CPAC: Consevatives Vote for Ron Paul

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Calling it emotionally charged is dismissing my points without really addressing that they related to real things that happened and deal with real issues society has had to face and/or struggle with.

Also I pointed out that I think your "simple principle" and/or "definition of life" are just flat out wrong.

Want to raise my taxes for social spending? Help single mothers? Give them an option to give away a baby without having to deal with the emotional and financial problems that are part of raising it? I'm for it. Raise my taxes for it. I've also donated (granted my donations may not be much in the great scheme of things) to groups that aid single mothers.

If the laws, including the Constitution (though I think that is debatable, but in case it really isn't), need to be changed then so be it.

You're right and wrong. If we just relied on individuals there may not be enough people. That could change if government and/or society as a whole got involved.

Also each of those problems are problems in a very real sense. But that doesn't mean people cannot or should not try to address them simply saying too few people will could be seen as a way of saying not to try-which I disagree with (and I know many other people do as well, you could add End Global Warming to the list as well BTW).

I'm pretty sure I, if nowhere else, just addressed that.

I addressed the good choice bit and since I already made the comment about not being opposed to letting adults do as they want to in terms of sex so the part about and relating to "moronically saying 'sex is bad'" is ignoring what I said in order to complain about the stereotype rather than what I said.

You got into a rant and many people here do it at some point or another. But I think (and this is one of the problems with a rant) you got so into what you were complaining about that you started talking about what was in your mind about what you feel ProLifers think and do (and there probably are some who are very much that way) that you didn't stick to replying to what I said in your reply to/about me.

 

That's because I rarely limit my responses to just one person. Part of debate on the boards is to address a bigger issue. I find it amusing that you decided I should focus exclusively on you and your opinions with any response I make -- that's quite an ego there....

By the way, the "sex is bad" thing is not a stereotype, it's a tactic actually used with exceptionally poor results ('if we educate our children on birth control we are giving them permission to have sex' is something I've heard in five different school districts).

 

You don't have to focus exclusively on me. But it is inconsiderate of you not to address my points when they relate to something you said and for the moment I'm the one presenting a Pro-Life argument.

NOG will be back sooner or later but is not unreasonable for me to expect you would respond to what I say rather than talk over me.

Especially since, if I read it right, your comment about adding emotionally charged issues to this discussion was aimed, at least partly, at me.

It certainly seemed to be aimed at people arguing for the Pro-Life side of this discussion in this thread.

I think I already said that there are some Pro-Lifers who fit the stereotype.

And I think I've already at least partly addressed the issue you're bringing up when I said I don't mind if they hand out condoms in schools.

So is there something else you can think of or feel towards my more leftwing argument for being Pro-Life that hasn't been addressed?

 

I already addressed all your points -- in one paragraph. You seem to think that several of your points add some meaning to the argument when in reality they do not (they may be meaningful to you, but that's different) -- it really doesn't matter to the argument if there are atheist pro-lifers out there just as it doesn't mean anything that are religious pro-choice advocates; that you're for consenting adults getting laid is meaningless in the overall argument; that you don't like the legal definition of when life starts doesn't mean you can ignore the law.

It's great that you're for the "Give Condoms to Kids" campaign -- but what they need is education (correct usage of a condom occurs ~85% of the time, that percentage drops dramatically in teenagers). Kids need to understand all the issues, especially the girls.

As I said before if we, as a society, want to reduce abortions we need to educate our kids and give expectant mothers good options. Carrying a baby for nine months and having her give it away is not a good option (although it is better than some other options).

Overturning Roe v. Wade simply moves where the abortions occur, it does nothing to help the issue.

 

You seemed to have made a point and I responded. You made a point about religious Pro-Lifers and my response to that was that opposing abortion in most cases doesn't have to be based on religion. So my response matters to at least the extent you included religion in the discussion.

If you didn't believe the fact that many Pro-Life advocates are religious matters perhaps you shouldn't have talked about it.

If you do think it matters, and I took what you said as a complaint they were trying to basically impose their religion on the rest of society and perhaps through that the implication that being Pro-Life is limited to the religious, then my reference to Pro-Life Atheists is perfectly valid as it highlights that being Pro-Life (or Pro-Choice as you accurately brought up) is more than simply a religious issue/understanding.

I don't think sex ed is a bad thing and figured the implication would be understood if I already thought it was ok for condoms to be available to students-a step that is arguably going beyond sex ed.

If that wasn't clear before it should be now.

