(Prolifer)ations 8/16/07
I said yesterday I was impacted by an article stating lib bloggers do a much better job of linking and cooperating to one another than do conservatives. So I’m hereby launching a new post – daily? couple times a week? – spotlighting good information gleaned from other pro-life blogs.
And here we go….
Witty Dawn Patrol:
“Fun new products available soon,” says the home page for Planned Parenthood’s online store… with… a logo reading
“I ♥ WOMEN.”… [A] more appropriate slogan would seem to be
“I ♣ BABIES.”
JivinJehoshaphat reports on the latest abortion drug – cattle hormone.
Mother may I… be born has an update on the Manhattan coathanger billboard I reported on earlier today, linking to an ongoing WCBS on-line poll. Thus far most of us agree: crass.
Ruben at Prolifeblogs.com has posted an ABC News video on the plethora of lawsuits against the Ortho Evra patch. Don’t wanna die? Peel it off… now.
Christina at RealChoice has a couple of good posts, one an in-depth analysis of the PBS Frontline videos I featured the other day, and the other four short obits of mothers who died this day in various years from abortion complications (3 legal, 1 illegal). What a way to be remembered.
Over at Reasoned Audacity, Jack and Charmaine Yoest take on the pro-abort PR move of the moment thanks to a willing Newsweek accomplice: “How much time should she serve?”
Nathan Sheets must have been inspired by our Bethany’s “Once-a-month Cooking” post and photos, because he took a break from blogging today to make soup. More interesting, though, are photos of his way chic stainless steel, under counter frig.
And, my, have those human embryo experimentators snowed us with their whining. Vital Signs reports private funds have donated almost $2 BILLION to their fruitless and repugnant research.
Excellent and professional research and writing, all.
Know good pro-life blogs I don’t? Let me know!
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
Oops, sorry Jill. I don’t actually own those. I should have labeled that more correctly. I was asking people if they would be practical for a kitchen.
*feels sheepish*
Jill, you are wrong to call experimentation on human embryos “fruitless”.
Included in the fruit is the entire adult stem cell industry–we first learned how to isolate and characterize adult stem cells from previous work done on embryonic stem cells.
And, my, have those human embryo experimentators snowed us with their whining. Vital Signs reports private funds have donated almost $2 BILLION to their fruitless and repugnant research.
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Yeah! The American Cancer Society has been around since 1913 and STILL hasn’t cured cancer. We shouldn’t spend another dime on their fruitless research! (Sarc.)
@Laura (and slightly off topic): I’ve heard that the arsenic in apple seeds and the seeds found within the pit of an avocado are supposed to be good for fighting cancer. It’s sort of a hippie thing, I guess. :)
Doug, I am posting this here, because the other post has been bumped down:
Bethany, good morning.
“Cruel”: willfully or knowingly causing pain or distress to others.
Excellent question. Yes, it’d be cruel to me, but bear with me as I did really have to think about this one. Does it cause pain or distress to the baby? Actually, I don’t think so, certainly not mental distress, there’s no conscious suffering that goes on there. We give drugs to terminally ill patients and pets due to us feeling that it’s cruel not to do so. I realize those are vastly different situations, of course.
We do have a “social contract,” however – the implied agreements we accept in return for living in society. As a society we are really just a group of people that want similar things, all in all. Once right-to-life is attributed, we think it wrong to kill, usually; wartime, legal execution, self-defense, etc., being some exceptions. With the baby, killing it would cause pain and distress to many people – it’d be cruel in their eyes to do so, and in mine as well. I really don’t have any need or desire for that baby to be killed.
I know that you and many others feel the same way about killing the unborn. I see it as different there because it’s not just a case of the baby anymore. It’s also a case of the pregnant woman. She can definitely suffer, have pain and distress. The social contract doesn’t apply to the unborn, or at least doesn’t apply in the same way. I know many people wish that were different, too.
In both cases – your example of the poisoned baby and an aborted embryo or fetus, there may be no pain or distress on their part. There’s no conscious input from either of them – it’s all what we think about it that makes for cruelty or not. With the born baby, there is little disagreement. With the unborn and the pregnant woman, there’s lots of disagreement.
Doug, suppose no one knew about the mothers’ pregnancy except the mother herself, and she delivered the baby alone, with no one, but she and her baby to know that the baby even existed. No one else would be hurt by the baby’s death. Would it still be wrong?
And by the way, it is very common for the grandmothers and grandfathers, of the unborn child aborted, the boyfriend (in some cases), the best friends, etc, to all go through an immense period of grief for the baby that their friend, daughter, or girlfriend was willing to kill for her own reasons. Have you never heard of grandmothers crying because their daughter chose abortion? They just lost their grandchild. Abortion does affect other people, not just the mother, in a very large number of cases.
Just as it wouldn’t make it any better for a mother to kill her newborn who no one knew about, not having anyone else knowing about an abortion doesn’t make the act any better either. But I just thought I’d bring up the fact that many people do feel pain after the abortion that someone else committed to someone they already had bonded with in some way.
