Redstate

Well, I finally got an article that made me register.  

Anyway, I was particularly struck by the statement about the reverence for Motherhood.  As a relative of a wonderful couple who have great difficulty conceiving on their own, I am very grateful for the courage of those that are willing to place children up for adoption.  There is a lengthy wait for these children and I hope that even more girls and women will consider this option before having an abortion.  

I know others that want to adopt and the process is quite arduous (as it should be!) but the wait is even worse.  While I would prefer that there were fewer 'unwanted' pregnancies, I hope that adoption continues to become more popular for those in that situation.

What's sad is that the authors probably think they were fairly balanced.

I can honestly claim to have almost been in Glamour: I'm cropped out of some of the photos in this piece (PDF) on Ashley Judd in Africa.  The kind, benevolent Ashley Judd.  The Ashley Judd who, whilst deeply caring of poor people, also believes that unborn infants facing those persons' economic fates should be killed in utero if convenient.

No wonder Glamour loves her.

is that the likelihood of someone adopting a black "crack baby" from the ghettos of Los Angeles, New York, or Chicago could be slim. Who's willing to adopt all of the children?

Now here I will recognize a little of my newfound restraint and simply point out that if you gave the child itself a choice between being killed, or going through a rough adoption process (even to the point of state wardship), it would probably choose the latter.

Just a guess, though.

"What's sad is that the authors probably think they were fairly balanced."

Sounds awfully familiar to what a 24 hour news network claims, doesn't it?

The answer to the question of whether babies would choose abortion or an arduous adoption process is unequivocal. Of course anyone would choose to live instead of die.  However, I'm not talking about asking babies any questions. I'm asking a question regarding the probability of these kids being adopted.  In an affluent neighborhood in Chicago, the latest trend is to adopt Chinese girls in an effort to save their lives.  What about the black children in the ghettos who make up most of the up-for-adoption population?

By the way, have you ever asked a fetus what he or she would prefer?  How do you know they mean yes or no?

you are talking about CNN.

What about the black children in the ghettos who make up most of the up-for-adoption population?

I heard black children were off limits to any other ethnic background other than black.  Many say (Rev Jackson etc..)  only blacks can raise a black children so they will know their black heritage.

It can't be both ways.  

One of your best stories: well written, interesting, and providing new information.

" I mourn the fact that too often I have allowed my indignation to cross the line and turn people off. But the point of it all is that persuasion is working."

A point that is as important as it is humble.  RedState is read by many people who may not have encountered a well-reasoned defense of the pro-life position.  Using terms like baby-killers does not engender undecided or persuadable people.  However, sonograms, emphasizing adoption, and stressing personal responsibility seems to have a strong effect on changing or shaping people's minds including young women.  And much of the country is still persuadable on this issue while inside the political bubble everyone seems to already be on a "team."

On a side note, this article corroborates my personal experiences as someone in their 20s.  I know several women who have surprised their pro-choice mothers by leaning pro-life or at least supporting "more restrictions" on abortion.  The debate is also shifting from the mother to the child which is where pro-lifers win over more people.  This article is quite slanted in many ways but the lack of any emphasis on the unborn child is one of the most pervasive subtle biases in MSM coverage of abortion.

But I am relatively sure that it is not law anywhere.  Although I am not well versed in the topic, I believe there may be a racial preference in adoption but it is not as rigid as you mention.

Had neighbors that were very white and adopted 3 children that were very black. So, this must be an unsubstantiated claim.

Black children aren't "off limits to any other ethnic background other than black."  Adam is right that there's a preference, though.  Healthy infants of any age almost always get adopted--though there's been a fair amount of press lately about Black babies getting adopted overseas:

But there are plenty of American babies who need homes -- African-American babies. And more and more of those children are finding homes abroad, especially in Canada, according to people who work in the U.S. adoption field.

The kids who are really in trouble aren't the ones who get given up for adoption as infants--they're the ones who get removed from unsafe homes when they're older.  These kids are largely non-white, have suffered some kind of abuse, have behavior and/or learning problems, and are often a part of a sibling group that should be adopted together.  The older they get, the more difficult adoption becomes.  Babies who are born with cognitive or physical problems (whether due to maternal substance abuse or something else) are not as easy to adopt.  

Obviously, no disability negates someone's right to live.  Obviously.  But I think it's good for us to have these kids--and the particular challenges their circumstances present--on our radar screens.

the lack of any emphasis on the unborn child is one of the most pervasive subtle biases in MSM coverage of abortion.

Of course, to those of us who are stridently pro-life, it's about as subtle as a sledgehammer to the head.

THanks for the kind words in any case.

Nice work with this story, Leon!  (Who knew you read Glamour?  I know that "Mrs. Nachos" story was a cover.)

Something that I found interesting about the article, in addition to the points you brought up, is that they mentioned Patricia Heaton supporting the "Women Deserve Better" campaign--but they never mentioned Feminists For Life, even though she's their spokesperson and that's their campaign.  I'm guessing that they were trying to avoid sending their readership in that direction, because their readership is who that campaign targets.

When they give quotes from Ms. Foster on page 218, they mention that she heads Feminists for Life.  Interesting that they don't mention it in regards to Ms. Heaton.

Thanks.  Sorry about that--I guess I didn't read the whole thing closely.

who is have a hard life?  Let's just kill all the homesless people, or the mentally ill people, after all killing them would spare them those tough times.

Sorry but the "but somebody may not adopt them" meme is just illogical.  We do not advocate murder for people, because they go through tough times.

