How should abortion be stopped?

[Black_Rose]

Long story short, I advocate using repressive social institutions as opposed to rule of law to quell abortion.

I posted this on an earlier thread:

I just do not think it is politically possible to abolish abortion; furthermore, I do not believe abortion should be used as a cudgel to force people to disregard other important issues because of their moral ambiguity (or more likely the differential impact on varying people’s self interest causing people to take views consistent with their self-interest)

I believe abortion is best dealt with repressive social institutions not rule of law which is a Confucian position. Abortion should be discouraged through social taboos and inculcated morality, not draconian rule of law.

From the Analects of Confucius:

Guide them by edicts, keep them in line with punishments, and the common people will stay out of trouble but will have no sense of shame. Guide them by virtue, keep them in line with the rites, and they will, besides having a sense of shame, reform themselves.”

On a personal note:
As for me, I cannot imagine myself as fervent anti-abortion activist as one who volunteers to protests at abortion clinics and at Crisis Pregnancy Centers. I am mildly bipolar, and there are times where I wish I could cease living and withdraw from participating in society although these feeling do not manifest themselves as active suicidal tendencies. In other words, there are times where I do not value my life and, because of this, I do not think I could value of the life of others in the womb and have some feelings of apathy regarding the welfare of the unborn. Of course, this is just a statement of my own feelings and sentiments, not an argument about the morality or immorality of abortion in abstract terms.

However, I would like greater emphasis on bettering the condition of those who are born: for instance relieve physical privation and allow all people to live an economically dignified life regardless of their innate talents and abilities and promote an environment of amity not hostility and disdain for those who are born. Furthermore, the aforementioned changes would require an effort to actually raise living standards, not just give people an equal opportunity to do so.

 

[Prof_K]

Like any other instrinsic evil, abortion ought to be opposed with every moral means. There isn’t a choice between enacting rules of law (which can hardly be described as draconian) and creating social pressure. The easy answer for me as to which ought to be used, is obvious, both. There is no choice. The only restriction is to use means that fall within the moral teaching of the Catholic Church.

 

[kimmielittle]

I’d make Moms and dads view babygrams

I’d make mom’s and Dads view the baby destroyed

I’d require an in ground funeral paid for attended by Moms and dads

But you will have to wait awhile till I can run for President

 

[the_phoenix]

"I just do not think it is politically possible to abolish abortion; furthermore, I do not believe abortion should be used as a cudgel to force people to disregard other important issues because of their moral ambiguity (or more likely the differential impact on varying people’s self interest causing people to take views consistent with their self-interest)

“I believe abortion is best dealt with repressive social institutions not rule of law which is a Confucian position. Abortion should be discouraged through social taboos and inculcated morality, not draconian rule of law.”

Likewise, I do not think it is politically possible to abolish theft. So let’s just decriminalize it, according to the social taboo theory. I mean, some poor guy thinks it’s in his self-interest to steal, right? I mean, he really needs that loaf of bread or that plasma screen TV to watch American Idol, that’s what he believes anyways. So who are we to say otherwise? It’s his body, he’s got a right to steal with it if he wants, right? His choice? Pro-choice? And nobody even necessarily dies in a robbery, like they do in abortion … Well, people might die sometimes if the robber has a gun, but hey, if we can kill the unborn, why can’t we kill anyone who gets in the way of our self-interest?

Same thing with speeding. The guy with the flashy Mustang thinks it’s cool to go fast. (I love Mustangs, btw … ) So what we as a society need to do according to the social taboo theory is to make speeding uncool. What’s up with all these police, laws, speeding tickets, if we all want to drag race at 125 miles an hour down the highway, don’t we have a right to do what we want with our own cars? Cars that are driven by our bodies, and we have a right to do what we want with our own bodies? Shouldn’t we as a society just set our own speeding limit according to what’s popular based on how we all feel, or what mood each driver happens to be in on a given day, or what our self-interest is when it comes to how quickly we want to travel? Therefore, in the interest of safety, we who are in favor of safety should drive around with bull horns and as a speeder passes us, we should politely say, “Hey dude, slow down, would you? Like, pretty please?”

