New educational campaign: The Con in Obama’s contraception mandate
Americans United for Life has launched a new educational effort: The Con: The Attack on 1st Amendment Rights.
The con? According to AUL president Charmaine Yoest:
[T]he coercive policies in the healthcare law that are forcing both an abortion mandate and an abortion-inducing drug mandate on all Americans – regardless of their personal beliefs. In a public relations bait-and-switch tactic, the Administration pretends that this is about contraception. But that’s a con — this issue is about mandating abortion-causing drugs.
More than 8,000 clinics across the U.S. provide contraception at little or no cost, and it is universally available in any number of retail stores. Clearly, it is readily accessible. What is at stake here is the Obama Administration’s agenda of forcing all Americans to pay for life-ending drugs.
Check out AUL’s website for key facts and to sign up for updates. AUL has also released a cutting edge video to introduce its campaign…
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soou-cD6WDc[/youtube]
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.
Who are they trying to “educate”? Themselves? People who already agree with them? Because nobody who is not already firmly in their ideological camp is going to give the slightest bit of credence to an “educational effort” spewing insanity about contraceptives being “life-ending drugs”.
If women “need” abortifacient drugs and contraception so badly, and if women “can’t” afford it, then do the Obama worshippers expect us to believe that all the pharmaceutical companies are going to be providing these products FREE OF CHARGE? Because, it won’t be free, at all. And it’s even more heinous that we are being conned to pay for these things, which are ELECTIVE, while diabetics and cardiac patients can just tough it out. After all, insulin isn’t as important as killing someone else’s baby, with our tax money.
I guess you need to have a conscience to understand what a conscience right is. I suggest the following compromise. Everyone who doesn’t have a uterus, including me, will shut up about abortion, but only if everyone who doesn’t have a conscience shuts up about conscience related issues, for example, the free exercise clause of the First Amendment and knowledge of the difference between right and wrong. I think that’s a fair trade.
AUL refers to “Ella” in the video. I wonder how many senators who voted “NO” today on conscience protections have a clue how the drug works. I’m guessing not even close to all of them. Maybe the MSM could test them on it. *HINT: Google “Ella”.
John L.,
“Right and wrong”. That would require knowledge of the natural law, natural rights, and well-formed conscience. The Catholic Catechism would be a great source. Unfortunately I don’t think libs will go there.
“but only if everyone who doesn’t have a conscience shuts up about conscience related issues” – whose conscience? About what? Everyone has a conscience, they just differ to varying degrees.
“knowledge of the difference between right and wrong.” – whose concept of what’s ‘right’ or ‘wrong’?
Reality,
You should change your moniker to “Relativism.” Other people have changed their names (remember when cc used to use ‘artemis’?) and as long as you let the mods know, I bet they would approve it.
I’m guessing the relativists have a slogan: “A man needs a conscience like a fish needs a bicycle.” LOL!!
So, let me see if I can follow this line to it’s logical conclusion: If there are to be no conscientious objections to paying for abortion, then will there also be NO conscientious objections to SERVING IN WAR and KILLING PEOPLE if a President needs to reinstate the draft? Hmm? Would that mean draft dodgers will have to face the prospect of KILL OR BE KILLED? Hmmm???
Why would I change my moniker to something so universal?
“I’m guessing the relativists have a slogan” – ‘the relativists’? We all practice relativism.
“A man needs a conscience like a fish needs a bicycle.” – I doubt that that would be said, everyone has a conscience to some extent or other. What we have a ‘conscience’ about or what we may consider ‘unconscionable’ differs.
“So, let me see if I can follow this line to it’s logical conclusion” – I don’t think you have in this particular instance.
“If there are to be no conscientious objections to paying for abortion” – oh, there can and will be, just like I have a conscientious objection to faith being in my wallet.
“then will there also be NO conscientious objections to SERVING IN WAR and KILLING PEOPLE if a President needs to reinstate the draft?” – there were and there probably always would be.
“Hmm? Would that mean draft dodgers will have to face the prospect of KILL OR BE KILLED? Hmmm???” – no, it’d be jail time or similar punishment.
No, Screwtape, we ARE NOT all relativists.
Here’s the dealio: Either 2 + 2 = 4 or it does not.
Either a God created the universe (and all of us in it) or not. There is no SUBJECTIVE reality. You can say that a soap bubble is an airplane, but that doesn’t make the soap bubble an airplane.
Now, YOU can SAY that everybody gets to believe what everybody wants. The fact is: we may or may not find out how close we came to knowing the true nature of God. God is either the way we believe, or God will turn out to be somewhat different from what we believe. Or, it will turn out that we were wrong. God will not twist into what we want because we want it. God is like 2 + 2 = 4. God either is or isn’t. You don’t obliterate God by not believing in him.