Also, I know quite a few people that foster and adopt the handicapped kids specifically-they want those kids precisly because most people do not (btw they are pro life).

Private adoptions generally do not care, but social services agencies are pressured (and some do have policies) of only permitting black children to be adopted by black parents.  

I read a reader's digest/parenting (I don't recall the magazine but it was probably in a Doctor's office) about a white couple that fostered some black children, and wanted to adopt and instead the department for children's services took the kids away-because of the race differences.

So this kind of policy realy varies from state to state, and probably within each individual department within that state (social services is overrun with touchy feely people who often buy into the idea that black children should only be adopted by black parents).

I think they are right that availability of birth control and the ultrasound affect have been huge influences.

And the bias over the "pro life" make over issues is sort of close to what they missed.  I don't think it is so much that pro life has had a make over (although it does seem like the pro life tent is getting bigger, and it helps a lot that Randall Terry is not the main spokesman for the movement anymore).  I think it is more that the pro choice movement sounds strident and unwilling to bend or compromise on the one thing most people do agree on-which is that abortion shouldn't be easily aivalabe to anyone at anytime during pregnancy.

I think the fact that the main spokespeople for pro choice (NARAL, Planned Parenthood, NOW etc) tend to oppose anything and everything that might reduce the number of abortions outside of handing out gree condoms, and the fact that that strongly opposed the Conner's Law (where unborn victims got to be considered a seperate victim and abortion was specifically an exception in the law) just makes them look strident, unreasonable and in reality pro abortion.

So I would say it is as much the lack of make over in the pro choice movement as it is a make over in the pro life one.

Most people instinctively understand that there is a human baby in there.

I have heard of Black leaders saying white people should not adopt black children.  Because they would not be able to teach them about their black heritage.  I did not say it does not or should not happen only that some Black leaders have said it should not.  

Those who believe that ethnic identity support race matching and pride can be best preserved if, for example, an African American child grows up in an African American family. Since 1972, the influential National Association of Black Social Workers (NABSW) has taken this stance, suggesting that interracial adoption is a form of "genocide" and that "black children in white homes are cut off from the healthy development of themselves as black people."

....

But some researchers say that interracial adoptions are more complicated than many prospective parents believe. Robert T. Carter, a professor of psychology and education at Columbia University, has found that many adoptees as young adults begin struggling with issues of identity and culture. David Watts, who is part of Carter's research team, says he only realized after he left his white adoptive family in Cleveland how isolated and different he had sometimes felt as a child.

"Because there were no black people around, and my parents did make a concerted effort to give me a lot of history and heritage, I thought I had a handle on what it was to be black," says Watts, 30. "I didn't realize the difference between white and black culture until I was 21 and came to New York. That's when I learned what I had missed, not only the obvious things, like food and dress and music, but the subtleties of black culture-the jokes told, how loud you speak, how much you touch when you talk, the relationships between mothers and sons. That's when I realized that while my parents had done a good job, it was incomplete, because I didn't have the full story."

There is a debate going on about this.

The article was very insightful and quite informative, I agree. Bravo. There is a way to approach these isuues with such "fairminded" folks that puts them on the defensive, without animosity. I too have often allowed my indignation to turn people off to my arguments against abortion.

The article, though, cites something I think is crucial (and I know something for which I'll get a ton of flak). The liberals who are lamenting the decine in support for abortion-on-demand are suggesting the increase in use of contraceptives are part of the reason. While this might be the case, it's very dangerous ground for principled folks to get involved in supporting contraception for the mere fact it reduces abortion.

Abortion is simply the logical end of a contraceptive mentality, that as G.K. Chesterton says is why suburbia treasures bathrooms over babies. It is the logical end of a desire for consequence-free intercourse. So long as we as conservatives support this as well, we will lose the arguments and ultimately the war, even if we win the abortion battle for now.

for example:

"...many social workers and adoption agencies are adamantly opposed to placing a black or biracial child in a white family."

from this link:

http://encyclopedia.adoption.com/entry/race/298/1.html

is the battle, then you have already lost many people like myself.  If ending abortion on demand is the battle, then lets get working.  Contraception is accepted by 70+% of society as legitimate and moral.  It will take a lot to convince people otherwise.  I think ending the scourge of abortion-on-demand should be a much higher priority in conservative activism.  Save the contraception fight for later, and don't expect every who is against abortion-on-demand will join in fighting all contraception.

I wonder whether the editors of Glamour have noticed that this sea change in attitude among young women is coinciding nicely with the expected second-generation effects of Roe. Or, to put it another way, every one of the women in this demographic are alive today because their mother did not choose to kill them. Their mothers were, at least in each of these individual pregnancies, pro-life.

Whereas there are literally millions of potential women aged 19-25 whose mothers opted for "choice" and who are thus not alive.

While it is not always the case that children believe as their parents do, it is arguably more common than the opposite. Millions of people with a generally left-leaning and secular mind-set are voluntarily failing to reproduce at replacement. This will be a major driving force in politics in this country for years. Major demographic distortions do that.

China has their one-child-per-family policy, and it has interacted with their male-centered culture to produce a politically explosive (relative) lack of young women. Roe will allow an entire philosophical belief system to extinct itself by attrition.

Re: While this might be the case, it's very dangerous ground for principled folks to get involved in supporting contraception for the mere fact it reduces abortion. Abortion is simply the logical end of a contraceptive mentality

I have to say that I have no sympathy for this sort of argument at all. And no one I think would apply this sort of reasoning to any other matter of controversy. For example,  pro-Life people who also oppose euthanasia would never argue (I hope!) that improving pain management for the terminally ill is a bad idea since if we accept that idea the people can avoid pain, the next "logical" step is euthanasia when pain medication fails to be effective.

