In the week
before the assassination attempt, a fierce controversy began to arise within
conservative ranks over some radical changes to the Republican Party platform made
at Trump’s insistence, and apparently rammed
through without allowing potential critics sufficient time to study them or
deliberate. The changes involved gutting
the platform of the staunchly pro-life position that has in some form or other
been in it for almost fifty years, and also removing the platform’s statement
of support for the traditional understanding of marriage. The platform no longer affirms the fundamental
right to life of all innocent human beings.
Instead, it opposes only late term abortions, while leaving it to the
states to determine whether there should be any further restrictions, and explicitly
endorses IVF (which typically involves the destruction of embryos).
In short, the
platform now essentially reflects a soft pro-choice position rather than a
clear anti-abortion position. As Robert P.
George has noted,
the platform has in this respect become what liberal Republicans like Arlen
Specter had long but heretofore unsuccessfully tried to make it. That would be alarming enough by itself, but
it is made more so when seen in light of other recent moves by once pro-life Republicans
in the direction of watering down their opposition to abortion. For example, Senator J.D. Vance, apparently
the frontrunner for the position of Trump’s running mate, has said that he
supports access to the abortion pill mifepristone, which is said to be
responsible for half of the abortions in the U.S. Senator Ted Cruz supports
IVF, despite the destruction of embryos that it entails. Arizona U.S. Senate candidate Kari Lake has
denounced a ban on abortion she once supported, and at
one point even appeared to adopt Bill Clinton’s rhetoric to the effect that
abortion should “safe, legal, and rare.”
Trump
himself now not only favors keeping abortion legal in cases involving rape,
incest, and danger to the mother’s life, but declines to say much more, other
than that the matter should be left to the states. He no longer treats the abortion issue as
fundamentally about protecting the rights of innocent human beings, but instead
as a merely procedural question concerning which level of government should
make policy on the matter. Nor do most observers
seriously believe that abortion (much less the defense of traditional marriage)
are issues that Trump is personally much concerned about, given his notorious
personal life and the pro-choice and otherwise socially liberal views he
expressed for decades before running for president in 2016. The most plausible reading of Trump’s record
is that he was willing to further the agenda of social conservatives when doing
so was in his political interests, but has no inclination to do so any longer now
that their support has been secured and their views have become a political
liability.
Some social
conservatives have defended the change to the platform precisely on these
political grounds, arguing that they cannot accomplish anything unless the
candidates who are least hostile to them first win elections. They note that a federal ban on abortion is
highly unpopular and has no chance of occurring in the foreseeable future, so
that for Trump to push for such a ban would be politically suicidal. But the problem with this argument is that
Trump does not need radically to change the platform in order to win the
election. For one thing, even his
bitterest opponents have for some time judged that he is likely to win the
election anyway, despite the unpopularity of the GOP’s traditional stance on
abortion. For another thing, he could let
the existing platform stand while basically ignoring it. Or he could have merely softened the platform,
preserving the general principle of defending the rights of the unborn while
leaving it vague how or when this would be done at the federal level.
In short, it
is one thing to refrain from advancing
a certain position, and quite another positively
to abandon that position. The most
that Trump would need to do for political purposes is the former, but the
change to the platform goes beyond this and does the latter. If this change stands, the long-term
consequences for social conservatives could be disastrous. Outside the churches, social conservatism has
no significant institutional support beyond the Republican Party. The universities, corporations, and most of the
mass media are extremely hostile to it.
And those media outlets that are less hostile (such as Fox News)
tolerate social conservatives largely because of their political influence
within the GOP.
Some social conservatives
have suggested that while the change to the platform is bad, it can be reversed
after Trump is elected. This is
delusional. Obviously, the change has
been made because Trump judges that, politically, the best course of action is
to appease those who are hostile to social conservatism and gamble that social
conservatives themselves will vote for him anyway. If he wins – and especially if he wins without significant pushback from social conservatives
on the platform change – then this will be taken to be a vindication of the
judgment in question. There will be no incentive
to restore the socially conservative elements of the platform, and every
incentive not to do so.