Overturning it may have that effect but it would also allow states and society to more directly democratic in determining how they and it, respectively, deal with it.

 

Fair enough -- but the right to lobby, legally, for a change to the law is still there, right? The right to disagree with a law is still there, right? That's the foundation of civil rights -- people disagreeing with a law and doing what they can to have that law changed.

As for options, I hear what you are saying. My argument, and that of several others, can be phrased in a manner similar to yours: that an abortion is not a good option (though it is better than some.)

It may surprise you that there are some days that I think that abortion isn't so bad -- days when I am feeling particularily misanthropic. On those days, I'd like nothing better than for the non-contributing imbeciles of society to stop having kids and then reaching for my wallet (via the government) to fund the kids they couldn't avoid in the first place.

But once a life (IMHO) has started, I need to put my own needs behind the needs of the life that has started. The mother* should be required to do the same. To be honest, I think that you underplay the potential of adoption -- I know it's not a panacea for the problems Western society faces, but IMHO, societally speaking, it's a much better option than abortion.

*Assuming the sex was consensual.

 

No, I did not. Once again, read what I said, not what you think I said.

That's exactly what I said in post #153.

No, I don't. My sister found her first child after looking for twenty years. Giving her baby up nearly killed her, but she also knew she'd have a lot of problems raising a child as a 17 year old single parent. I have his picture in My Friends request, my sister recommended him but he's turned down everyone in the family. If I send off the request his picture will be deleted, so I keep it as a recommended friend. It's not a good option -- to be honest until you're lived through it you really don't know.

 

T2Bruno you definitely mentioned Constitutional Amendments. As I said before I think if one is needed is debatable but if necessary I would support it.

However with your comment that "the pro-life crowd want to circumvent the entire system of government and put justices in office who will vote their religious beliefs over the Constitution" that is a pretty strong indication you feel Pro-Lifers are out to force their religious beliefs on the rest of the US.

Thus the discussion of if religious beliefs are only reason to be Pro-Life can be brought up.

Also overturning Roe wouldn't undo the entire government system of the US. State governments would have to write laws defining what they approve of, or not, with abortion and the why would also be debated as the laws were debated and crafted in the various state legislatures.

Generally, laws are overturned or supported by the supreme court and it doesn't undo or generate the entire system of government.

We can talk about if a particular ruling makes the government weaker or stronger and society better or worse but the system of government we have will remain for better or worse.

And yes sometimes parts of our government try to circumvent other parts, that happens (and not just between federal and state, sometimes executive vs legislative, local vs state, between different parts of state government, and so on). But if Roe is overturned and states generate terrible laws nothing is stopping (except the concern that its members would have to face elections themselves) the US Congress from writing a law that refers directly to abortion and, via federal power, overrules the state governments. But in a direct fashion (pointedly referring to an issue and why it does or does not mesh with the USA is about).





On adoption, I haven't lived it but if there was choice between having mental scars related to adoption and not having a chance to grow up I suspect many of the adopted would favor the former. That doesn't mean its perfect-it can involve really bad experiences with who knows how many mental scars-but it is still better than the other option.

 

Is there an echo in here?

You're still not reading what I wrote. You had it right above your typing and still aren't reading it. The religious affiliation of the individual pro-lifer doesn't matter -- as a group they want to select justices who will vote or rule based on personal (or religious) beliefs rather than the Constitution. I think that's been a pretty obvious tactic.

Who said anything about undoing the system of government? Are you making up arguments as you go along?

Now this was pure tripe:

That was a ridiculous argument using an emotional but meaningless example -- of course nearly every adopted person would rather have been adopted instead of aborted. How many ways can we possibly state the painfully obvious? I said nearly because many adopted kids never made it to adulthood -- you see an adoptive parent is 100 times more likely to kill than a birth parent (I don't know where he got the numbers, but I trust Gavin DeBecker when he makes comments like that).

I've known several women who've given up children for adoption and I've never been around one who doesn't feel the pain of loss. I don't know how many hours my sister cried over the years because of her decision, but I know how many she cried around me. It was easily the most emotionally painful thing that ever happened to her -- and we didn't have a very pleasant childhood. You never really know anything about the adopting family, you have no idea how they are treating the child. It is very much like the child just died -- in fact, giving the baby up was harder on my sister than a late term miscarriage she had.

Adoption really isn't much better for the mother than abortion, it's physically harder and carries its own emotional scars.

 

You say that now I note that you now say the religious affiliation doesn't matter.

