“Fractures within antiabortion movement helped doom ballot initiatives”
This is just scandalous. Not only did pro-life actions against the SD abortion ban stop it, but they likely stopped all future efforts. Reported Medical News Today yesterday:
The defeat of abortion ballot measures across the country – such as SD’s Initiated Measure 11 to ban virtually all abortions in the state – may have been the result of divisions among antiabortion groups, the Tennessean reports.
Opposition to the measure in SD came from the antiabortion groups American Life League and SD Right to Life. The groups did not support the measure because of its exceptions to the abortion ban – cases of rape or incest or in narrowly defined instances “to preserve the health or life of the woman.”…
Bob Burns, a retired SD State University political science professor, said opposition from such groups “may have been responsible” for the ballot measure’s defeat.
Voters defeated SD’s measure by 55% to 45%, but the state produced a win for Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain, who opposes abortion rights. The rejection of the second attempt by abortion-rights opponents to ban abortion in a conservative, Republican-favored state should prompt antiabortion groups to end their efforts to change abortion laws through ballot initiatives, Mark Rozell – a professor of public policy at George Mason University – said. He added, “If this measure cannot succeed in SD, where else could it succeed? It’s hard to imagine many other places in America where such a measure would stand a better chance.”…
In CO, the failed Amendment 48 measure – which would have defined a fertilized egg as a person in the state’s constitution – found opposition from Americans United For Life and National Right to Life, which questioned the timing and the approach of the measure….
These groups could say the election of Obama proved their analysis right. Or their action from a position of fear could have helped realize their fear. Who knows.
Here was an interesting tidbit at the end of the story:
According to NARAL, voters across the country also elected 16 more House members and 3 more Senate members who support abortion rights, bringing the percentage of abortion-rights supporters in the House up from 38% to 42%.
I don’t know how NARAL cogitates its numbers, but it’s saying a U.S. Congress that was only about 1/3 pro-abort is still far less than half pro-abort. I have never read this ANYWHERE. Pro-lifers are in the majority? If they are, they’re comprised of a majority of wimps or half-bakes. Otherwise we’d have gotten somewhere, even with liberals in charge.
[Artwork, “House Divided,” by Marty Ittner, 2002, courtesy of the Library of Congress]
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.
People, I am so sick of reading these kinds of articles!
We all agree that all life is sacred. We all agree that all life should be protected.
The only thing we disagree about is how to do this.
We need to stop the infighting and come together and fight for the lives of the unborn. What is more important, being “right” or saving lives?
Lauren,
I would answer your question that being “right” saves more lives, both in the short term AND over the long haul. We have proven in Georgia that the “principled” approach is the most PRAGMATIC approach to pro-life political action, legislation and policy. “The enemy of best is always second best.” In 2006 we were the only state in the nation to NOT lose a single Republican seat. In 2008 we actually gained 1 pro-life Dem thereby adding to our pro-life caucus. NO pro-life seats were lost. All of these gains were in a state environment that prohibits “rape ad incest” exceptions to its legislators. Compromise on a single human life destroys our principled argument for the sanctity of ALL life.
Dan Becker
Pres
GA RTL
Luke 11:17-19
17But He knew their thoughts and said to them, “Any kingdom divided against itself is laid waste; and a house divided against itself falls.
18″If Satan also is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand? For you say that I cast out demons by Beelzebul.
19″And if I by Beelzebul cast out demons, by whom do your sons cast them out? So they will be your judges.
Any philosophy that results in just one, just one child, an eternal soul worth more to God than the whole world, being murdered in the womb, is not of God.
If the SD ban would have passed and saved just one baby, this would have pleased the heart of God.
Dan, the all-or-nothing approach was tried in SD in 2006 and FAILED. You can argue to try it again would have been the right thing to do but it wasn’t possible in that political environment.
But for fellow pro-lifers to thwart a pro-life effort that would have saved 99% of the lives it is currently legal to kill simply because they disagree on strategy is disgraceful. To argue more babies will be saved in the long run is still to sentence the babies who could be saved NOW to death.
There are many factors. We are having a few cases where abortionists are being shut down for breaking a variety of laws. Litigation is not their friend. If we have an underage mom killed by an abortion parlor, some parents may win a massive criminal case against the doc and it will hurt them. I am not so sure over ruling parental consent is totally safe for the clinics. We still have a Supreme court and there are all kinds of things out there. Another is the fact they DO NOT report rape or preganacies on underage girls. That is statutory rape, Some clinics don’t get a medical opinion and that is a crime in cases when it is required.
I am aware that there is a Breast Cancer link with abortion. I am also aware that it is not politically correct to do research on it. As more data comes, we can see some litigation where there is a case of cancer and there was an abscense of disclosure. I realize many of us understand the biochemistry that explains the increased incidence of cancer. I remember the battle Tobacco fought and how long. I smell some side of the parental notification laws but on the other side, it is still a minor and juries still are sympathetic to wrongfull death.