The result
will be that the national GOP will be far less likely in the future to advance
the agenda of social conservatives, or even to pay lip service to it. Opposition to abortion and resistance to other
socially liberal policies will become primarily a matter of local rather than
national politics, and social conservatives will be pushed further into the cultural
margins. They will gradually lose the
remaining institutional support they have outside the churches (even as the
churches themselves are becoming ever less friendly to them). And their ability to fight against the moral
and cultural rot accelerating all around us, and to protect themselves from
those who would erode their freedom to practice and promote their religious
convictions, will thereby be massively reduced.
In short, for social conservatives to roll over and accept Trump’s radical change to the Republican platform would be to seek near-term electoral victory at the cost of long-term political suicide. Robert P. George, Ryan Anderson, Albert Mohler, and other socially conservative leaders have called on the delegates at this week’s Republican National Convention to vote down the revised platform and recommit to the party’s traditional pro-life position. It is imperative that all social conservatives join in this effort in whatever way they are able.
It's gonna be horrible if this change is accepted. As a European, I have been watching with hope and relief American politics, for the simple reason that, despite all of its problems, you got there positions that here are not part of the mainstream political discussion, as the mainstream. In a country like Greece for example, there's no mainstream political power that is pro life; anyone who is is automatically far right. You're effectively ostracized out of mainstream political discussion if you are pro life.
ReplyDeleteIf the US becomes like that, it's gonna be a tragic development.
I admit that this rational analysis and even critique was a good suprise. This terrible attack that happened with the man made the subject quite heated here, i can't imagine how it is there. Dr. Feser, you are awesome!
ReplyDeleteAnd yea, this shift on this issue is quite bad there and globally. The EUA social conservative movement is a good influence on this issue, so the party becoming less afirmative of it takes away a good support. Thankfully, the pro-life movement there seems very organized*, so perhaps the republicans will not weaken that much on the subject.
*to my standards, at least
WCB
ReplyDeleteThe right to bodily autonomy is inalienable
WCB
Biology Lesson: At conception a human being is created with DNA unique from either parent.
DeleteIn other words, the Baby’s body is their own. And as a human being, that Baby has the right to not be beheaded, torn apart, or starved to death.
“"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you……
DeleteJeremiah 1:5 ESV
WCB
ReplyDeleteThe right to bodily autonomy is inalienable
WCB
No it isn't. So called "bodily autonomy" has limits from the fact that your body affects others. Parents cannot refuse to feed an infant by claiming "my body, my choice, and I don't choose to employ my body to feed her". And back before there was formula, "to feed her" meant for the mother to nurse the baby, with her milk, from her breasts. Her body.
DeleteA complete and bald-faced lie. Trump's GOP has done more for the pro-life cause than any other since Roe v Wade by overturning it and returning the issue of abortion to the states and counties.
ReplyDeleteMaybe Mr. Feser should focus on doing something to oppose abortion besides grousing ineffectually while better men than he do the real work of stopping children from dying.
The issue of abortion has been returned to the states. Outlaw it at the state level. Whether to include it as a priority on the national level is a purely tactical decision, and considering his track record, I'm more inclined to trust Trump's judgement then Feser's.
The same boring non response circulating around. Trump did good things about the pro life cause, that doesn't answer the current situation which is that the new platform is undermining it.
DeleteWhat exactly is the lie that Feser said? Did he deny the goods that Trump did? Can you specify or are you just responding frantically?
Three questions:
Delete1. Do you think the Democrats will be content with merely trying to increase abortion funding/access at a state level?
2. Does the federal platform at least sometimes set something of a tone for state platforms?
3. What role do you see the federal government (the FDA, say) having in regulating things like abortifacients?
I'm admire Feser's work. It is excellent. I'm mostly in favor of this opposing opinion in this case. Some of the cases made by Feser here are purely opinion, not fact. They give no benefit of doubt to the most pro life president of my lifetime.