Instead of passing laws, why don’t we just tell people who commit crimes to wear a dunce cap and stand in a corner with a sign saying “Loser” while the rest of society stands around and laughs? We can spray them with silly string for added public humiliation. That’ll stop crime just fine, huh? Because we wouldn’t want to be draconian, now would we?

~~ the phoenix

 

[lizaanne]

The pro-life community has bashed its collective head against a wall for decades trying to educate those who don’t understand that we are discussing a living humanbeing in the womb. It appears that no amount of education will change the desire for “choice”.

Given this - the alternative is that we are forced to protect the unborn by making it illegal to murder them. Sad that we even have to do that, but some folks just don’t get it.

Sure - in a perfect world laws would not be necessary because every person would understand this to be an unborn child, and never even entertain the concept of killing it. But alas, we await heaven for such a “world”.

Until then - we do what we can.

~Liza

 

[Puddin317]

I’d make Moms and dads view babygrams

I’d make mom’s and Dads view the baby destroyed

I’d require an in ground funeral paid for attended by Moms and dads

But you will have to wait awhile till I can run for President

You could start with compassion and prayer for those of us who are post-abortive and struggling so that we may join the fight to end it. The kind of things you post as above are detrimental to the healing process in ways you can’t possibly even imagine. Every time someone speaks that way, you knock down those who are trying to recover.

Who else but those of us who have been through it and regret it to be a more eloquent defender of life?

 

[estesbob]

However, I would like greater emphasis on bettering the condition of those who are born: for instance relieve physical privation and allow all people to live an economically dignified life regardless of their innate talents and abilities and promote an environment of amity not hostility and disdain for those who are born. Furthermore, the aforementioned changes would require an effort to actually raise living standards, not just give people an equal opportunity to do so.

None of which matter in the least to those who are denied the right to life. None of the above, even combined, rise to the level of abortion.

 

[kimmielittle]

You could start with compassion and prayer for those of us who are post-abortive and struggling so that we may join the fight to end it. The kind of things you post as above are detrimental to the healing process in ways you can’t possibly even imagine. Every time someone speaks that way, you knock down those who are trying to recover.

Who else but those of us who have been through it and regret it to be a more eloquent defender of life?

Would my suggestions work or help stop abortions?

They suggest a responsibility be taken by Moms and Dads…
I think, Abortions need to be unhidden…AND that is what I’ve promoted

I sorrow for your personal loss…but Abortion isn’t just a personal issue…it affects all of us.

I do pray for those who have gone through this…ALL of us.

 

[aicirt]

IMO more needs to be said to men of all ages.

Young men need to know there are girls who want to get pregnant. It is and always has been a way for girls to get out of living at home and start their own family way too soon for them and for the boyfriend. Flip side is the girl who wants to have sex and really doesn’t believe it is wrong to have an abortion. The male has no rights. It is her body and the girl decides whether or not to keep the child. Bottom line is males need to be educated that this seed they are planting will be living with the girl long after they’ve left or aborted. I would really like it if the point could be comprehended by more men not to have sex with anyone they wouldn’t want to be their mother.

 

[Lutheranteach]

I’m in the legal, safe, and most of all RARE camp.

 

[CWBetts]

I’m in the legal, safe, and most of all RARE camp.

Then you really need to explain why it should be legal. It is NEVER safe. In fact there is a nearly 100% chance of somebody dying. As long as it is legal, and has the sanction of the government, it will not be rare. Your position is self-refuting. Try again.

 

[tbcrawford]

The value of life is something we don’t always realise when we are young /teenagers when our hormones kick in.Do these young girls who find themselves pregnant really understand that there is a life inside them?

I think this is part of the problem.When we can get our young adults to think for themselves about politcal situations they usually develop a wonderful genuine heartfelt conscience.When I used to work with young adults it was always heartwarming to hear their debates about things happening in the world that they felt strongly about such as wrongly imprisoned people injustices in the world and so forth.

My personal view is that if we made it a priority in our schools and at home to educate our young about abortion and the injustice to the child perhaps this would help them to develop their own strong opinions to not go ahead with abortion.Just my opinion

Puddin317 I am humbled by your frank and open experience.May God bless you.
I agree that compassion and healing for the mother who regrets abortion is extremely important
thankyou for sharing your experiences with us.I pray for you to heal from this and help others by your experiences.I am sure kimmie didn’t mean to offend I think she merely thought shocking a young pregnant couple might prevent another tragedy.