Oh and good morning to you too! :)
Doug, I have another question. Suppose the entire United states had no problem with infanticide…suppose until 18 months (the period of time when studies show that children begin to have true “self awareness”), if a mother chose not to have her child, and didn’t want to put it up for adoption, she could choose to put her baby to sleep, until the 18 months was up.
Would you consider it morally acceptable, simply because it was socially acceptable?
And another question. In your opinion, why are we born with the desire and the will to live?
Why do we fight death, from the very earliest moments of our life? What is your opinion on that.
Leah, Apricot and peach seeds are also supposed to fight cancer.
Bethany, “wrong” is in the eye of the beholder. If the woman is the only person who knows of the baby’s death, and she wanted it, then nobody is going to say “wrong.” If everybody on earth just “poofed” out of existence, would that be “cruel”? If there was no sentient mind to think of it? Doesn’t there have to be “somebody” to be sad, etc., to think of it as cruelty? I know it may seem strange to think about this stuff this way, but I think it’s a good point that cruel or not only exists when a mind is considering it.
I definitely know that sometimes the boyfriend, mother, etc., of a given women will not be happy about an abortion. Sometimes there is no way to avoid somebody having grief.
You don’t really know that killing the newborn won’t make it better for the mother. I am not saying that is a good thing, at all, and almost everybody on earth agrees that it’s wrong, but the woman’s feelings are her own.
On abortion, I would say that if there are other people who are really going to feel hurt by it, then it is better if they don’t know about it. It’s the presence of suffering versus the absence of suffering.
As far as “bonding with the unborn” – the mother of the woman, for example, may feel that way. So it’s her desire against that of the pregnant woman. I still go with the pregnant woman. Very good discussion.
Doug
Bethany, if the whole United States had no problem with infanticide, then I wouldn’t either, and I’d say it’s morally acceptable (same as every other American in that case). I realize that birth as the dividing line for right-to-life is arbitrary. It doesn’t “have” to be there. It could be later or earlier.
I don’t think we are born with the will to live. “Will” is not the right word, in my opinion, because it involves consciousness. Perhaps we could say “unconscious will” or something….? The baby’s body will try to keep breathing, etc. It has to be that way or no species would survive if not.
Later on, as we develop self-consciousness, then obviously true mental will comes into play. Most people want to keep living, but some don’t.
Wow, Doug. You ideals really scare me.
Doug, would it be okay, if you had no friends or family who loved and cared about you….if someone took you out to a field, and drugged you, then and buried you alive? Would you be okay with this, because it would affect no one? How much do you care about your own life?
Hi Doug.
“Bethany, “wrong” is in the eye of the beholder.”
So would I be justified in saying that the Holocaust was not wrong? Because it didn’t affect me. Sure, while those who died in it may feel that it is wrong as well as those who lost loved ones, maybe none of those who died were “wanted” by me. In fact, then I could argue that it was a moral good for me.
It seems like labeling the definition of “wrong” as arbitrary will lead to conclusions like the one I just wrote. And there should be nothing “wrong” with it. God love you Doug.
I would be so depressed if I lived in a world of moral relativism…where people only have as much value as others say they have. I used to be nearly suicidal in my depression when I valued myself as little as my schoolmates valued me. They called me ugly, I tried to “fix” myself. They told me I was stupid, I felt the pain and rejection, and thought that I deserved it. When I sat at my own table at lunch time, and all the other students shunned me, I felt that I was not worthy of being in their presence. I lived in depression and grief, until I finally learned that I had value which did not depend on the beliefs of others! If I had continued on the path of believing my value was determined by others, who knows where I would be now?
I now live a happy life, with a husband who I adore, and who adores me, with three children who know they are gifts from God… and if someone doesn’t value me, or my family, it doesn’t bother me, because I know I and my family have inherent value, not depending on others opinions.
I would never desire to go back to thinking that others perceptions of me determined who I am or what I’m worth! What a sick and sad way to view your life!
Bethany,
Who would think you were ugly? You are very beautiful!
I agree!
Jk, and Heather, that is so sweet of you to say. To this day, I still have issues with being able to believe anything like that.. but, it’s just one of those things, I guess. My husband thinks I’m pretty, even when I think I look hideous. :-)
Yeah, they were really mean about it too. They would tell me about a certain flaw they saw, and I would go look in the mirror, and see it magnified a hundred times, and I would buy makeup and try to fix it…being so young, I would end up making it look worse, and I would get made fun of for that too. For instance, one boy told me I had two veins coming down from the ends of my lips to my chin. I had never noticed it before, but I looked in the mirror, and what do you know? He was right. All of a sudden, I felt like a freak, and I went to the store, and I bought some of that white makeup that covers blemishes, trying to cover them up, but it just didn’t work. The kids at school would tell me that I was dumb cause I didn’t wear earrings, and when I finally got my ears pierced to make them see me as a better person, they looked at them and said, “So what?”
