You suggest that Democrats should really emphasize this desire to keep abortions rare. But do you think these efforts will appease evangelical voters who firmly believe abortion is wrong?Those who are long-time readers know that most of us here are SOLIDLY Pro-life. We believe abortion is killing a baby. Some of us are willing to accept exceptions for the hard cases - rape, incest, life of the mother - and some of us are even willing to vote for a Pro-Choice candidate who otherwise reflects our views.
You're never going to win over all evangelicals, and I don't think anyone has suggested that. But 40 percent of evangelical voters are politically moderate, and when you dig deeper into that, you find that abortion is not their key issue. They're very willing to vote for a candidate who differs with them on abortion. We did a poll at Time in November on this and we found that when we asked people that very question -- would it be possible for them to vote for a candidate who didn't support their view on abortion? -- very high percentages said not only that they could but that they did vote for these candidates.
But I still find that Pro-Choice Democrats (and Pro-Choice Republicans) underestimate the importance of this issue, and don't understand why for so many of us it is a deal-breaker. "Abortion: legal but rare" is a nice slogan. But we are reminded of the surveys which show so many women (and men, unfortunately) view abortion as birth control, when they don't want to bother with a condom or a cold shower. Until the Pro-Choice community is willing to face this fact and deal with it, I do not see the Democratic party really cracking the Evangelical vote.
I think many people don't try to understand the Pro-Life stance that life begins at conception. If you believe that, you ought to be anti-abortion. If you don't believe that, then it is understandable that you might be pro-choice for certain or all circumstances.
YanıtlaSilAs to the Democrats "cracking the Evangelical vote", I think the Democrats only get substantial evangelical crossover votes when the Republicans really mess up. When Republicans are either corrupt or abandon their constituents core principles, then evangelicals find strong enough reason to vote for Democrats.
YanıtlaSilJust a test to see if this will work with Name/URL.
YanıtlaSilAs much as dems are vilified, you can understand why a Christian would be behind universal health care and "helping the poor" (put in quotes for a reason!) and various other social platforms of the party. There are many big gov. christians that I know but all of those would balk at the thought of public money, their tax money, paying for abortions. Dems aren't all bad, they are just wrong. (that doesn't make Reps right by default)
YanıtlaSil-BH
I agree with BowHunter. I have voted Democratic on occasion, and the only vote I well and truly regret in my life was for a Pro-Choice Republican who felt it her job to rub in my face every week that she was Pro-Abortion and therefore so was I. The heartache of those weekly mailings showed me that I can't vote for another Pro-Choice candidate.
YanıtlaSilBut if there were a Pro-Life Democrat then they would have a real chance for my vote.
A Pro-Life Democrat? I've never heard of one. (OK, at least one who wasn't only a Democrat for local politics purposes.)
YanıtlaSilThere are a few... here's an article about one: http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0404122.htm
YanıtlaSilI was a late teen/young adult when Roe vs. Wade was decided. All the discussions leading up to it were about how rare abortions would remain, but that the "hard cases" would not have to hide. We all know that slipery slope became a free-fall. In CT you can have an abortion for any reason, right up until the baby is actually born. That's about as steep a slope as it can get.
YanıtlaSilHaving someone now say that they want to make abortion legal (with few to no exceptions) but rare is a lie.
There are still some pro-llife dems from the south.
YanıtlaSil-BH
PS. My wife is due to have our second baby today. She it totaly within her rights to go kill the baby at a clinic without ever consulting me first. I would have no recourse. On the other hand, if she was in a trafic accident with a drunk driver and the baby was killed, that drunk would be charged with 1st degree murder. The level of how wanted a baby is determines it's value as a human. That is how sick our socity is.
(my wife is a good mother who makes beautiful babys and would never commit the formentioned murder.)
Ive never understood the 'rights from conception' thing myself. I dont know what it is that makes humans special, but its clearly some feature of brain or mind - take the brain out, and you are left with a sack of meat of no more moral worth than any other animal. Whatever this something is though, it seems clear that an embryo doesn't have it. It cant appear until, at an absolute minimum, the brain has formed and is capable of some significent activity. It might be much later than that, but it serves as a minimum point - trying to assign human rights before that point makes as much sense to me as trying to assign them to a plant.
YanıtlaSilSuricou, I know for me, it is a belief that God created humans special and that is why humans have rights that animals don't have. I won't speak for the others here, but I'm pretty sure most here would agree with me. Since it is a God-given right, it would have to be from conception.
YanıtlaSilSuricou, the same argument is used by eugenists who advocate the sterilization and termination of the handicapped and "vegetables." Making the determination that humans are only worthwhile as more than "a sack of meat" if they fit certain criteria that is arbitrarily determined by humans without the other's best self-interest in mind is a road that is morally repugnant at best, and outright cold-hearted extermination at the best.
YanıtlaSilLet's take what God says out of the equation for a minute. If Suricou is right and an embryo is just a sack of meat until later on in the cycle... who is to say when that point of being human is. What if you picked a date and then that date was later proved to be wrong and was set back. What are the moral implications for all of the embryo's terminated with the wrong scientific date?