Re: While it is not always the case that children believe as their parents do, it is arguably more common than the opposite.

Granted anecdote is not the singular of data, but it's been my experience that while people may inherit their parents' general temperament, their specific political beliefs will vary extermely with the generations. An if this were not the case then how could we ever explain political change of any sort?

Anyone wishing to argue the pro-life position would be well-served by reading Chesterton's Eugenics and Other Evils where he makes precisely the same points, albeit in the inimitable Chesterton style.

Actually, this site: http://www.aei.org/docLib/20050719_050719abortion.pdf has compiled literally hundreds of survey questions on abortion from the 1970's to the present day and what is remarkable is how little of a shift in either direction there has been.  Most Americans are more-or-less pro-life on a personal level, and pro-choice on a political level, and the large majority want to maintain Roe v. Wade, and these numbers haven't changed in any perciptible way since the 1970's.

the legacy of parents to their children, than the individual opinions on various issues.

One thing that seems to be different about the under 30 crowd, is that they tend to be more socially liberal (open to gay marriage, alternative lifestyles, cohabitation, etc), but they also seem to very much be on a personal responsibility bandwage.  I think abortion-which often gets tossed into the socially liberal pot, in reality is fitting more into the "personal responsibility" pot, not to mention that the majority of people instinctively realize that abortion isn't just getting rid of a parasite or a mass of cells, that there is in fact a baby in there-some people just attach more or less value to the baby.  But when you haul in the personal responsibility issue-people realize that there are many areas of "choice" for a woman long before you get to the abortion clinic-a woman has the right to choose to have sex, and she has the right to choose to use contraception (which is given away for free in many places, so income isn't an excuse either).

But I think children tend to for the most part stick with the party or identify with the party of their parents, in the end the political positions shift.

The other big shift you see is that younger people often eschew political parties all together.

As any poll watcher will tell you, the majority of respondents have no idea what Roe really stands for, or how far it goes. Most believe it means something like, "Abortion is legal with some restrictions," which a majority would indeed support. If told, especially after Doe and Casey, that it means, "Abortion on demand is legal through all of pregnancy, and the state has a hard time outlawing a jot or tittle, if it means so much as the pregnant woman will experience some stress," then I rather suggest the numbers change a little.

Roe, by the way, draws a red flag when Shepardized. I rather wonder why it continues to hold such talismanic significance.

you make an excellent point about the polls, and how questions are constructed, and how uninformed the majority of people are as to what Roe means.

I don't know how many times I have been in a debate over Roe, and bring up Doe, and the response is almost always "What is Doe?"  

Until people fully understand the decisions involved, and how difficult it is to get even some of the most minor of restrictions passed, most polls may not be telling you what you think they are.

Review the collection, questions are asked about any and all aspects of abortion, and no matter how the question is asked, only a small minority would support banning abortion outright, and there has been no discernable change in any direction since 1973.  I personally think that the slight growth of those favoring "abortion with a few restrictions" rather than "abortion on demand" reflects the fact that as time goes by, Roe v. Wade has become the settled law of the land, and no one seriously expects it to go away.  So minor restrictions don't necessarily appear to generally pro-choice people as being a prelude to an all-out ban on abortion.

and that is that people misunderstand what Roe is.

When the question is asked in terms of Roe, it ignores the other case law-Doe-which has an extremely broad definition of health, so broad as to make abortion on demand legal up until the day of birth, and Casey.

AT this juncture in time-the majority of people actually think it is possible to restrict abortion-especially 2nd and 3rd trimester abortion.  

Looking on pollingreport.com, I am not sure the poll Glamour used is consistent with other polls on the topic.

In particular, there is another poll done by CNN/USA Today/Gallup last month which still has only 20% of people stating that abortion should be illegal in all circumstances.

Also, as someone from Europe, one thing I can never understand is why so many of the pro-life people are also so opposed to promoting contraception, when the majority of abortions are due to unwanted pregnancies. Surely we would want to promote contraception as much as possible, since doing so has had demonstrable success in Europe, especially in reducing teenage pregnancy?

That people read what I write before they respond.

Try again.

that both sides rule out seemingly reasonable compromises because they would be seen as the first step toward unequivocal establishment of the other side's rightness. Thus, pro-life folks oppose increasing the availability of birth control and pro-choice folks oppose banning late-term abortion. Obviously there are principled positions on those issues, too, but I think a lot of the incomprehensible stubbornness comes from what I mentioned.

The influence of the Puritans, who played a key role in the early colonialization of America, continues to this today.  My own time in Europe leads me to think that Europeans disapprove of selfish sex and irresponsible sex, but they do not see sex itself as something shameful.

My own pro-life position is based on the belief that  "human life" is entitled to certain "human rights" as a matter of natural law.  Thus I favor approaching abortion from the perspective of balancing the rights of one living entity against the rights of another living entity.

I have been disappointed to discover that there are those in the pro-life movement who do not believe in fetal rights, but rather wish to outlaw both abortion and birth control in order to discourage sex for pleasure.  I see these folks as latter-day Puritans.

Is something that some folks need to work a little harder at.

The poll specifically stated that it dealt only with females between the ages of 18-29. You do understand why that might present a discrepancy with polling among the general population, right?

I hardly think the comparison is reasonable. One is a eugenics argument (less suffering is good) the other can hardly be called good even from a eugenics standpoint (less children are good) unless we identify why children are a problem.