They called me “hairy legs” because I hadn’t started shaving. Well, I begged my mom over and over till she finally let me start shaving. Once I did that, they basically didn’t care. They were simply looking for things to insult me over.
That’s how the kids were. Always looking for a reason to criticize me. Only, the difference is that now, I don’t take it to heart like I used to.
Wow, there were some pretty mean kids at your school, that’s horrible!
Bethany, I was bullied too. I don’t think you ever forget that pain. I’m still sensitive to criticism. I was tall and skinny with very small breasts. I wore braces. I had a short, unflattering haircut. I was called all kinds of names. I have to wonder what kind of parenting these kids must have had to make them so mean. It had to start somewhere. There were several people who had it far worse than I did. The overweight kids and the disabled. I went to an predominately “all white” high school, so black kids weren’t treated very well either. We had 2 suicides. One student was gay, and he was constantly bullied. The other boy walked with a limp. The football jocks pushed him down the stairs one day, and he went home and blew his brains out!
Your ideals really scare me.
Bethany, my ideal is less suffering versus more. Why would that scare you?
Doug
No, your ideals support killing anyone in this world, as long as enough people support it! I don’t consider that less suffering.
Bethany, I was bullied too. I don’t think you ever forget that pain. I’m still sensitive to criticism. I was tall and skinny with very small breasts. I wore braces. I had a short, unflattering haircut. I was called all kinds of names. I have to wonder what kind of parenting these kids must have had to make them so mean. It had to start somewhere. There were several people who had it far worse than I did. The overweight kids and the disabled. I went to an predominately “all white” high school, so black kids weren’t treated very well either. We had 2 suicides. One student was gay, and he was constantly bullied. The other boy walked with a limp. The football jocks pushed him down the stairs one day, and he went home and blew his brains out!
Wow, heather, that is awful! I had my hands held behind my back by one boy while another boy punched me in the stomach…I can’t imagine having been pushed down the chairs though. That is so tragic that kids can hurt others so much that they will kill themselves just to get away from it all.
Like you, I was skinny and had barely any breasts. They teased me for that too…did you ever stuff your bra with toilet tissue? I did.
Heather, I think the types of parents who’s children turn out this way, are the very same type of parents who feel that material goods, education, etc, are more important than love. Love is way down on their list of priorities. I have met many of the parents and it’s usually the same story.
Doug, You really can’t prove that there is any less suffering in this world because of abortion! It’s ludacris. You are clearly forgetting about post abortive women in pain. The unborn are suffering plenty. They are left to die on shelves, and in garbage cans. God is weeping, and he will repay us for our evil deeds! Maybe this is why our suffering is increasing.
Also, Heather, child abuse has skyrocketed since abortion became legal! Studies have shown that women who have abortions are much more likely to be abusive to the children resulting from their subsequent pregnancies! (I think it was in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology.) Don’t these children deserve better?
Bethany, LOL! I didn’t “stuff.” However, I did eventually get breast implants. I had a congenital defect, and my breasts were 2 different sizes. Picture a dime beside a 50 cent piece.
Bethany, Be right back. I have to give baby a quick bath.
okay, I’m going to have to get off for a little bit too….Noah needs diapers and I only have one left. Gotta run to the store. :D
“Bethany, “wrong” is in the eye of the beholder.”
Bobby: So would I be justified in saying that the Holocaust was not wrong? Because it didn’t affect me. Sure, while those who died in it may feel that it is wrong as well as those who lost loved ones, maybe none of those who died were “wanted” by me. In fact, then I could argue that it was a moral good for me.
It seems like labeling the definition of “wrong” as arbitrary will lead to conclusions like the one I just wrote. And there should be nothing “wrong” with it. God love you Doug.
Greetings, Bobby, and thank you for the kind sentiments.
How you feel about the Holocaust is up to you. There are people who feel it wasn’t wrong, (and who might argue it was a “moral good”), and they are justified in saying it, just as you and I are justified in saying it was wrong. We can argue about feelings, but if they exist they exist. That other people disagree doesn’t mean they shouldn’t say things. There are people to this day who are so anti-Jewish, anti-Christian, anti-Muslim, etc., that they advocate killing those they don’t like. Doesn’t have to be a religious deal, either. It can be one tribe against another, even fans of one soccer team against another.
The fact is that most people on earth, by far, value the victims of the Holocaust positively. Just to be clear – there was enormous horror and suffering in the Holocaust. That matters to me. There is horror and suffering going on in this world right now, as in places like Darfur – speaking of holocausts. And that grieves me. Suffering children, going hungry, dying of disease, being tortured – that is incredibly sad to me (and again there isn’t much disagreement on that).
Many times “wrong” is not really “arbitrary” because just about everybody agrees on it. Abortion is different because the Holocaust and everything else above doesn’t involve something inside the body of a woman, and her desire is part of the argument. And abortion is different because there is enormous disagreement about it. To me, at least, abortion is also different because while there is incredible suffering sometimes, as described above, to a point in gestation anyway the unborn don’t suffer at all, no matter what.
