Not really surprising
How going green may make you meanWhen Al Gore was caught running up huge energy bills at home at the same time as lecturing on the need to save electricity, it turns out that he was only reverting to “green” type.
According to a study, when people feel they have been morally virtuous by saving the planet through their purchases of organic baby food, for example, it leads to the “licensing [of] selfish and morally questionable behaviour”, otherwise known as “moral balancing” or “compensatory ethics”.
Do Green Products Make Us Better People is published in the latest edition of the journal Psychological Science. Its authors, Canadian psychologists Nina Mazar and Chen-Bo Zhong, argue that people who wear what they call the “halo of green consumerism” are less likely to be kind to others, and more likely to cheat and steal. “Virtuous acts can license subsequent asocial and unethical behaviours,” they write.
It’s not just “green”. This is just the latest example of what happens to people who “love humanity but can’t stand individuals”. A classic example is the cliched and ubiquitous Thanksgiving media attention to some Hollywood celebrity serving up dinners at a homeless shelter. The same celebrity who treats “the little people” he or she comes in contact with — from hairdresser to car valet — with undisguised contempt and entitlement.
These kind of collectivist “causes” – Save the Whales! Save the Trees! No more War! Do it for The Children! — attract followers exactly because of the “moral balancing”. They are easy macro-causes that allow someone to strut their “moral creds” — “oh look, I’m gathering signatures to ban paper OR plastic in supermarkets!” — to their neighbors and allows them to act like jerks in private. The old-fashioned practioner of Judeo-Christian principles who everyday engages in the micro-practice of small kindnesses or charities — generously tips the waitperson, does grocery shopping for the housebound next-door-neighbor, is polite with the harried cashier — doesn’t get the press even as focus on helping individuals in a pay-it-forward model makes an immediate difference in each individual’s daily life.
This is not to say that even so-called religious “leaders” haven’t succumbed to the temptation to be public paragons while engaging in private perversions. The abandonment of one of the central tenents of ethical monotheism — that God wants us to act good individually — comes first.
There is little difference between a Christian pastor preaching increased taxes regardless of the individual harm it does in the service of “social justice” and environmentalists advocating increased regulation of carbon. Both rarely figure it will affect them, only that other guy.
Individuals can be beautiful, humanity sucks.
(h/t Daily Caller via Wizbang)
Comment by Squid on 3/17 @ 10:42 am #
In similarly shocking news: I had a salad for lunch yesterday, which meant I felt entitled to indulge in plenty o’ chips and beer when I got home.
Comment by Joe on 3/17 @ 10:43 am #
It is not just “green”. Dennis Kucinich with his new age ideas might actually have a modest proposal of making Obamacare work fiscally.
Green did you say Darleen? What day is today? How about this.
Comment by sdferr on 3/17 @ 10:44 am #
God wants? That’s a puzzle, right?
Comment by dicentra on 3/17 @ 11:09 am #
God wants? That’s a puzzle, right?
God reveals. That’s the harder part: knowing how to discern it, and once that’s done, to act on it.
Positively, I mean. Sometimes people find out what God wants and do just the opposite.
Comment by sdferr on 3/17 @ 11:11 am #
Nevermind the God lacking business, I guess.
Comment by Darleen on 3/17 @ 11:48 am #
sdferr
are you saying that what God expects of us (and the discovery/reflection/examination) is not a central tenent of ethical monotheism?
Nevermind the God lacking business, I guess.
again, the context of my statement doesn’t deal with atheism, so why the hypersensitivity? Atheists as individuals may act/not act in the same way as theists. When their “cause” becomes being belittling and beligerant to theists, then they are as small as greens.
Comment by sdferr on 3/17 @ 12:01 pm #
No, I’m just interjecting a non sequitur type question, apart from your assertions Darleen, occasioned by thoughts on what people say God is and the simple weirdness of musing on the God’s desires, God’s lacks, God’s wants, etc. blah blah blah puzzle. That’s all. If there aren’t any questions worth discussing, then, y’know, meh the whole thing.
Comment by sdferr on 3/17 @ 12:07 pm #
oh, and this bit? “again, the context of my statement doesn’t deal with atheism, so why the hypersensitivity?” is just a bullshit misread.
Comment by DarthRove on 3/17 @ 12:30 pm #
Although too often, some people are astounded to discover that “what God wants” just happens to jibe perfectly with what they wanted to do themselves. Which then “justifies” them doing stupid/evil shit and calling it “God’s will”.
Comment by DarthRove on 3/17 @ 12:32 pm #
To be specific, think Fred Phelps and his band of inbread soul-deprived assholes.
Comment by DarthRove on 3/17 @ 12:32 pm #
Also, I need an “a”-ectomy, STAT!!
Bobby Orr.
Comment by The Sanity Inspector on 3/17 @ 12:38 pm #
Color me not shocked.
Comment by The Lost Dog on 3/17 @ 1:19 pm #
What a maroon!
Unlike my parents, who quietly donated their time and money to those in need who they deemed worthy of help, this moron (and our government) want to wear a big badge on their sleeve that says: “I gave at the office. Now let someone else deal with it. Just make sure that EVERYBODY knows how compassionate I am”.
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Comment by Mikey NTH on 3/17 @ 1:39 pm #
A religion of causes allows people to immerse themselves into something larger and find ‘meaning’ for their lives; something larger than the traditional religious expressions and civic organizations of their societies in order to sustain the Great IAM of their lives.
At the core of these religions of causes you will find Narcissus. No matter how pathetic the adherents actually, really, objectively are – you find Narcissus.
AGW, Weathermen, Jihadists – at the core is Narcissus, and his twin Envy.
Comment by Bob Reed on 3/17 @ 1:49 pm #
The distinction of “individual” efforts, charities, and other acts of service is well noted and at the crux of the distinction Darleen.
As you noted, many often join the feel good bandwagons of the highly publicized “crusades” even while declining to globally “practice what they preach”-so to speak.
I can only speak with respect to Christianity, but from the Bible, especially the New Testament, I get the clear impression that Christ wasn’t talking about taking control of any governmental entity to ensure “righteous” social justice. Instead it was quite the opposite. He was referring to the cumulative effects of individual selflessness and service; the integrated effect being the realization of said social justice.
Otherwise, why would He have bothered to draw a distinction between what was Caesar’s and what was God’s?
Once again, speaking as a Catholic, we are called love our brothers and sisters and to individually use the talents and gifts we are graced with to serve God and one another. It is a way of life that is laid out, specifically in the “Sermon on the mount”, that will serve God through selfless service to others.
It occurs to me that smug, self-serving, self-satisfaction that one has forcibly used the resources of others, regardless of the benefit, is antithetical to Christ’s call to serve others. At once, I’m reminded both of the story of the Pharisees ridiculing the old woman for only putting two coins in for alms at the temple, Christ reminding them then that she gave ’til it hurt while they-not so much, as well as the fact that there is not even the slightest example of Jesus coercively forcing anyone to either follow Him, believe in Him, or even practice the tenets He enumerated.
And needless to say, the replacement of the cumulative effect of individual acts of service to others and the charitable outreach of the church, by the benevolent tyranny of governmental alms-giving, is central to the replacement of God in the public consciousness that the progressive left strive for.
The immutable truths and morals that are embodied in religion don’t gibe well with the relative morality and situational ethics that are the cornerstone of modern statist philosophies.
Comment by Mikey NTH on 3/17 @ 1:52 pm #
BTW – splendid day in Michigan, warm, sunny, blue sky.
Simply wonderful.
Comment by Darleen on 3/17 @ 2:17 pm #
is just a bullshit misread.
if you think that, sdferr, I apologize. My interpretation on your “puzzlement” comes with the history of anytime I may refer to how believers view morality or principles, you’re right there with the “like what use is god?” I’ve never asked you to believe, nor have I ever asserted that a belief in an ethical God is a prerequisite to moral behavior. Indeed, I point out that even people who do assert their belief is never an automatic guarantee they will behave morally.
People who commit evil in the name of God are breaking the Commandment not to take the name of God in vain. THAT’s the meaning behind that Commandment – bringing the name of God into disrepute is evil itself.
I fail to see why discussions of the differences between good and not-so-good behavior and prioritizing those behaviors is at all controversial. The anti-Judeo-Christian knee-jerk reaction so prevelant on all manner of the political spectrum is troubling because as the influence in the private lives of church/temple/family has waned in contemporary society, so has the influence of GOVERNMENT increased via a plethora of ever expanding laws aimed at private behaviors (smoking/transfat/salt bans, speech codes, et al).
