 |
| H/T Red Rambler: Is Pro-Life really Pro-Life? |
Image via Wikipedia Have you ever noticed that when Social Conservatives use a bumper sticker term like "Right To Life," it often means something entirely different than what ordinary English Usage would suggest?
"Right to Life" - you would think - would imply a broad reverence for life and a reluctance to interfere in matters of individual liberty. But in fact, the only real right to life they seem to respect is their right to interfere with your life, and there are two iconic causes here - any chance that a woman might control her own reproduction, even in cases of rape or incest (one is tempted at times to use the word especially) and of course the gun-culture fetishism. It is not Right to Life when the direct outcome of policy and politics is a demonstrable effect - the obvious and naked assertion that it's the Right of the Right to take any life they goddamn well please.
Of course, it's not just abortion. It's the War on Drugs. It's the Climate Denialism. It's the never ending whine that the concept of evolution is controversial. It's the outright war on science, education and yes, decent, civilized humane behaviour.
I've become increasingly impatient with the extremists of the Social Right. The raging intolerance of any complexity, any suggestion that professional and considered examination of anything is a good idea, and critical for whatever sort of government exits has taken western society into a very dark place indeed.
I am done considering it to be a valid, debatable, defensible position. Oh, you may have an ideology, a faith, a doctrinal viewpoint - but there are consequences and logical outcomes to those positions; if you blame those outcomes on the people who are affected by your views, you don't have a goddamn right to talk in public, much less try to impose your will. Oh, and I'm not the only one; HT: Dispatches from the Culture Wars. (ganked in toto with)
Answering the Anti-Abortion Billboard
Posted on: April 3, 2011 10:03 AM, by Ed BraytonI posted the other day about the new billboard campaign in Chicago that features a picture of Obama and the text "Every 21 seconds our next possible leader is aborted." Commenter lofgren left the absolutely perfect response to that message:
Every 21 seconds, our next possible leader receives a crappy public education, misses out on invaluable opportunities due to his family's indigence as a result of a health crisis, is forced to work two minimum wage jobs in order to survive and cannot possibly invest in the world around them, commits suicide because of the despair of being bullied because of his sexuality, is benighted by denialism and anti-intellectualism, or finds herself forced against her will to sacrifice her future for a baby she doesn't want to give birth to.I'm in awe of that response. Bravo!
Me too! And like another commenter there, I wish I'd said it myself. In a few years, I'm sure I will be quite sure I actually did. But in fact, this is more than just semantics, or pay to play politics, or social engineering, or the desire to impose a theocracy on us all. All of these things are ingredients in one putrid vat of toxic kool-aide. It's not mere stupidity compounding ignorance. This is now a war on sanity. There's a point beyond where you cannot respect, much less tolerate a "divergent view." And here we are.
Killing For JesusWell, when the same people want to put pregnant women in jail for things like this, but have no problem with sending people to death row for crimes they didn't commit, I have a problem with the phrase "right to life."
by digby
Nothing extreme here, nothing at all:
There is no greater example of the "Right To Life" moral bankruptcy than their stem cell fetish. They would rather see living, brething, sentient human beings die than kill a few cells in a petrie dish. You tell me who's the Nazi?
Religious Right activists have frequently found themselves at odds with the prominent health organization the American Cancer Society, attacking the group over its support for stem-cell research, the approval of an HPV vaccine, and for an anti-smoking program by an Iowa Planned Parenthood clinic. Josh Braham, the director of Right to Life Central California and the host of Life Report, has taken this antipathy to a new level, calling for a boycott of American Cancer Society activities because of the group’s support for stem cell research. Writing for the anti-choice website LifeNews, Brahm calls for a boycott of the Relay for Life and claims that supporting the group is no different than aiding Nazi scientists.
Here's an excerpt from the ACLU article, cited above.
Yesterday, the ACLU submitted a friend-of-the-court brief urging the Marion County Superior Court in Indiana to dismiss the prosecution of Ms. Bei Bei Shuai.But Justice Alito sees no need to compensate a man from who almost everything and very nearly his life entire - was taken from him by a corrupt, malicious and incompetent agent of the state.
The facts of this case are heartbreaking. On December 23, 2010, Shuai, a 34-year-old pregnant woman who was suffering from a major depressive disorder, attempted to take her own life. Friends found her in time and persuaded her to get help. Six days later, Shuai underwent cesarean surgery and delivered a premature newborn girl who, tragically, died four days later.
On March 14, 2011, Shuai was arrested, jailed, and charged with murder and attempted feticide. Had Shuai, who is being represented by National Advocates for Pregnant Women and local attorneys, not been pregnant when she attempted suicide, she would not have been charged with any crime at all.
Justice Alito doesn't believe in your right to life. Just the right to impose upon yours. I'd like to close with this observation by A. Barton Hinkle.
[C]onservative Christians and conservative Muslims share enough values on enough social issues that it can be jarring to watch how the debate over faith in America unfolds. For persons of deep religious conviction, it matters deeply whether injunctions against homosexuality, fornication, abortion and so on are rooted in this sacred text or that one. For everyone else, the doctrinal basis someone cites for a theocratic state matters far less than the fact that he wants to impose one in the first place.Oh, you may well wonder what I suggest we do about it. I have a profoundly powerful idea. Shunning. Do no business with such people. Make a point of avoiding them. Snub them in public if necessary. Lose their email addresses. And yes, even family, and even within marriage. Do not "agree to disagree" - hold no congress with them!
Unfuck 'em.
2 comments:
Adult stem cells (stem cells taken from a donor) are proven effective...fetal stem cells are not. In fact, in several cases using fetal stem cells, the patients have developed tumors. To use fetal stem cell research as a justification for abortion is assine and morally reprehensible.
Speaking of "assine and morally reprehensible" - implying that I did so is a particularly cheap and shallow example of drive-by trolling.
Post a Comment