Best,
Doug
Bethany, Think about this. If a post abortive woman develops low self esteem from her abortion, she will be less likely to even like herself. How do you love someone else when you don’t even love yourself? I have seen many post abortive mothers who have difficulty with bonding. They seem to hate themselves!
Doug, You really can’t prove that there is any less suffering in this world because of abortion! It’s ludacris. You are clearly forgetting about post abortive women in pain. The unborn are suffering plenty. They are left to die on shelves, and in garbage cans.
Heather, some women have a lot of pain due to having abortions, yes. But not as much nor as severe, in general, as do women who carry to term and give birth. Post-partum depression is more prevalent and more severe in general than is post-traumatic stress from having abortions.
The unborn are not on shelves or in garbage cans. I am not for letting babies die that way, either.
“Less suffering in the world due to abortion.” I just looked, and one site said 46,000,000 abortions per year, worldwide. Had there been that many more people on earth, there would have been a lot more suffering. A lot more. Of course some women suffer after having abortions. But most do not suffer, not to the point where they would not do the same thing again in the same circumstances. And many of them would have suffered had they continued the pregnancies. Even aside from arguing which has more resultant post-traumatic stress, giving birth or aborting, that’s not going to change the big picture from the extra 46,000,000 people per year.
Doug
Doug, what you are saying to us is that you cannot think for yourself. You must rely on others to do your thinking for you. I mean, you say you would support infanticide if the majority of the US supported it…but you don’t support it now. So that means that you allow others to change your views. In other words, you really don’t have any of your own views. Anyone who believes in everything really believes in nothing.
You don’t change your view according to what you believe is morally acceptable or not, or what you genuinely feel is wrong, so in my opinion, you really don’t have an opinion, you just go by what the majority of others think.
This is a very dangerous way to think. Don’t you think that the majority can ever be truly and absolutely wrong?
I have seen many post abortive mothers who have difficulty with bonding. They seem to hate themselves!
I know one of those women now too. It’s exactly like you said, and it breaks my heart.
Now is this a big post or what?
I would be so depressed if I lived in a world of moral relativism…where people only have as much value as others say they have. I used to be nearly suicidal in my depression when I valued myself as little as my schoolmates valued me. They called me ugly, I tried to “fix” myself. They told me I was stupid, I felt the pain and rejection, and thought that I deserved it. When I sat at my own table at lunch time, and all the other students shunned me, I felt that I was not worthy of being in their presence. I lived in depression and grief, until I finally learned that I had value which did not depend on the beliefs of others! If I had continued on the path of believing my value was determined by others, who knows where I would be now?
Bethany, good self-esteem is good to have, because we want to be happy. You do live in a world of moral relativism, but people are still happier if they have good self-esteem. I know kids can be cruel. And where JK says You are very beautiful! I agree very much. In fact, you are a major Babe.
I also appreciate all your energy, as seen at the website about the meals and cooking, and as seen right here.
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I now live a happy life, with a husband who I adore, and who adores me, with three children who know they are gifts from God… and if someone doesn’t value me, or my family, it doesn’t bother me, because I know I and my family have inherent value, not depending on others opinions.
You are welcome to your beliefs but it’s still valuation taking place in sentient minds, whether we think of a god or gods or other “higher” beings. It’s not inherent or intrinsic – its existence is in those sentient minds. I am glad you are happy and have a great family.
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I would never desire to go back to thinking that others perceptions of me determined who I am or what I’m worth! What a sick and sad way to view your life!
It’s not that simple. Different people are going to have different valuations. That’s just reality. It’s not sad or sick to see reality for what it is. We will take other people’s opinions into account to varying degrees, but that really doesn’t bear on morality, necessarily.
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would it be okay, if you had no friends or family who loved and cared about you….if someone took you out to a field, and drugged you, then and buried you alive? Would you be okay with this, because it would affect no one? How much do you care about your own life?
I care a lot – I want to keep living very much. If somebody wanted me dead, they’d say it was okay for me to be killed. Since I want to live I don’t say it’s okay.
As things really are, my death would affect a lot of people – my wife, family, her family, my co-workers, etc. I don’t see anybody’s desire to kill me as trumping the desire I have nor the desire of those who know me. With abortion the desire of the pregnant woman is the most important, in my opinion. I don’t see the desire of pro-lifers as trumping hers.
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your ideals support killing anyone in this world, as long as enough people support it! I don’t consider that less suffering.
How hold on – you are wrong there. No, I am not necessarily going to be for killing somebody, just because others are for it. No matter how many other people feel a certain way, you’d have to ask me about the actual situation before you’d know what I think.
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Doug, what you are saying to us is that you cannot think for yourself. You must rely on others to do your thinking for you. I mean, you say you would support infanticide if the majority of the US supported it…but you don’t support it now. So that means that you allow others to change your views. In other words, you really don’t have any of your own views. Anyone who believes in everything really believes in nothing.