Why do I despise Huckabee so? Because he’s a Big Government politician who pretends his background as a man of God excuses his desire to use force that harms one individual for the alleged benefit of another.
What one asserts to believe is less important to me than how one behaves.
They profess to know God, but by their deeds they deny Him, being detestable and disobedient and worthless for any good deed. Titus 1:16
Comment by Squid on 3/17 @ 2:20 pm #
One can’t help but recall the episode of Top Gear where Clarkson came over to California to interview Jay Leno. In discussing the Prius, Leno said (and I’m paraphrasing): “Californians love to drive ugly, crappy cars, because in America, it’s really important to loudly proclaim your anonymous acts of charity.”
Jay’s just lucky that nobody in CA watches BBC America.
Comment by Darleen on 3/17 @ 2:23 pm #
In addition, I’m wildly happy that the TEA Party prioritizes and focuses on what the proper role of Government is and rejects that that role includes any micromanaging of peoples private lives.
There is a base morality the law does regulate in order to secure a person’s individual rights (laws against stealing, murder, assault, fraud), after that, the law has no business (other then demonstratable matters of safety) regulating personal behavior.
That said, the law should also have no view on what people say to each other in debates on what IS the proper way to live IS.
Comment by Squid on 3/17 @ 2:25 pm #
The Sermon on the Mount tells us that the poor, the hungry, and the meek are blessed in the eyes of the Lord. The Proggs, whether secular or Christian, are just trying to make sure that we’re all blessed good and hard.
Comment by Darleen on 3/17 @ 2:26 pm #
“Californians love to drive ugly, crappy cars, because in America, it’s really important to loudly proclaim your anonymous acts of charity.”
Ha! I once pondered out loud to my husband why in the world did hybrid cars have to be so damned ugly and he said “because they would then look like any other car.”
Comment by sdferr on 3/17 @ 2:31 pm #
“My interpretation on your “puzzlement” comes with the history of anytime I may refer to how believers view morality or principles, you’re right there with the “like what use is god?” I’ve never asked you to believe, nor have I ever asserted that a belief in an ethical God is a prerequisite to moral behavior. Indeed, I point out that even people who do assert their belief is never an automatic guarantee they will behave morally.”
I wasn’t actually concerned with questions of human morality in this instance though, but rather, with questions about the attributes humans assert of God, what people say God is, what people say God does, what people say God needs, (needs!), what people say God says God wants, what people say God says God lacks, what people say God’s ends (teloi) are, etc. etc. That’s why non sequitur, as I said before.
As to God knowings, I’m a sort of Butterfly McQueen as far as that goes: “Lawzy, we got to have a doctor! I don’t know nothin’ ’bout birthin’ God stuff.”
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 2:31 pm #
the religion of “causes” makes having small people a lot mandatory
Comment by McGehee on 3/17 @ 2:35 pm #
Look out, he’s gonna blow!
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 2:37 pm #
did we realize Donna Pescow has had such a successful career?
Me I did not know.
That’s really very remarkable.
Comment by 13013 on 3/17 @ 2:40 pm #
Who died and made you God?
Comment by Darleen on 3/17 @ 2:41 pm #
the first guarantee of the Declaration of Independence
You might like to refresh your memory on what that is, HF.
Because, like, thinking life is based on one’s usefulness to others never has consequences.
Comment by 13013 on 3/17 @ 2:51 pm #
Pescow got her driver’s license at 25. That is an accomplishment for a New Yorker.
Comment by Darleen on 3/17 @ 2:51 pm #
sdferr
IMHO what people say their god demands of them is worthy of discussion as there are generally a great deal of difference in behavior from the followers of the god that venerates the tale of the Good Samaritan and the followers of the god that tells trees to cry out for murder when a Jew is hiding behind it.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 2:54 pm #
I think codgers already have the right to off themselves if they want. They just have to do it without help.
Comment by 13013 on 3/17 @ 2:56 pm #
The Declaration of Independence does not create any rights, it recognizes natural rights as being self evident.
I’m going to ask you to exercise glands you never knew existed.
Comment by 13013 on 3/17 @ 2:58 pm #
I am all for prosecuting anyone who successfully offs themselves.
If only for the irony.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 2:58 pm #
Glands!
Comment by Mark A. Flacy on 3/17 @ 3:03 pm #
Yeah, ’cause there’s no birth control available. And a woman can’t say “no” when a man wants to have sex with her.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 3:08 pm #
well there’s birth control but if it doesn’t work… like with NG… you can either have yourself a baby person or you can go and get an abortion… that’s how we do it her in our little country.
If you have the baby then you can register at Target or Baby Persons R Us and your co-workers will buy you something that is probably of equal or greater value to what they got Other Guy when he had his baby person…
If you decide to have an abortion then you usually don’t tell anyone you’re pregnant unless you work with someone who is staunchly not pro-life and then you can tell them either way especially if y’all go get tacos together a lot.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 3:08 pm #
*here* in our little country I mean
Comment by 13013 on 3/17 @ 3:21 pm #
So when is Target coming out with home fetus incubators? And more importantly, is there going to be a Martha Stewart version available? Oh wait, she shills for K-Mart. Well that makes sense given she is a felon.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 3:23 pm #
home fetus incubators are the future… home fetus incubators and India and 3D telubizhuns
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 3:26 pm #
also if you choose to have the baby person you may suffer from sciatica which will probably be temporary
Comment by McGehee on 3/17 @ 3:33 pm #
Everybody please move back 100 feet so you won’t get hurt.
Comment by Frontman on 3/17 @ 4:14 pm #
Wait, wait, I’ll be right back. I’m going to microwave a package of Orville Redenbacher Kettle Korn.
Comment by DianaWho?" on 3/17 @ 4:56 pm #
Happy hears a “Who?”.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 5:38 pm #
cause a happyfeet’s faithful ONE HUNDRED percent I think
but it sure is hard being on Team Abortion in a world what is so hostile and uncaring about Choice.
yet soldier on I do
Comment by Mikey NTH on 3/17 @ 7:13 pm #
Not finishing the thread, but I will type this here.
The religion of causes is all about this temporal earth, and what is done on it. The religion of causes has very little to do with with another life on another world. The adherent of the religion of causes does not mind going to hell in a handbasket so long as he looks good on the trip.
Comment by LBascom on 3/17 @ 8:10 pm #
“it sure is hard being on Team Abortion in a world what is so hostile and uncaring about Choice.”
There’s three people involved in a pregnancy.
How many of them get to choose?
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 9:17 pm #
The law says it’s the hoochie that gets to choose unless she’s underage and even then sometimes she can go to a judge usually.
It makes a pretty concise flowchart.
Comment by serr8d on 3/17 @ 10:53 pm #
Nice and concise, yeah. Puncture-drip-drip-suction-cut-smiles and lulz for all.
Cheerio, really.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 11:02 pm #
I really don’t see the difference between crafting some maudlin fetus narrative and crafting some maudlin fevery earth narrative. It’s all just people what want to tell other people what they can and can’t do I think.
We could do with less of that sort of ethos in our once-great little country.
Comment by bh on 3/17 @ 11:16 pm #
I never enter abortion threads but it always surprises me that no one talks sentience levels.
I’d be a vegetarian if I thought cows were particularly bright and I’d start punching people at abortion clinics if I thought fetuses were thinking about the present and the future and the horror of infinite non-existence.
Okay, I’m back to never being on abortion threads.
Comment by serr8d on 3/17 @ 11:45 pm #
All of the sentient non-sentient stuff is drivel. My dawgs had more sentient sense than some humans I’ve encountered, I swears it’s so.
There’s a teeny, tiny difference though…
Comment by not bh, he's never on abortion threads on 3/17 @ 11:49 pm #
Not saying non-sentient. That’d be a slam dunk then. I’m saying less sentient.
Of course, how does having a soul make it worse for them? It makes it infinitely better. If you can’t kill a soul and they last forever, how did you harm the soul?
I’m against soul abortions. Fully.
Comment by bh, coming back into an abortion thread on 3/18 @ 12:19 am #
That was wildly flip, I admit it. However, if we go down that path, I have many more like that. Who chooses the soul we’d use to make our judge-able decisions? God? Can’t be judged then, His fault. Us? Who were we before we choose such a crappy/awesome soul?
When you think about it, if you’re honest, you can’t figure any of this shit out. Not gonna happen.
So, ultimately, it’s visceral or “what would you do if?”.
If a baby or a very prematurely born baby was laying in the middle of a busy highway I’d probably kill myself trying to help it. So, that’s my ultimate position at the end of the day.
But, play the game of “let’s think about it” and all bets are off.
Okay, this time I swear: never again will you find me in an abortion thread.