With twisted logic one can move anything from a good to an evil. I could say that we should ban personal interaction with one another because personal interaction can lead to romantic encounters and that can lead to unwanted children, and hence abortion. Is that reasonable? So, while one can move from good pain mangement to, "let's end their suffering and kill them" I submit it's a non sequitur, unlike the move from contraception to abortion. Then again, this all depends on the principles from which you are arguing. Principles are simple to compare, argue and determine which is correct. Practicals are difficult, because two different and contrasting practical can both be right, while two contradictory principles cannot.

I'm saying that the basis for contraception is a desire to have consequence-free sex. It readily follows that abortion is simply an extension of contraception, and is treated that way by many. It is a method of not having a child, which is the whole point of contraception: No consequences.

I don't want to jam up the comment board with this argument, so if you want to continue I'd be happy to reply to a personal e-mail.

I'd say both are important battles, but I don't think you can remove the link, from a logical stanpoint or even from a practical, since the basis for Roe is Griswold which established a "right to privacy". The war is not over contraception or even abortion, but the war is over immorality and the wholesale support of immorality.

The statistic as I last heard them are that just under 80% of the population feels more contraceptives/education would reduce abortion. I'm not afraid to say I think this is wrong, and the history of the 20th century as regards these issues is my proof.

Practically speaking, the abortion battle is, perhaps, more winable, and should be fought. I certainly think an end to such an evil is good, but what weapons do we use? A good end does not justify evil means. I am simply saying it is a poor choice of weapon to support contraception in place of abortion, because it is a concession of the liberal's main argument (which has its roots in Marxism).

and I would like to see more details about the poll.

If they are referring to the CBS poll on pollingreport.com about abortion (CBS News Poll. July 13-14, 2005. N=632 adults nationwide. MoE ± 4 (for all adults)) then I would have some concerns.

Although I can see in the article that there is a apparent trend in the group's opinion, the sample size appears too small to be able draw any definitive conclusions for the population at large.

The number of 18-29 females in the sample must be a pretty small sub group (at most 100) which is open to a far bigger margin of error (approx 9%)...

Listen, Chicagoan, don't shop that crap around here.  There are tons of people willing to adopt the toughest of cases.  Call your local crisis pregnancy center.  Contact the Missionaries of Charity.  Try your local church (if it's not UU or Presbyterian).  Put an ad in the paper.

No child in this day and age goes unwanted.  Many are slaughtered.

My wife and I have been married 18 years, have 4 kids (youngest is 12), and are no one's definition of puritans, but we have never used contraception.  That's 12 years without a pregnancy, with what (by surveys) is slightly-above-average "frequency of use."   We are not seeking to take access to contraception away from anyone, but don't particularly care for being slandered.

We are anti-contraception because it is at the heart of the wrongful separation of the marriage act from the marriage purpose - that is, procreation.  Jaws drop at this heresy (sex is for fun, not babies!), but it is the true bottom line (long philosophical discussion surrounds this).  You don't have to get pregnant every time you have sex, as we have proved the last 12 years, but you also don't need to have sex anytime you want it.  The myth that unbridled access to sex is the secret to happiness and marital bliss is just that - a myth.  Look at the rise in divorce rates since legalization in the 1960's.  

You can have an enjoyable sex life without contraception.  Divorce rates for practioners of natural family planning are below 5%, and surveys show that they enjoy sex more than average.  No, NFP doesn't translate to the rhythm method, and most NFP practioners are parents (to head off the joke about what you call people who do such strange things).  Let's just say that having to do without occasionally tends to make you more imaginative and appreciate it more when you can.

Most people don't realize the The Pill itself is an abortifacient much of the time.  If it fails to prevent conception (contra-ception) (estimates as high as 30% of the time), it prevents the fertilized egg from implanting itself in the uterus.  Call it a "first week abortion," as the embryo just flows on out of the body.

All that being said, it is nice to see young women realizing that abortion is not the unbridled good NARAL and NOW want them to think it is.

No, NFP doesn't translate to the rhythm method

I thought that's what it was.  What is it?

My use of the term "Puritan" refered to those who:

1.  Do not recognize fetal rights.
   
   
   
2.  Wish to outlaw contraception.
   
   
   
3.  Wish to use the power of the state to discourage sex for pleasure.
   

Does this apply to you?

If you wish to practice NFP sex and to preach the merits of that practice to willing listeners, I have no objection.  I do object, however, to using the power of the state not to protect life, but rather to criminalize or control private sexual behavior between consenting adults.

are you pro-life because you believe that fetuses are children and should not be killed?

or are you anti-abortion and anti-contraception because you believe consequence free sex is wrong?

but I agree with JustMe about the contraception.  If you take away the right to contraception you may find less young women indentifying as pro-life.

But the effectiveness, while greater, is not all that's advertised. Let's just say there are more variables than can be controlled for in every female and leave it at that.

Here's a link, admittedly from an advocacy group. Any Catholic couples who go through pre-Cana get that url during a discussion that might go minutes or hours, depending.

when your wife hits menopause?  Cease having sex since there is no longer any marital purpose to it as procreation will no longer be possible?

No snark intended.  I'm just perplexed.

who's had a pleasant surprise :)  

My own two are 15 months apart so I don't have a huge belief in the breast feeding portion of NFP (not that that is what I was intentionally doing). I am simply one of the many women for whom pregnancy briefly "cured" infertility.

Better than Ed McMahon, when you come right down to it.

For decades, a vast majority of women have said that they think abortion should generally be illegal months before viability.  See statistics below.  But public opinion means nothing, because the Supreme Court does not operate based upon public opinion, any more than they operate based upon the Constitution, with regard to abortion.  They operate based upn what five robed lawyers wish the Constitution said, just like in Dred Scot, just like in Lochner.  