DeleteThere are possibilities of being correct here, but this also might very be an overly idealistic work that doesn't take the political landscape into account.
WCB: are you referring to the bodily autonomy of the innocent unborn child?
ReplyDeleteSurely he is referring to the bodily autonomy of adults to either choose to refrain from sex until they are prepared to have a child, or to accept the known and predictable outcome of sex and raise the offspring they create.
DeleteSurely that is what pro choice means.
This is a great post Dr Feser. I agree with you.
ReplyDeleteI had a related question which could be useful to the discussion if you would be so kind,
Suppose Trump allowed the federal ban to remain a part of the party platform but citing political realities he says he would veto such a proposal if it passed (say by very slim majorities in such a way that it's unlikely to be upheld and would invite further political backlash). Would that be morally licit ?
Or what if he refuses to bring the proposal to the table in the house while still letting it be in the platform ?
Are these options morally available to him or any other Republican president namely Vetoing amd refusing to table the proposal citing existing political realities while still allowing it to remain on the party platform ?
The women of this country will never let you social conservatives take them back to 1950. Get over that.
ReplyDeletePreach!
ReplyDeleteEd,
ReplyDeleteYou may or may not be right about what might transpire with the change to the national platform—I have to give it some thought. So, I'm not commenting on that, but rather on another point that I think needs to be raised.
"They note that a federal ban on abortion is highly unpopular and has no chance of occurring in the foreseeable future, so that for Trump to push for such a ban would be politically suicidal."
Not only would it likely be suicidal, but short of a constitutional amendment (which I personally support), it would probably be struck down. Roe v. Wade overturned *state* laws, not federal statutes. Dobbs, in *returning* the issue to the states, merely restored conditions to what they were for the nearly two hundred years of country's history before Roe.
As the Tenth Amendment says, "...any powers that are not specifically given to the federal government, nor withheld from the states, are reserved to those respective states, or to the people at large." In other words, domestic and social matters, such as laws concerning public morals, were the province of the states, while the focus of the federal government was on matters that concerned the whole union of states, such as war, diplomacy, international commerce, and the border.
I recount this bit of history and constitutional law to make a point. The pro-life movement might be the most patient and tenacious in all of American politics, but we sometimes have the political instincts of lemmings. Case in point:
1. From the 1980s through 2000s, the pro-life movement pushed hard for a federal ban on abortion, without achieving much material progress and making themselves obnoxious with our messaging, thereby losing the support of people who might otherwise have been sympathetic. The fact that we ignored the underlying constitutional issues of such a ban was icing on the cake.
2. The Texas heartbeat bill was a rare stroke of political genius for the pro-life movement. By focusing on heartbeats, we made the issue visceral and concrete for the average voter and took the narrative away from the Left. In Ohio, we displayed the long term memory of concussed goldfish, and got completely outmaneuvered by the Left in messaging, who made the issue about "women losing access to healthcare," among other things.
3. A lot of the most recent pro-life fights at the state level coincided with Trump's rise, in part because he reminded people it was okay to fight back. He injected some energy back into the movement.
"Opposition to abortion and resistance to other socially liberal policies will become primarily a matter of local rather than national politics, and social conservatives will be pushed further into the cultural margins."
There's a reason they say that "all politics is local."
We've been pushed to the margins, in part, because we spent too much time on national politics—often burning bridges to achieve little more than symbolic gestures—and paid too little attention to what happened in our own back yard. The Left understood this lesson well, as they perfected the art of "community organizing." San Francisco, Seattle, Portland, and other cities weren't transformed into leftist looney bins by national politics, but local action.
Or take a lesson from the 2A crowd. Wherever one falls on the issue of the Second Amendment, they've had undeniable success. Twenty-six states are now counted as "constitutional carry." Most of the fighting has been at the state level, while there's also been a significant cultural component in promoting "gun culture" and making it appealing to younger generations.