Comment by Yackums on 3/18 @ 4:50 am #
Happyfeet, can I propose a thought experiment?
Step One:
Let’s assume for the sake of argument that both (or all n+1) sides in the abortion debate are willing to stipulate that life begins at conception. And that it’s “real” life, such that embryo = fetus = infant = teenager = adult = geezer for Lifeyness.
Why should anyone have any problem with the statement that abortion = murder? And how then could anyone defend abortion?
(I should point out that even under this set of assumptions, one could still theoretically justify abortion in cases where continuing the pregnancy endangers the life of the mother.)
Step Two:
Now let’s make the opposite assumption: That all parties to the debate are willing to stipulate that life begins at birth.
Now what happens? Nobody can say that abortion = murder, though it certainly remains something ugly, perhaps akin to self-mutilation, perhaps not, but in any event it opens up a much broader set of justifications for doing it. Nobody could argue with this. Whether anyone would then be able to go so far as to use it as a kind of birth control, depends on in what category of negative act you can put abortion.
Can we all agree, then, that at least half the debate merely comes down to the question of when life begins? And how “life” is even defined?
(Now this thought experiment is going to segue into a proposal.)
Why, after all, is it permissible to kill animals and plants? Are they not “alive”, in the physical, dictionary-definition sense? What elevates human life above these? Somebody mentioned sentience. Is killing a monkey or a dolphin worse than killing a cow or a chicken?
We’ve heard a lot here, on this topic anyway, about Judeo-Christian values, and I submit that while the Christian view of this topic is well enough known, I wanted to share what I understand to be the classical (as in, Orthodox) Jewish position as I think it could be the basis of a healthy compromise on this divisive issue.
In the creation story (SIT DOWN, it doesn’t HAVE to be taken literally!), the creation of man is described thus: G-d fashions man from the dust of the earth, blows the “breath of life” into his nostrils, and man “becomes a living being.” (cf. Gen. 2:7) The takeaway from this is that man, unlike other life forms, has a spiritual component (a soul) as well as a physical component (a body). It is the extinguishing of this spiritual component, the soul, that is the essence of homicide, and that makes it qualitatively different – and worse – than killing an animal, no matter how sentient it may be.
Now, when does this soul commence its existence? Jewish tradition posits that all the souls of all the human beings that ever lived are eternal, as they are really sort of “chips off the old block,” so to speak, of G-d Himself. They were here before us, and will be here after we’re gone. When, then, do they begin inhabiting the body, and when do they leave the body? The answer to that is in the verse I mentioned earlier. The idea of the soul is expressed there as breath. The tradition concludes that life begins when a baby takes its first breath, that is, at birth.
One may conclude from this, correctly, that Judaism does not consider abortion to be murder. (I SAID SIT DOWN!!!) It does still, however, consider it to be a Very Bad Thing™ and it is a priori outlawed in all cases except when the mother’s life is in danger. (Exceptions can be allowed by a competent Rabbinic authority on a case-by-case basis on the grounds of extreme – and I mean extreme – hardship or emotional distress; this would presumably include the cases of rape and incest.)
Now before you all get to hyperventilating, I’m not suggesting that Jewish law be made the law of the land (I’m not even holding my breath for that to happen in Israel!), or that we start appointing Rabbis to the courts, or that we start making policy based on the Book of Genesis. Far from it. I am suggesting a compromise that may be acceptable to the “pro-Life” side as it is based on a kindred religious tradition, and to the “pro-Choice” side (for lack of better labels) as it seems to me that their extremism is based in the fear of the slippery slope, which might be mitigated if they can be assured that the pro-Life side, having found a religion-based point further down on the tree, won’t try to climb back up.
The rest (parental notification, etc.) is all details.
Flame away! I’ve got my asbestos undies on.
Comment by B Moe on 3/18 @ 4:50 am #
If a baby or a very prematurely born baby was laying in the middle of a busy highway I’d probably kill myself trying to help it. So, that’s my ultimate position at the end of the day.
As would everybody here, including happy I’m guessing. Which makes late term or partial birth abortions purely a matter of location. If the baby is outside the womb, it is protected, if it is inside, it has no rights. That just doesn’t make a lick of sense to me, God has having nothing to do with it.l.
Comment by Yackums on 3/18 @ 4:51 am #
Dang, that was long.
Comment by B Moe on 3/18 @ 4:54 am #
God I need coffee.
Comment by Yackums on 3/18 @ 5:35 am #
BMoe –
Yeah, but which God?
;)
Comment by Bob Reed on 3/18 @ 6:57 am #
Yackums,
Thanks for that excellent discussion of Jewish theology; as a Catholic I was not aware of that outlook.
Forgive me though, because I may be dense; but I read your post several times and couldn’t find the compromise you were speaking of…
If life begins at birth, then there is no argument and all abortions are all good, including the horrific partial-birth kind. I don’t see how this is any compromise. Please tell me where I have this wrong.
Although Darleen’s thread was about more global notions of morality and the religion of “causes”, it somehow devolved into an abortion thread; which is unfortunate because, as I mentioned the other day in another thread, many personal choice social issues causes deeo divisions among folks who might otherwise agree. And vis-a-vis abortion, we might all consider the wrangling but a mere taste of that wrangling over the slavery question that took place at the Constitutional convention in Philadelphia in the 1780’s. And although politics do make for strange bedfellows, as we can see by the reactions of some, even in this short thread, there are dealbreaking rocks amongst the shoals of compromise…
As a devout Catholic, and fierce believer in our God given liberties, I will say the following. I abhor abortion, in any of it’s forms. And while I understand that there are sometimes medical reasons for the practice, given the opportunity I would always try to persuade someone to forgo it and bestow the God’s blessing of a new life upon our world once again. Also, I will generally support candidates that themselves profess to abhor abortions, if only because, generally speaking, I feel more confident that our values and morals are more closely aligned-although that is not exclusively the case…
All that being said, I can not in good conscience try to outlaw the process legislatively, for principled philisophical as well as, surprisingly, theological reasons. To start, outlawing abortion would probably create a terrible public health hazard; as folks will still engage in the practice, but do so in back-alleys and speak-easy-esque clinics. Furthermore, it would infringe on the fundamental liberty of the prospective mother in ways I’m not prepared to do. In all of His time here on earth, Christ never engaged in trickery or coersion to bring people around to his belief; they came out of love and free will. And, as I noted above, he clearly deliniated between governmental authority and God’s moral authority, when He famously said, “Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God that which is God’s. What I’m getting at is He didn’t force the government of the day to adopt God’s law as legislative canon, so why should we think He would do any different today?
Just as he woudln’t “force” anyone to accept his Christian beliefs, neither can I; but am only able to witness my belief to them and hope to change their outlook.
And the same is true for abortion in our society. I will always work personally, individually, to try and stem the practice; to use any opportunity I have to convince people to embrace life and the womder pf God’s blessing of new life. While abhorrent and reprehensible to me, abortion must remain legal for the same reason that I canot force anyone to adhere to my religion. In our free society those choices are made by the free will of the one who does the choosing, and cannot be dictated by the majority.
But I do thank God that most people seem to be in agreement that partial-birth/late-term abortion should be illegal. I realize that some make take me to task for this apparent hole in my logic. I prefer to look at it as taking what I can get, within the bounds of our society of laws…
All the best
Comment by Yackums on 3/18 @ 7:00 am #
Bob,
Are you interested in taking this further offline?
Everyone else,
Would you like us to take this offline, or is anyone interested in the continuation of this thread?
Comment by Yackums on 3/18 @ 7:02 am #
And, by “everyone else” I mean Jeff. And anyone else, but mostly Jeff.
Comment by Bob Reed on 3/18 @ 7:09 am #
Yackums,
I think this thread is appropriate, since it somehow morphed into the “abortion argument” one; although I will be in and out, due to some other committments.
Say what you’d like. Unless anyone else pointedly objects it’s probably cool.
And by “anyone else” I mean Jeff :)
Comment by Darleen on 3/18 @ 7:24 am #
Comment by happyfeet on 3/17 @ 9:17 pm
The issue for you HF is less the law then you absolutely go off the rails at anyone that dare say “you know, abortion is Not.A.Good.Thing” completely absent the law. You want them to SHUT UP.
When that indecent woman who tweeted her abortion said “I’m doing this to DEmystify abortion” she lied. She did it because she wanted to feel good about killing the nascent sibling of her already borne child.
Regardless if the law ever changes into something more reasonable (actually abiding by Roe v Wade, which was expanded under Casey), today’s teenagers are much more prolife then their elders.