No – I said I would support infanticide if “the entire United states had no problem with infanticide.” Those were your words, and as such I’d automatically be included. I can think for myself. I don’t blindly accept dogma just because other people have told me it, or because I have the emotional need to do so. As I feel right now, I would not support infanticide, even if I was the only person who felt that way. Had I grown up with everybody else thinking it was okay to a certain age, then my opinion could well be different, and I think that’s true for us all.
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You don’t change your view according to what you believe is morally acceptable or not, or what you genuinely feel is wrong, so in my opinion, you really don’t have an opinion, you just go by what the majority of others think.
This is a very dangerous way to think. Don’t you think that the majority can ever be truly and absolutely wrong?
You are mischaracterizing me. One’s view already is what one considers morally acceptable. That’s true regardless of how many other people agree or disagree. I have plenty of opinions and will tell most anybody about most anything. In no way do I necessarily go with the majority. From my point of view the majority certainly can be wrong. I will feel that way as long as I disagree with the majority, and again, that is true for all of us.
There is no “absolutely wrong.” I know this is where you and I disagree, too. All the feelings of “wrong,” and all the entire good/bad/right/wrong of the moral realm exist in sentient minds, not outside of them. This is not stuff with external physical reality we are talking about. These are concepts of thought. They are internal to the mind, not external to it, and they don’t exist in any external “absolute” way.
Doug
Nathan, 11:19p: haha! I guess I scanned too quickly. My bad. But man that fridge did look awesome. I wonder how much it costs. Do you know?
Doug, thank you for the kind words.
How do you define “self-esteem”? Do you think it is a sense of self-worth, how one values himself? And if so, upon what should a person base their self-worth/value upon?
Doug, if I truly felt that morals and values were relative, I would have absolutely nothing to base my worth upon, because my worth would be subjective, as everything else in my world would be. I have an absolute base for my knowledge that I and other human beings have value. Value that even we cannot comprehend. But I cannot imagine what you, or others like you, would possibly have as your foundation for self-esteem. Do you feel that you have value, no matter what? No matter whether you contribute to society, and no matter whether you are missing limbs, or are deaf and blind?
I see people who do not have faith in God constantly searching for self-fulfillment, but never finding it. Where do you suppose one should look, to find it, in your world?
You are mis-characterizing me. One’s view already is what one considers morally acceptable.
Of course it is what one considers morally acceptable. I am sure that Ted Bundy felt justification for the things he did to women…but just because he potentially considered them to be morally acceptable…does that give him an excuse to do it? And does that make it actually right?
John asked an EXCELLENT question in the other thread. He asked if math is relative.
I wonder if someone were to tell you that 2 + 2 equals 5, would you agree that to them, it did equal 5, so it was a valid thought? Or would you say that they were simply wrong?
Just because a person believes that something is right, doesn’t always necessarily mean that they are actually right. Aren’t there absolute truths in mathematics?
From my point of view the majority certainly can be wrong.
From your point of view, could you ever be wrong?
I think women who want to abort should be required to talk to a woman who regrets her decision.
Bethany,
You’re a very pretty girl, they were probably just jealous. I noticed in school that a lot of the girls that got teased were also very pretty.
Bethany: How do you define “self-esteem”? Do you think it is a sense of self-worth, how one values himself? And if so, upon what should a person base their self-worth/value upon?
“Esteem” often has the meaning of “good” to it, so I’d say it’s how good a person feels about themself. Let me look it up, though.
:: look :: look :: look ::
Dictionary.com’s first definition is: “a realistic respect for or favorable impression of oneself; self-respect.” Sounds on-target to me. Yes: self-worth and one’s valuation of oneself. What should a person base their value upon? Well, as always, that depends on what is desired. There will be different “shoulds” there as different desires are expressed. Beyond that, I think it’s obvious that a person *does* base their self-worth on the extent that they make themself happy, and the extent that they fullfill their own ideals, i.e. what they think “should be.”
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Doug, if I truly felt that morals and values were relative, I would have absolutely nothing to base my worth upon, because my worth would be subjective, as everything else in my world would be. I have an absolute base for my knowledge that I and other human beings have value. Value that even we cannot comprehend. But I cannot imagine what you, or others like you, would possibly have as your foundation for self-esteem. Do you feel that you have value, no matter what? No matter whether you contribute to society, and no matter whether you are missing limbs, or are deaf and blind?
I see people who do not have faith in God constantly searching for self-fulfillment, but never finding it. Where do you suppose one should look, to find it, in your world?
Morality is relative but you still have stuff to base your worth upon – it’s what you want. Yes, that’s subjective but people simply *do* have desires and make valuations all the time. One thing we don’t have to worry about is humankind wanting things. Here is what I think – you have a need to embrace certain unprovable things, i.e. religion, etc., and that makes you feel better. All fine and good, and I know that lots of people get lots of good out of religion, but it does not mean that those who aren’t religious lack a foundation for self-esteem. It’s the same for us non-religious as for you religious people, and as above – it’s how happy we make ourselves, how we approach our ideals, how we respect ourselves. Our paths to self-esteem (or away from it, for that matter), may be different but we’re all the same in that way.
