, but fiscally liberal would presumably be seeking government spending for programs that benefit the poor. Corporate welfare shouldn't even be near the word liberal.
Quietus again: "Ah, but fiscally liberal would presumably be seeking government spending for programs that benefit the poor. Corporate welfare shouldn't even be near the word liberal." You haven't been paying attention. "Faith based funding" and the prescription drug program (which admittedly amounts, in part, to corporate welfare) both amount to "liberal" expansions of federal spending. But they're wrapped in con clothing, so Repiglicans supported both of them.
Oh. I had thought the faith-based initiatives thing had petered out sometime after 9/11. When you said that the Bush administration had been fiscally liberal, I thought you meant that they had simply been spending massive amounts of money, instead of the sis-boom rah-rah balancing budgets without raising taxes fiscon schtick.
Quietus again: "I thought you meant that they had simply been spending massive amounts of money, instead of the sis-boom rah-rah balancing budgets without raising taxes fiscon schtick." Since they did both, what difference do you discern? There is none.
What I meant was that while the Bush consortium did do make a few noises towards fiscally liberal measures (Matt Y. wrote about this in a post last month, and included No Child Left Behind as one), it's easier to think of them as being more fiscally liberal in the massive government expenditures sense, rather than fiscally liberal in the sense of spending the money on the poor. So in other words yes the Bush administration did do some fiscally liberal things, but not much of it was really "liberal", so to speak. I'm pretty sure I'm not really arguing with you anymore at this point.
Quietus quoncedes: "What I meant was that while the Bush consortium did do make a few noises towards fiscally liberal measures (Matt Y. wrote about this in a post last month, and included No Child Left Behind as one), it's easier to think of them as being more fiscally liberal in the massive government expenditures sense, rather than fiscally liberal in the sense of spending the money on the poor. So in other words yes the Bush administration did do some fiscally liberal things, but not much of it was really "liberal", so to speak. I'm pretty sure I'm not really arguing with you anymore at this point." Yeah - I'm pretty sure that means that I'm right in the reality-based sense. The third path you think there's a niche for no longer exists in any real sense. The Bushpigs killed it. "Liberal" in con-speak no longer means anything except for "what Bush says is wrong." The reason the GOP field is now so scrambled and impotent is that after 7 years of Dumbya, "conservatism" is just a pile of incoherent shit. It now means favoring constant war and constant fear and abandoning any notion of fiscal sanity. Each and every person who thinks Dumbya's presidency has been a success is an idiot or a paid whore.
The third path you think there's a niche for no longer exists in any real sense. The Bushpigs killed it. Whoa there, tiger, I never conceded any such thing.
Quietus quotes and writes: "The third path you think there's a niche for no longer exists in any real sense. The Bushpigs killed it. Whoa there, tiger, I never conceded any such thing." You wouldn't. You couldn't. But the reality sits there and mocks you and your ilk.
We'll return here in a few months. Huckabee may be far too right-wing for such a CDP, but his configuration- in rhetoric- of social conservatism and economic liberalism- seems to correspond with CD. If he wins the nomination, that may just mean the voters want such a configuration, even if the party won't reshape itself for them. And thus the comments come full circle back to the subject of the original post. Well conversed, Master MoeLarryAndJesus. And good night.