Funny thing that affect of 3D ultrasounds (no wonder the pro-abort crowd hates em) and semi-open adoptions.
Comment by Darleen on 3/18 @ 7:29 am #
. I will always work personally, individually, to try and stem the practice; to use any opportunity I have to convince people to embrace life and the womder pf God’s blessing of new life. While abhorrent and reprehensible to me, abortion must remain legal for the same reason that I canot force anyone to adhere to my religion. In our free society those choices are made by the free will of the one who does the choosing, and cannot be dictated by the majority.
You’re a “reluctant pro-choice”, Y, as I am.
But for many in the pro-abort crowd (any abortion, any time, under any circumstance is fine and poses no moral question), we are as EEVVVILLLL, misogynist and Patriarchial Oppressors equal to any radical Islamist that murders his daughter for looking at a boy.
Comment by Bob Reed on 3/18 @ 7:41 am #
That’s true Darleen,
To them, we are part of the “XTIAN TALIBAN!“, that need to be taken down a few pegs and who are responsible for guys like Roeder who KILLED THE GOOD DR. TILLER ‘CUZ OF THE INTOLERANCE INHERENT IN RELIGION!1!!1!eleventy”
The people spouting this drivel are obviously not Christians and know little about the religion as well. They don’t understand the concepts contained in Christ’s instructions to “go the extra mile”, “Pray for your enemies”, and love others as God does-unconditionally.
Here on Long Island, in a conservative Italian/Irish ethnic neighborhood, we have many gay people, mostly lesbians, who attend our church. While most choose not take part in communion, they aren’t belittled or ostracized; because everyone is praying for them instead. While their lifestyle choices are certainly not approved of, so to speak, we know that we are all sinners who rely on God’s mercy and the prayers of others.
So the critics know not of what they speak, or, you know, are engaging in the usual multi-culti moral relativism…
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 8:11 am #
I think it might be as simple as please keep your fetus anxieties away from my Republican party and when that doesn’t happen – like when the Alaskan wench decided to make the vile Mama Tebow an honorary member of Team R – I think indecorous noises should be heard. And when the 2008 platform abortion language reappears in 2012 I think more indecorous noises should be made.
It’s just the gayest issue ever. Other people’s fetuses are not your concern they’re not my concern they’re not the pope’s concern.
Maybe when the sad little Catholic Church ordains a woman, she might get to share her thoughts. But til then I don’t have much respect for what those ones have to say.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 8:15 am #
But to talk about the religion of causes making small people and elide idiot whores like Lila Rose spending her days “acting” like a white trash little slut in planned parenthood clinics is pretty short-sighted…
God only knows what depravity a cumslut like Lila Rose feels entitled to after a long day of prostrating herself in an abortion clinic.
Comment by guinsPen on 3/18 @ 8:24 am #
It smells like cheese in here.
The stinky European stuff.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 8:30 am #
I learned that camembert is better if you leave it out for a few hours the day before you want to serve it. It just needs to ripen a little so it doesn’t taste like dead goldfish.
But here was my favorite Catholic Church dealio in recent memory.
They’re just not credible when speaking to or about womens I don’t think.
Comment by Mikey NTH on 3/18 @ 8:31 am #
“Wench?” “Whore?” “Cumslut?” Well, haps, you are acting pretty small and petty and pathetic right now. I guess you got too immersed in your cause to the exclusion of all else.
I hope the immersion makes you feel good, because every time you make your argument, you drive people further and further away. But that’s fine, because how else can you martyr yourself in burning self-rightousness if you aren’t being oppressed by mean old Mrs. Palin, and mean old Mrs. Tebow, and mean young Miss Rose? Or Mean Darleen?
I hope your search for ‘meaning’ was worth what you paid in your reputation, ’cause brother – you have paid a lot.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 8:40 am #
and that is not true Darleen person… I just think the righteous blather of the Lifey ones needs to be secular with respect to politics… cause it leads to things like dimbulb Alaskan whores getting a leg up on the process for no other reason than a willingness to play a cheap Values card while courageous and principled politicians get passed over cause their insufficient zeal…
what I do think is that when self-righteous whores like Timmah’s mommy get on a tear, it’s a Good Thing for people to slap the bitch down. Rhetorically. Especially if wretched and desperately narcissistic hoochies like Sarah Palin try to make Team R own it, but also just cause it’s good manners to ensure that when the Timmah’s mommies speak, that there be a disclaimer affixed to their blatherings. And they never remember to do the disclaimer themselves.
and partial birth abortion, which is icky and not right, doesn’t need to be regulated any more than anything else… the government can fuck itself in this and many other matters I think.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 8:42 am #
cause *of* their insufficient zeal I mean
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 8:42 am #
happyfeets is just showing his left-tail o’ the IQ distribution creds, here.
Comment by Bob Reed on 3/18 @ 8:43 am #
That’s some pretty tough stuff there indicting the Catholic church and all happyfeet. Did you actually read what I posted above in response to Yackums? Essentially that morality could not be legislated?
I think you used a pretty wide brush when criticizing there, that’s all.
Why does this push your buttons so much?
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 8:46 am #
Isn’t that just the point Mikey? When Lifey Team R ones make their argument, they drive people further away. It’s the abortion fetishists that create retarded primary processes that give us Meghan’s daddies as our standard-bearers.
Huckabee wasn’t just a joke he meant something. People hardly ever talk like he affected the process, but he sure did.
And there’s no reason to think something similar is not destined to play out again.
Comment by guinsPen on 3/18 @ 8:47 am #
No, that’s not it.
Try putting your shoes back on, cheesesuit.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 8:47 am #
Not that there’s anything wrong with that. There wouldn’t be a left tail without folks like happyfeets to hold it up.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 8:56 am #
I just think the Catholic Church has lost its relevance with respect to women and abortion and such, Bob. I did read what you said and I love your take on it. I really do.
But there’s nevertheless… I think also there’s an implicit willingness in your view to tolerate or even approve of pro-life politicians what exploit this issue for political gain. And I just say that cause of what you don’t say. Maybe I’m not being fair. But those politicians are the lynchpin of this argument I think.
Comment by Mikey NTH on 3/18 @ 9:03 am #
The only one driving people away are you, haps. You are the only one calling people you disagree with whores, sluts, wenches, etc. It’s as if you have no real argument; just your zeal for your cause, one which you can gloriously martyr yourself in wrathful self-rightousness, driving away every possible ally you have for every other issue you favor.
But you really can’t get the rush from the religion of a cause unless you can convince yourself how evil and oppressive your opponents are. Only then can you convince yourself that your martyrdom was glorious, that you can get enough self-rightousness to support the Great I AM of your self.
But in reality it is pathetic; as pathetic as the Bush Haters of the last decade, who also indulged in the religion of cause to bolster their puny self-worth.
And I am right, because you just conflated the pro-life people as those who gave the Republican Party John McCain as a candidate – a John McCain who really doesn’t say much about abortion at all or even run on that issue.
But anything to support your glorious martyrdom, I suppose.
Comment by Bob Reed on 3/18 @ 9:07 am #
Perhaps happyfeet, perhaps,
But as I’m not a single issue voter I’m pretty confident that I could discern if one was exploiting the issue for simply electoral purposes. Truthfully, I’ve stopped considering a politicians disposition on abortion, and am suspicious of those that would make it and other social issues the focus of their candidacy.
I am suspicious of Huckabee, and don’t want to see him as a nominee for any party. But I think your mistaken about Palin making social issues the focus of any prospective candidacy on her part. It’s hard to tell with all of the different voices talking about her across the spectrum and all, but I think she’s more about limited government than social issues.
I know you don’t care for her, and that’s not the subject matter here, but I think she wears her religious beliefs on her sleeves to demonstrate that some social justice functions now practiced by the government are best left to the traditional, faith-based, charitable organizations.
Oh, and the Catholic church’s position on abortions has absolutely no bearing nor relevance to the issues surrounding it’s refusal to bow to social pressures and ordain women. These are matters based on Holy Scripture, Holy Tradition, and the Magesterium of the church and as such are neither arrived at democratiacally nor subject to public opinion; they are God’s will as inspired by His Holy Spirit.
I’m not tryinn’ to get all God-bothery on you, just explaining…
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 9:11 am #
We’ve simply reached a point on the slope of the curve of the decline of our once-great country after which political invocations of abortion are grossly obscene I think Mikey.
Simple as that.
But also Protein Wisdom is not about screeching at Planned Parenthood or hailing Lila Rose or Mama Tebow drivel or slapping teen lesbians back into their place.
I don’t think so anyway.