I don’t have value “no matter what.” Value is dependent on sentient thinking of such, and if “nobody” thinks I have positive value then there is no positive valuation on me. As far as “somebody,” too, I’m not ruling out supernatural gods or other “higher” beings than us earthly humans. I can’t prove they don’t exist, and if they do then they too may have their opinions and desires, and make their valuations. The question remains if if a senient mind values me positively or not. If so, then to that mind I have positive value.
I’ve seen plenty of religious people never really finding self-fulfillment, so it works both ways. My bottom line is that being honest with oneself is the best way to start.
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In my world, where does one look for self-fulfillment? Satisfying what I want is where I find it. And that’s true for everybody, although it’s usually a good argument-starter. As I said to John, elsewhere, Short of physical compulsion otherwise, we do what we want the most, among our available choices. That is our motivation. In all this arguing and discussion, I think it’s very important to note that. What I want is:
1.) To keep promises I make. This is a real biggie for me.
2.) To love and be good to my wife, my family, friends, co-workers, etc. This is a tall order and quite complex – involving the present time and what has yet to be – balancing the desire for things right now with sacrificing for the future. Here too it’s a question of valuation, and if I can define “maturity” I’d say that one big part of it is being able to give up something now in order to get a more important thing later. By no means am I perfect or even necessarily “good” on this one all the time, but it’s still what I want. Tell you what though – Doug does keep a promise.
3.) To think, learn and discuss/argue. I dearly love it.
There are others but they’re not as important to me or I just can’t think of them right now.
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“You are mis-characterizing me. One’s view already is what one considers morally acceptable.”
Of course it is what one considers morally acceptable. I am sure that Ted Bundy felt justification for the things he did to women…but just because he potentially considered them to be morally acceptable…does that give him an excuse to do it? And does that make it actually right?
Obviously, few people indeed thought what Bundy did was right. Neither I nor anybody else I know thinks he had an excuse to do it.
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John asked an EXCELLENT question in the other thread. He asked if math is relative.
It’s an already agreed-upon system of definitions and relationships, so my answer is no. Higher physics, cosmology, etc., may get into some mathematics where things aren’t so simple, but I still don’t see the science of math as “relative.”
I wonder if someone were to tell you that 2 + 2 equals 5, would you agree that to them, it did equal 5, so it was a valid thought? Or would you say that they were simply wrong?
If he and I agreed on a different system where 5 was defined that way, no problem, but of course under our present (most common) system he’d be wrong. Another example: with our “normal” base 10 calculations, 2 + 2 = 4, but in base 3 it equals 11.
Just because a person believes that something is right, doesn’t always necessarily mean that they are actually right. Aren’t there absolute truths in mathematics?
Yep – and they’re already defined. A given quantity, for example, is not dependent on somebody’s feelings about it. It’s not somebody thinking/saying “good” or “bad” about it, etc. We agree upon mathematical systems in the beginning. The right/wrong/good/bad of morality isn’t agreed upon like that, though with respect to some things there will be vast commonality of opinion about them.
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“From my point of view the majority certainly can be wrong.”
From your point of view, could you ever be wrong?
I know that I could be wrong in the opinion of another person, another group of people, or a majority of people, sure. Depends on what my opinion is about.
Doug
Doug,
With all due respect, I’d like to also imput my opinion and I disagree with the following:
Heather, some women have a lot of pain due to having abortions, yes. But not as much nor as severe, in general, as do women who carry to term and give birth. Post-partum depression is more prevalent and more severe in general than is post-traumatic stress from having abortions.
I find it ridiculous to compare post-abortion PTSD to post-partum depression. Also it’s condescending and selfish to minimize the pain and grief of other women in order to justify ones own abortion abortion. PPD and
and post-abortion PTSD are both disorders, in which the severity can vary, however both can negativly affect a woman’s life if left untreated. We don’t know that post-abortion PTSD isn’t just as prevailiant as post-partum depression, but rather because of the stigma and the politics surrounding abortion, many women aren’t disclosing their abortions to their primary care provider, nor would they disclose or be able to make the connection of their abortion to these issues in therapy.
“Less suffering in the world due to abortion.” I just looked, and one site said 46,000,000 abortions per year, worldwide. Had there been that many more people on earth, there would have been a lot more suffering. A lot more. Of course some women suffer after having abortions. But most do not suffer, not to the point where they would not do the same thing again in the same circumstances. And many of them would have suffered had they continued the pregnancies. Even aside from arguing which has more resultant post-traumatic stress, giving birth or aborting, that’s not going to change the big picture from the extra 46,000,000 people per year.