I'm not saying that we should simply accept this change to the national platform, or that we shouldn't make a fight of it on the national level. But for the love of all that's good and holy, we need to start developing some horse sense and pay more attention to what happens at home, as well as to the country at large.
And of course, before anything else, pray for God's grace and assistance.
In the current environment, it is quite true that any attempted federal law banning abortion would probably founder at the Supreme Court by being held unconstitutional. And the net effect would be returning the issue to the states, with the political fallout of a failed attempt at a ban.
DeleteHowever, under a more sane legal and medical world, it would not be impossible that the definition of "human person" could be recognized properly to include the unborn, and by that route gain protection under the 14th amendment. It might be a stretch to imagine that right now, with the strength of the "historical" standard that the conservatives on the SC have managed to push through, but in the long run that standard will almost certainly be whittled down with qualifiers and such, to the point where it is theoretically possible to recognize the protection the 14th provides already belongs to the unborn as a proper right.
Or, an attempt to create a federal ban might founder in some (future, more conservative) Congress on the very point that they know the SC will say it's a state matter, causing them to push for an amendment at politically some opportune moment.
Similar problems faced the eradication of slavery, and while in this country it took a civil war, it didn't take that in many other countries. It is notionally possible for a people, over a time scale of a century, to eventually realize a truth that earlier had evaded them. It took 100 years after the Civil War for the US to pass the Civil Rights Act to enforce truths that were widely unrecognized in 1865 even in the North.
But any room for that most likely must wait for a time and conditions in which the liberal mind-set is not being foisted on the young by the lock the liberals have on schools, universities, and media. Frankly, conservatives who put their kids in public schools and public universities are effectively handing the future to the liberals. The young thereby are being inculturated to the mindset of the teachers, administrators, and the lib establishment.
For which reason, Trump's intent to get rid of the Ed. Dept. is, actually, a worthy conservative goal toward long range success. Not enough by itself, of course, but you don't get everything at once. It would be even more useful to get rid of 90% of the SES (Senior Executive Service) in government that have graduate degrees from any large university, and replace them with people with degrees from small Christian colleges with an explicit directive to select / foster all new SES from the same pool.
Unfortunately, the Republican Party's softening of its platform reflects the desires of most Republicans. Most so-called conservatives don't really care about life from conception to grave, and there's no getting around that, short of a miracle or a religious revival.
ReplyDeletePolitics is always downstream from culture, and conservatives have thoroughly lost the culture. This is why the window ever moves Leftwards, the social Left have full control over the decision-forming apparatus of the West and moulds it's culture. Add to this that the "democratic" political level is essentially a shell game designed to keep you docile, and you have a recipe for social collapse.
ReplyDeleteThat's correct. The conservatives have forever lost the culture, which is why when Trump gets elected and the Repubs sweep the house and senate, the culture will still be ours. That's what gives this 1970s leftist hope.
DeleteAnonymous July 15, 2024 at 12:51 PM
DeleteThat's correct. The conservatives have forever lost the culture, which is why when Trump gets elected and the Repubs sweep the house and senate, the culture will still be ours. That's what gives this 1970s leftist hope."
Obviously I cannot speak for compassionate conservative Catholics, but ...
We might eventually be able to do a few things - not to stop the inborn preferences of perverse organisms for a hedonic nihilist existence but, to reduce the spillover costs which the perverted impose on innocent and uninvolved others.
For example, Federal underwriting of "your" anti-virals and so forth might be reduced or strictly made 10th Amendment state affairs. In which case "you" would just rot away naturally, like an albatross not chained around the mariner's neck; or else, simply bankrupt your own "community". Why, there is potentially almost a billion Federal dollars saved right there! Not to mention the liberty interest served to the "normies" by cutting you loose.
Then too, there are those abominable spillover effects of the ACA on actuarial based insurance. Something might eventually be done about that, too.
Increased moral hazard might even result in fewer prolapsed rectums, and thus benefit your progressive community and its populations as well.
