Avoid Raising a Serial Killer

[KarenNC]

I am saying that for 27 years abortion was shown by having happy healthy pictures. Did abortion decline or was there an attitude adjustment that it might be wrong. No, not really. Only after many years did pro-life people change their tactics.

Maybe you missed what I included in that post:

*cdc.gov/MMWR/preview/mmwrhtml/ss5511a1.htm

*CDC’s abortion surveillance report for 2003, the last year available as far as I know, shows:

"Overall, the annual number of legal induced abortions in the United States increased gradually from 1973 to 1990 (peak point) and then generally declined thereafter (Figure 1)…

The national legal induced abortion ratio increased from 196 per 1,000 live births in 1973 (the first year that 52 areas reported) to 358 per 1,000 in 1979 and remained nearly stable through 1981 (Figure 1, Table 2). The ratio peaked at 364 per 1,000 in 1984 and since then has demonstrated a generally steady decline…

The national legal induced abortion rate increased from 14 per 1,000 women aged 15–44 years in 1973 to 25 per 1,000 in 1980. The rate remained stable at 23–24 per 1,000 during the 1980s and early 1990s and at 20–21 per 1,000 during 1994–1997. The abortion rate remained unchanged at 17 per 1,000 during 1998–1999 and at 16 per 1,000 during 2000–2002, both overall and in the same 47 reporting areas. In 2003, the abortion rate remained unchanged overall at 16 per 1,000 and decreased to 15 per 1,000 in the 47 reporting areas. "*

To summarize, the number of abortions has been declining since 1990, the abortion ratio (number of abortions per 1000 live births) has been declining since 1984, and the abortion rate (number of abortions per 1000 women of reproductive age) has been declining, though in plateaus, since 1980. This is well within the 27 year mark you mention.

cdc.gov/MMWR/preview/mmwrhtml/ss5511a1.htm#fig1 is a graph showing the number, ratio and rate of abortions in the USf rom 1973 to 2003. If you look at the graph (I tried to include the image of it, but can’t make it work for some reason), you will plainly see that there was a much greater decline in all those areas prior to 2000 than there has been since 2000.

As an aside, there is an interesting article from the AGI about the efforts to make abortion rarer from both sides.
guttmacher.org/pubs/gpr/09/1/gpr090102.html

I was talking about the healthy developmental pictures of babies in the uterus or even a discuss about when life begins without pictures. The catholic church did not want any discussion about life at all and I haven’t seen any change of that in the Sunday School program.They leave it up the parents so to suggest that the Sunday school is where it should happen is bogus. It is not going to happen.

If the Catholic Church considers the most morally appropriate way to educate children about abortion is to leave it up to the parents, even for teens, much less preschoolers, then I am a bit confused as to why Catholics are here arguing that it is their religious duty to show these huge photos of blood-covered dismembered babies in areas and situations where parents have no option to choose whether or not their young children see these photos.

I do not really understand why they are saying that it is their religious duty and right to educate the children because they know (evidently based solely on the fact that the parents are headed to the toy store or grocery store with their children) that the parents are inadequately explaining abortion to their 3 and 4 year olds and that the protestors showing these signs in this manner are actually doing them a favor to so educate the children (presumably so they don’t grow up to be serial killers?).

Pretty big disconnect here. Is the Church then wrong in its moral teaching on this subject?*

 

[gam197]

origin

ally posted by KarenNC
Pretty big disconnect here. Is the Church then wrong in its moral teaching on this subject?

The church doesn’t necessarily have a moral teaching on how to teach against abortion. It teaches that it is wrong but doesn’t deem it necessary to teach in in its Sunday school classes. Now some Pastors may do that but others may not. There is no disconnect.

originally posted by KarenNC
you will plainly see that there was a much greater decline in all those areas prior to 2000 than there has been since 2000.

I am just not sure you can use these figures to represent that. There were many anti-abortion laws passed during that time and many feel these laws helped reduce abortion.

The aborted baby signs were used mainly to bring awareness to the holocaust going on in this country but some maintain that they also have reduced abortion.

 

[KarenNC]

The church doesn’t necessarily have a moral teaching on how to teach against abortion. It teaches that it is wrong but doesn’t deem it necessary to teach in in its Sunday school classes. Now some Pastors may do that but others may not. There is no disconnect.

The Church does not have a moral teaching on the ways in which adults should behave toward young children, regardless of the topic?

I’m afraid that there is at least an implicit teaching from the Church on ways in which one should go about teaching things like this, when one combines the example of the ways in which the issue is approached (or not) in Church’s own institutions along with the material from the Vatican on the appropriate ways to teach children about sexuality, etc.

