From: JLOCK00@RICEVM1.RICE.EDU (Joseph L. Lockett)
Newsgroups: tx.politics,rice.politics
Subject: Re: Anti-choice vs. Pro-abortion (was Re: Houston Defending Choice Coalition needs you)
Date: 30 Aug 1992 06:28:00 GMT
Organization: Rice University

[Assorted rhetorical hipshots unconducive to rational argument, but more
 to wiggling out from difficult points, deleted.]
 
exuptr@exu.ericsson.se and I continue to exchange (him first):
>
>>>Bull.  My point was clear in the context.  We are quite capable of providing
>>>for children as a society.
>>>I will agree that the point is to prevent the misery, but not by committing
>>>what may very well be another misery.
>>
>>"As a society"?  Well, given high enough taxes (or would 'tithes' be more
>>in line?) perhaps we could.  I confess I, at least, and perhaps many others,
>>would not feel inclined to subsidize the children others can't take care of.
>
>Why not?  We subsidize all kinds of bullsh*t in IRAQ and IRAN.  We spend
>our butts off to help the needy in third-world hellholes.  Why not spend
>some at home?
 
Gosh, I applaud you.  You sound like a Clinton supporter.  Aside from the
fact that he's pro-choice.... :-)  Actually, I would applaud spending a
bit more here at home -- rationalize the welfare system, so that it no
longer encourages child-bearing, and requires some sort of vocational or
other educational training (by God, if you're being supported on my tax
dollars, I damn well want you learning how to get off of them too!).  That
could make up a whole separate thread, though....
 
Briefly put, I'll support international aid because those people are already
born.  I want a woman to be allowed to get an abortion if she can't or
doesn't want to carry a child to term.  And I don't want to support any
children that the mother herself isn't willing to support, else I discourage
individual responsibility and allow welfare mothers to gad about whelping
infants in the street.  No deal.  I would actually tend to support required
birth control for those on welfare -- but refrain because of issues of
freedom of religion.  No flames, please, as I'm being tolerant there. :-)
 
>>I find that over-idealistic.
>
>So were the Wright bros, weren't they?
 
True, but they were dealing with the cold, hard sciences like physics and
engineering, not fuzzy subjects like sociology and economics.  Your analogy
is inappropriate.
 
>>Reviewing the above argument, why should we give a parasite, a
>
>Ok, let's get this crap straight once and for all.  Is the pro-choice
>position that it is part of the woman's body, or a parasite.  It cannot
>be both.
 
Yes it can.  A child is like a cancer -- a lump of your cells turned
against yourself.  It derives from your cells, feeds off your body,
takes oxygen and other supplies from your body.  If you want to let
it grow and be born, and then support it yourself, then bravo.  If you
don't or can't, then it's within your rights to get rid of it.
 
>We have a basic disagreement about what a fetus is, so I don't think we'll
>get anywhere on this line.
 
I think you're right.  Sigh....
 
>FOr the longest time (and rightly so IMHO) persons have ridiculed Christians
>for not doing what they should by their own creed.  I'm not sure you'll
>like it any better, but there's a huge movement in the church now to drop
>the games and the crap and start following the word of God.  Scary, isn't it?
 
Yes, if it's not done with careful thought and sufficient knowledge.  Much
of the furor over homosexuality derives from a mistranslation in the King
James Bible -- 'sexual aberrancy', or some such, was translated by zealous
clerics as 'homosexuality', so while it really should have applies to rape
and such crimes, today we get crusading gay-bashers and such.  (I support
gay rights, in case you couldn't tell.  Does that make me completely
irredeemable? (-: )  And if you start holding up some of the strictures
from the Old Testament, then you'd better start explaining why you've
let others fall by the wayside -- clothes of more than one cloth, women
being ritually impure after menstruation or, for that matter, after
childbirth (and for twice as long after birthing girls as boys, I believe),
and so on through the Pentateuch.  (You see, I used to be a fairly devout
Episcopalian, until it seemed to get in the way of good sense....)
 
>>An example -- Jewish religious law REQUIRES an abortion in cases where
>>the health, physical OR psychological, of the mother is endangered.
>>banning abortions would constitute a violation of freedom of religion.
>
>Only extremists could possibly want them banned in the above case.  Except
>that I'm quite certain that Jewish law does not say psychological anything.
 
My source for that point was a Jewish acquaintaince of mine, actually, who
is usually quite up on her information.  So unless you can quote me some
rabbinical lore, I will believe that that's the current position of the
Reformed movement -- 'physical OR psychological'.
 
>>Whither the religious argument now?
>
>Same place.  They should be entitled to follow their laws.  And we ours.
>All of it. :-)
 
You're more than welcome to follow your own religious tenets.  Just let
others follow their, and me mine, or lack of same.  I don't even mind
if you peacefully try to convert me, so long as I allow it. :-)
 
Joseph L. Lockett
jlock00@ricevm1.rice.edu
Xref: sparky tx.politics:4760 alt.politics.clinton:3859