These are all clever dodges that let you slither off the hook when it comes to addressing the undeniable fact of our nation’s enduring problem of unwanted children being poorly raised by bad or overwhelmed parents with insufficient resources. I have no intention of backing away from noticing it, just because you toss a couple of silly names at me.

Dodge? Dodge What — the existence of poor people? The existence of young, out-of-wedlock pregnancies? The existence of pain & suffering? A worldview that values life at every stage is a dodge? No, Kranky, I’m far more of the old school belief that pain & suffering is an Inherent part of being alive. I don’t dodge it – I embrace it.

You see poverty, you see pain and hard situations and your solution is not to alleviate the problem with charity and compassion and community, but to snuff out the life itself. A simple solution. Your whole premise is quite literally to throw the baby out with the bathwater. And sit back and feel smug and morally confident, because it wasn’t your “choice” — it was hers, the 17 year old girl. Isn’t that convenient for you? You don’t have to take any moral leadership, you don’t have to get involved in her problems, and you get to escape moral culpability because it is her choice, not yours. In addition, you get to say, “we’ve stopped the ‘enduring problem of unwanted children being poorly raised by bad or overwhelmed parents with insufficient resources.’” So you can claim all of the moral upside (if that what you want to call it), but none of the moral downside…perfect.

Kranky, how did we get this place in our culture? I see relatively little charity. I see relatively little real community involvement. I see very few people willing to take in the poor and those people that have real problems. This is particularly true in large urban areas. I think Obama was elected because something deep within the human spirit wants a loving, compassionate, involved community that cares about people.

Abortion, including this pill, takes us further away from that community and further into self-isolation, alienation and greater pain and suffering for the very people that you think it helps so much. I don’t think it helps anybody in the long run. It allows people like you and I which are in pretty good relative shape to conveniently deal with the pain and suffering of our community without actually having to be involved in anyone’s life. That is not an instrument of a healthy society, that is the instrument of a cold, dead society that no longer really cares about its members.

So Kranky, I’m VERY GLAD that you don’t intend on backing away from Noticing it — now I would challenge you to do something about it, beyond suggesting to a 17 year old girl that a pill will alleviate her problems. Do more than notice Krank, go ahead and act on your proclaimed compassion and charity.

Well done, tossing the ghosts of bad science and communist boogeymen (further up: central planning) round so freely. Thankfully, I an not a communist, nor do I collect data on skull size or anything like that. The god-playing thing is just a one off. No need to respond to that.

These are all clever dodges that let you slither off the hook when it comes to addressing the undeniable fact of our nation’s enduring problem of unwanted children being poorly raised by bad or overwhelmed parents with insufficient resources. I have no intention of backing away from noticing it, just because you toss a couple of silly names at me.

If we discuss these notions in the future, please try to take account of the obvious distinction between making something available and forcing someone to use it.

Michael, I agree with you that a substantial component of human nature consists of overlooking our own inability to live up to the ideals we profess. You’re guilty, so am I, so is most everyone else.

But this does not mean that the things which each of us profess can therefore be summarily dismissed. Nice try, but no sale. If pushed, I bet you’d agree.

You have to this point given us no good support for the contention that pro-lifers primary goal is denying control to women. I am happy to acknowledge that if pro-lifers were to get their way on the law, that loss of control to women would ensue. I just don’t think it’s their goal. IMO it’s crystal clear that for most pro-lifers the goal is to end a practice that they think is a moral abomination. And they think that’s an important enough goal that they are willing to infringe on the freedom of choice of others.

Which BTW is what we do every time we pass any law.

But then I don’t live in any of the various worlds imagined into being by the various cultures of ideological perfection.

Ah, the perfect sentence: 1) a self-congratulatory slap on the back, 2) a dig at the opposition and 3) the erection of a some ambiguous strawman.

unwanted children being poorly raised by bad or overwhelmed parents with insufficient resources

I don’t doubt that it is quite satisfying to play God, Kranky, if a little nerve-racking at times….

In other words: you got nothin’. But you’re mad at me.

The low income thing made me think. It made me think, “WTF is he talking about?”

Well, that doesn’t really surprise me…I’ll pitch is soft and high: Do you think the Chinese would find the Plan B pill useful for a particular state policy?

You know what, Michael, never mind — all due respect, this kind of discussion requires both side have a shared philosophical frame of reference and I don’t think we’re quite there. Nor do either one of us really have the desire or time to educate or understand the other.

But then I don’t live in any of the various worlds imagined into being by the various cultures of ideological perfection.

You addressed no part of my argument. Other than to diss Differently Abled bunnies. All due respect, I’m expecting KK to do a much better job.

The low income thing made me think. It made me think, “WTF is he talking about?”

Cute argument. Cute like a little retarded bunny, but cute.

Let me just ask you this question Michael and show me how your progressively brilliant mind deals with it: How would you feel about Plan B pills being predominantly distributed, free of charge, to low-income minority women? Does that make your gut tighten a little, just a little? If so, why?