The disconnect I see is with the protestors who are using the Church to defend the indiscriminate use of these huge graphic pictures in ways that any reasonable person would know is guaranteed to include young children against the wishes of their parents without making any even nominal attempts to prevent such exposure (outside the driveway to the toy store, as I pointed out), claiming it as a religious duty. The ones who go on to say that anyone who is not 100% behind such a method, has any criticism at all of it or dares to suggest that this is excessive is labeled as a bad Catholic, a “pro-aborts” throwing “hissy fits” and “hiding behind their children when they really don’t care about children at all” who wants their kids to grow up and have abortions and is a “bad parent” for not providing graphic instruction on abortion to 4 year olds.

All for saying “why is it okay to not care about showing these images to children without their parents’ permission on the street corner if we wouldn’t do the same thing to the same children in the Church on a Sunday morning?”

The Church certainly, I believe, has a teaching on the morality of living one way during the week and another way on Sunday morning.

I am just not sure you can use these figures to represent that. There were many anti-abortion laws passed during that time and many feel these laws helped reduce abortion.

The aborted baby signs were used mainly to bring awareness to the holocaust going on in this country but some maintain that they also have reduced abortion.

You said that abortion did not decline in the 27 years before the use of these graphic pictures of dismembered babies. The data does not support that statement. The question is pretty straightforward—either rates, numbers and ratios declined or they did not. They did.

That same data does not, by itself, tell us of any one specific cause for the decline, but it does show that a decline occurred. Even if it correlates with the use of a particular method of abortion protest, there would have to be a lot more research done to show that the one was the sole or even primary cause of the other. Correlation is not causation.

Note also that I keep mentioning data—concrete meaningful evidence. Not testimonials or anecdotes. Such can be useful to put a face on an issue or stir emotions, but they are not hard evidence or proof of overall effectiveness. I can gather testimonials on the effectiveness and desirability of anything in the world—watch the infomercials.

I contintue to be astounded that in 34 years evidently not one single person or group has seen fit to do any actual statistical studies or research into whether or not anything that the pro-life movement has done has had any measurable effect, much less which methods have yielded the most desirable results for the effort.

All of this is, of course, totally setting aside the reality that using unethical means to achieve an ethical goal doesn’t then make those means ethical. It just shows that one is the sort of person willing to use unethical means.

 

[estesbob]

All of this is, of course, totally setting aside the reality that using unethical means to achieve an ethical goal doesn’t then make those means ethical. It just shows that one is the sort of person willing to use unethical means.

Fortunately there is nothiing unethical about showing people the truth about what abortion does.

 

[KarenNC]

Fortunately there is nothiing unethical about showing people the truth about what abortion does.

Circumstances matter. Audience matters. Venue matters.

There is nothing unethical about showing an R or NC-17-rated documentary of the effects of war in a theatre to adult patrons with the rating clearly displayed.

Showing that same documentary outside a preschool or elementary school playground during recess without the consent of the parents I would classify as unethical.

It is the particular application of the method (showing that truth via tractor trailer-sized photos of bloody dismembered babies in places that you know young children will see them without their parents’ consent) that you are choosing to use that I consider unethical, not the simple “showing people the truth about what abortion does” via methods that use these same images in ways that actually target the “intended” audience and take basic reasonable precautions to avoid showing them to young children without their parents’ consent.

 

[estesbob]

Circumstances matter. Audience matters. Venue matters.

.

In your opinion. In my opinion these pictures can be shown anywhere those involved in the Ministry feel they will be effective. Having worked with them for years I trust their judgment

 

[jmcrae]

In your opinion.

It’s not just an opinion; it’s the law. It’s illegal to shout “fire” in a crowded theatre, unless there is actually a fire, and it’s illegal to show disturbing images to children.

It is not an “infringement of free speech” that this is so; rather, it protects the freedom and security of those who would not derive any good from such things.

 

[vern_humphrey]

It’s not just an opinion; it’s the law. It’s illegal to shout “fire” in a crowded theatre, unless there is actually a fire, and it’s illegal to show disturbing images to children.

Please cite the law.

It is not an “infringement of free speech” that this is so; rather, it protects the freedom and security of those who would not derive any good from such things.

First of all, there is no such law (if you contend there is, cite it.)

Secondly, the “Shouting fire in a crowded theater” test is not met here – that ruling applies only to incitement to immediate violence. There is no immediate danger to human life from showing graphic images of abortion victims.

And finally, thank you for once again proving that the persons opposed to using these images **do **want to make it illegal.

 

[KarenNC]

In your opinion. In my opinion these pictures can be shown anywhere those involved in the Ministry feel they will be effective. Having worked with them for years I trust their judgment

I am curious about why you don’t seem to trust the judgement of “those involved in the Ministry” (question about the capitalization here and what you consider to be encompassed in that term, btw) who are saying that it is wrong and ineffective, in fact perhaps actively counterproductive, to show these images where young children will encounter them.