In a "Times Poll, 65% of respondents said abortions in the second trimester should not be legal. Female respondents feel more strongly about the issue: 72% believe second-trimester abortions should be illegal, compared with 58% of men." Rubin, Americans Narrowing Support for Abortion, L.A. Times, June 18, 2000, at 1. See also Saad, "Americans Walk the Middle Road on Abortion," The Gallup Poll Monthly (April 2000) (The poll question was: "Do you think abortion should generally be legal or generally illegal during the second three months of pregnancy?" 65% said illegal in July of 1996, and 69% said illegal in March of 2000). See also Saad, "Roe v. Wade Has Positive Public Image; Americans want abortion legal in some, but not all, circumstances," Gallup News Service (January 2003)(68% say abortion should generally be illegal in the second trimester, and 25% say legal).

I would like to see those who are involved with children (parents, teachers church leaders) take an active role in emphasizing the importance of waiting to have sex, and why abstinence is a good thing, and in reality a better thing than contraception (condoms do prevent pregnancy, but they don't prevent HPV and herpes at all, and the teeniest tear in a condom can let an aids virus through, although it still is likely to keep a sperm from heading on up).

But I don't think banning, or making contraceptives inaccessable is a good move.  The banning of contraceptives moves into the realm of telling people what they can and can't do when that behavior doesn't really put anyone else at risk (the issue of sexually transmitted deseases aside).  

I am pro life because of the invasion of the baby's right to live, not because I want to turn the world into the morals police and make sex illegal.

illegal-I don't even think the most prudish among us is after making sex between husband and wife illegal.

the puritan influence means sex is something to be shameful.

Now I am Baptist, not congregational, but I have always been taught that sex was something God designed to be enjoyed between a husband and wife.

We teach that belief to our children.

Sex is one of those good things that is great, when it is used within God's boundaries, but comes with great risk and consequences, when used outside of them.

we have four of them, and no breastfeeding is not a good thing to rely on when it comes to spacing children.  I was breastfeeding two of the four, when their younger sibling was conceived.

I think one thing the issue of abortion has done for people mentally, is it has turned children into something less than a blessing-they are now "problems" "accidents" etc.  I have four wonderful surprises, and every one of them was a blessing, and if God chooses to bless us further, than I will feel the same way.

You state, "Of course anyone would choose to live instead of die."

But you obviously don't believe a "black "crack baby"" (or for that matter, any aborted child) should ever get any choice. A baby cannot vocalize, but that doesn't mean we cannot know its preference. In your quote, which I included above, you unequivocally stated as much. Unless by saying "anyone" you mean anyone allowed not to be aborted.

Being pro-life, I view an unborn child as a human with rights. I am truly stumped how anyone can view the choice of convenience for a mother as outweighing that child's choice (unstated, but obvious) of life.

Of course anyone (given the chance) would choose to live instead of die.

The same could be asked for couples that are naturally infertile. Should they not have sex?

The principle is that the primary purpose of marriage/sex is procreation, but there are other ends/purposes too, including spousal union and pleasure, etc. These ends since they are not primary are subject to the first end. If naturally the primary end cannot be met, then that is no fault of the couple, and the secondary ends still exist. To willingly put an artificial barrier in the way and change the primary purpose artificially is against the Natural Law in principle.

The primary purpose of ears are to hear, but those that are deaf are not able to use their ears for their primary purpose. Should they cut them off? Should people with perfectly good ears be allowed to intentionally deafen themselves because they "don't want to hear" or "it's their choice"?

But the Puritans, in their backwards view of things did view sex as a necessary evil and something that was shameful.

It certainly is not like that, of course, and is as you described a wonderful and beautiful thing ... like a glass of good red wine. It is a great thing, when used with deference to the Virtues and right reason informed by Divine and the Natural Law.

As you correctly indicate, when used irrationally and out of the proper context, it is more dangerous than hard drugs, as it is the abuse and corruption of a wonderful and Godly thing.

I am pro-life (though I hate all the silly names given to either side) for a variety of reasons.

I oppose abortion because it certainly is infanticide and murder, and even worse, because it is the murder of an unbaptized child whose fate now rests in God's hands, without the benefits of the promises and assurances he made to those who were baptized.

I oppose contraception as a violation of the Natural Law and a terrible scourge on society in the effects of sex without consequence. It is this promiscuous culture that has twisted the meaning of sex into something free, mundane and dirty. (None of which it truly is). I see abortion as simply the logical end of this mentality whose principles are straight from Marxism and aethestic Communism.

In short, abortion is premeditated murder, but it is so much more than just that terrible evil.

Is there a real "right to contraceptives"?

I would imagine that most here oppose the "right to privacy" that the Supreme Court used to enshrine the "right to abortion" in Roe.

Many forget that the basis for this "right to privacy" which is certainly opposed by all the "originalists" has it's origins in Griswold v. Connecticut which struck down a 100-year-old CT law banning contraceptives. The rationale: the "right to privacy".

As I tried to say in other comments. The abortion and contraception are necessarily linked, both from a philosophical viewpoint (where I think we have to keep the debate, lest we abandon our principles) and also from a practical standpoint.

A good read on this connection.

Still should we support a "right" that is evil or bad (as I would argue it is) just because it helps our cause? Isn't this same question as: "Can I kill one innocent man, if from it 1,000 or even 1,000,000 might live (at least a bit longer)?"