Over the next few years, it can become miserable for abortionists from many fronts. As we get closer to increasing the number of people that believe it is a human baby and we find judges that have clarity on what their pay grade is we will make progress. By the way, just let Obama know that we still have a Supreme court and the same courts do understand States have rights for legislation. We will not assume Washington will decide States have no rights to legislate in this area and if they do all their laws are over ruled.
Lauren stated, “What is more important, being “right” or saving lives?”
Politicians don’t know the difference between Right and Wrong. They demonstrate this daily and in every political campaign.
If John Roberts and Sam Alito, GW Bush appointees to the Supreme Court, NEVER sided with the right to life of an unborn child would you want to know about that? Look it up.
Justice Harry Blackmun, Roe v. Wade, invented a “right to privacy” in the U.S. Constitution, then persuaded enough justices to agree with him, opening the door for legislation allowing the killing of babies for any reason. Did this decision make killing babies RIGHT, or is it WRONG to kill a baby in or out of the womb?
Being right and choosing to do what is right is how people honoring God’s enduring command will influence the culture.
Hundreds of millions of dollars wasted on politicians and court appointees that are not Pro-Life is enough for me to conclude that the babies do not have a voice in our state houses.
Have you ever considered what would happen if Roe v. Wade really was overturned? The very laws fought for by the Pro-Life industry would, at the state level, perpetuate the holocaust on the pre-born. What about parental consent? Go tell your mom and “then you can kill the baby”. What about waiting 48 hours? I went in Monday, signed the papers, I’ll be back on Wednesday, “then you can kill the baby”…
McCain is not Pro-Life. Obama is not Pro-Life. Who did you vote for?
Jill Stanek stated “But for fellow pro-lifers to thwart a pro-life effort that would have saved 99% of the lives it is currently legal to kill simply because they disagree on strategy is disgraceful.”
Did you mean how George Bush went into South Dakota in the 2006 election and defeated the amendment that would have made all abortions there illegal? Because the amendment did not have the exceptions GW Bush believes are acceptable reasons to kill the pre-born, he would rather see them all killed. In Novemebr 2008, the same amendment, with the GW Bush exceptions (that’s a compromise) made it on the ballot, and it too was defeated. Hmmm.
This is not about strategy as much is it is about exposing where compromise leads to. Common sensibility on how wrong it is to kill a baby is no longer common. The battleground is inside the hearts and minds of the culture of death. These people have been cultivated by evil, persuaded to fight for evil, and they look just like your neighbor, your fellow church member, and every politician and judge I have researched.
If I’m wrong, then why has NRTL ignored the free $10,000.00 cash donation offered to them on 4/26/08 to produce the evidence of even one justice that is Pro-Life? Huh? They hound you for $25/$50/$100 donations, but ignore $10,000!
The “purists” ought to answer me these questions:
Should Oakar Schindler simply have turned the Jews who worked in his factory over to the Nazis to be gassed, since he couldn’t save all the Jews?
When the Titanic was sinking, should they just have jettisoned the lifeboats empty, since they couldn’t save everybody on board?
Should officials have refused to even try to evacuate New Orleans when Katrina was bearing down, since they couldn’t get everybody out?
In what other situation is your all-or-nothing, “if I can’t save them all, then I won’t save any” thinking okay?
I’ve been thinking about this a lot since the election. In fact, I’ve been thinking of almost nothing else. I got into it a little with Hisman on an earlier thread. My thinking has crystallized into this:
My neighbors who do not share my pro-life views would never think of walking next door and killing their neighbor in cold blood. This act does not seem immoral to them because they are Christians or followers of the Bible or because they will go to hell if they do it; it seems immoral to them because of our civilization’s base-line assumptions on what is right and what is wrong — assumptions rejected only by criminals and sociopaths. Those same people are able to see the anti-abortion movement as something they can easily reject because it presents its reasoning in parochial, rather than universal, terms: it is all couched so much in the language of Jesus that if they don’t happen to feel the connection to Jesus that we do, why should they trouble themselves with our concerns?
Like it or not, everytime we quote Jesus in our reasoning we exclude someone. Maybe this is a bad thing, but it’s the reality, and as somebody said above, do we want to save lives, or do we want to be right? We have to appeal to UNIVERSAL NOTIONS OF RIGHT AND WRONG, and this is not achieved by quoting scriptures specific to our religion.
And the next is politics. The neighbors of whom I speak, the ones who would never walk next door and chop their neighbor’s head off, look at our movement and see hypocrisy when we support candidates who make war and call for an end to gun control, and when I try to argue with them on this I find I have nothing to say. So we should remove ourselves from all politics. We are not arguing politics. We are arguing universal morality.
Until we make that change, we will continue to fail as abysmally as we did in this election cycle.
No politician, and no Supreme Court, is going to lead us out of the wilderness.
Christina 3:26PM
Excellent point. I would also ask if the Underground Railroad should have been shut down as well. After all, if you couldn’t make slavery illegal and free all the slaves, then you shouldn’t have bothered trying to free any at all.
One more thought —
I will probably get banned for the site for this, but: one thing that unites otherwise moral people against our movement is when they hear us speak out, as we sometimes do, against contraception. We have to have to have to take that out of our argument if we want to win enough hearts and minds to get people voting differently than they have been voting.