This place has changed, and Darleen is perverting what used to be so wonderful about this blog.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 9:15 am #
I think you’re probably right about Palin and limited government… my disdain for her comes from a different place than policy… I *love* Palin’s politics… I *hate* that she represents a Team R affirmation of rock star politics what elevate charisma above qualifications.
Comment by Carin on 3/18 @ 9:19 am #
We just can’t
have nice thingstalk about abortion anymore.Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 9:19 am #
but the point is that I think it’s willfully blind to think that an embrace of leftist cant is any more compromising than an embrace of righty cant
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 9:22 am #
This place has changed that should have said
Comment by BJTex on 3/18 @ 9:23 am #
So any politician who is pro life would be amenable in happyfeet world if he or she would just STFU about it? Or, in happyfeet world, do they have to be pro choice, thereby running against almost half of the population that identifies as pro life not to mention the 75% of registered Republicans? Are all of those who identify as pro life illiberal scolds or do some of us hold more nuanced positions?
It seems to me that you have defined “exploit the issue” as nothing more than a simple statement of point of view. It also seems that you are far more concerned with branding in the political field than you are about closely held principles, unless those principles are in complete disagreement with happyfeet world on a particularly vitriolic topic for happyfeet.
Also I can’t help but feel really empowered when my nuanced and long thought over pro life position puts me in the same contrived and leaky boat as Global Warming Alarmists. Near as I can tell I wouldn’t qualify as a courageous and principled candidate under the Republican “brand” if I take a pro life position, regardless of the nuances and details of said position. If I were to run and someone asked me my views on this topic and I replied, “Pro-life!” would I be exploiting that position even if I didn’t believe in sweeping regulation to make abortion illegal? Most definitely I should, if I were a politician, never, ever suggest that a reasoned debate be held about what constitutes “life” in conjunction with the word “fetus” and, again, STFU upon the altar of “choice” and “liberty.”
People are trying (and have tried) to engage you on a pointed but respectful discussion regarding your rather vitriolic take on choice and life. With very rare exceptions you’ve offered nothing more than angry denunciations, derision and a curious victimization.
Will we ever have a meaningful discussion on this issue or are we to be slain upon the altar of happyfeet’s absolutism and dismissal? That would make me sad but I think the ball is in your court. One comment without a name calling to those who hold principled but opposing views would be a good start, I think.
I am rooting for you.
Comment by BJTex on 3/18 @ 9:28 am #
OK, that’s one! Yah!
Comment by DarthRove on 3/18 @ 9:30 am #
@hf#82: I’m confused now, hf… You don’t hate Palin so much as you hate people who like Palin…? You disdain Palin because of who’s fanned her on Facebook?
From what I can see, you hate the Media Image Of Palin, while indifferent or somewhat favorable toward the Actual Person That Is Palin.
Am I making any sense, or just demonstrating my lack of brain-goop?
Comment by Mikey NTH on 3/18 @ 9:39 am #
Haps, by your crude invective on this topic you have driven away nearly every friend you had on this site: those who were pro-life, those who were pro-choice, and those like me who really don’t give a fuck about the issue.
You can’t discuss this sanely and intelligently, all you can do is throw around ‘cumslut’ and ‘whore’ and ‘cunt’. The site didn’t change all that much – you changed. If you can’t discuss your position and make a decent argument for it, then perhaps you should just avoid these threads. By acting as you have been, you are making yourself irrelevant. For instance – you haven’t convinced me of anything other than you got nothin’.
Other than a desire for glorious martyrdom for the cause.
Comment by Mikey NTH on 3/18 @ 9:41 am #
Or what BJTex said – whatever.
Comment by guinsPen on 3/18 @ 9:45 am #
That’s:
for those of you keeping score at home.
Comment by McGehee on 3/18 @ 9:50 am #
So.
You guys still say there’s no subtext?
Comment by Yackums on 3/18 @ 10:01 am #
Sheez, I go away to compose a thoughtful reply to Bob, and half a thread goes by!
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 10:03 am #
BJ I think vitriol is essential to any discussion of the intersection of Lifeyness and politics. And Sarah Palin. Lifey people want to bracket Lila Rose and Pam Tebow and Sarah Palin as inoffensive and then allow the conversation to proceed from there.
I reject the premise. They disgust me.
Comment by Yackums on 3/18 @ 10:03 am #
Darleen #64,
You were quoting Bob there (assuming the “Y” refers to me), but I’d have to say that is true of me as well.
And I think that in the final analysis, the “pro-Abort” crowd is but a tiny subset of the “pro-Choice” crowd, and in the scenario I envision, if the “reluctant pro-choice” position can embiggen its tent, so to speak, the pro-Abort crowd will finally be marginalized the way it so richly deserves to be.
Bob #59,
That’s a great big leap you just took and it makes me think you missed a very important part of what I was trying to say. I will attempt to clarify:
There is a great big honking gulf between “murder” and “all good.”
Yes, abortion is forbidden in Judaism. No, it is not murder.
Judaism has lots of laws governing human behavior (the Ten Commandments are merely examples – overall there are 600+ mentioned or alluded to directly in the Bible, and hundreds more Rabbinic injunctions on top of those). Now, as the old saw goes, for every two Jews there are three opinions…so through the past two millennia of Jewish scholarship and jurisprudence, there is a very wide range of opinions as to when abortion may be performed – from it being “tantamount to murder” (note: not “equal to murder”) at one extreme, to “allowed in cases of hardship and emotional distress” at the other – but at the very extremes they are all in agreement: The default position is that it is not allowed, and that when the mother’s life is in danger, it is obligatory. But the starting point for all of these must be that it is not the same as murder. And even the most liberal opinion allowed it only subject to a thorough examination of the parents – economic, psychological, social, etc.
The prevailing opinions in the modern era tend toward the restrictive end of that spectrum – in one case a Rabbi wrote of the need to be particularly restrictive “these days” as a counterweight to the general permissiveness of the world around us. One extreme drives the other. It was ever thus.
I had more, but it’s too convoluted to post.
Comment by Yackums on 3/18 @ 10:06 am #
Cumslut?
Happy Lurves Lila! Happy Lurves Lila!
Happy and Lila, sittin’ in a tree…
Come on, feets, you were just askin’ for that one.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 10:09 am #
But also it’s willful on the part of Lifey ones here not to see that the Bob and the Carin and the Mikeys are not people I have a problem with. If all Lifey people were like Bob and Carin then we wouldn’t be having this conversation, would we?
No we wouldn’t.
I will say I feel badly for people who fall for ginned up issues like partial birth abortion and eagerly cede regulation of it to government.
Cause I wonder what else won’t they fall for. I wonder what next they’ll cede.
And that issue in particular informs the likelihood of some sort of peculiarly American autocracy being in the offing I think.
Americans are easily manipulated.
I blame marketing.
Comment by not bh, that guy would be a liar with this thread re-entry on 3/18 @ 10:10 am #
Poor phrasing on my part, B Moe. Because that’s exactly what I meant by my analogy.
Comment by Bob Reed on 3/18 @ 10:13 am #
Thanks for the clarification Yackums.
I was thrown off by the Genesis reference to “breathing life into Adam” and somehow thought you said that equaled life begins with the first breath at birth.
Maybe I needed more coffee!
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 10:16 am #
nishizonoshinji is starlight and whimsy I think, guins… she’s fun and she’s vibrant and she cares… she cares very very much I think
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 10:20 am #
We should be so lucky. No, happyfeets is going to chew through another 200 comments at least explaining why it’s essential for him to refer to women as cumsluts and hoochies, and why it should raise no eyebrows at all for him to do so in lieu of argument. And how the whole rest of the world is disintegrating because it’s unwilling to accept the swill he dishes out at face value.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 10:24 am #
Ah. That’s what you think is so important.
That the caringness is accompanied by little but dipshittery is less important to you, I think.
hf, I think you’ve found a kindred soul in nishi. I hope you two will be happy together.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 10:28 am #
calling Lila Rose and Pam Tebow out for the dirty little cumsluts that they are is a nice counterargument I think to those who place the earnest little whores above all criticism I think, Slart.
nishi isn’t a kindred soul… I’m a conservative!
She’s just cool beans.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 10:29 am #
Okay, enough of this.
Happy: when does life begin, to your way of thinking?
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 10:35 am #
I think the question is more when does some startlingly pregnant woman in Akron or Lexington or Miami think life begins.
Me I tend to think life begins when you think you’re in a position to support it but if you’re not sure and you think you might be don’t think I won’t help. But the important thing is that motherhood isn’t something what’s inflicted by a pregnancy, not unless you’re a sow… it’s something what should be willingly embraced I think.