So, no, we don’t all get to make up our own ideas about it. We take our chances, don’t we? Either God exists and we were right, or not. Get it? God doesn’t disappear into thin air because someone doesn’t believe. The same with natural law. However, if you do believe that you create your own reality, that you can make a table a glass of water by wishing so, good luck to you, because you’re going to get mighty thirsty waiting to drink that table.
Now, do something constructive and go read some CS Lewis.
Now, readers: do tell: if there are no conscientious objections allowed, how many of you are going to show up for boot camp if the draft is reinstated? Hm? Gonna show up at boot camp or not?? If you’re telling us that Catholics have to pay for your abortion, guess what? I’m telling you to stand at attention, and hup 2, 3, 4.
I think it might prove constructive if you were to do some reading about relativism rather than cs lewis.
“God is like 2 + 2 = 4. God either is or isn’t.” – that may be the case but not everything is simply a case of yes or no.
“You don’t obliterate God by not believing in him.” – nor do you make one real by believing one exists.
Relativism relates to a whole lot more than whether any god/s exist or not.
If memory serves me correctly, conscientious objectors who faced the draft either secreted themselves or dealt with the punishment. Perhaps there’s a lesson there?
“If you’re telling us that Catholics have to pay for your abortion, guess what? I’m telling you to stand at attention, and hup 2, 3, 4.” – yep, and while your faith is reaching into my wallet, guess what. I suck it up because although I’m forced to financially contribute, I don’t have to participate.
Some things ARE relative. What is your favorite color? Yellow? Blue? That is fine. Favorite food? Favorite movie? I’m sure the answer I give will be different from the answer anyone else gives on this page. There is nothing wrong with that.
But things that relate to morality? Referring to theft as “borrowing without permission” doesn’t change the fact that it’s theft. I can think of no instance where rape, child abuse, or genocide should ever be permissible. Among other things.
Morality is subject to relativism too Sarah. Whilst I pretty much agree with the instances you mention there are many, many more which generate great differences between people.
The “con” is all about one thing: an attempt to buy women’s votes with taxpayer money. The Obamaites believe that women can be bought by such a cheap gesture and it really is quite pathetic of them to think so dismissively of women.
The chief con, our own president, is in it up to his elbows. He really does not care about women–what he cares about is defined by his sociopathic view of self and the world. That is precisely why Obamacare is the perfect expression of the man–controlling, cunning, dishonest, duplicitous, arrogant, manipulative, and cold. In the regulations now being written to implement the directives contained within Obamacare there is verbiage referring to patients as “units”. How Obama-like.
Remember, this is the same man who argued against saving babies born alive after a botched abortion. Can we expect anything good to come from such a man? Obamacare is in its own way a perfect segue from allowing unborn babies to die without medical attention to its logical slippery slope diktat of official government policies to bombard the female body with free chemicals lest implementation occur.
Ninek: I’m guessing the relativists have a slogan: “A man needs a conscience like a fish needs a bicycle.” LOL!!
A better slogan, a true one, is that “Absolutists frequently mischaracterize relativist arguments.” ;)
Reality: “there are many, many more which generate great differences between people.”
If you slap someone’s face their face will sting. If you spill milk and refuse to clean it either someone else must clean up after you or it will sit there and start to rot. If you lie about someone you will cause distrust, either towards them or towards you, or both. If you eat more than your fair share of the dessert someone else gets less of it. If you have sex with multiple partners you increase your risk of getting an STD/giving one to someone else. If you kill someone, their life will never be lived out to the fullest, they will never help people they might have helped, they will never see all they should have seen, etc.
But things that relate to morality? Referring to theft as “borrowing without permission” doesn’t change the fact that it’s theft. I can think of no instance where rape, child abuse, or genocide should ever be permissible. Among other things.
Sarah, there is great commonality of desire among people around the world, and hence laws and people’s morals tend to be similar. There’s not much disagreement about the things you mentioned. How about female genital mutilation? In the West and really – in most of the “developed world” it’s regarded as horrible, but in parts of the Middle East and Africa, for religious and cultural reasons it’s seen as the right way to raise a girl.
Ninek: God is like 2 + 2 = 4
No, it’s really not. God is a matter of belief. If we have the physical reality of objects, then the count isn’t a matter of belief.