Bean Counter Savagery Recap: """" Of course, she's a celebrity, so her life will go on, but your average 16 year old who gets pregnant needs to get an abortion. Teen pregnacies ruin people's lives. """" """" """" """"
It is only 'screwing over' women if you assume that being required to fulfil one's obligation, one's nature, and one's deepest (even if unconscious) spiritual yearnings is a curse. This is the worst sort of gender essentialism. Where do these assumptions about women's "nature" come from? The ignorant people who authored the Bible thousands of years ago and didn't have the faintest idea about biology or pyschology? The questionable premises of evolutionary psychologists? Your own sexist assumptions? For your information, for lots of women, pregnancy is not about "nature" or "deepest yearnings". It is an obstacle to their being able to live the life they want to live. And even if there is some truth to your assumptions as to women AS A GROUP (and given the cultural presumptions that are involved, there would be no way to know even this), that doesn't justify imposing restrictions on those inidividual women who DO NOT exhibit the characteristics allegedly held by the majority of the group. It is not women as a group that we are talking about, but individual women, including individual women whose "nature" and "yearnings" are nothing like their sisters'. Really, this is, at bottom, the antifeminism behind the pro-life cause. You may assert that it is all about life, but it isn't. It is about deep-seated assumptions about the roles that women should play in society, assumptions that have thankfully been rejected as our society has become more educated and feminists-- who are much smarter and more informed than the idiots who wrote the Bible, as well as the religious leaders who interpret it now-- have taught us things. Not every pro-lifer is anti-feminist-- there are pro-lifers who sympathize with feminism-- but the energy behind the movement comes from people who, either for religious reasons or because they just reject feminism, want to restore the "separate spheres" that men and women were claimed to inhabit in the good old days.
Dilan, I enjoy these discussions because they lay bare the arid and joyless mentality behind your ideology. Incidentally, I would not call myself a feminist, nor would I call myself an anti-feminist. I would call myself a post-feminist, in much the same meaning as a post-Marxist, meaning that I would choose to absorb whatever is good and true in feminism, while throwing out what is false and pernicious. Since you seem to have spectacularly missed the point, let me rephrase. I don't think that loving and caring for children is a woman's role or nature. I think that it is a basic part of _human_ nature. While women are probably a bit more nurturing than men, the difference is not great, and is swamped by individual differences. I think that a normal, well ordered human being typically has the desire to love, nurture, and care for children. Some of us may decide for many reasons- health reasons, poverty, environmental concerns- not to have children, and that's fine, nothing wrong with that. I do think that it's wrong to end the life of a child once created. I also think that it's wrong to try to demand total control over one's life. A certain degree of control is fine and good, but to claim total control is to thumb one's nose at God. That fine line, in my mind, corresponds to the difference between contraception and abortion. Your problem is that you see society in terms of rights, not obligations, which is totally the wrong way to look at things. Also you appear incapable, not just unwilling but _incapable_ of grasping the meaning of Christ on the Cross (i.e. redemption through suffering). Like I said before, sacrifice is a necessary part of morality, and those who have sacrificed much are all the more to be admired. Among the foremost of people like these are women who sacrifice their life plans because of their convicition in the value of the lives of their babies.
"Your problem is that you see society in terms of rights, not obligations, which is totally the wrong way to look at things. Also you appear incapable, not just unwilling but _incapable_ of grasping the meaning of Christ on the Cross (i.e. redemption through suffering)." Who gives a fuck? The triumph of liberal society since the Enlightenment was that it emphasized the individuals' rights. It was the totalitarian states that placed more emphasis on obligations (for instance, communist, fascist and theocratic states have placed emphasis on how women had the obligation to be good mothers and breeders. Chairman Mao told the women of China to have as many children as possible so that China could survive a nuclear exchange with the US to continue to build international socialism after WWIII. Stalinist propaganda was filled with the image of the good, almost-sexless Soviet mother who bore lots of good communist children. The Nazis emphasized the woman's role as the good mother in the home.). What you are arguing for is theocratic authoritarianism. You also dishonestly conflate children with a zygote. They are not the same thing. Why don't you go and enjoy a circle jerk with Mullah Omar and the corpse of Dworkin? It could probably do all of you a lot of good. As for the discussion about Christian Democratic parties, I know a powerful family who supports the main Catholic right-wing party in Chile yet also have for years funded and help run underground abortion clinics because the women in the family find the Catholic propaganda on women to be retarded. This is a very old, very Catholic family. Just saying.
Also, if you think about it, "redemption through suffering" if basically the Christian translation of Lenin's idea that the masses must suffer enough before they learn to rise up in revolution.