I don't think Puritan theology has had a lot of influence on Baptists.  The first Baptist church in America was founded by Roger Williams.  Roger Williams came to America as part of great migration of Puritans from England.  The Puritans took strong measures against religious dissent in the colonies they controlled.  Roger Williams had to leave Boston and then Salem because he spoke out against several Puritan practices.  In fact, he fled Salem to avoid what probably would have been severe physical punishment.

Many people are not aware of how harshly the Puritans dealt with religious dissent.  In 1651, Obadiah Holmes was sentenced to 30 lashes for the crime of holding a Baptist service in a private home in Boston.  The lashes were dealt out with maximum force, and Holmes was badly hurt.

As members of other religious groups came to New England, both the practices and the theology of the Congregational churches began to change.  During the Great Awakening of the 1700's influential figures such as Jonthan Edwards embraced science and enlightenment philosophy.  In the following centuries, the Congregational churches continued to change, with the result that they have little resemblance today to the Puritan congregations of the 1600's.

Puritans were essentially an ancestor of Baptists, and the Baptist church's theology went a slightly different direction, but there are still a lot of things that they have in common doctrinally and theologically.

Baptists were obviously influenced by the anabaptist movement to some degree, but they are mostly an offshoot from the puritans in the church family tree.

truth to it.

I oppose contraception as a violation of the Natural Law and a terrible scourge on society in the effects of sex without consequence. It is this promiscuous culture that has twisted the meaning of sex into something free, mundane and dirty. (None of which it truly is).

Our culture now mostly views sex as something more akin to instinct and natural, something that we have very little control over.

I think having this attitude about sex actually removes the sacredness and the special part of what it is.

a part of that, is letting God be in control of the children issue, and not man.  It is trusting God in regards to children, not your own desires, which may or may not have selfish motivations.

Re: So, while one can move from good pain mangement to, "let's end their suffering and kill them" I submit it's a non sequitur, unlike the move from contraception to abortion.

It's a non sequitur in both cases because both cross a very large moral boundary: We are talking about killing people after all. But contraception is not about killing people any more than a morphine drip is; it's just about not having children. In and of itself there is nothing immoral about that and in certain situations it makes sense, and why should it matter whether this is achieved cynically, physically or by means of simply not having sex? Surely there is no obligation to have an infinite number of children, or even a single child, and if there were, then the religiously celibate would be the worst among us.

Re: I'm saying that the basis for contraception is a desire to have consequence-free sex.

I hate to say this but I think your attitude is what feeds the abortion mentality: the notion that children are a "consequence" (perhaps even a "punishment"?) for taking pleasure in sexual coitus. But nature itself, and nature's God if you will, have designed human intercourse rather deliberately so that children are only a rare "consequence" of the act. Those who desire children should have them, but those who do should be free to enjoy the pleasures of sex, in every licit manner, which is what God and nature intend. Sex is not "wicked" and should not require some sort of ulterior motive to justify it.

Re: I think party preference tends to be more the legacy of parents to their children, than the individual opinions on various issues.

You may be right about that. I have a strong nostalgia for the GOP. My father was a "Eisenhower" Republican (very much a hawk on the Cold War but otherwise moderate; he loved Nixon, liked Reagan but despised social conservatism) and my step-mother was a GOP-leaning libertarian. (My real mother, a conservative Democrat, died when I was nine). But today's GOP is too far to the right for me to sign up with it.

where a poster (probably a Roman Catholic) has made his case for opposing both.

were actually the liberals of their day. The conservatives of the 16th and 17th century were the people who believed in the Divine Right of Kings, a hierarchial, tradition-guided church, and aristocratic privelege. Puritan intolerance has more in common with the leftwing intolerance of the later Jacobins or even the Bolsheviks-- when you're convinced you have the keys to utopia you have no patience with people who refuse to go along. And it is the Puritans' legacy (long since shorn of its theology) which accounts for the fact that New England has always been the most liberal area of the country.

"...I may be crazy..."

(c8

If you have read all the comments posted here so far, I hope you will now understand that there are two very different arguments that can be used against Roe v. Wade.  One argument is that the embryo/fetus has rights that must be balanced against the mother's rights. The other argument is that the constitution grants no right to privacy.

Now this business about "no right to privacy" has implications that go far beyond Roe v. Wade. If there is no right to privacy, then the government can exercise control over you in quite a number of ways.  You may think that the government is only going to control people in ways you think they need to be controlled.  But remember this:  The wheel turns.

If Roe v. Wade is overturned on the grounds that there is "no right to privacy," then we are left with the idea that the state has the right to regulate abortion based on the state's interest in "potential life."  Since "potential life" has no rights under the constitution, what keeps the state from limiting certain kinds of medical treatments for a fetus at risk based solely on the state's interests?  What keeps the state from requiring the abortion of a fetus found to be badly defective?

If you think these examples sound like just the opposite of the right to life, you are quite correct.  The point I am making is that the connection between the right to life and "no right to privacy" has been made only because of the Roe v. Wade decision.  It's a bad connection, and it needs to be undone.  However, claiming that there is no right to privacy is the wrong way to go about it.

I understand that there are some, like Scalia, who claim that "no right to privacy" is an originalist position.  However, there is also a long line of conservative thinking which holds that an original and fundamental goal of the constitution was to protect individual liberty by limiting the power of the state.  In Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court did not increase the power of the federal government when it protected liberty by upholding the right to privacy recognized in Griswold.  In Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court failed to protect life by declaring the embryo/fetus a "potential person" without rights.  THAT is the problem with Roe v. Wade.  The only way to really protect human life is to recognize it as such and to affirm that human life has inalienable rights.  Before human life acquires the capacity for independent action, the right to life is paramount.  For the adult human, however, liberty may be more important than life itself.