God bless you

 

[the_phoenix]

I’m in the legal, safe, and most of all RARE camp.

Well, you’ve got one out of three. It’s currently legal, sad to say.

 

[Stjudeprayforus]

I’d make Moms and dads view babygrams

I’d make mom’s and Dads view the baby destroyed

I’d require an in ground funeral paid for attended by Moms and dads

But you will have to wait awhile till I can run for President

Seeing my sisters sonogram at 8 weeks pregnant changed my mind. I came from the day where we were all told ‘its just a blob of cell;’

Then my sister was pregnant (happily married ect…) she had to have one and there was a BABY… that was my nephew. I have been pro life ever since. That ‘blob of cells’ is graduating high school this week and off to college.

 

[manualman]

Well, you asked. It’s entirely possible that abortion would have been illegal in the very near future had catholics placed priority on this issue in the 2008 presidential election. By all accounts, the court was split 4-5 on the matter before the election and one pro-Roe justice has already been replaced. Had a pro-life been president and managed to get a pro-life justice confirmed there would be a 5-4 margin in favor of overturning Roe. The overturn would likely take the form of taking the matter out of federal jurisdiction (strict constructionist), not a judicial fiat against abortion, so a number of states would immediately revert to their EXISTING laws that ban abortion (which have been in enforcement limbo since Roe). The issue would become a public debate and become an opportunity for us all to witness to the gospel of Christ and the sanctity of human life.

Vote life next time.

 

[kimmielittle]

The value of life is something we don’t always realise when we are young /teenagers when our hormones kick in.Do these young girls who find themselves pregnant really understand that there is a life inside them?

I think this is part of the problem.When we can get our young adults to think for themselves about politcal situations they usually develop a wonderful genuine heartfelt conscience.When I used to work with young adults it was always heartwarming to hear their debates about things happening in the world that they felt strongly about such as wrongly imprisoned people injustices in the world and so forth.

My personal view is that if we made it a priority in our schools and at home to educate our young about abortion and the injustice to the child perhaps this would help them to develop their own strong opinions to not go ahead with abortion.Just my opinion

Puddin317 I am humbled by your frank and open experience.May God bless you.
I agree that compassion and healing for the mother who regrets abortion is extremely important
thankyou for sharing your experiences with us.I pray for you to heal from this and help others by your experiences.I am sure kimmie didn’t mean to offend I think she merely thought shocking a young pregnant couple might prevent another tragedy.

God bless you

It always has bothered me…that us kids get more truthful information on the package of a bread-wrapper or happy meal…than we get about abortions -kimmie

 

[kimmielittle]

Seeing my sisters sonogram at 8 weeks pregnant changed my mind. I came from the day where we were all told ‘its just a blob of cell;’

Then my sister was pregnant (happily married ect…) she had to have one and there was a BABY… that was my nephew. I have been pro life ever since. That ‘blob of cells’ is graduating high school this week and off to college.

AWWWW…

I have a picture of me

 

[estesbob]

I’m in the legal, safe, and most of all RARE camp.

I’ve never understood that slogan. If abortion is the killing of a human being we should vehemently oppose it. If its not then why should it be rare? Seems like a cop-out to me-well to be honest it seems like the kind of slogan a pro-abortion canidate would use to try to dupe pro-life adherents into voting for them

 

[Black_Rose]

Same thing with speeding. The guy with the flashy Mustang thinks it’s cool to go fast. (I love Mustangs, btw … ) So what we as a society need to do according to the social taboo theory is to make speeding uncool. What’s up with all these police, laws, speeding tickets, if we all want to drag race at 125 miles an hour down the highway, don’t we have a right to do what we want with our own cars? Cars that are driven by our bodies, and we have a right to do what we want with our own bodies? Shouldn’t we as a society just set our own speeding limit according to what’s popular based on how we all feel, or what mood each driver happens to be in on a given day, or what our self-interest is when it comes to how quickly we want to travel? Therefore, in the interest of safety, we who are in favor of safety should drive around with bull horns and as a speeder passes us, we should politely say, “Hey dude, slow down, would you? Like, pretty please?”