1 pregnancy + 1 abortion = 1 dead baby there is no in between
Heather, you going to get all your Democratic friends to vote for Santorum? ;)
I’m really glad that AUL distinguishes between ella (essentially a small dose of RU-486) and other hormonal birth control (which might not actually have any post-fertilization effect after all). I think that as pro-lifers, we really need to do a better job in this area. This becomes a major problem when issues like total abortion bans and personhood amendments are on the table. Asserting that all hormonal contraceptives can kill an embryonic human (when the science is actually unsettled) really only gives free ammunition to conspiracy theorists like Rachel Maddow and Amanda Marcotte.
pretty much the very people who voted for obama are now sorry they did. thats satisfaction enough for me.;)
THANK YOU, NAVI.
If the science is unsettled, should a prolife person of conscience be ok with taking that chance?
While I’m still scratching my head about the tangential weirdness of contaception entering into election politics, I’m not comfortable with any drug that might act after conception.
It makes no sense to me to love and respect all human life and then turning around and being ok with the use of such *unsettling* drugs. Prolifers need some consistency here.
So, I do see the distinction between ‘maybe/probably’ and ‘certainly’ ending life.Still, Considering real lives are involved- or may be involved- neither is a great idea.
And I think it’s crappy medicine to begin with…
God is a matter of belief. If we have the physical reality of objects, then the count isn’t a matter of belief.
Wrong. God exists or not independent of our belief. 2 + 2 = 4 always. They are the same. You could express it as God = X.
Not being a physical object in no way indicates whether a thing exists. Time is not a physical object but there’s no denying it.
The puzzle is that, with contraception so readily available, we still have about 3 million unplanned pregnancies per year.
Doug wrote, “A better slogan, a true one, is that ‘absolutists frequently mischaracterize relativist arguments.'”
Or we could say that relativists can never see the trees for the forest. He’s eternally in the twilight zone!
I just prefer to say that relativists never have a definitive answer and leave it at that.
A great sci-fi/horror movie about moral relativism: Pandorum. One of my new favorites, with a great message. Oh, and plenty of bloody gore, ‘cuz I’m weird like that.
Wow! Well-played! The Relativism Gambit!
If you really don’t have any coherent value system, this one is great.
There are three steps, plus the fourth unseen step.
one
provide an example where reaonable people would disagree about something. here, female genital mutilization. (this is great because you have religiously-motivated circumcision waiting in the wings);
two: get the religiously-grounded person to declare that he or she believes morality should not be a matter of convenience and relativism, but a matter of some recognizable, firm code.
three: almost there!
define your opponent as rigidly inflexible, small-minded, and unthinking, with formulaic approaches to moral issues, which obviously require thought.
four:
now, you can defend abortion, “post-delivery abortion,” ”infant abortion,” helping a minor teen get an abortion without her parents knowing, and whatever else you might want to defend, and defend with a fake veneer of “moral” defense!
morgan freeman is free to marry his step-grand-daughter, and woody allen is free to marry his step daughter! Just so long as each declares that he pondered the opportunity seriously, as if he were engaged in moral decision-making!
Ladies,
Don’t have sex during your fertile time. It’s free contraception.
Reality’s probably not going to come back and check this thread but in case:
Yes, R, I can recommend YOU read a little Bertrand Russell. Or should I insert “the over rated” Bertrand Russell.
No offense to the author, but my college professors were just a mite too smitten…
Jerry: “The ‘con’ is all about one thing: an attempt to buy women’s votes with taxpayer money. The Obamaites believe that women can be bought by such a cheap gesture and it really is quite pathetic of them to think so dismissively of women.”
Well, why shouldn’t they? The majority of Catholics — and certainly Catholic women — were swayed by something as stupid as the vacuous “hope and change” mantra, swooning to teleprompted speeches from a guy who can’t even mumble properly without the TOTUS.
The cynic’s constant defense is “no, I’m just a realist.” Heh. Interesting twist. Just here, I think it could be argued that the cynics about this cynicism are wrong. Such a ploy isn’t cynicism — it’s realism.
There’s a bell curve for IQ (50% of the population is under 100), and there’s one for credulity as well. Also for sycophancy and adulation of nanny state messiahs.
Get used to it, people. Charging the pols with cynical manipulation is meaningless when it differs little from the billboards we drive by every day, or from the ads in our gmail. It’s REALISM. It may be insulting to those not moved by it, but to others it’s like the two guys at the parking garage in Truman Show, when Christof says “We accept the reality with which we are presented. It is as simple as that” and the best they can do while watching that on the television is nod assent.
Why we haven’t accepted that such manipulation is normal and effective, I don’t understand. I don’t mean we should accept it AS normal — but we’re deluded if we imagine that most of society does not understand that it is so.