What of the promises made by pro-choice advocates of reducing poverty, homelessness, or abuse? The legalization of abortion hasn’t fixed any of these issues. Abortion is like a band-aid on a large wound. It addresses the issue of the pregnancy, however it doesn’t remove the surounding circumstances which have made the pregnancy undesirable or affects her quality of life. She will return home to the same circumstances as she was in before. What do you think will happen next time she becomes pregnant if she’s in the same situation? However to provide women with the resources to empower herself, change her situation, and give her children a stable life (equal employment opportunities, safe housing, low-cost medical care, low-cost or co-op daycare, equal educational opportunities, victim advocacy and awareness on domestic violence, parenting classes, support groups in the community, etc) would probably reduce the need for abortions and give women and their children an opportunity at a better life.
Rachel: I find it ridiculous to compare post-abortion PTSD to post-partum depression. Also it’s condescending and selfish to minimize the pain and grief of other women in order to justify ones own abortion abortion. PPD and and post-abortion PTSD are both disorders, in which the severity can vary, however both can negativly affect a woman’s life if left untreated. We don’t know that post-abortion PTSD isn’t just as prevailiant as post-partum depression, but rather because of the stigma and the politics surrounding abortion, many women aren’t disclosing their abortions to their primary care provider, nor would they disclose or be able to make the connection of their abortion to these issues in therapy.
Rachel, nice post and your opinion is welcome. I think there can be post-traumatic stress after both having a baby and having an abortion. I don’t think it’s ridiculous at all to compare them. In no way am I minimizing the suffering of women who have abortions. That wouldn’t be trying to justify other women having abortions anyway. The studies I have seen are quite monolithic in their findings – that post partum depression affects a higher percentage of women who give birth than does PTSD affect women who have abortions, and that PPD tends to have more severe symptoms. We can go into the studies but it’s a lot of work. Still, I’ve done it before, several times.
Agreed that some women won’t tell about their abortions or their feelings about it, but the overall percentage of such women is not known, and in no case have I seen where it would alter the studies’ findings, i.e. of all women who had abortions in a given place where a specific study was done, it’s a relatively small number who wouldn’t talk about it, not a large enough number to overcome the results of the others even if all the non-talkers had PTSD.
Beyond that, lots of women have more than one abortion. If there was an “epidemic” of PTSD, it seems to me that more women would be agreeing with you and not having a second abortion, a third, etc. I realize it can be argued and that “more women” isn’t scientific, but I also see the principle applying to women in general – I think that women usually know what is best for them, whichever choice they make, and that in the long run the vast majority are happy with the choice they made, and would do the same thing again in similar circumstances. I see no evidence of any “big secret” that either group doesn’t know – women who have abortions or women who give birth.
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“Less suffering in the world due to abortion.” I just looked, and one site said 46,000,000 abortions per year, worldwide. Had there been that many more people on earth, there would have been a lot more suffering. A lot more. Of course some women suffer after having abortions. But most do not suffer, not to the point where they would not do the same thing again in the same circumstances. And many of them would have suffered had they continued the pregnancies. Even aside from arguing which has more resultant post-traumatic stress, giving birth or aborting, that’s not going to change the big picture from the extra 46,000,000 people per year.”
What of the promises made by pro-choice advocates of reducing poverty, homelessness, or abuse? The legalization of abortion hasn’t fixed any of these issues.
I don’t think anybody told you that legal abortion would “fix” those issues. Surely, with some almost 50,000,000 less people in the US due to legal abortion, (and the number could be a good bit higher than that since a person born in 1973 could already have a bunch of kids; heck, even grandkids by now), there are less people in poverty, less homeless people, etc. Do you think that is really even arguable? Reporting rates of abuse are much, much higher than in the past. Is there actually more abuse, per capita, than there used to be? I don’t think so. We hear about it more now. If anything, I’d think the tendency to do what we call “abuse” now would be less because there is much more stigma to it than in the 1960s and earlier.
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Abortion is like a band-aid on a large wound. It addresses the issue of the pregnancy, however it doesn’t remove the surounding circumstances which have made the pregnancy undesirable or affects her quality of life.
I don’t disagree with that. I don’t “like” abortion for itself. I think it’s a shame that some women have that quality of life that isn’t good enough.
She will return home to the same circumstances as she was in before. What do you think will happen next time she becomes pregnant if she’s in the same situation?
Maybe her circumstances don’t improve, but sometimes they do. Lots of times they do and she has kids later on. In the same situation most women who have had abortions will have another.
However to provide women with the resources to empower herself, change her situation, and give her children a stable life (equal employment opportunities, safe housing, low-cost medical care, low-cost or co-op daycare, equal educational opportunities, victim advocacy and awareness on domestic violence, parenting classes, support groups in the community, etc) would probably reduce the need for abortions and give women and their children an opportunity at a better life.
I agree there too. No question about it.
Doug
But most do not suffer, not to the point where they would not do the same thing again in the same circumstances.
If a woman wouldn’t possibly continue having abortions again simply if they had previously caused her pain…and women always learn from their mistakes….
…then what about the women who prostitute themselves, and again and again are beaten by the men they sell their bodies to, or their pimps. Yet, they do it again and again…why? Do they do it because they actually enjoy being beaten? Degraded? Humiliated?