Well some believe that Baptists predate the Catholic church.  But I understand your point.  Most believe Baptists are one offshoot of the Protestant dissenters who wanted to "purify" the Church of England from "papist" influences.

By the time we get to the American colonies, I believe the Baptist are distinct from those commonly referred to as the Puritans.  Keep in mind that they did not call themselves Puritans.  That term was applied by others, and it does go back to the early English dissenters.

I could be wrong, but I think the Baptists did not much buy into the idea that sex is corrupt and shameful, and that it should be engaged in with as little pleasure as possible only in order to produce children.

I agree that the intolerance of the left may have a Puritan origin, as may the notion that "the elect" know what's right for all the rest of us.

I also agree that the Puritans were the "liberals" of their day.  They were levelers who wanted economic equality (so that everyone would be poor), and they were willling to use extreme measures to achieve their goals.

out of the puritan/seperatist movement (the puritans/seperatist are the NE congregationalists), with some influence from the anabaptist movement (the main influence being the belief in adult baptism, but the main doctrinal theology was most influenced by the puritan movement).  The puritans got their name, because they wanted to ditch all the pomp and circumstance associated with the C of E and to some degree Catholicism, and basically do religion in its purist form (they ditched the church hierarchy for the most part, and believe the Bible was the main source of authority).

So that kind of belief very much influenced baptist thinking.  

The only way to make Abortion illegal  is by law by fetal rights law.  Overturning Roe V Wade has implications on our rights to privacy and does not make Abortion illegal--I bet most states will keep current Abortion laws.

So what is stopping a Republican Congress for even discussing a fetal right to life bill?

There are several fetal rights bills/amendment propositions but they get stopped in committee, and they aren't brought to the floor.

I think mostly because there isn't enough support for them-especially at the senate level, and from the looks of it, congress is going to have to go for the amendment rather than an act (just from case law) although if Roberts' addition to the court puts some breaks on the pro roe decisions after Roe, an Act may survive the courts.

But just look at how difficult it was to pass the partial birth abortion prohibition and Conner's law.  There is too much money flowing around congress on the pro choice side, and the pro choice side is adamantly opposed to anything even remotely indicating that a fetus may have some rights.

Please tell me who in the United States Congress has introduced any kind of fetal rights bill or amendment other than the UVVA?  I dispute your claim that such legislation has been introduced but stopped in committee.

Which was passed in the 1990's, and Clinton vetoed, and was passed again during the Bush administration, and was signed into law and is currently working its way through the courts.

Ashcroft sponsored a constitutional amendment that recognized fetal rights when he was in the senate (it is probably still at the bottom of stack of other bills in committee).

Also at the state level there have been quite a few-Missouri actually has an amendment that recognizes the fetus as a person (although it isn't used to restrict abortion, and that is the main reason the SCOTUS did not strike it down), other states have passed laws that permit the jailing of pregnant women.  And there are a multitude of partial birth abortion bills at the state level (some working their way through the courts).

I thought Republicans control the scheduling or agenda.  So why wouldnt it even be released out of the committees?

I have often been frustrated with Glamour and other similar women's magazines for the assumptions they make about women.  The articles and comments on the topic of abortion are written in such a way as to assume that all readers must be pro-choice, and that it would be appalling for "today's woman" to be pro-life.  Women and men in the public light who are known to be pro-life are seen as enemies or ignorant people by these magazines.  

When did pro-choice become pro-woman?  Glamour should write an article about all the negative consequences that women who have abortions must deal with, all the health risks and emotional and mental problems associated with it.  Maybe then they'll realize that being pro-life is actually being pro-child AND pro-woman.

I was referring to current members of Congress, since it would be a large undertaking to research all legislation proposed since Roe v. Wade.  However, I am glad you raised the point about the legislation sponsored by John Ashcroft during his one term in the U. S. Senate.

In 1998, Senator Bob Smith, along with Senators Jesse Helms and John Ashcroft, introduced a bill to establish a Human Rights Act.  Had this bill passed, it would have established fetal rights by federal statute.

At the same time, these Senators introduced a proposed amendment to the Constitution, the Human Life Amendment, which would provide an alternative way to establish fetal rights in the event the statute described above was found unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

In a Republican controlled Congress, neither bill made it out of committee.  Since 1998, there has been no Congressional legislation introduced to establish human rights for the embryo/fetus.

Initially, I thought the UVVA helped to establish fetal rights.  After further research, I have concluded that it does not.  I have similarly concluded that the prohibition of partial-birth abortion does nothing to establish fetal rights.  I will explain these conclusions more fully at a later time, since I have work to do today.

What I will say in closing is this.  After 1998, the Republican party decided that fetal rights legislation was too hot to touch at the national level.  I understand why that decision was made.  However, I believe the current approach of opposing abortion by challenging privacy is wrong, not just morally, but also strategically.  I believe the state-level efforts to pass fetal rights legislation point the way.  The national party should take notice.

Suffice to say that there is an element of calendar watching at the first part of the cycle, and symptom watching after that.  There is also a method that uses basal (i.e. resting) temperature taken before a woman gets up in the morning.  However, it's a bit of a pain, and we dropped that part fairly early on.

I am against contraception, but not nearly to the extent that I am against abortion.  I am realistic enough to understand that we won't be seeing that toothpaste put back into the tube.  However, that doesn't stop me from wishing it hadn't happened in the first place.