Mr. Becker:
I am an engineer. Engineers solve very complicated problems.
Did putting a man on the moon happen in one day, in one fell swoop of scientific discovery? I submit to you that it began in earnest when the Wright brothers proved that a heavier than air object could fly decades before.
What would have happened if Rosa Parks hadn’t taken the small step of not sitting in the back of the bus? And then the marches. And then Martin Luther King.
Do you know what sanctification means? Does it happen all at once or take time, sometimes a lifetime? People’s hearts change slowly my friend.
What if God took the same all or nothing approach with you, i.e., “Dan must be perfect before I will accept him”? You’d be toast. Is there any room for grace and mercy in your thinking?
What’s your goal? To save children or be right?
Your actions may work in GA, but do they work in NY? Are babies in GA worth more than babies in NY?
What if a million children were standing on the edge of a precipace and emergency workers were trying to figure out how they could save every single one. In the mean time while one side said, “if we can’t save all of them, we shouldn’t do anything”, while the other side said, “let’s do what we can and maybe we can save a few”. Which side would you call insane?
All or nothing approaches don’t work, period. They don’t work in the physical world, they don’t work in the spiritual world and they don’t work especially in the political world.
Because you are willing to sacrifiece children in the womb in order to be “right” means that your motives have to seriously be put into question.
And this too Dan, “the enemy of best in this situation, results in more dead babies” and your “principles” are anything but.
St. Paul, a former Phrisee of Pharisees said this, “I have become all things to all men…so that I may save some”……not all Dan….some. Got it? S-O-M-E.
theonlything2fear
seems you dojn’t accurately speak for McCain.
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — The Republican Party’s platform committee has put the finishing touches on a new party platform that contains some of the strongest language ever condemning abortion and supporting legal protections for unborn children. The platform stands in stark contrast to the pro-abortion plank Democrats approved Monday.
The platform will officially be adopted when Republicans start their convention on Monday.
The platform draws on the nation’s founding documents as expressing the earliest support for human life but backs a Constitutional amendment to make those protections clear.
unfortunately, though Tom, contraception is the ROOT of this evil.
it is BECAUSE of contraception that abortion is “needed”
It wasn’t until significant numbers of people were having sex outside the confines of marriage (which is when people are most prepared to accept and welcome new life) that something needed to be done about the unwanted “consequence “, namely the conception of a baby. That something was abortion.
Very rarely is contraception brought into the debate, but it is the raison d’etre for abortion.
unfortunately, though Tom, contraception is the ROOT of this evil.
it is BECAUSE of contraception that abortion is “needed”
It wasn’t until significant numbers of people were having sex outside the confines of marriage (which is when people are most prepared to accept and welcome new life) that something needed to be done about the unwanted “consequence “, namely the conception of a baby. That something was abortion.
Very rarely is contraception brought into the debate, but it is the raison d’etre for abortion.
Posted by: Patricia at November 11, 2008 3:47 PM
Wrong. It is abstinence. No sex no pregnancy.No wonder Obama wants to teach all about sex. No sex no std’s.
Hi Tom.
“I will probably get banned for the site for this, but: one thing that unites otherwise moral people against our movement is when they hear us speak out, as we sometimes do, against contraception. We have to have to have to take that out of our argument if we want to win enough hearts and minds to get people voting differently than they have been voting.”
Why do you think you’d get banned for saying that? There are a lot of pro-lifers here who would agree with that statement. In fact, as long as you don’t use vulgarity or commit personal attacks or try and cause trouble etc, we very much respect your right to try and argue your case. I very much agree with what Patricia said, though. Contraception is not only at the heart of abortion, but the ENTIRE culture of death.
Testing
[I thought I had already posted this, but it didn’t show up, so if it shows up twice, forgive]
Patricia:
Your reasoning does not hold water. Abortion as a practice goes back into pre-history. Even in the most staunchly abstinence-only home (Bristol, anybody?) teenagers are just plain-out going to have sex. Period. So withholding education about contraception leads to more pregnancies, some of them unwanted, which leads to more death.
And from a public-relations point of view, if we cling to your reasoning we will keep losing election after election, and that will certainly lead to more death.
I simply do not understand how one can be both anti-abortion and anti-contraception.
Supporting abstinence-only education is so out of touch with reality as everybody knows it to be that hanging onto that does our movement a massive amount of harm.
TO ALL MCCAIN/PALIN SUPPORTERS!!!!
Obama Citizenship Controversy: A Call to Action
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnZ68ZBR1fc
PLEASE SPREAD FAR AND WIDE!!!!
theonlything2fear, 3:25p, wrote:
Jill Stanek stated “But for fellow pro-lifers to thwart a pro-life effort that would have saved 99% of the lives it is currently legal to kill simply because they disagree on strategy is disgraceful.”
Did you mean how George Bush went into South Dakota in the 2006 election and defeated the amendment that would have made all abortions there illegal? Because the amendment did not have the exceptions GW Bush believes are acceptable reasons to kill the pre-born, he would rather see them all killed.
