spartakus@my-deja.com wrote:

spartakus@my-deja.com wrote:

Spartakus wrote:

I've asked anti-choicers about that many times. They don't see
the contradiction between allowing parents to force their pregnant
daughters to continue their pregnancies and not allowing parents
to force their pregnant daughters to abort.

There is no contradiction. Is there a contradiction between allowing
parents to force their children to not steal and not allowing parents
to force their children to steal? Nope. Stealing is wrong.

Well, duh... but we were talking about a low-risk medical procedure to
enable a teenager to resume her life with a better chance of making
something of herself, not of unlawfully depriving a third party of
their property. Bad analogy - no bagel.

Your not being able to understand the analogy does not make it bad.

First, come up with a *good* analogy - stealing isn't anything like
abortion. This is what it comes down to - you made an assertion that
there is no contradiction between parents not being empowered to force
their pregnant daughters to abort and being empowered to force their
pregnant daughters to continue their pregnancies. To support your
assertion, you made an analogy between abortion and stealing. You
offered a pair of syllogisms in series:

Stealing is wrong. Therefore, anything we do to prevent stealing is a
good thing.
Abortion is wrong. Therefore, anything we do to prevent abortion is a
good thing.

And than you treated yourself to some undeserved self-congratulations
over your stunning debating coup. Except...

Abortion isn't anything like stealing, and many people don't think that
abortion is wrong. Therefore, your analogy only holds for people of an
anti-choice frame of mind. To be continued...

You'd have made a fine argument if I was comparing abortion to
stealing. But I wasn't. The analogy was about the parental attitudes
towards abortion and stealing. Not about abortion or stealing itself.
If an act is immoral then there is no contradiction between supporting
parents having knowledge of their child performing that act, and not
supporting a parent's authority to force the child to perform that act.
The specific act is irrelevant. This principle holds true regardless
of what the act in question is.

Whatever supports not stealing is the right thing to do. Therefore, if
you believe that abortion is wrong then whatever supports abortions
not happening is the right thing to do.

Iow, the ends justify the means. How "wrong" is abortion, Mr. Barnes?
If it is wrong enough to force a teenage girl not to abort, isn't is
also wrong enough to force doctors and nurses not to perform abortions?
Assuming that the level of force should be commenserate with the
wrong-ness, what level of force is appropriate?

None of that is relevant to the point.

It's very relevant, because the principle that you are asserting ("if
you believe that abortion is wrong then whatever supports abortions not
happening is the right thing to do) should apply to doctors and nurses
as well as pregnant teenagers. How robust is this principle of yours?
If it doesn't apply to doctors and nurses, then it must not be a very
robust principle.

This is about whether it is consistent or contradictory to simultaneously
support parental notification before an abortion and not support parental
authority to force an abortion. It has nothing whatsoever to do with
doctors or nurses.

There's no contradiction.

Of course there is.

Then demonstrate it. You're not making any point. You're just
editorializing about how right you are and how wrong people are who
disagree with you. That's not offering any logic or evidence to prove
me wrong.

1. Re-read this post from the beginning.

There is nothing in this post that demonstrates there was any
contradiction either. You have still not addressed the original point
in any way whatsoever.

2. I am starting to get annoyed by your wholely unmerited pretensions.

I posted a message about something not being a contradiction. Your
response said "Of course there is" and other than those 4 words not one
single bit of it addressed the contradiction in any way. My pretention
is not unmerited. Your diatribes about the evils of anti-choices do
not prove anything whatsoever about the central contradiction that I
was writing about.

Of course it is, because it explains why people of an anti-choice frame
of mind don't have a problem with the contradiction (although they
should). It's because the anti-choice movement is about reasserting
outside control over women's sexuality and reproductive capacity. As
long as they (or some approved proxy like the church or the government
or parents) are in control, they are happy.

The reason why anti-choice people don't have a problem with the
contradiction is because there is no contradiction to have a problem
with in the first place.

Whatever
supports not stealing is the right thing to do. Therefore, if you
believe that abortion is wrong then whatever supports abortions not
happening is the right thing to do.

And if you believe that minors bearing children is wrong, then
whatever supports childbirth not happening is the right thing to do.

Yes, exactly right.

So abortion is OK, as long as the parents approve.

I don't know where you get that from. What you said was "if you
believe that minors bearing children is wrong, then whatever supports
childbirth not happening is the right thing to do" and I agreed. I
don't see how that says abortion is okay as long as the parents
approve.

It doesn't actually say anything is okay. That was never my point in
the first place. I'm not saying abortion is okay or not okay. I'm
saying that for someone who does believe it is wrong, then it is
entirely appropriate for them to oppose parents being able to force
their kids to have an abortion and also appropriate for them to oppose
kids being able to have an abortion without telling their parents.

I'm not arguing for or against abortion here,

I'm arguing against the
idea that there is a contradiction.

There's no contradiction.

The contradiction (as usual) is between what they say and their real
motivations. If they said, we support parental notification/consent
because it will reduce abortions, then they would be honest. When
they say, we support parental notification/consent because we believe
that parents should have authority over their children, they are
lying. Thank you for admitting that much.