Comment by Carin on 3/18 @ 10:39 am #
Seems a bit arbitrary to me.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 10:41 am #
Oh. So “life” is determined by whomever. There is no set condition for it — rather, it is to be determined by those who control the power (and so the definition).
And the thing inside is like a disease — something that’s inflicted upon you — unless, of course, you embrace it socially, in which case it’s more like embracing a tapeworm because you were trying to lose a few pounds for swim suit season anyway.
You’re sure?
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 10:41 am #
In other words, you think it’s subjective, and the most qualified subjects to evaluate it are pregnant women.
Me, I think we should consult pregnant women on everything, because they are intrinsic fonts of the deepest wisdom.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 10:42 am #
putting the little guy up for adoption would count as being in a position to support it I think, but not everyone can carry a baby to term and then put it up for adoption cause of the abusive idiot what sired the kid can make that untenable or the pregnant person’s parents will get all judgey or the pregnant person has unfortunate genetic predispositions or all sorts of other unknowable unknowns…
Comment by Carin on 3/18 @ 10:44 am #
Me, I think we should consult pregnant women on everything, because they are intrinsic fonts of the deepest wisdom.
Kinda like Magic Negroes?
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 10:44 am #
Oh. So “life” is determined by whomever. There is no set condition for it — rather, it is to be determined by those who control the power (and so the definition).
Yes.
And the thing inside is like a disease — something that’s inflicted upon you — unless, of course, you embrace it socially, in which case it’s more like embracing a tapeworm because you were trying to lose a few pounds for swim suit season anyway.
No.
You’re sure?
Very.
In other words, you think it’s subjective, and the most qualified subjects to evaluate it are pregnant women.
Yes.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 10:45 am #
The funny thing is, I’m pro choice. Because I recognize the difficulty of weighing what I consider to be competing rights.
Then again, I’m very reluctantly pro choice. And I have no problem with placing restrictions on abortion, as a way to suggest that we have at least acknowledged that we may very well be dealing with the death of a person at a certain stage, and not just the removal of tissue.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 10:46 am #
From this, I deduce that happyfeets is a pregnant woman.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 10:46 am #
The thing inside is more like a responsibility I think. Not a disease.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 10:47 am #
…but it’s a responsibility that one can rid oneself of, kind of like bankruptcy.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 10:50 am #
I’m beginning to see why you like Pat and Nishi so much.
Comment by Carin on 3/18 @ 10:52 am #
The thing inside is more like a responsibility I think. Not a disease.
And the best thing to do when faced with responsibility? RUN AWAY!
It’s twisted that somehow people view aborting a baby as the responsible thing to do. There are a couple other MORE responsible things that could have been done. Too late for some of them, of course.
It’s interesting, because what is ignored by women, in this, is that abortion makes men LESS and LESS responsible for their actions.
Guy has a choice to not support – ’cause she’ll get an abortion if talk her into it.
Also, the man/father has NO rights because she can get an abortion regardless of his desires.
I think this two factors have become ingrained into our society in a bad way.
Single motherhood is way up. We don’t need you men, you see. We can abort or not and you can just play video games all day.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 10:52 am #
I’m not reluctantly pro-choice. That’s so phony. What is that? I really wish I could figure out a way to usurp your control over your life but I can’t figure out a way to do that what I’m comfortable with?
People have to make their own way in this world. They get to make their own choices.
Mr. P is very very Lifey. Like Paul Ryan.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 10:52 am #
And if you want to turn it into a NOT-responsibility, simply rename it a burden and get rid of it.
Me, I’m a big fan of ovens for getting the job done.
Comment by Carin on 3/18 @ 10:53 am #
typos. whatever. sorry.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 10:55 am #
If you were pregnant, Carin, hf could take what you say as gospel.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 10:56 am #
typos and all.
Comment by Carin on 3/18 @ 10:59 am #
Well, I (collectively) was a wise pregnant woman for (counting fingers and toes) 50 or so months ?
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 10:59 am #
I don’t really disagree with that Carin… I just think the proper locus of that conversation is in families and churches, not politics and government.
And politicians what claim the pro-life mantle need to take care that they not sully those in whose name they claim it. Because they sully the ideal of freedom I think. The government of this benighted little country needs must piss off on matters like abortion.
And I think the abortion as holocaust metaphor is really lame, Mr. Jeff.
There are abortions what are your business and there are abortions what simply aren’t, and one must be judicious.
Comment by Lost My Cookies on 3/18 @ 11:00 am #
What happens if I get fired and die and my wife can no longer afford to support my children?
Or, what if someone else is willing to support that life?
I’m rabidly pro-life, came to it late out of my own experience. I know people who are pro abortion. Most of my family is, and while it bothers me, I don’t call them assholes, whores, sluts, etc…at least not for that reason. I think they’ve got the idea in their head that not being uncomfortable is worth more than the potential good of human life. Of course, they may not think much of the potential of human life, and in that case, it just makes me sad.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 11:01 am #
Doesn’t count. I don’t think it counts unless you’re currently pregnant.
Possibly hf might add that you also have to be thinking that you want to be expeditedly un-pregnant. Only then are you utter genius.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 11:01 am #
Being reluctantly pro choice isn’t “phony” nor does it have anything to do with wanting to “usurp” “control over your life” — at least, not in my case.
Instead, it has to do with trying to figure out a way to balance your control over your life, and your control over ANOTHER life that isn’t yours, and so may not be yours to control.
Secondarily, it has to do with impressing upon those who find themselves having to make certain difficult choices the importance of considering their options BEFORE having to make those choices, because there are social limitations to the safety net. And those are not arbitrary, nor are they about ME. They are about balancing the rights of a woman to control her body against the rights of a person (?) being carried therein.
The easiest way around those questions is to pretend that those who have these legitimate concerns — those like me who do battle with these competing interests — are really only in it out of some kind of religious-driven moral self-righteousness. That way, you can demonize us as “phony” while advocating for what you pretend is an unconditional libertarian position.
Sorry to say, however, that granting control of what life is to every individual woman is not the same as granting them full control over their bodies. In fact, it is the kind of argument that repudiates “law” all together.
Comment by Carin on 3/18 @ 11:04 am #
I just think the proper locus of that conversation is in families and churches, not politics and government.
Well, leaving aside the Palin issue, because I just don’t think we’re going to see eye to eye on that, what about opening the door for federal funding of abortion?
To speak against this? Well, politicians HAVE to talk about it. Abortion is the law of the land. I really don’t see how any politician is really riding the anti-abortion wave to Washington.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 11:04 am #
That wasn’t the metaphor I used. The comparative term was not abortion. It was your idea of what responsibility is and how that can legitimately be handled.
Your next move is to call me a cumslut.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 11:05 am #
fine Mr. Jeff, but that conversation and the legitimate concernings what are attendant don’t have to find political expression… that’s completely arbitrary… and unnecessary I think… and tacky… and distracting.
Comment by Carin on 3/18 @ 11:06 am #
You know, I missed my last period. I could be …
(or it could be the stress and my diet)
But we don’t KNOW. I think I should get the wisdom thing until we know for sure.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 11:12 am #
Sorry to say, however, that granting control of what life is to every individual woman is not the same as granting them full control over their bodies. In fact, it is the kind of argument that repudiates “law” all together.
That’s so melodramatic. Women get to decide whether or not to have a baby.
And it’s very America that that is so.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 11:13 am #
But do, regardless of your opinion. Why are you struggling against what already is? You can’t negate reality by calling people you disagree with hoochies or whores or cumsluts.
Not for lack of trying, though.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 11:14 am #
…to someone who believe it is up to a pregnant woman alone to determine when life begins.
If, however, you happen to believe life begins at a particular moment that isn’t tied to the whims of an individual pregnant woman, it makes perfect sense that, if you also happen to be one of those who thinks a fetus is a person (at whatever temporal point in the gestational period, you feel like its rights ARE NECESSARILY a political question, insofar as the law is political, produced by politicians (the obverse would be to believe abortion a natural right).
And so it follows that you would agitate for those rights through politics.
You dislike the foregrounding of the question. That’s fine. But that doesn’t delegitimize the question, nor does it turn all those with an interest in how we as a society deal with the question into self-righteous cumsluts.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 11:17 am #
This kind of begs the question, doesn’t it? I mean, the question is, should women alone get to decide this, why, and to what degree? — because there are other potential rights at stake that not all of us are as willing to dismiss as you are.
And those potential rights are predicated on what we do with the question of “life.” Your subjective definition of life as beginning when a pregnant woman makes up her mind that it is so (very Berkeleyian) is a political one.