Two years later, you’re saying the same thing as President Bush. Because the amendment had the exceptions you believe are unacceptable to kill the pre-born, you would rather see them all killed.
And for the record, I disagreed with President Bush on his position, just as I disagree with you.
To James:
We have to stop being a fringe movement. We became that way by putting ourselves on the fringe. The Obama birth certificate thing is a conspiracy theory blind alley. It is not going to get us anywhere:
http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/birthcertificate.asp
The more we grasp at unsubtantiated straws like that, the more easily our message is dismissed.
Obama’s Certification of Live Birth is a forgery!
“But for fellow pro-lifers to thwart a pro-life effort that would have saved 99% of the lives it is currently legal to kill simply because they disagree on strategy is disgraceful. To argue more babies will be saved in the long run is still to sentence the babies who could be saved NOW to death.”
I WHOLEHEARTEDLY agree with Jill!!!
angele
Tom, trust me it’d take a lot more than that to get you banned. There are many people w/in the prolife community who agree with you.
The problem with contraception, as Patricia has explained, is that it is the root of abortion on demand. Yes, abortion in some form or another has existed for quite some time, but not until modern contraception became availible did we have the resources to so freely engage in sexual activities with people who we were not pledged to in any meaningful way.
The problem with contraception is that it doesn’t work. 50% of women who become pregnant without planning used contraception during the month in which they became pregnant. Contraception gives a false sense of security while simultaneously reinforcing the societal message that children are something to be avoided.
Ultimately, even if we found a contraceptive that was 100% effective, we would still be dealing with the devaulation of life. So, though I see your point that the theoretical increase in contraceptive use and education might reduce the number of abortions, I disagree that it is ultimately a solution that will furthe the pro-life movement.
“one thing that unites otherwise moral people against our movement is when they hear us speak out, as we sometimes do, against contraception. We have to have to have to take that out of our argument if we want to win enough hearts and minds to get people voting differently than they have been voting.”
Right on, Tom Jayson.
About the South Dakota thing, there was a good comment:
“It was a wasteful attempt at a grandstanding law that would have been grossly unconstitutional, and then the state would be forced to pay for its defence. Lunacy!”
Posted by: Theresa at November 8, 2008 7:24 PM
We need to stop trying to end violence against unborn children through referenda. It just does not work. I am looking at marriage referenda which almost always succeed, but our referenda almost always fail.
If we promote a militant referendum, such as in Colorado, the more moderate organizations, such as National Right To Life and Americans United For Life, will oppose it and it will go down to devastating defeat (it would anyway). If we propose a more moderate amendment, such as in South Dakota, more militant organizations, such as American Right To Life and American Life League, will oppose it and it too will go down to defeat. So if it is too moderate, the militants will oppose it and if it is too militant, the moderates will oppose it.
In the meantime, the abortionists with all their industry money will carpet bomb it into the ground. To defeat a referendum, all you have to do is create some doubt in a person’s mind and they will vote against it. The abortionists are like the Nazis and Communists of days gone by in that they are unconstrained by morality. Like those totalitarians, they feel it is okay to do anything to advance their inhuman agenda, because they consider their agenda to be moral. So they are willing to tell any lie and twist and didstort any truth to suit their purposes. They know we can do nothing about it and that they will always be protected by the media. They will outspend us and engage in such intense demonizing, distortion and fearmongering that they manipulate and frighten the swing voters into opposing any referendum we put up. They know if they pound us hard enough and throw everything at us, they can frighten away all the middle of the road people and reduce us to our base (about 45% in South Dakota).
In a fair fight we could win, but not if we are being pounded with lies and distortions by the abortionists, as happened in South Dakota. This means we cannot win anywhere with this strategy and should abandon it, since it plays to our weaknesses and not our strengths.
Having the purist, “all or nothing” organizations working against our initiatives and candidates is not particularly helpful either. The 100% people say that we are authorizing or allowing the death of unborn children when we permit exceptions in situations where we cannot get protection under all circumstances. Actually, we would protect 100% of kids if we could, but will settle for 99% if that is all we can get. We are not authorizing or condoning the killing of ANYONE. We are simply recognizing reality.
The 100% people who refuse to save the 99% who can be saved, because it is not 100%, ARE allowing large numbers of human beings to die, children whom it is entirely within their power to save. We are UNABLE to save the 1%; they REFUSE to save the 99%. Their position is immoral, not ours.
The other problem we have is that we could lose three critical Senate seats as a result of Constitution and Libertarian Party candidates. Gordon Smith lost his Senate seat in Oregon by 3 points. The Constitution candidate got 5% of the vote, costing us a the seat. In Minnesota, Norm Coleman is hanging on to his Senate seat by 200 votes in a recount. The Constitution and Libertarian candidates got 24,000 votes combined! In Georgia, Saxby Chambliss has to face a runoff because the Libertarian took 3%, denying him a majority (he got 49.9%). So now, he must risk his pro-life seat again.