But the part of your comment I noted and repeated, in specific and out of the whole quote, is:

That indicates you feel the religious affiliation, or at least the relating "religious beliefs", of Pro-Lifers does matter.

Now if you're rethinking that at least acknowledge it or, if you didn't really intend that the way it reads, then acknowledge you mistyped it.

The way you put it implies that the religious beliefs, rather than laws and/or Constitution of the land would be what the judges would follow.

Perhaps I exaggerated the point with the phrase "undoing". The point was that the system of government we have would handle the topic of abortion, just in different manner than now.

And you did say:

Which is a very strong comment and exaggerates, to say the least, what would happen and what Pro-Lifers want to do.




You called a point you basically agree with (when you said "every adopted person would rather have been adopted instead of aborted") as "pure tripe".

You may not care for my argument it but it is factually accurate. Moreover, as I was referring to the people who abortion has the greatest impact on rather than being "ridiculous" its a perfectly valid part of a discussion about abortion.

And if you think the example is painfully obvious then why defend abortion as a different option?

If both scar the mother than why not acknowledge it and that it may sadly be unavoidable that the mother is hurt but go with the option that is better for the child instead of seeming to deride it as an alternative in discussions of abortion?

No I don't know what your sister went through and I don't know if I ever will. If your intent is to highlight that adoption isn't a happy thing I can understand that.

But then why don't you do that as part of helping people understand the reality of the situation rather than as part of an argument against Pro-Lifers and in that way seem to defend abortion?




As a side note there are attempts to modify the practice of adoption so that a mother does know the family her child is growing up with-she may even be providing babysitting for them and has a chance to see up close how her child is doing.

This idea may have come too late for your sister and I don't know if it would have been workable in her case or not but at least some are trying to deal with the pain, wondering, and worrying that you talked your sister going through.

Again, it may have come too late for your sister but attempts to address it are being made. I can understand if that may be little comfort to you or her now-unfortunately sometimes things come too late in society, be they reforms, ideas, or better medical treatments they help those they come before and not after.

 

The courts defined when life began in legal terms, and thus what rights applied to it. Historically, society has not touched the issue of rights, but on the issue of life it's been quite divided. Many churches today still give christian burials to stilborn babies. The Catholic Church taught for a long time that the souls of those who die in the womb go to Limbo for a while because they didn't get baptised. Now that they don't have Limbo any more (I swear, that sounds like something WotC would do ), I don't know what the teaching is.

The courts decided when life began, the courts decided how much the interests of the State in an imminent human life weighed against the interests in the 'privacy' of the mother, or her 'involuntary servitude'. The courts could change either of those considerations without violating anything but their own previous ruling (and they can do that).

T2, like with the Amarillo nuts, this is something both sides do. Sad, but true.

When one person presents a counter to your arguement, it's generally proper to respond to that counter. You have a tendency to lump anyone you're arguing with into a large category (i.e. pro-life) and argue against what you percieve that category's arguements to be, whether the poster has made them or not, or even different arguements altogether. I'm not saying you shouldn't respond to the issue as a whole, just respond to individuals as well.

I'm sorry, but you shouldn't. Try The Murderer Next Door for a better source. I don't remember the exact statistics, but it's something like 2-4 times more likely. Now step-parents are dangerous, especially if you have two. Having one makes the child something like 10 times more likely and having two makes it something like 30 times more likely.

That kind of thing is dangerous, though. If there's anything people are willing to go crazy over, it's their children. The laws making adoptions double-blind (i.e. neither side knows the other side) were put in place for a reason.

 

The were put in place for a reason. But was that reason and/or the ideology/reasoning it was based on accurate.

It could have been that some felt a supposedly clean break was the best thing for all parties. If that was the thinking then it may have been inaccurate in that it didn't recognize the complexity of human beings.

T2Bruno's sister went through a bad experience. I may have worded it wrong when I said that a mother gets to babysit for her child (in this case the child is of the adoptive family now). But such a practice may have spared his sister some of her suffering. You may have to try to figure out which mothers will or won't go crazy when doing this to determine risks (something that may be hard to do). But I would argue that it isn't a bad thing to at least see if some of the aspects of adoption can be improved.

 

I think I'll pass on the "NOG School of Posting and Debating on Internet Forums."

 

pplr, I meant that there have been documented cases of mothers who put their children up for adoption trying to reclaim them later, legally and illegally, even from households and families better than what they could offer. These things can get as nasty as the worst divorce custody battle you've ever seen.