I’m philosophically aligned with the Right To Life movement. Where I part ways with most of that crowd is the method for solving the problem. Which leads me to repost some comments I made on another thread about the issue. I’m not going to post a link (it is not hard to find) out of deference to the commenter I’m responding to.
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Let us put the Government in charge of women’s vaginas. What could possibly go wrong?
What if the government decided to conscript those vaginas to produce more babies? Or what if the government decides those vaginas are producing too many babies?
But I get your drift. It can’t happen here. Because government programs are never corrupted from their original intention as sold to the Public. Well not when Conservatives are in charge anyway. We have to wait for the Democrats to do that. Generally not too long though. Which is a comfort. I’m sure the very thought of giving Democrats power over the wombs of your female relatives makes you swoon.
“Smelling salts in aisle CV.”
Simon’s Law: It is unwise to attribute to malice alone that which can be attributed to malice and stupidity.
“Every power you give the government to do good will eventually be used by the government to do evil.”
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Typical Conservative “I’m too stupid to figure out how to fix this without putting a gun to people’s heads. Lets pass a law.”
Wait a minute. That sounds like a Typical Liberal.
It is getting hard to tell them apart.
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I like Rockford Pro Life. They are against a government “solution”.
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I do get the your [the commenter’s] dilemma. Either start a black market in abortion and give the Democrats control of all female wombs. Or solve the problem outside government.
Tough choice.
Black markets and empowering Democrats has a nice ring to it don’t you think? If I take your side on this it will be because I would LOVE to see those outcomes. Just to be able to watch your self inflicted agony.
Well yeah. I get a thrill out of the strangest things. Why do you ask?
Cross Posted at Power and Control
Comments
5 responses to “Let’s Put Government In Charge”
I don’t exactly understand your position on abortion. You say you are aligned with the Right to Life side. Without going into their position in detail, would it be safe to say they would like to use government to outlaw abortion, while you would choose a more subtle form or coercion, perhaps showing pregnant women pictures of aborted fetuses and having them listen to heart beats? Or offering assistance with adoption if necessary? Or just hand out literature and show films?
I don’t take a stand on this issue outside the concept of rights, and without defining exactly what constitutes a human being. Unless one believes that life begins at the moment of conception, and if you are religious that a soul is created at that instant, then the life that “is” is in an evolving state that eventually reaches full human status. Some would define that as being able to survive outside the womb possibly with extraordinary medical help such as preterm births require. Others may say human status occurs sometime, but undefined, after the zygote stage, but when the “child” becomes recognizable, whenever that is. But in all cases, the Right to Life people align themselves with the child. The mother may be carrying the child, physically nurturing he/her through the developmental stage, but in this view the child is a separate entity deserving of rights. Makes perfect sense, except that it negates the rights of the mother totally.
She becomes nothing more than a brood mare, without a right to her own body. A child developing within a woman is part of her until birth, attached through an umbilical cord. So in essence the Right to Life side is saying that a woman looses control of part of her body the minute she becomes pregnant, or at least somewhere along the line. Should she have an abortion she is committing murder. My view of this comes from my father, a doctor who on occasion performed illegal abortions.
He got his M.D. at Stanford before WW1, at a time when the best medical books were still published in German. It was also a time when women didn’t have many rights, not even the right to vote, let alone decide for themselves when to get pregnant or have an abortion. He saw women who had been raped by their husbands – (yes, after 8 or so children they didn’t want anymore, could barely feed and clothe the ones they already had, and didn’t want to have sex but were forced) – women who had tried to abort their own child. He performed emergency surgery on such women, and some died along with the fetus. Others came to him and begged to have an abortion. If it was early enough, he had a method of using potassium permanganate to induce abortion. If a later stage, he would secretly and at great risk, perform the abortion and usually without pay. He said his conscience wouldn’t let him watch a woman potentially commit suicide.
I know that women’s rights have come a long way since by father practiced medicine. But I also think a woman has a right to her own body. Without that right she is second class, little more than chattel of the state.
Outside women’s rights, I think a child gains rights when he becomes sentient. This condition of life can be demonstrated scientifically. Religion and the soul can’t enter here. You are free to believe, but not free in impose your beliefs on others, unless of course you can demonstrate the existence of a soul, which by definition has no physical form. Not likely.
What is sentient? Here’s a definition from Jeremy Bentham especially for Eric:
[from Wikipedia]
“The 18th-century philosopher Jeremy Bentham compiled Enlightenment beliefs in Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation (second edition, 1823, chapter 17, footnote), and he included his own reasoning in a comparison between slavery and sadism toward animals:
The French have already discovered that the blackness of the skin is no reason why a human being should be abandoned without redress to the caprice of a tormentor [see Louis XIV’s Code Noir]… What else is it that should trace the insuperable line? Is it the faculty of reason, or, perhaps, the faculty of discourse? But a full-grown horse or dog is beyond comparison a more rational, as well as a more conversable animal, than an infant of a day, or a week, or even a month, old. But suppose the case were otherwise, what would it avail? The question is not Can they reason? nor, Can they talk? but, Can they suffer?
I’m going with the Jewish rule on the matter:
“It becomes an independent human when half the head exits the mother’s body.”
Frank,
I guess I should have been more explicit. No government imposed nothing. Just citizen to citizen engagement – with those willing to listen.
In fact – barring medical necessity women shouldn’t have abortions. Unless they are Democrats. I believe that in war it is allowable to let the enemy kill themselves and their future generations. It sure saves me the trouble and expense.
Persuasion. Ok.