This is absolutely devastating! Can the Constitution and Libertarian Parties not see that giving Chuck Schumer and the Democratic Party 60 seats in the Senate (or close to it) would be devastating to ALL the causes that those parties hold dear? This is sheer strategic madness and I do not know what we can do about it.
This movement might have a better chance of succeeding if it were not trying to destroy itself from the inside out.
Theresa and Josh, obviously you do not understand the intent of the SD law. The law was intended to be a trigger law that would require the SC to re-evaluate state rights as they relate to abortion, and ultimately Roe V. Wade in general.
Your reasoning does not hold water. Abortion as a practice goes back into pre-history. Even in the most staunchly abstinence-only home (Bristol, anybody?) teenagers are just plain-out going to have sex. Period. So withholding education about contraception leads to more pregnancies, some of them unwanted, which leads to more death.
And from a public-relations point of view, if we cling to your reasoning we will keep losing election after election, and that will certainly lead to more death.
I simply do not understand how one can be both anti-abortion and anti-contraception.
Supporting abstinence-only education is so out of touch with reality as everybody knows it to be that hanging onto that does our movement a massive amount of harm.
Posted by: Tom Jayson at November 11, 2008 4:11 PM
First of all, you make a ton of assumptions Tom and ignore reality.
Abortion may have a been a part of society to some minor extent, but has never become so widely available as in the modern era with the advent of modern surgical techniques, infection control and anaesthesia. Contraception methods were made more efficient and widespread prior to abortion, especially with the invention of rubber latex and the use of pharmaceuticals. What is more important than just methods is mindset. The contraceptive mindset is important because a couple that contracepts simply does not have the same openness to life, no matter what they might claim. Their view of sexual intercouse is wholly distorted, it is seen as something that “takes” for self-pleasure and not as gift to the other spouse. In marriage a contracepting couple is in circumstances that allow them to be more open to the (unexpected) baby. But outside of marriage, sex now more easily undertaken, supposedly without worry of pregnancy, will not have the same view. In fact, usually the couple is not ready at all for the presence of a new life. The woman unprotected financially and emotionally by a committed man in marriage is now left to her own devices. Abortion increasingly has become that solution.
Without getting personal, I wonder if you support contraceptives?
And BTW, I have 3 teens and none of them are sexually active, including my 19 year old son. I also know at least 4 families who have adult children in the their 20’s who also remain virgins. Our families and our children have the view that waiting until marriage is best physcially, emotionally, and spiritually.
Mr. Jayson:
You obviouosy think the Gospel, the word of God is foolishness, impotent, powerless?
To those who believe this, the Bible says, is evidence that they are perishing.
I submit to you that legalized abortion was only able to be passed by a godless Supreme Court under the circumstances of a muzzled church via 501c3 legislation that happened only 19 years prior. Yep, it only took a generation for the effect of censoring God’s word for this heinous thing called abortion to infect our thinking as a nation.
And you think we should stop couching this issue in spiritual terms?
Joe, 4:58p: Excellent comment.
Our families and our children have the view that waiting until marriage is best physcially, emotionally, and spiritually.
Posted by: Patricia at November 11, 2008 5:01 PM
That’s nice.. Others have different views.
“But for fellow pro-lifers to thwart a pro-life effort that would have saved 99% of the lives it is currently legal to kill simply because they disagree on strategy is disgraceful. To argue more babies will be saved in the long run is still to sentence the babies who could be saved NOW to death.”
I have to agree with Jill and HisMan – very good posts. You cannot solve this problem in one fell swoop. Chip away at it and you will slowly but surely get the desired results. Take the 99% and then get to work on the remaining 1%. I don’t understand the logic in the all or nothing mentality.
At this point, it seems important to learn whether anyone here disagrees with the following fundamental pro-life logic as a HUMAN RIGHTS matter (comparable to legal slavery), NOT as a personal morality question (such as alcohol prohibition represented):
1) Regardless of anyone’s particular religious beliefs (including among denominations), the basic Judeo/Christian/Islamic commandment against wanton killing is required to maintain a civil society, i.e one based on universal recognition of common rights, rather than on “might makes right” as has been practiced thoughout most of humanity’s brutal history).
2) The prohibition against murder applies equally to all human beings as children of God, regardless of any other classifications, including age or developmental status.
3) Biological reality does not differentiate pre-birth children’s human characteristics (e.g. unique DNA), whether still in the womb or after birth; the only known non-arbitrary point along the line of gestation is conception (i.e. “creation”). (Twinning, which still does not seem to be perfectly understood — I have no background in medicine myself, so anyone out here please add any pertinent details — actually strengthens the pro-life argument in that early abortifacients may be killing MORE than 1 person).
4) Thus, pre-birth children are as deserving of legal protection as newborns, infants, young childre, teenagers, adults, and seniors.
So on this basis I generally agree with Jill, and vehemntly oppose the “purist” approach, in that it requires applying a DIFFERENT STANDARD to legally forbidding abortion than to proscribing murder or minimizing death in general. So the “Titanic” analogy raised earlier has always seemed undeniable to me — meaning that we should always do what is possible at any one time to advance the cause of ending this holocaust, even if “perfection” is not currently available — but if anyone has a cogent argument to the contrary, by all means express it. We must all be respectful allies here.