Society still has a powerful influence on behavior, and the expectation today that a woman will use contraception is nearly as universal as expecting them to eat right and exercise.  Most people look upon someone of my views as a bit of a nut (which I am, but not for that reason).  NFP is hard to practice, although it is not without its rewards (like never having to cringe when some report comes out about women's health issues due to some sort of contraception).  Its also the right thing to do.

Another poster had it right - there is natural law, and we shouldn't put artifical barriers in its way merely for our pleasure and convenience.  I already mentioned the unintended consequences of the legalization of contraception.  Nature always finds a way to strike back...

There's no need to lecture me on any of this. My growing family is ample testimony to the fact that I'm on board on this one.

"Consequence" is not negative as you seem to suggest it is. A consquence of giving a sandwich to the poor man on the corner is that he is fed. Is that bad? Of course not.

My point, the natural purpose (all we need do is look at the rest of nature, excepting us) and the natural conequence of sex is offspring. Sex is naturally geared toward procreation, and accompanied by pleasure to enhance the natural desire to procreate that much more.

I certainly am not avocating a Puritanical view of sex, far from it. I am advocating the natural use of such a beautiful thing, with right reason. Yet, everything we do has good and bad consequences. Sex is no different. Perverting sex into just pleasure without consequence is pure hedonism, because it destroys the primary natural purpose. That is what feeds the abortion mentality (pleasure without consequence) and a view that a child is unwanted and can be killed (though they make it sound much more justifiable by denying the child's humanity).

I have to disagree. There is no moral boundary to cross from contraception to abortion, except denying  that a child in utero is alive.

If we assume this, then abortion is simply a extension of contraception without any need to extrapolate. No moral leaps to take, no killing, because the child "isn't really a child, but just a mass of tissue." In this way, "I want sex and pleasure, but not a child" means contraception, and if that doesn't work, abortion (because it's just removing a mass of tissue, not a life ... it's like a biopsy. It's like the "morning-after" pill for a few months after.

Unlike the non sequitur of the euthanasia proposition. No one would deny that a terminally ill patient is not alive. No one denies that euthanasia is killing. Right there is the difference in argument. On the contrary, many (wrongly) would deny that abortion is killing. Hence, why I say the argument initially made was like comparing apples and oranges.

You've exactly stated the basis for my arguments.

Re: My point, the natural purpose (all we need do is look at the rest of nature, excepting

Except that in human beings this is not true. It's true in, say, cats, where (under normal circumstances) the creatures are only sexually motivated when the female is in heat and (absent pathology) is thus fertile. But human beings are almost unique among the animals in that we are sexually motivated at any and every time, irrespective of the fertility status of our females. Hence any claim that human sex is principally (let alone solely) "for" procreation is false. Rather it seems as if human sex is intended primarily for producing strong social bonds that result in family ties, the very building block of human society, whether or not those families are rearing children: how else to explain the fact that human females remain sexually motivated even after menopause?

If one is going to reason from nature then it is first necessary to get the facts of nature right. Going from "is" to "ought" is fraught with philosophical peril, but it will decidedly fail if we seek to apply the facts of nature that obtain with cats or aardvarks or canaries to human beings when they do apply to us.

Nor is the abortion mentality "pleasure without consequence". Where did you get that of notion from? It does indeed sound like a Puritran tenet: the idea the pleasure is morally suspect and must be paid for in some way. There is even a whiff of Gnosticism about that thought*. But I would say rather that God made the world for us to love and rejoice in, and we need not excuse or pay for our joys here with some sort of corresponding "consequence". As for the abortion mentality it can be summed up thus: The assumption that human beings can be treated instrumentally, not as ends in themselves, but as means.

* Not surprisingly, as the "sex is for procreation" theory first appeared in ancient Alexandria where Gnosticism was indeed strongest, and from there its migrated to Rome. But it was never well accepted in the other Eastern centers of Christendom, one reason the Eastern churches do not maintain a categorical ban on contraception.

on God our other responsibilities. Why should we do so in this matter alone? If a person ate an unhealthy diet and said "I'll let God worry about my health" or a mother failed to immunize her children and said as much, or a person did not bother to save for old age but merely said "God will provide" we would think them fools at the very least.

I believe very firmly that while God may do all the heavy lifting in the matter of salvation, in all other matters we are expected to take responsibility for ourselves.

This multiple-level-of-commentary thing is a bit new to me.

Glad to see someone reads down this low in the comments, though!

Again, the comparisons you have are truly not related to the "let God decide when sex produces children" that was advocated.

We do not offload our responsibility on God to give us children, we simply do what is natural in marital relations and if He chooses to allow conception to happen, then it does, and if He doesn't, then it doesn't.

Being unhealthy in your diet is really neglect of your body and your responsibilities, so we should not say, "well God'll protect me" and eat slabs of bacon. Of course not. This is an eminently different proposition.

I agree with all your examples, that these are poor things to fail to do (within reason) proudly assuming that God will give us the material things or some aura of protection. Ultimatley as the axiom goes, we are to "Pray like it all depends on God, act as if it all depended on us."

Yet I still don't see how you extend that to whether conception happens or not. It does not follow, because conception is not a "responsibility" we're offloading. It really isn't in the control of a man or a woman without in vitro fertilization, or in preventing it (with contraception).

When certain conditions happen that put grave hardship, then things like what is often called NFP or "periodic continence" might be legitimate. But again, back to the eugenics argument, we have to define why children are bad, before we can consider if not having them is good. My argument before was that artificial contraception always peverts the sexual act and turns it into hedonism and selfishness. I don't see how this is offing our responsibilities on God.