What about the women who is being abused by her husband? She suffers through the abuse again, and again, never defending herself, always justifying him and staying with him for years and years. Why? Why doesn’t she leave him the first time he abuses her? Do people always do what you think they might do in a situation? Do they always do what is logically the best decision for themselves, the thing that will make them happy?
“But most do not suffer, not to the point where they would not do the same thing again in the same circumstances.”
Bethany: If a woman wouldn’t possibly continue having abortions again simply if they had previously caused her pain…and women always learn from their mistakes…. …then what about the women who prostitute themselves, and again and again are beaten by the men they sell their bodies to, or their pimps. Yet, they do it again and again…why? Do they do it because they actually enjoy being beaten? Degraded? Humiliated?
“Previously caused her pain” isn’t necessarily the whole deal. If not having an abortion would cause her more pain, she’s gonna choose to have another abortion. No, I don’t think prostitutes enjoy being beaten, etc. But they still want to do what they do, more than anything else among their available choices. Otherwise, they would pick something else. And of course, at some times some of them do pick something else.
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What about the women who is being abused by her husband? She suffers through the abuse again, and again, never defending herself, always justifying him and staying with him for years and years. Why? Why doesn’t she leave him the first time he abuses her?
Because for whatever reason, she wants to stay more than she wants to go.
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Do people always do what you think they might do in a situation?
Heck no. How would I know what they will pick?
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Do they always do what is logically the best decision for themselves, the thing that will make them happy?
They pick what they want the most at the time, among their available choices. “Best decision for themselves”? – No, not necessarily, and perhaps another person could see their folly in an instant. Perhaps the other person sees what will make the person in question happy in the long-term, while the person themself chooses more based on short-term considerations. One’s “best” won’t necessarily mirror another’s. And what, exactly, is “best”? That needs some serious defining.
Douug
Jill: I couldn’t find the price, but here is the section on the manufacturer’s website.
But you see my point, right, Doug? Sometimes people continue doing things that actually hurt them, fooling themselves into thinking it’s the best thing for them. Deceiving themselves into thinking things will get better if they just keep on going. People don’t always do the thing that will make them most happy, and what is best for their body or best for their well being, naturally. They just don’t. Do you see what I am saying now?
They pick what they want the most at the time, among their available choices. “Best decision for themselves”? – No, not necessarily, and perhaps another person could see their folly in an instant. Perhaps the other person sees what will make the person in question happy in the long-term, while the person themself chooses more based on short-term considerations.
Exactly! This is precisely what we are saying. The woman herself, chooses based on short term considerations (“What will make me happy today?”), never considering how this will possibly effect her, physically or emotionally, in the future. It’s all about what makes her happy “today”.
Bethany, Heather,
I grew up around alot of bullies, I couldn’t stand them, I always thought they were cowards. btw, you’re both beautiful, inside and out…..
AAAWWW, thanks jasper. Actually bullies ARE cowards. Just last night I ran into a woman who talks about me like a dog behind my back. I heard from someone else that she was at it again just a few days ago. I saw her, and she was just as nice as pie to me. I always kill her with kindness.*I can’t stand turncoats though*
But you see my point, right, Doug? Sometimes people continue doing things that actually hurt them, fooling themselves into thinking it’s the best thing for them. Deceiving themselves into thinking things will get better if they just keep on going. People don’t always do the thing that will make them most happy, and what is best for their body or best for their well being, naturally. They just don’t. Do you see what I am saying now?
Sure, Bethany, and the same thing can apply to deciding to continue a pregnancy. Therre are no guarantees that there won’t be regrets later. Sometimes it’s best to cut your losses. Do we deny women the choice of continuing pregnancies on that basis? I’m guessing you’ll say no, and likewise I don’t think we should deny the choice of abortion to women just because some women will end up regretting having them.
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“They pick what they want the most at the time, among their available choices. “Best decision for themselves”? – No, not necessarily, and perhaps another person could see their folly in an instant. Perhaps the other person sees what will make the person in question happy in the long-term, while the person themself chooses more based on short-term considerations.”
Bethany: Exactly! This is precisely what we are saying. The woman herself, chooses based on short term considerations (“What will make me happy today?”), never considering how this will possibly effect her, physically or emotionally, in the future. It’s all about what makes her happy “today”.
That’s not always true. Many women know what they want, both in the short term and in the long. Most women make their best choice, whether continuing a pregnancy or ending one, and the vast majority of women end up being satisfied with those choice – whichever one they made. Of course some women regret having abortions. Well, some women regret giving birth too.
Dawg
That’s not always true. Many women know what they want, both in the short term and in the long. Most women make their best choice, whether continuing a pregnancy or ending one, and the vast majority of women end up being satisfied with those choice – whichever one they made. Of course some women regret having abortions. Well, some women regret giving birth too.
I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree.
By the way, on what basis would a woman regret giving birth? That she gained some weight? That she didn’t like the way her baby looked? I mean, really. What kind of a selfish monster would regret having given birth, given life to their child?
Doug, is what you want always the right choice for you?