It is in the answer to “why” your gut tightens (if it does, you might be so “progressive” that it doesn’t) at the thought of Plan B being distributed to low-income minority women that you might start to discover what the “culture of life” is about or, perhaps more important, what its opposite, the Cuture of Death, is about.

I agree with everything else but don’t see any solution on the horizon.

Sorry, but I think you’re wrong, at least as to many pro-lifers.

Beliefs are tested by actions. Do pro-lifers act as though their sole concern was saving lives? No. If they did they’d be protesting at fertility clinics which cause tens of thousands of what they would call abortions.

Have they protested fertility treatments? No. Have they ever attempted to outlaw fertility treatments? No.

So we have a disconnect between what they claim to believe and how they act on those beliefs. I am therefore justified in being somewhat skeptical.

People are generally not terribly self-aware. They claim to believe things which they find flattering to their self-esteem, or which place them in a position of authority or power, or in compliance with a group to which they belong.

I am holding them to a different standard than you apply. I don’t take professions of belief at face value, because professions of belief are cheap and easy and psychically profitable. Actions are more revealing.

I believe I should take care of my health. But I’m sitting on my ass smoking a cigar. So how much do I really “believe?” Might you reasonably look at me and say, “Michael, you’re full of it. If you really believed, you’d put out the stogie.”

Do I get credit for my professed belief? Or do I have to own up to my actions?

So I for one would not count an unimplanted fertilized egg as a pregnancy, nor would I consider the use of medicine to prevent implanting to be abortion. To muddy the water further, Plan B is more likely to prevent pregnancy by preventing ovulation. Thus, its greater acceptance will REDUCE THE NUMBER OF ABORTIONS THAT HAPPEN.

I definitely don’t want out laws changed to force all women to bear unwanted pregnancies to term.

But multiple discussions that I have had with pro-life advocates has left me convinced that the vast majority of them are genuine in their belief that abortion is wrong because it amounts to the intentional extermination of an existing human life.

In other words, to pro-life folks, the thing of central importance is to prevent what they see as murder, not to deny control to women. Your argument is IMO so crappy that you deserve for some pro-life advocate to declare that your argument is not about choice, but about the central importance of allowing murders to continue unabated.

Have you not talked about abortion enough to be aware that the root of the ongoing conflict is the fact that each side disagrees about WHAT is of central importance, choice or life? Surely you’ve noticed this by now?

Again, my experience with your writing leaves me certain that you can do much better.

Then the comparison is between manslaughter and murder. Either way there’s a death, right? Which is why you would no doubt condemn a woman who tries repeatedly to get pregnant despite a history of miscarriage. Right?

Because, logically, if the fetus is sacred — even when it’s just a dozen cells — a woman who has a high likelihood of miscarrying is in effect committing manslaughter. Not as bad as murder, but an action resulting in a death, just the same.

So you condemn fertility clinics? Do you condemn pregnancies in older mothers? Do you condemn pregnancies in women with a history of miscarriage? Isn’t a woman who’s had three miscarriages engaging in reckless behavior by your lights if she tries for a fourth time? And if that fetus miscarries hasn’t the mother committed negligent homicide?

I’m going to guess your answer is: no.

And I’ll suggest that the reason is revealed by your own words: “An intentional act.” Which implies this isn’t really about the fetus, it’s about the central importance of denying control to the woman.

I have never heard or read any argument that life begins at conception that is any more compelling than arguments that, say life begins before conception. Is a sperm not animate and purposeful? The bible calls it a sin to spill your seed after all.

Such arguments are also no more compelling to me than those which suggest that the line ought to be drawn at other points in time for other plausible reasons.

But then I think life is cheap and plentiful. And I remain unconvinced of the rectitude of the notion that each human life ought to be regarded as equal in value. It’s at best a questionable contention, and many might say its demonstrably unture.

I am all for trying to reduce the numbers of unintended and unwanted pregnancies prior to conception. But I would never pretend that we’ll get that number very close to zero, not without some magical adjustment to human nature. And I am unwilling to support any adjustment to the law which mandates that all pregnancies MUST be carried to fruition. Even with abortion at the levels we now see, unwanted pregnancies still lead to many, many, many unwanted children who are raised in the hands of incapable and resentful parents.

And we all pay a high price for that. I am not eager to see that price raised.

Without major changes in adoption laws I’d like to see it ended. In reality, the problems would be addressed. Without the threat of it going away it will continue based on lies and deception.

In your response to Toad, you take a convenient out. If God is omnipotent and omniscient then it is the greatest practitioner of abortion.

As to the rape argument, that is logically consistent so I presume that the reason it isn’t upfront in the so called ProLife argument is that deception and dishonesty is ok.

@ Toad, abortion is an intentional act. So the fact that a fertilized egg naturally fails to implant isn’t an abortion. That’s like saying a miscarriage is an abortion. You’re not saying that, right?

@ Ben, any idea how many unwanted pregnancies result from rape? With that logic, if torture were used to stop a bomb going off, that would be ok, right? Worst-case scenario arguments are tricky things, aren’t they?