That still doesn't demonstrate any contradiction. You're simply
restating the same thing again. If people believe that abortion is
wrong, then they will support that which reduces abortion.

Including telling lies to achieve that end. That is the real point.
The apparent contradiction exists because they are lying.

But maybe they aren't lying. Sure they might be. But not necessarily.
You say it like it's the only possibility and that's what I think is
narrow minded of you. There are billions of people in the world and
that means there are billions of different ideas and perspectives on
things.

A parent's authority over their children does not extend to the point
of forcing the child to do something that is wrong.

That doesn't mean
the parent has NO authority over the child. It just means the
authority has limits. A parent can't force their child to jump off the
Empire State Building either.

Just because someone
supports parents having authority over their children does not mean
that person supports parents forcing and/or allowing their children to
commit immoral acts.

But if the parent doesn't consider it an immoral act, then this
reasoning wouldn't apply. Rather the stated preference of
anti-abortion lobby - that the parents' authority should be respected
- should dictate that the daughter gets the abortion whether she wants
it or not.

Yes, sure. If the parent doesn't consider it an immoral act then the
reasoning wouldn't apply. Of course. I'm just saying that it's
possible that the parent does consider it that way and that the
reasoning does apply. So therefore making blanket statements about
there being a contradiction is wrong. There may not be a
contradiction, depending upon the opinions and perspectives of the
people involved.

That's not to say the people are *justified* in feeling the way they
do, it's just to say they aren't lying or hypocritical about it.

Fortunately for the anti-abortion lobby, it is unlikely that the
parent will be able to find a clinic which will perform an abortion on
an unwilling patient, parents wishes be damned. That is because most
doctors performing abortions have high ethical standards and believe
in the woman's right to chose whether or not to continue a pregnancy.

Personally, I believe there's a difference between a girl and a woman.
If a girl can't get a job, can't vote, can't drive a car, can't sign a
contract, can't be tried as an adult in court, etc then she has no
business making important medical decisions. I don't believe a 13 or
14 year old who is physically developed enough to get pregnant is
necessarily mentally and emotionally developed enough to make an
informed decision. The idea that a person can be not old enough to
consent to having sex in the first place but can give sole consent to
an abortion seems far fetched to me.

That's all there is to it. There's no hypocricy
or contradition there.

Only the appearance of contradiction created by anti-abortion lies.

Or, sincere anti-abortion principles.

Your
problem is seemingly (I can't say for sure, but just based off this
comment you made) that you can't comprehend that not everyone thinks
like you do.

I think they shouldn't be lying hypocrites. They obviously disagree.

You're demonstrating my point. You don't allow that people who
disagree with you simply disagree with you. They couldn't honestly
have a difference of opinion. They must be lying hypocrites. Your
views are the only possible correct views.

When they said, a parent should have authority over medical treatment
of their minor children, they lied because that isn't what they
thought. If they had said, "We're only doing this to reduce the
number of abortions," they would have been telling the truth.

Yes you're right except that if someone believes that abortion is wrong
and believes that nobody should have the choice to have one, then
there's no lie. Like I said, you can support a parent's authority over
their children while not supporting the parent's right to force their
kid to jump off a building. If something is wrong then it's wrong.

Just because the issue is about choice to you, doesn't
mean it's about choice to others. If the issue is not about forcing
choice, but is instead about stopping abortion, then it would be
contradictory to not allow parents to stop abortion and to allow
parents to force abortion. The only reason you see a contradiction is
because you're viewing the actions of others through your own
motivations. But based on their motivation of stopping abortion, there
is no contradiction.

Just lying.

Your accusation does not make it so. All it does is show that you, the
self proclaimed champion of choice, are more narrow minded than those
who you call controlling.

I absolutely do not support the supposed right of a parent to force
their daughter to have an abortion or to not have an abortion. I have
no desire to see abortions rise. I only want women of all ages and in
all places to be able to choose abortion if they want it. I am not a
lying hypocrite.

I'm not saying you're a lying hypocrite. I said it's narrow minded to
assume that you know what motivates other people. There are a number
of valid opinions out there, neither yours nor mine is the only one.

Personally, I don't like the death penalty. I think there's always a
chance you have the wrong person and there's always a chance the person
could do some good deed from prison. I support locking people up until
they die of natural causes when the crime is severe enough, but I don't
support actually executing them. But I accept that people who do
support the death penalty see things differently than I do. They are
still moral people. I don't call them "no better than murderers
themselves" or anything like that.

I'm not saying I'm some kind of saint or anything, I'm just saying that
you can take a stand on an issue and believe in it without having to
declare that the people on the opposite side of the issue are evil
liars.

I can't tell you how many "Pro-lifers" I have met who were positively
giddy about AIDS. They are lying hypocrites.

Yes I've seen that too. I agree it's pretty disgusting.

--
satyr #1953
Chairman, EAC Church Taxation Subcommittee
Director, Gideon Bible Alternative Fuel Project
Supervisor, EAC Fossil Casting Lab