Do you extend this unquestioning trust to each and every individual in each and every prolife group? Does anyone who says, “I am prolife” then get carte blanche to do whatever that person feels is effective? Do you trust their judgement so implicitly only when it agrees with your own desires or even when it disagrees? Or are they not part of the “Ministry” if they disagree?

You are asking me and every other parent to cede our parental responsibilities for our very young children over to anyone who “feels their methods are effective” in any given cause without any prior opportunity to even examine their methods. Do we give that privilege to every person who is espousing every cause? History is replete with folks who did some pretty horrible things “because they felt they would be effective.” The prolife movement has not shown itself immune to this phenomenon.

You may trust these folks to that extent. If you do, feel free to take your 3 year old to them and say, “Teach her in anyway you feel is effective. Obviously you know best. I won’t question you.” No one has ever said that you do not have that right.

I, however, don’t trust random strangers standing on street corners holding giant pictures of dismembered babies to that extent.

 

[mapleoak]

And finally, thank you for once again proving that the persons opposed to using these images **do **want to make it illegal.

Face it, they can’t hide that fact, try as they might.

 

[estesbob]

I am curious about why you don’t seem to trust the judgement of “those involved in the Ministry” (question about the capitalization here and what you consider to be encompassed in that term, btw) who are saying that it is wrong and ineffective, in fact perhaps actively counterproductive, to show these images where young children will encounter them.

.

I trust their judgment not to show them as much as I trust others judgments to show them. What I don’t trust is your judgment since you are not pro-life and have no experience in the Ministry

 

[estesbob]

It’s not just an opinion; it’s the law. It’s illegal to shout “fire” in a crowded theatre, unless there is actually a fire, and it’s illegal to show disturbing images to children.

It is not an “infringement of free speech” that this is so; rather, it protects the freedom and security of those who would not derive any good from such things.

Well I will make sure the next time we have a board meeting to remind people they shouldn’t enter a theatre and cry fire.

 

[estesbob]

Face it, they can’t hide that fact, try as they might.

He was clear about that.

 

[jmcrae]

Face it, they can’t hide that fact, try as they might.

It’s already illegal to show violent images and pornographic images to children under the age of 18 - ask any employee of a movie theatre, and any seller of magazines.

Please cite the law.

It’s the one that requires violent movies to receive an “R” rating*, thus keeping children out of the theatre when it’s playing, and also requires magazine sellers to keep certain magazines out of reach of children, in a separate section for adults only.

*R - Restricted to 18 years and older. No rental or purchase by those under 18. Contents not suitable for minors. Contains frequent sexual activity, brutality/graphic violence, intense horror, and/or other disturbing content.


Another interesting link.

 

[vern_humphrey]

It’s already illegal to show violent images and pornographic images to children under the age of 18 - ask any employee of a movie theatre, and any seller of magazines.

It’s the one that requires violent movies to receive an “R” rating*, thus keeping children out of the theatre when it’s playing, and also requires magazine sellers to keep certain magazines out of reach of children, in a separate section for adults only.

*R - Restricted to 18 years and older. No rental or purchase by those under 18. Contents not suitable for minors. Contains frequent sexual activity, brutality/graphic violence, intense horror, and/or other disturbing content.


Another interesting link.

Wow! Let me put my hip boots on! It’s getting deep around here!

The restrictions on Home Videos do not apply to pictures shown by protestors. And for you to pretend that they do is simply an admission of the poverty of your argument.

 

[jmcrae]

Wow! Let me put my hip boots on! It’s getting deep around here!

The restrictions on Home Videos do not apply to pictures shown by protestors. And for you to pretend that they do is simply an admission of the poverty of your argument.

If you can’t show a movie or a magazine with dismembered body parts in it to children, then how can you be allowed to show a poster of a dismembered baby to children?

 

[vern_humphrey]

If you can’t show a movie or a magazine with dismembered body parts in it to children, then how can you be allowed to show a poster of a dismembered baby to children?

And that’s your “proof” that it’s illegal to use these images?

 

[jmcrae]

And that’s your “proof” that it’s illegal to use these images?

If it’s illegal to show these images in a public venue, that includes the street outside the public venue, as well, right?

How much sense does it make to forbid the child to buy a movie ticket to see these images, and then go ahead and show them to him for free at the playground, or at the toy store?

 

[KarenNC]

I trust their judgment not to show them as much as I trust others judgments to show them. What I don’t trust is your judgment since you are not pro-life and have no experience in the Ministry

Please clarify what you mean when you say “the Ministry” and which groups you consider to be included under that title.

What happens to that trust if two groups disagree with showing them in exactly the same situation? On what objective basis do you judge which is correct?

 

[estesbob]

Please clarify what you mean when you say “the Ministry” and which groups you consider to be included under that title.

this

The fact you have to speaks volumes about your knowledge of the subject.

What happens to that trust if two groups disagree with showing them in exactly the same situation? On what objective basis do you judge which is correct?

Each group does what they think is best.