Denying others the chance to fight your politics with theirs is itself a political maneuver.
Comment by Pablo on 3/18 @ 11:19 am #
Are Pam Tebow and Lila Rose in government or politics? And would this question make more sense if I called you a baby murdering cocksucker?
Comment by guinsPen on 3/18 @ 11:21 am #
*jiggers, it’s dad*
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 11:21 am #
I think, hf, that your objections in this regard are best presented to your family, and your church.
I highly recommend that you refrain from using the word “cumslut” in church, though.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 11:22 am #
because of.. I already said it Mr. Slart…
We’ve simply reached a point on the slope of the curve of the decline of our once-great country after which political invocations of abortion are grossly obscene I think
The silliness of people what think the government can and should regulate abortion but shouldn’t socialize the whole kit and kaboodle and make lots of other decisions for us is… quaint I think. There’s simply no fucking difference. You either respect the individual or you don’t.
And America increasingly doesn’t. Lindsey is Teddy. Meghan’s daddy is Barney Frank.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 11:24 am #
I think that’s exactly the argument Jeff is making, hf. Only you’re not quite smart enough to see it.
Your rights end where mine begins, if you’re thinking along libertarian lines. Jeff’s asking: where do the rights of a fetus begin? Anywhere at all? Is that never a legitimate question to ask, in your book, Oh Mighty Respector of Rights?
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 11:25 am #
no Pablo… Sarah Palin claimed the Tebow whore’s message for Team R… and Lila Rose is slathered all over Hot Air like lifey bukkake… that’s just completely disingenuous to suggest that these hoochies don’t have a political agenda and that politics doesn’t embrace them
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 11:27 am #
Comment by Pablo on 3/18 @ 11:28 am #
A reply that makes some sort of sense would be more helpful. Emulating a Marcotte screed doesn’t really get us anywhere.
Comment by Pablo on 3/18 @ 11:29 am #
Oh, that was on Facebook, right? Where she said Pam Tebow is the future of the GOP…
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 11:30 am #
Fine Jeff… and yet you don’t think we should make abortion a front and center part of Team R’s message, do you. For sure me and Barone think maybe the lifey ones should get their fetus anxieties out of politics while our little country teeters on the brink of a dirty socialist abyss.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 11:33 am #
Happyfeet: you say the rights of a fetus at any point in the pre-delivery stage are subordinated to the rights of the female carrying that fetus. You predicate this argument on the notion that the advent of “life” is to be determined solely by the person carrying it / not it.
Yet somehow you don’t see this as a political question. Instead, it is settled…uh, what? Science? Dogma? And any who are not satisfied with this political formulation — and dare tackle it through politics as if it matters to them, or is if they have some stake in the question — are either cumsluts or self-righteous moralistic phonies. Unlike you, who is a champion of women. In the abstract. As if it matters to you.
Is that about it?
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 11:35 am #
that’s fairly on the mark I think Jeff
Comment by McGehee on 3/18 @ 11:35 am #
Except for those individuals happyfeet deems “whores,” “harpies,” “coochies” and “cumsluts,” of course.
Comment by McGehee on 3/18 @ 11:35 am #
(I find myself using the word “deem” a lot lately. What’s up with that?)
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 11:36 am #
Me, I don’t. But then, I’m not for demanding a unified narrative, nor do I require loyalty oaths.
GOP strategy is a different question altogether than the legitimacy of the abortion-as-politics question.
Comment by Pablo on 3/18 @ 11:36 am #
Hey, who was it that turned this into an abortion thread? Lemme scroll up and check…
Oh. Hobby horses are funny things.
Comment by Lost My Cookies on 3/18 @ 11:39 am #
What about the individual cooking in the oven? Or if it isn’t an individual, who else isn’t an individual, and why? Or does it become an individual when someone arbitrarily calls it an individual? And what if they don’t? How about we make it 7/16th of an individual? Too complicated. I know, why don’t we make it so that it’s not an individual until the government decides it’s an individual and let the government decide when it should get the rights that only the government can give it. Including the right to have an abortion, but only certain people are given that right by the government. Because the government can be picky about what rights it give whom. Because it’s the government who keeps all the rights in the pantry in a big brown bag of rights, next to the Splenda.
Comment by McGehee on 3/18 @ 11:40 am #
Can’t say y’all weren’t warned.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 11:41 am #
I don’t think GOP strategy is a different question altogether than the legitimacy of the abortion-as-politics question. I don’t think that at all.
The little individual sometimes gets aborted, Cookies. Sometimes rich people don’t pay taxes. Sometime supermodels are lousy in bed.
It’s a mixed up muddled up shook up world except for Lola.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 11:44 am #
Well, in fairness, I kinda explicitly tried to draw happy out, because I wanted to see what assumptions were supporting his thinking.
I think LMC has it about right. Happy seems to think that now that the government has determined when abortion is legal and who can have it (and who has rights and who doesn’t), it is no longer valid to ask the government for restrictions on those rights it has itself decided. Otherwise, socialism.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 11:46 am #
Well, if it’s all the same to you, I think we need to leave that determination up to the person in Akron or Lexington or Miami or Denver whose argument it happens to be.
Comment by Pablo on 3/18 @ 11:47 am #
Also, you can’t talk about not having abortions of Facebook, otherwise sharia.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 11:50 am #
That’s not something that fits comfortably on a banner of limited government I don’t think Mr. Jeff.
Cause it’s no longer valid to ask our broke-ass piece of shit government many, many things I think.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 11:52 am #
My brother lives in Akron. Maybe he can look that person up, and get some advice on stock market investments or some such.
Comment by sdferr on 3/18 @ 12:01 pm #
It appears on its face that separating Rights or natural right from life, if not the abortion question as an aspect of the life question, is impossible. Which would argue, I think, for setting the abortion question aside for a short time, and returning in its stead to the question of the origin of right or natural right itself, in order to examine the relation of life and right simply.
We Americans don’t spend this time in examination of our principles easily; we tend rather to take them for granted as well proved (self-evident) and in consequence loose that establishing relationship in the muddle of our much later far more abstruse considerations of the application of those assumed principles to particular questions, questions like the abortion question and the necessary invocation of the question “when does life begin?” simply, as opposed to the question “when does right arise in or for the living?”.
It doesn’t appear in current trends though, does it? Would the question of the origin of natural right have been an interesting question to the founders, who could invoke natural right as “self-evident”? You’re damned skippy it would.
Comment by DarthRove on 3/18 @ 12:06 pm #
After a pregnant woman has an abortion, how long until the wisdom leaks out? If your brother in Akron finds that person up there, make sure they’re headed into PP rather than out or he might not get the sage advice.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:08 pm #
I think natural rights adhere in the individual, and adhere not in government. The government, and not even our one in particular, is gay I think.
Therefore it follows that government govern as little as possible, lest it gay everything up. And fetuses are sometimes charmingly pre-people, and sometimes they’re s.o.l.
So it is written.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 12:11 pm #
At what point in the life of an individual do you think said rights adhere?
After you answer that, why do you think your beliefs in that regard ought to trump the beliefs of others?
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:14 pm #
At what point in the life of an individual do you think said rights adhere?
It’s kinda like laches… which is a legal term.
If you don’t assert your rights you lose them, and fetuses are just not terribly assertive little guys.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 12:14 pm #
Neither are infants, but it remains illegal to do away with infants.
Silly, meddling government.
Comment by sdferr on 3/18 @ 12:15 pm #
To say they adhere, hf, assumes we already know what they are and where they came from, I think.
Where they came from, I mean, not in the sense (which I consider a mere handwaving dismissal anyway) as from God, but in the sense where they came from in the articulations and specifications of individual political thinkers, who, after all, were attempting on the whole to establish a just and lasting political order and in the process, overthrow centuries long practices they found unjust and befouled by misery (kingship, feudalism, theocracy, etc).
They were attempting to reason their way from the world to the right.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:20 pm #
good point about the infants…
to be more serious sdferr personally I think it’s the CNN fallacy, abortion is… the fallacy that CNN can bring you the world… Government can tell people whether or not they can have abortions… they can just push it underground… people like to yammer about how the kids are getting more and more lifey.
Try banning abortion and see where that trend goes.
We simply can’t control whether or not people have abortions, and to pretend we can is to tell a sort of lie I think.
I’ve a very low opinion of people who stop having abortions just cause their gay-assed government tells them not to.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:21 pm #
or tells them *to* I mean
Comment by Pablo on 3/18 @ 12:22 pm #
Schrödinger’s fetus?
