Just like all those climate change scientists are in it for the big money.
There’s a reason it’s called the Green Party!
Great Post, Cory. THANK YOU.
First, EXCELLENT VOCABULARY. The current fight over access to abortion is about fending off aggressive anti-choice politicians, not about picking fights with our fellow citizens who are sincerely Pro-life.
Second, Yes: from a financial standpoint, every Planned Parenthood in the country would be better off if they focused on woman’s health issues and stopped abortions. But then they would not be honestly addressing women’s health issues, would they? So we Planned Parenthood supporters keep up our commitment to supporting women, however problematic the money or the politics.
Quick Summary from my viewpoint:
My discussions with Pro-Life people boil down to “What is a human life?” and “Who decides?” Framed that way, there is an amazing amount of agreement, and what is left is a difficult set of questions Western Civilization has been wrestling with for over two thousand years. [*] Little wonder we’re still dis-agreeing
When fighting anti-choice politics, like TRAP laws and the kind of mis-information Cory is calling out, I am fighting against people ( generally midde aged white guys) who are willing to heap on misery (generally poor) women in pursuit of their vision of a “traditional” America most of American has in fact left behind.
[*] The Chinsee and Indians have presumably been at this longer; I just don’t know those cultures well enough.
The biggest lie is calling these guys “pro-life”. Fetus Worshiping Assholes (“FWA”) would be more appropriate.
The whole point of being anti-abortion is to claim that you are of such great moral fiber that you automatically can make personal and intimate decisions for all women. That women are just morally and mentally unable to do so for themselves. Pure narcissism.
In countries where abortion is illegal there is a growing body count of women who die in either clandestine abortion procedures or failure to receive adequate medical care because doctors are more concerned with upholding religious dogma than giving a shit about the lives of the patients.
They are all “collateral damage” to the FWAs. Since FWAs consider those women were such immoral dirty sluts, they somehow deserved to die. I have no respect for the position whatsoever. They are nothing but a bunch of self-righteous lying sacks of crap.
Frankly I find the Pro-life argument to be rather presumptuous and generally misses the general point.
“Who decides?” is really the only practically relevant question to ask here.
Whether one considers a fetus a person or a clump of cells is rather immaterial to the more important issue of where it is gestating. As long as its within a woman’s womb, it makes no difference what you consider it. It requires her will and her will alone to survive. Nobody can take custody of the fetus from her. Therefore, it is not the equivalent of a born child in any practical sense. Therefore her will, not whatever philosophical notions of personhood, rationally is really the sole consideration. Therefore nobody else needs to be consulted here. Its in her body, its always going to be her choice.
You can’t take the pregnant woman out of the equation, so her considerations are the only ones which matter. Any restrictions on abortion have to be considered attacks on her ability to make decisions for what goes on in her body. Anti-choice and pro-life people usually try to remove the woman from consideration by slutshaming and narcissistic appeals that they as more moral people have a right to decide for her.
Mangochin,
I generally agree with you. But I need to point out that your argument, too, can be viewed as presumptuous.
As long as its within a woman’s womb, it makes no difference what you consider it. It requires her will and her will alone to survive. Nobody can take custody of the fetus from her.
Technically, that isn’t true, which is why the concept of “Viability” is part of in US constitutional law. As a reductio ad absurdum, consider delivery by C-section. Are you arguing that between when the surgeon grabs the fetus and pulls the child clear of the abdomen – but has’t yet cut the cord – that the collection of organs becomes a human? or is it when the cord is cut? Why?
I am a fierce supporter that each individual mother should decide for her child/fetus, her alone, and only in that one case. I find arguments that over-simplify “what is human”-- in either direction – unsettling and inadequate. Indeed, the fact it is so hard to settle “What is human” is, to me, why the “who decides” should pretty much always be the mother. She has – by far – the most as stake.
BTW-- do you see what we’re doing here? Having a civil discussion about a core issue at the heart of the “Pro-Choice/ Pro-Life” debate. That’s a good thing. Thank you.
“What is human?”, to me doesn’t factor in as strongly as “who is a person?”
In the logic of most anti-choice people’s arguments about a fetus being a person, unplugging a completely braindead patient would be murder, as is aborting an 8 week old fetus. In my opinion, the key factor about whether someone’s a person has to do with if they have any kind of a mind and the requisite brain to run that mind on.
In the case of a braindead patient and the case of a fetus, they’re both not people, and it isn’t murder to pull the plug or to abort respectively.
Are you arguing that between when the surgeon grabs the fetus and pulls the child clear of the abdomen – but has’t yet cut the cord – that the collection of organs becomes a human? or is it when the cord
is cut? Why?
I am saying whether you or anyone else considers it human is an irrelevancy to the situation. I don’t have to care how that argument comes out because it misses the whole point of abortion rights. The only thing that matters is how it survives. A fetus could speak 15 languages fluently, be the messiah, and have a viable plan for world peace. But until it can come out of the womb, it only lives at the will of its mother and only her will matters.
Viability works well into my point. Because my ideas are based on the sole solitary burden she must bear when choosing to keep a pregnancy. Unless one is capable of taking possession of the fetus, it is only her business.
Republicans.
Saying somebody else is only in it for the money.
No technical barriers prevent an (evil) government from doing precisely this to a woman.
By 28 weeks, that technology already exists, and has for decades. Look around the “preemie” ward at your local major hospital. Recent advances have pushed this “viability” boundary below 24 weeks, and there is no reason to expect medical knowledge and skill to stop here.
Hence, while I agree with your conclusion, your argument is flawed. Or, to use your word, “presumptuous.”
I don’t understand the misunderstanding about abortion. It’s the other person’s body, and you should have no fucking say. Period.
p.s. Is this America, or isn’t it? You can’t have it both ways. My body is my domain. GTFO.
Especially since once that precious, innocent fetus is alive outside of your body you’d better not want any government help with it! Subsidized daycare? Socialized medicine? FOOD STAMPS?! No chance, maybe those slutty sluts shoulda kept their legs closed.
This sounds like an open door for infanticide, since the difference between a unborn and new-born is negligible. Is that what you intend? And how do You avoid making some people (the aged or mentally disabled) less equal?
I think there’s two issues here, indubitably: the legal and the moral. It’s one thing to insist that you should have a legal right to control your own body, but is that the same as a moral decision? What do you say to the family from a traditional culture that asks for ultrasound and then abortion when they discover that the 20 week foetus is female? (Not at all a hypothetical question)
Pfft, go right ahead, no skin off my teeth. It’s their sons who’ll be paying the price for that tradition ~25 years from now — and they themselves, if they were counting on having grandchildren to support them in their dotage and maintain their legacy.
As the philosopher said: Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
Well I’m kind of on-board with your schadenfreude,LM, but I’m after a different question. Not, would you stop them, or are they stupid, but is it wrong?
I lean utilitarian, so I’d say of course not. Whatever hardships come about as a result of prenatal sexism will sort themselves out within a couple of generations.
Besides, we’ve already got more than enough people around.
In the Bible, that’s exactly right: newborns weren’t counted as people until they were a week old.
The Bible knows nothing about Christianity!