~~ the phoenix

Most people, despite possessing differing capacities for moral reasoning (see Kohlberg’s stages of moral development), agree that speeding and theft (actual robbery, not jejune libertarian slogans such as “taxation is theft”) are wrong. However, different people at advanced levels of moral reason (Kohlberg’s fifth and sixth stages: the post conventional stages of social contract and universal ethical principles) can arrive at different conclusions about the morality of abortion using abstract reason. For instance, Peter Singer, a formidable ethical scholar, argues that abortion can be ethnically acceptable in a preference utilitarian framework because the baby has no legitimate interests nor the capacity to feel pain. Furthermore, one can argue that imposing the pro-life views on the general population is an act of moral imperial since a substantial fraction of the population do not find abortion morally objectionable (about 40-60%).

I posted this earlier:

Some political axes are influenced by religion; for instance, those who oppose abortion, homosexuality, and embryonic stem cell research are almost always those who embrace Christian theology with atheists and agnostics being insignificant exceptions to this general rule. The converse, however, is not valid since a nominal Christian/Catholic identity does not translate into opposition against the aforementioned issues. As I journey through the Catholic Church as I become catechized (my parents already had me baptized by I was never raised Catholic), I expect to adopt the orthodox Catholic position on these issues, but I have no intention to project my views in a moralistically imperialist fashion. Instead, I see Church teaching as a “code of rites” regulating individual conduct that is voluntarily adhered but not universally applicable. Church teaching does not dictate the rule of law which is universally applicable to all citizens and adherence is not optional. This approach is pragmatic because it respects people’s differing values in a diverse multicultural society and fosters an environment of tolerance although such diversity may erode social capital since people do not share the same homogeneous views. While abortion is considered acceptable within the rule of law, those bound by the “code of rites” are prohibited from procuring abortions. However, this should not be mistaken as complacency towards abortion. Because I am relying on an analogy based on an oriental (Confucianism Ru Jia) instead of an occidental understanding of social conduct, I will post this to facilitate comprehension:

The Confucian Code of Rites (Liji) is expected to be the controlling document on civilized behavior, not law. In the Confucian world view, rule of law is applied only to those who have fallen beyond the bounds of civilized behavior. Civilized people are expected to observe proper rites. Only social outcasts are expected to have their actions controlled by law. Thus the rule of law is considered a state of barbaric primitiveness, prior to achieving the civilized state of voluntary observation of proper rites. What is legal is not necessarily moral or just.

The ideal state rests on a stable society over which a virtuous and benevolent sovereign/emperor rules by moral persuasion based on a Code of Rites rather than by law. Justice would emerge from a timeless morality that governs social behavior. Man would be orderly out of self-respect for his own moral character rather than from fear of punishment prescribed by law.

atimes.com/atimes/China/EG24Ad01.html

From the Catholic perspective, one voluntarily abides by its “Code of Rites”, not because one fears punishment from a wrathful God but from one’s desire to meaningfully signal their greater love for God over themselves.

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=443731&highlight=confucian

Why impose Church Teaching on people who do not agree with Her through with the political apparatus of the state by restricting abortion for everyone? Isn’t that a violation of the classical liberal principle of liberty (of which many people on this forum embrace (at least economically) as a political principle)?

 

[Black_Rose]

In addition, wouldn’t those with financial resources circumvent any abortion ban by traveling to a jurisdiction where abortion is legal?

But as I stated earlier in this thread, I am a human with an emotional nature where my rationality can be overwhelmed by neurochemical imbalances. For instance, right now I am in a state of mild depression where I am incapable of loving and respecting myself (although I can tolerate such emotional fluctuations and I expect this state to pass in about a day). But if I could not love and respect myself, how could I respect the life of the fetus in the womb? Considering my emotional proclivities, I think, at best, I would be a lukewarm opponent of abortion where the issue of abortion could never eclipse what I perceive to be other important injustices in the world.

In addition, before I considered Catholicism, I had a set of secular ethics, mostly derived from utilitarian ethical theory, and I have not yet completely abandon it since I still find it a useful tool for moral and ethical reasoning.