Un-Reality Man, I'll respond to the rest of your absurd post in due time. But one absurdity I need to point out right now. Evidently you know little about Chilean history. There is no 'main right wing' party in Chile. There are several Christian parties, some of which are on the left, others on the right. The main Christian Democratic party began as a Falangist (far right) movement in the 1930s, but rapidly evolved into a centrist party that was at times on the center left, and at other times on the center right. The Christian Democrat candidate, Tomic, ran on a moderate socialist platform in 1970, and at the same time several factions of the Christian Democrats broke away from Tomic to join the Popular Front. Today, the CD party is in coalition with the moderate left, and the major right wing alliance has no particular ties with the church. The support for criminalizing abortion, by the way, is not a right vs. left thing as it is held broadly across the political spectrum in LA region. Two of the farthest left leaders in the region today, Chávez and Morales, are both strongly anti-abortion and in fact pro-natalist. Morales' Minister of Education, Felix Patzi, has gone on record saying that contraception is a capitalist-imperialist plot and calling on Bolivian Indian women to have between five and eight children. (Patzi, interestingly enough, is not a Catholic but rather an neo-pagan.) Your knowledge of Latin American history is on par with your ability for casuistical moral reason.
Unreality Man, You do have a point though in that communism and fascism are best viewed as heresies of natural law, while your liberalism is nothing but the negation of natural law. Whatever gave communism its power to inspire men came from what was true within it, i.e. the things it borrowed from the Christian tradition, redemption through suffering among them. It is for this reason that I have some sympathies for the more liberal communist states (Cuba, Yugoslavia, Nicaragua), and even can see some good in the more liberal of the right wing regimes like in places like Greece. When it comes to your liberalism, I can see very little good at all. Rights over obligations is the formula for a society without faith, without morals, without virtue and without love. For hell, in other words.
Hector, there is a right-wing party in Chile that is more powerful than the others. Do you deny this? "Whatever gave communism its power to inspire men came from what was true within it, i.e. the things it borrowed from the Christian tradition, redemption through suffering among them. It is for this reason that I have some sympathies for the more liberal communist states (Cuba, Yugoslavia, Nicaragua), and even can see some good in the more liberal of the right wing regimes like in places like Greece. When it comes to your liberalism, I can see very little good at all. Rights over obligations is the formula for a society without faith, without morals, without virtue and without love. For hell, in other words. Posted by Hector | December 29, 2007 12:21 PM" I'm not sure that that is a good defense of Christianity: that it helped inspire some of the better ideas in communism. The type of liberalism I support based on individual autonomy and helping women to seek their own paths has helped to lead to peace, liberty, innovation and prosperity in places like the US, Canada and Europe. Meanwhile, you talk about being sympathetic to the likes of Castro, who I wouldn't mind see choke on his own spittle. You can keep Castro, Chavez and Morales for all I care. Rousseau would agree with you about the horror of a society "Rights over obligations is the formula for a society without faith, without morals, without virtue and without love." He was also a major influence on the thinking of the Jacobins and Marx. You can have him. Hell, you're the guy that was talking about how great Sparta was not too long ago. One of the great thing about a liberal society that allows for individual choice is that it empowers an individuals faith with individual meaning. Azar Nafisi, the author of "Reading Lolita in Tehran," has made a point that religious female students of hers who used to wear the veil before the Iranian Revolution felt that the veil helped to give their belief in Islam meaning that they felt deeply. Once the veil became a tool of the state, they felt the veil lost all meaning and connection to their religious faith. What you are suggesting is very similar, a state that makes such decisions for you instead of allowing one's own individual conscience to guide them. When a religious woman decides to keep her unwanted child due to her faith, at least she is deciding how to express her own personal faith. No one has the right to use the coercive power of the state to make her make that decision. It is wrong for China to force unwed women to have abortions and it is wrong for Catholic states in Latin America to force women to seek a pregnancy to term. What if a woman does not see any contradiction between her own autonomy over her own body leading her to have an abortion and her religious beliefs? Who are you to decide that for her? Without freedom of individual autonomy and choice, there is no religious freedom. Without religious freedom, religion means nothing.
Also Hector, do you believe that places like the US where abortion is legal and the state doesn't force you (or at least women) to meet obligations (which seem to mean whatever you decide obligations are) is hell? Are you really that so hung up on freedom in America that you think our freedoms make us a hellish place? To sum up, you have mentioned sympathy for anti-Americans like Castro and Chavez.