YanıtlaSil(quizwedge)
We can't win a debate with someone who doesn't believe in a higher power by saying "because God says so". As soon as we interject God into the mix we lose. We might see it as wisdom (and it is because the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom) but we will not reach anyone from our viewpoint. The two planes are different. (bad pun) Am I wrong on this?
bh, you're absolutely right on both points. specifically referring to your point to quizwedge, to win the debate it has to be on a moral/legal grounds that are universal to all people's ethical/belief system. much like bh's argument previous argument in his post. If it is okay to abort an embryo before it becomes human, then the question becomes when does an embryo become human and since all embryos are different it becomes increasingly difficult to pinpoint when that happens. Thus making it morally responsible to not abort any embryo because we do not know when it has actually become human and not just a 'sack of meat'. Though I totally agree with quizwedge's point that it is God that gives human's special value - it's simply that in a secular state we need to keep our arguments on a secular level.
YanıtlaSilI guess I wasn't so much as trying to "win the debate" as explain why I thought so, but good points and I agree. Just to add a little bit more, I believe it was the Romans (or maybe the Greeks - Spartans, perhaps?) that believed that you didn't become human until your parents picked you up and accepted you after birth. Therefore, if you were born cripple, your parents were free to leave you for dead because you weren't a human yet.
YanıtlaSilThat belief was held among some of the Greek tribes, but not all. The Spartans were definitely of this mind, but the Athenians tended to care for the crippled.
YanıtlaSilThis is one thing that we often forget. The height of Greek civilization (until Alexander the Great) was not a unified culture, but a set of historically and genetically-related tribes. Each tribe had their own philosophies and ethics.
and I guess that some were pretty messed up.
YanıtlaSilSorry for not replying, I dont frequent this blog often. My responses though,
YanıtlaSilWard: A position may lead to unpleasant conclusions, but this does not mean it is wrong. Nor does avoiding these make one correct. A simple logical argument suggests that no rights should be assigned until some time after conception, because there is no brain to assign them to - if this happens to resemble in some ways the arguments used by some of history's less pleasant people, this is no reason to reject it. When issues of eugenics or disabled rights come up those can be debated seperately, but for now the discussion is over the arguments for and against assigning rights from conception vs at some later stage of development.
Quizwedge: When a 'God-given' right is specified, it seems always to be a human applying it. When did God give these rights? Where did He set them down, and how does He defend them? Why, if they have the backing of omnipotence, have they been so easy to infringe upon throughout history? Where was God during the millenia of slavery, or the many waves of religious persecution? If God really grants a right to life, why does He allow death due to illness or chance? And how do you explain the OT accounts of God smiteing millions of people, for 'crimes' ranging from serious things such as murder to trivialities including complaining and in one case merely thinking for a moment of sinning - and on a few occasions, killing people who performed no crime merely to show off his power (eg, the firstborn son event of Exodus, punishing the people of Egypt for the crimes of its ruler)? God-given rights appear to me to be nothing more than rights created by humans who then claimed to have God's backing. This doesn't mean they are not rights - but they are still artificial. Like currency, government and all morality they exist only so long as people believe in them. If people do not believe in these rights, and fight to keep them, then they cease to exist - just as a coin would be nothing but a piece of worthless metal if not for the widespread belief in its value.
Besides, even if God did grant a right to life, nowhere in the bible does He say at what stage of development it becomes applicable. I know all the verses that can be related to abortion, but they all require a great stretch of interpretation to be connected. One of the great secret of the religious right is that the bible is silent on the issue. In the absence of an answer from God, it must be up to man to determine. Even a God-given right does not 'have' to be from conception.
That was fun, but I must be going. First sunday of the month, and that means bootfair, yay!
Surico,
YanıtlaSilActually the place that a decision takes us is EXACTLY what we should be worried about. The ends do not justify the means, and consequences of decisions are the most important factor in deciding those decisions.
As for history, well you are defined by those who you are most close to in thinking, and I will avoid altogether being lumped in with mass-murders.
As to your last point, the Bible doesn't say, word for word that life begins at a certain point. However, the entire current of the essence of NT teaching is that life is precious, in any condition. You can't read the NT with an open mind and not come away with that realization. You are confusing the topic when you bring up the Hebrew Testaments. Yes, we accept them, but they are Jewish and not Christian in their origin. Those are two very different religions.
"The ends do not justify the means, and consequences of decisions are the most important factor in deciding those decisions."
YanıtlaSilCorrect if you are making a decision - incorrect if you are trying to establish a fact. In which case, the most important factor - the only important factor - is the determination of what is true.
Comparing me to mass-murderers doesn't do anything to counter the argument - the mass murderers went too far, but you are going too far in the opposite direction. Its like declaring you need to ban cars because Hitler supported road expansion.
"However, the entire current of the essence of NT teaching is that life is precious, in any condition."
Were this true, all Christians would be vegetarians.
I didn't bring up the NT because there isn't anything in there that I know of which could be used in connection with abortion. There isn't a lot in the OT either - you need to stretch that.