Patricia: yes, I support contraceptives. I have a teenage son and a daughter in her 20’s. They’re like Levi Johnston and Bristol Palin: sexually active. They’re careful. They also have great respect for life. One difference: no pregnancies.
HisMan: no, I don’t think the Gospels are foolish and powerless. I just think they haven’t been swaying the voters we need to sway.
I’m not Christian. I’m against the war. I’m for gun control. I happen to also be intensely anti-abortion. People like me are too often turned away by talk of Gospel and Jesus. We are universalists. Until you open the pro-life tent as wide as it can go, you’re not going to have very many people in it.
Sixty two million people voted for Obama. They’re not all tools in the hand of Satan. If you think they are, you’ll never pull them into the tent.
Our families and our children have the view that waiting until marriage is best physcially, emotionally, and spiritually.
Posted by: Patricia at November 11, 2008 5:01 PM
That’s nice.. Others have different views.
Posted by: Hal at November 11, 2008 6:36 PM
It’s also the best way as proven by tradition and Christian culture. Other views have been demonstrated to not produce the best outcomes nor anything similar to stable marriage.
———————————————–
Patricia: yes, I support contraceptives. I have a teenage son and a daughter in her 20’s. They’re like Levi Johnston and Bristol Palin: sexually active. They’re careful. They also have great respect for life. One difference: no pregnancies.
For now.
Until people like you Tom come to face the root of abortion and the facts, you will never understand the problem fully and therefore never understand the solution. Any solution will be at best, a bandaid solution.
The prolife tent as you call it is open to those who want to explore the roots of the problem with intellectual honesty and forthrightness.
Few seem to want to.
Tom, as I said earlier, 50% of all women who have an unplanned pregnancy got pregnant while using contraception. So while you think that your children are “covered”, they’re not.
Assuming perfect use, a woman using contraceptives during her entire childbearing years will still get pregnant twice. Of course, most people (especially teenagers) do not use birth control perfectly.
Your children are not as safe from your dreaded grandchildren as you think.
according to the FDA, the typical pregnancy rate for women using the pill is 5%.
This means that if every 100 women using the pill, 5 will be pregnant within 12 months.
Since about 10.4 million American women use the pill, this means there are approximately 500,000 pregnancies per year among pill users alone.
Surveys by PP have shown that 56% of women were using some kind of birth control when they become pregnant.
Tom, your ideas don’t add up. I hope your daughter and son know the stats. And you might do well to advise your son that not every woman he sleeps with will necessarily tell him if she becomes impregnated. So it’s quite possible he could be responsible for placing a woman in a situation which results in her getting an abortion. Not exactly a prolife lifestyle.
Patricia.
I hear what you are saying. I’ve discussed those points with my kids.
But we’ve been losing. It’s time to start winning. Maybe it’s time to start facing life as it is lived by most of the world, not as you want it to be lived.
The movement has to stop preaching and start changing minds.
there’s a difference between preaching and presenting the facts.
I related the facts to you. What do you think those 500,000 women who got pregnant on the pill did? Do you think they all had their babies?
What might be the way to prevent those women from getting pregnant? Use a second back-up contraceptive? or maybe stop the behaviour that caused the pregnancy in the first place?
You have bought the line that people will simply have sex. I am telling you that if you keep telling people to have sex they will certainly keep having sex. But if you offer them a better way, they just might try that instead.
Your way is based on the idea that the baby is the problem. My way is based on the idea that the behaviour (sex outside of marriage) is THE problem.
I support contraceptives. I have a teenage son and a daughter in her 20’s. They’re like Levi Johnston and Bristol Palin: sexually active. They’re careful. They also have great respect for life. One difference: no pregnancies.
Is that supposed to make it OK with us Republicans?
. . . . . . .
Also, our children generally rise to the level of their parents’ and society’s sexpectations (that’s not a typo). Your suggestion that teens will have sex becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Good luck to them with that not getting pregnant thing.
Janet: I like your word “sexpectations”.
The movement has to stop preaching and start changing minds.
Tom, well said.
@Doug: the facts as presented here….no preaching just the facts…..
Patricia,
Kudos on your teens.
I have a nineteen year old daughter who is in her second serious relationship. She has been very up front with the boys she dates that she intends to remain chaste until marriage and if that’s a problem for them, then they need to move on. Now we’re starting with the pre-teen.
I agree with you 100%. When we lower our expectations and expect our kids to have sex, they have sex. When we can provide prudent reasons to save sex for marriage and do it in a loving manner and show them that their total well being is our primary concern, our kids will at least try and live up to that expectation. I also don’t only talk with her, but with the boyfriends. I even took her and her first serious boyfriend to a Christopher West weekend. Also, my husband is not afraid to weigh in in his own way.
Kids like to know they are loved and cared for and they like boundaries, as long as they don’t think it’s just about spoiling their fun.
Patricia,
Thank you!
