NeoNotes — Abortion
❝❝Understand that I am still torn on the subject.NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
But not every pregnancy results in live birth, even without abortions. Not every pregnancy comes to term.
Under those circumstances, it's hard to call abortion murder or killing babies.
I saw it. I also was treated to a film series in high school called Whatever Happened to the Human Race?
I come from a long line of farming stock. Death happens. It's not pretty. But it's a part of life.
Incidentally, the big reason why the US has a higher infant mortality rate than many other nations is because in other nations babies aren't always counted as "alive" until they've gotten through the first year or so.
There are a great many things that our country does that are not civilized. I'm pretty sure that if I were deciding what is and is not acceptable to society, there would be complaints. Public nudity wouldn't go over well. Neither would removing body parts from those who abuse children.
All that being said, if abortions were not government subsidized, I suspect there would be fewer. I think that is a more workable solution than banning abortions outright.
Well, that depends. For the most part, yes.
But let's acknowledge that is an artificial distinction. For example, my mother, stepsibs, and I in accordance with my stepdad's wishes from years before decided not to extend his life. Those last couple of years, he was on a feeding tube and incapable of communicating. Years before that, he had lost the ability to understand what was going on around him.
So yes, it was a death from willful causes. But at that point, what kind of life was it?
On another board, I've had talks with people with terminal illnesses who were considering assisted suicide.There were also surviving family members of people who had done that. What kind of life was it? Would you want someone to live with pain and having their body fall apart?
This is not a clear issue. We should accept that if nothing else. People die. Babies die. How much do we mourn? How much do we blame?
There's no absolute here. We should stop pretending that there is.
It is a distinction, but I am not convinced it has bearing. It's a while before a baby has awareness of self and even longer before the beginning of language.
I agree it's a fuzzy area and that there are many moral questions that can't be easily answered.
It gets even more complicated when considering the implications. If we accept the sense of self as the defining point of where killing is and is not ethical, what does that say about our companion animals? Or our food animals?
I'm not trying to justify abortion. I'm saying it's not easy to justify outlawing abortion and it raises certain moral issues.
The sense of self is different from perception. Humans develop a sense of self as we mature. We can also lose that sense of self.
Admittedly it is a fuzzy concept and psychologists argue over it. At it's most basic, it's a recognizing the distinction between "I" and "Other." It's a mental framework that probably arises from brain structure. It's the key to individuality.
As a libertarian, I don't give "society" an ethical justification to do squat. That includes ending lives and mandating clothes in public.
Here's the thing, if we do recognize rights, the only workable way is to make those rights individual rights. Not granted because of some label or gifted by government. You have rights because you are an individual and you share those rights with other individuals.
At that point, we're really defining "personhood" by individuality. That means you must be functionally an individual and accept that others are individual too.
Without individuality, we're hunks of flesh with automatic responses. With individuality,we can choose.❞❞
Comments
NeoNote — Human rights
❝❝For the record, there are no LGBTQ rights. There are no black rights. There are no women's rights. There are no Hispanic rights. There are no pagan rights. There are no Chinese rights. There are no Christian rights. There are no police rights.NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
There are human rights. Period.
It's not a right unless the other has it too.
Too many times there are privileges passed off as rights. Privileges benefit a select few at the expense of everyone else. Too often, what should have been rights for everyone were enforced privileges for some. This is a big reason why rights and privileges are confused.
It's not a right unless the other has it too.
Which means they get a head thump when they demand I submit.❞❞
NeoNote — Tit for tat
Tuesday - 05Jun2018 Filed in: NeoNotes&Morality & Modern Life
❝❝The only reason to follow the rules is if the other does too. If they don't follow the rules, you aren't bound to the rules.NeoNotes are the selected comments that I made on other boards, in email, or in response to articles where I could not respond directly.
Tit for tat.
You play by civilized rules until the individual doesn't. Then you crush them.
Not the group they belong to, the individual. You refuse to treat the label as the enemy. That prevents them from retreating into the safety of the group identity, and it delegitimizes the moral claims of that group. It also demonstrates that rules work only if everyone follows them. And when someone doesn't follow the rules, then they don't have the protection of the rules.
I might have had some small experience fighting this type of battle.
ETA: Oh, it also makes someone who believes in collective identity for the greater good feel very exposed when they can't retreat. Very exposed.❞❞