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:22 pm #
and Government *can’t* tell people whether or not they can have abortions… is what that was to say
OG is leaving and it’s very distracting… tomorrow is his last day and it’s very sad
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:22 pm #
that’s brilliant, Pablo
Comment by sdferr on 3/18 @ 12:22 pm #
I guess that this particle “Which would argue, I think, for setting the abortion question aside for a short time…” hasn’t held the day then.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:24 pm #
I am very pro setting the question aside, Mr. sdferr.
On one side there is me and you and the Barone. On the other side are lunatics what are buying SUPERBOWL AIRTIME.
I feel at something of a disadvantage.
Comment by sdferr on 3/18 @ 12:26 pm #
They superbowl ad buyers will still be there when we get back from our discursions to the past hf, and not much will have changed in them in the offing, while we may have found something of use in the struggles with the socialists yet to come.
Comment by Pablo on 3/18 @ 12:27 pm #
They’re posting on Facebook too.
*shudder*
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:28 pm #
I’m in.
Shall we invite Darleen?
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 12:28 pm #
This is such a ridiculous statement that I’d like to have it bronzed and displayed somewhere prominent. Possibly the Smithsonian.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:29 pm #
jeez at least Mama Tebow is rumored to have a sense of humor
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 12:30 pm #
The horror. The horror.
But I noticed that letting people do as they please suddenly went on vacation, unannounced.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:32 pm #
that’s not the point Mr. Slart… the question is to what extent we can imagine it possible for the abortion question to recede… Me I think given the stalwart determination of the Lifey ones it may be best to temper our expectations…
fervor is what it is, really.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 12:33 pm #
I’ve noticed that, recently. In this very thread.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:34 pm #
I think if people want to get on a platform and Life it up fine, but I reserve the right to call them a whore.
That’s very America I think.
Comment by sdferr on 3/18 @ 12:35 pm #
I have invoked Hobbes’ De Cive before here as one useful starting point among others, partly because of its accessibility, partly because I think it actually is one of the few fonts of origin of our natural rights thinking, but I’d be happy to entertain another source for examination should anyone wish to offer one.
Anybody?
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:36 pm #
I bookmarked De Cive.
Comment by bh, talking rights not abortion on 3/18 @ 12:37 pm #
Towards your line of thinking, sdferr, I think the crux of natural rights is that they are unalienable. Their original use was to tell the king and catholic church to go to hell. Yet, it was still an assertion, wasn’t it? Why are they inalienable? Well, because I don’t want the king or pope to think he can cross certain lines, so we draw a line in the sand.
Now, to me, under our social contract or in a different way, in a democracy, (absent kings and powerful popes) we assert natural rights as a way to tell our fellow citizens to go to hell. Don’t tread on me, not just kings and popes, but collectivists and Obamas. We’re asserting that while they can make laws, create a legal system, they can’t do anything whatsoever in certain fundamental spheres of personal sovereignty.
It’s all gone to hell, of course. Why? Because the notion of inalienable rights is an assertion, not a metaphysical truth, and we’re not asserting them anymore.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:37 pm #
this is the book where I first learned about natural rights I think…
I was very small.
Comment by bh, talking rights not abortion on 3/18 @ 12:38 pm #
Locke. He’s my guy.
Hegel, I guess, but he defines unalienable rights in a way that strictly flows from what it means to be a person. Which, I think is wrong.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 12:38 pm #
…by the government.
Comment by sdferr on 3/18 @ 12:39 pm #
Chapter I, VII.
Comment by sdferr on 3/18 @ 12:42 pm #
Comment by sdferr on 3/18 @ 12:44 pm #
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:45 pm #
or She, really… abortion is nothing if not a means I would say…
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:46 pm #
Hobbes is very America I think, sdferr.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 12:46 pm #
How you all must feel like David Brooks, most days. Getting all that icky ally sludge all over your suit, which knocks the crease right off the pant leg.
sdferr — you can’t just bracket the idea of God in a discussion of natural rights. Whether or not you believe in a God, the idea behind natural rights is an “as if” proposition. As in, “as if” we are endowed with those rights by a creator. If it’s a fiction, it’s agreed upon as the basis for a social contract. Believing it to be a metaphysical truth or not only matters if your goal is to overthrow the proposition, because those who don’t can still adhere to the fiction as part of a compact that forms our way of life and shapes our subsequent ideals.
You can leave aside the specific question of abortion, but I don’t see why you would. For unalienable rights to obtain, you have to determine who gets them, and that requires determining who is a life and when.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:50 pm #
that’s not fair… I’m not Brookthian at all…
Freedom is America Mr. Jeff, and that is not a Brookthian sentiment, but it’s definitely a mine one.
I just think people should spare other people the fetal exhortations. I think it would be a kindness.
I’m gonna go get tacos now.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 12:51 pm #
And once again, happy, you are back to the competing rights of a woman and that of another — depending on when and where you believe that other exists.
None of which matters. Because this is all just a bunch of self-righteous prattle from non-freedom lovers who don’t really care about limited government like happy does. The cumslutting whore skanks.
Government is most limited when it doesn’t stand in the way of a woman’s unmitigated right to kill others. Q.E.D.
Comment by happyfeet on 3/18 @ 12:53 pm #
bosh. Fetuses roll their dice and they take their chances. Same as everyone.
Comment by sdferr on 3/18 @ 12:54 pm #
One can bracket, I think, and Hobbes appears to me to do just that. Yes, the question at root can be forced to appeal to an origin or source unknown as God is unknown, but I think the political questions are taken up by Hobbes in a stance of “ecce homo” without any time spent (that I can see) dwelling on the “what came before the beginning”. Or I may be wrong, in which case someone can point me to Hobbes’ invocations of the theological justifications for his thought.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 12:57 pm #
There’s nothing theological about it. It is merely an assumed proposition. It need not be mentioned. Natural rights aren’t “granted” by trees and hillsides. Natural means we are born with them. They adhere to us as having been born. If Hobbes accepts the premise, even as a man-made fiction, he doesn’t need a specific idea of God. A blind watchmaker will do. As long as we can appeal back to it as common ground in our dispute — something we’ve all agreed to accept as the premise for our social contract.
You haven’t bracketed the God question. Instead, you’ve agreed to bracket it. That’s not the same thing.
Comment by Jeff G. on 3/18 @ 1:02 pm #
But this has gotten us nowhere. All I know now is that happy believes life begins when pregnant women say it does — and that can differ on a case by case basis. Therefore, life is subjective. And it is a right to declare it such, because to do otherwise means socialism, ultimately.
That’s a colossal dodge of the question, it seems to me, so rather than wax philosophic about it, I’m going to go lift weights. Strength begins when the individual lifter says it does. Measurements are patriarchal constructs designed to appeal to a logic that only fences in the real me.
Comment by Slartibartfast on 3/18 @ 1:05 pm #
Oh, I take it all back. This one gets bronzed and put above the last one.
This is weapons-grade stupid, hf.
Comment by sdferr on 3/18 @ 1:09 pm #
Ok, I’ll buy that.
The question “how are these by nature come?” dealt with first by Hobbes is, after faculties, are they born “fit for Society?” or “are they not born fit for Society?”, Hobbes taking the latter stance as right:
Comment by Bob Reed on 3/18 @ 1:17 pm #
Perhaps part of the key lies in the notion that we are born with natural rights. I don’t want to get too far in the weeds, but the question of abortion has not always been as clouded by technology as it is today.
In the time of the philisophes, there were no chemical pregnancy tests or sonograms; no distinct and discreet knowledge of the biologcal process of fetal development-at least not on todays scale. Being pregnant was understood to be carrying a new life. Perhaps the reason that it appears that Hobbes is dealing with the concept, Ecce Homo, as sdferr said, is that it was inconcievable to them that the developing baby was ever “not alive”-stick with me here, I may be making a convoluted arguments, but not a religious based one.
Because their perception of the creation of new human life, through pregnancy obviously, was based on the tell tale signs of that life, or the effects felt by the prospective mother due to her carriage of the same, I think they may have ridiculed the notion of when that life began.
While some would have invoked deities and souls, others might have simply said that “it is” and left it at that. And while women have been terminating pregnancies for ever, my point is that they were doing so precisely to avoid the consequence in their lives, or at that time, of bringing forth this new person.
I’m stating this clumsily, but I don’t think that they would have necessarily ebntertained the academic discussion of whether it was “life”; although they certainly would have been intrigued by the question of how to balance the natural rights of such a simbiotic biological “system”.
All I’m saying is maybe they never considered what came before life, because without life there was no need to worry about said entities rights; like Jeff said, trees, rocks, stc. aren’t said to have rights.
Except by the gaia cult maybe:)