DeeL,
It’s awesome that your husband isn’t afraid to talk to your daughter. From what I have learned, it’s important for fathers to weigh in on the issues of chastity and modesty.
Big Al stated “Take the 99% and then get to work on the remaining 1%. I don’t understand the logic in the all or nothing mentality.”
What 99% victory has ever been achieved by the Pro-Life industry through compromising? The reason you don’t understand the logic in the all or nothing mentality, is because you are OK with compromising on God’s enduring command, DO NOT MURDER.
The baby has no voice. The government has successfully convinced the mob rule majority that pre-born babies are not persons. So it is OK to kill them. Do you think the 2007 partial birth baby killing ban was a victory? Or, do you believe Dr. Dobson was right when he said the decision did not have the legal authority to save even one child? What part of the 99% was that?
THE ONLY STRATEGY I HAVE SEEN AND BEEN A PART OF THAT SUCCESSFULLY SAVES THE LIVES OF PRE-BORN BABIES IS SIDEWALK COUNSELING, AND CRISIS PREGNANCY COUNSELING CENTERS. THEY DON’T RAISE HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS, BUT DO SACRIFICE EVERYTHING FOR THOSE BABIES AND MOTHERS. BUT HEY, THESE BRAVE AND DETERMINED PEOPLE AREN’T INTERESTED AT GETTING A SEAT AT THE RIGHT POLITICAL TABLE, THEY JUST SAVE BABIES.
Jill Stanek, 4:22pm, wrote “Two years later, you’re saying the same thing as President Bush. Because the amendment had the exceptions you believe are unacceptable to kill the pre-born, you would rather see them all killed.”
And when did I say I agreed with President Bush? I simply was calling out the mess some so-called Pro-Life political leaders are delivering.
If you agree with GW Bush who says if you can’t have the exceptions, and it’s OK to kill 100% of the unwanted babies, then what are you? If you disagree with GW Bush and want to kill babies conceived in rape, incest, and when the life of the mother is at risk, then what are you?
So who financially backed the negative TV ads in the 2006 SD election? Let’s get the truth out on the table.
Why did you just ignore my point about the $10,000 offer to National Roght to Life to provide evidence of just one pro-life justice?
And for the record, Jill, you are one of my few heros, and your story was a part of the spark that helped light the fire in me to get off my rear and do something.
Thanks Janet.
I think it’s awesome too, and very important. Perhaps more than anything I’ve said. He can actually weigh in on what it’s like to be a teenage boy as well as what a young man really wants when looking for a spouse. He doesn’t speak on it often, but when he does, she listens. She is after all her daddy’s little girl : )
Pharisees will be pharisees — and they are just as deadly and evilly wrong as ever.
Barack Obama’s neo-Marxists are willing to be incrementalists and gradualists. They just won.
Those who would be righteous should learn a grave, grave lesson.
theonlything2fear, 11:02p, wrote:
If you agree with GW Bush who says if you can’t have the exceptions, and it’s OK to kill 100% of the unwanted babies, then what are you? If you disagree with GW Bush and want to kill babies conceived in rape, incest, and when the life of the mother is at risk, then what are you?
So who financially backed the negative TV ads in the 2006 SD election? Let’s get the truth out on the table.
Why did you just ignore my point about the $10,000 offer to National Roght to Life to provide evidence of just one pro-life justice?
I’m really at a loss here. You’re making ridiculous statements you know aren’t true to stand by your point. Supporting a strategy to save 99% of babies when the strategy to save 100% of babies failed is not to support the killing of the remaining 1%. There are unlimited examples to demonstrate your logic is so faulty – the Underground Railroad, the Holocaust underground, even the Titanic, where there weren’t enough boats to save all.
As for who paid for the negative ads, if it was pro-lifers that is nothing I want hidden.
As for the $10k offer to NRLC, I’m not getting in the middle of the fight between ARTL and NRLC. I’ll only say the huff and puff by which ARTL launched has dissipated. It says on its site, “In the fall of 2008, ARTL will host a conference on ending abortion, titled 11 Years Till D Day, and the year after that, 10 Years, then 9 Years, etc., instead of the never-ending, perpetual conventions of NRTL (so far at 35th Annual and counting).” If that conference happened, I missed it… ??
And when ARTL launched a year ago (https://www.jillstanek.com/archives/2007/12/breaking_news_n.html) it gave itself 12 years to stop abortion. What has it achieved toward that goal in the past year? I’ll say the sign at the DNCC was fabulous, but ARTL proceeded to shoot itself in the foot and make itself look ridiculous by following up with a picket of Dobson.
I agree with Jill about the disgraceful behavior of so called prolife opponents of the ballot measures in SD and CO.
On the other hand, I take a stoic attitude about that, just as I do about the election results. I know there is probably nothing I can do to open the eyes of the “purists”, so I will not worry about it.
If they ever see the error of their ways, let them make a public apology…. but I won’t hold my breath.
Jill, If you disagree with the tactics of ARTL/ Bob Enyart, why do you publicize and promote everything he does, most recently on November 1?