Hector, also, how are you so sure that you are moral? How are you so sure that you are so moral that your preferences for what should be an individual's decision should be state policy? This is the drive behind totalitarianism: the belief that one has the answers so they should be allowed to rob others of their autonomy to make their own moral judgments. Just because you are a Christian and have faith is not an answer. Hong Xiuquan thought he had a very deep Christian faith and he killed millions of people trying to set up a Christian theocracy in China that would rob people of their sexual autonomy. Meanwhile, Martin Luther King, Jr. had faith in the equality of all men, but he made a strong secular moral case based on individual liberty and the liberal tradition.
Like I said before, sacrifice is a necessary part of morality, and those who have sacrificed much are all the more to be admired. Among the foremost of people like these are women who sacrifice their life plans because of their convicition in the value of the lives of their babies. Hector, if an individual woman wants to make that sacrifice, I can't stop her and I don't want the state to. And sometimes, sacrifice can be a deeply moral act, as in the people who gave their lives to fight the Nazis in World War II. But there are three big problems with your notion of sacrifice. First, except in extraordinary circumstances (e.g., a military draft), we do not use state power to REQUIRE people to make these sorts of serious sacrifices, and for good reason. It would be a big government indeed that enforced positive as well as negative rights. Second, pro-lifers' claim about the status of the fetus is, at best, completely theoretical. It is the result of reasoning about categories (what constitutes "human life") rather than looking at the actual characteristics of fetal development. And this is important because you are asking people not to sacrifice to help an unarguable person, but to help a theoretical one. Finally, and most important, sacrifice that hits only one gender is totally unfair. Again, I think most pro-lifers simply favor gender discrimination and a "separate spheres" outlook towards women, and this is why this doesn't bother them. But generally, racial profiling, for instance, is considered generally wrong because it makes a bunch of blacks suffer while whites don't have to. Well, you propose to force a huge group of women, and only women, to sacrifice. That hits at the heart of gender equality, one of the most important values of all of society, or at least to people smart enough to know that organized religions and 2,000 year old views about sex and gender are full of it.
Reality Man, Your comments are so absurd I'm laughing right now. Chávez is an "Anti-American", huh? Only if you thing that being opposed to American Values, being spread over the world makes one Anti-American. Yes, I think I will keep Rousseau. Rousseau had his errors, but he was in every way a more moral and a smarter man than the people that you appear to emulate. In particular, he was prescient enough to see that the Enlightenment was a farce, a sham and a horror. It figures that you would quote approvingly a woman who apparently believes that _Lolita_, a chronicle of sickening perversion that ought to be burned by the public hangman, is something liberating and inspiring. You can choose to be inspired by Lolita, if you choose. I would prefer to be inspired by Rousseau. The difference between China and Nicaragua if you are too unperceptive to see it, is that China forces women to do evil, while Nicaragua forces them to do good. Do you know the dictionary definition of totalitarian, chuckles? Please look it up and then try to make up a list of which historical states qualify. I'll give you a hint: Franco's Spain doesn't qualify, neither does Castro's Cuba, Tito's Yugoslavia, or Somoza's Nicaragua. Please try to achieve some historical literacy before you start babbling about totalitarianism. I suppose you think that Chávez is a totalitarian too. Ho hum. Read a dictionary, please. But yes, if you think that I am a fan of Chávez, Morales, Rousseau, Sparta, Hong Xiuquan*, and have a certain qualified admiration for Castro, then you would be correct. You would also be correct to call me an anti-liberal, a label that I would wear proudly. You want to impose a sterile, loveless garden-suburb utopia on the world under the banner of 'peace, freedom, prosperity and innovation". Keep your peace, your freedom, prosperity and innovation. You're welcome to them. *Hong Xiuquan's errors were theological, not political. "
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I like how the story actually reads that he's "not going to condem" her.
He wouldn't have wanted to condom her, either.
Posted by MoeLarryAndJesus | December 21, 2007 4:13 PM