DeeL: awesome! And wonderful to hear about your daughter.
The movement has to stop preaching and start changing minds.
“Tom, well said.”
Patricia: Doug: the facts as presented here….no preaching just the facts…..
Well, Patricia, there are some facts presented here, yes, but there’s also a lot of opinion stated as fact, which isn’t true, and there’s also a good bit of being anti-contraception (as Tom was talking about), which really hurts the Pro-Life side as far as acceptance.
Jill Stanek wrote… “As for the $10k offer to NRLC, I’m not getting in the middle of the fight between ARTL and NRLC.”
I didn’t ask you to get in the middle of a fight. This was an offer, that even you choose to not answer. Would like the same offer for the charity of your choice?
Jill Stanek wrote… “I’m really at a loss here. You’re making ridiculous statements you know aren’t true to stand by your point.”
What is ridiculous and untrue about asking what you are, Pro-Life vs. Pro-child killing, if you want some of the babies killed, or all of the babies killed?
Doyle wrote…”the disgraceful behavior of so called prolife opponents of the ballot measures in SD and CO…”If they ever see the error of their ways, let them make a public apology…. but I won’t hold my breath.”
And how many babies will take a breath, or see the light of God’s creation while you stand behind your pride and type out meaningless opinions?
One day when you actually hold a baby you, yourself helped save from a butcher , you will begin to see the result of not compromising for a seat at a political table. What value do you put on 3-4 hours of your time each week to be on the front lines and witnessing to mothers who take their babies to death’s doorstep, versus the 3-4 minutes it takes you to send a donation to the likes of National Right to Life. These people, in my own personal view, chartered an organization with good intentions, but ended up creating a fund raising industry on the backs of dead babies. After 35 years, how do you measure their success? 35 million +/- more dead babies That’s my opinion from my own observation.
So I ask again, who are you really, if you want just some of the babies killed, or all of the babies killed?
theonly,
So I ask again, who are you really, if you want just some of the babies killed, or all of the babies killed?
Since there is currently no option of “none”, I would say “just some” is better than all.
Lauren at November 11, 2008 4:59 PM – “Theresa and Josh, obviously you do not understand the intent of the SD law. The law was intended to be a trigger law that would require the SC to re-evaluate state rights as they relate to abortion, and ultimately Roe V. Wade in general.”
Theresa was right. The law would be grossly unconstitutional. It would trigger something, but it was going to be a foolishly wasteful mess for the state of South Dakota.
Janet stated…”Since there is currently no option of “none”, I would say “just some” is better than all.”
Janet, thank-you for admitting you are not Pro-Life, unless you capitulate to the exceptions that obviously leads to the killing of some babies.
theonly,
Janet stated…”Since there is currently no option of “none”, I would say “just some” is better than all.”
Janet, thank-you for admitting you are not Pro-Life, unless you capitulate to the exceptions that obviously leads to the killing of some babies.
Posted by: theonlything2fear at November 14, 2008 10:20 AM
No problem. I won’t take your bait and attack you, but I think you are being stubborn like a child.
What is “the only thing 2 fear”? Stupid “pro-lifers” like me?
You must trust that God can work through each of us His our own way. Mother Teresa said: “We can not all do great things, but we can do small things with great love.” (We cannot all be the ones to overturn Roe v. Wade, but we can each work to change smaller laws by changing hearts and minds.)
Has God told you YOU are the chosen one? Have you prayed and asked God what his will is for you?
Correction”
You must trust that God can work through each of us in His own way.
Janet, thank-you for admitting you are not Pro-Life, unless you capitulate to the exceptions that obviously leads to the killing of some babies.
This is not an attack. Only an admission of your position. Admitting you are OK for some babies to die so that some “might” be saved helps the discussion. Too many are 2 faced in these discussions.
I am unwilling to send precious dollars to the pro life industry leaders like Focus on the Family and National Right to Life. James Dobson, a man I love and have prayed for, admitted that after 15+ years of lobbying politicians and raising more than $250,000,000.00 to get a ban on the partial birth abortion procdedure “did not have the legal standing to save the life of even one child”. Huh? $250,000,000.00 FOR WHAT? To get a seat at the political table. To have a voice. To be in the debate. If you haven’t read Gonzales v. Carhart (April 2007) then please do and you will know just what kind of Republican appointed justices we have on this current Supreme Court. Worse than Roe v. Wade.
We give our precious dollars to those actually winning the battle for the lives of these mothers and their unborn children in front of child killing centers every day, rain or shine.
What will I tell Christ one day? I didn’t understand DO NOT MURDER. So I sent a check to Focus and NRTL to help pass a 24 hour parental notification law that ends with, AND THEN YOU CAN KILL THE BABY.
I am unwilling to capitulate. God’s commandment is DO NOT MURDER. This I believe and trust since God’s laws are above man’s laws.
I think Jill has labeled people like me as “purists”. The only methods I have seen work, are honesty about your position in the fight for each and every unborn child being sentenced to death, and witnessing to those mothers before they walk into death’s door and allow a child killer to rip their baby apart while asleep and dreaming in the womb.