Now, stopping the molesting strategy of the polluted left and its lawfare tactic comes first. But once the sh#t people can be paused in their molesting activities, there is some hope of keeping them at arms' length both legally and nonviolently.
As you say, there is hope.
this a form of TDS, grasping at anything logical to attack him .. come on man. come back to earth. you know so little about this population or politics .. at least focus on what you do know
ReplyDeleteYou're an idiot.
Delete...grasping at anything logical to attack him...
DeleteI commend you for your consistency, since you haven't used anything logical to attack Feser.
"Fight, yes, but for what?" Stopping the illegal alien invasion, stopping the use of government law enforcement agencies to target political opponents, insuring the appointment of conservative judges, the overall thwarting of the DEI agenda, among other things. Trump isn't great on abortion and, yes, the platform should not be changed. The reality is if Trump loses we lose on abortion and everything else as well.
ReplyDelete@ David T,
DeleteYes.
It is a matter of trying to salvage the basic institutions and constitutional predicates against a "By any means necessary" social justice and redistributive movement. One, which already believes they have won now and for evermore: believing that the country is irrevocably and by evolutionary right theirs, as is also (in due and convenient time), your stuff, your property, and the very lives of you and yours.
Christians, and I deliberately exclude Ed, who are so fuc$ing naive as to imagine that they can retreat to some Benedict Option Redoubt, are either willfully blind or stupid.
Where my dear purist, are you going to go where they will not follow? Nowhere.
You will be baking their cakes. They will be closing your churches and taxing the property. You will be silenced in the public square. They will be normalizing the buggering of your children, and the figurative buggering of you by lawfare; and tossing you in prison for civil disobedience. After first, that is, raiding your home with a masked swat team at 4 A.M. And habeas corpus be damned.
How do we know? Because it is already happening, if not fully then incipiently; if not on our street, then the next one over.
Now to those who are craving the orgasmic satisfaction of helpless martyrdom for themselves and those entrusted to their care, I have absolutely nothing to say.
For the disappointed Christian though, I say, "weigh carefully your response".
It might be the last really free political choice you get.
"Raiding your home with a masked swat team at 4am". Damn. Didn't know it was that dire a situation. But if you're right, there're coming for you too.
Delete
Delete" 'Raiding your home with a masked swat team at 4am'. Damn. Didn't know it was that dire a situation."
https://www.yahoo.com/news/pro-life-activist-arrested-swat-171717669.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAFxkl11ZfJJD1MffnDpCVfW65aOg6aSoMtM8yJg0nlp2fu2-6rOqiHMFjBOvShaLnjg0DDnz9ryeJASXslhwGlc7LqGitW2qQX7Qc8qLwf-cCBgKnTvWCXXdeXfX-fzLPtr1ZToktQHIwL0QS3QegMltCczXyfjAh18qIjrb2Ujh
"But if you're right, there're coming for you too.
They're coming for me too if ...?Nah. Not me.The only people who threatened to look me up were some socialists back when I was heavily involved in online RKBA debates.
I invited them to do so in one case, and had an investigator look into the guy in another case; letting him know he was no longer anonymous by addressing him by name. And the threats stopped.
But, justifiably brooming one crazy leftist off your porch is a different matter entirely [even though a year or two of your life would be ruined in court] than dealing with 2 dozen amoral government guns for hire decked out in paramilitary gear.
One link, uh? Well, you've certainly proved that it's happening "if not on our street, then in the next one over." Mark Houck was acquitted by a jury of violating the FACE Act. But juries have found others guilty.
Deletehttps://catholicreview.org/three-more-pro-life-activists-convicted-on-federal-charges-for-blockade-at-abortion-clinic/
https://www.ncregister.com/cna/six-pro-life-activists-convicted-of-federal-face-act-charges-face-over-a-decade-in-prison
While the feds may have falsely arrest pro-life activists, the pro-life movement has bloody hands.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-abortion_violence
Trump tried his best to weaponize the Justice Dept. He was restrained from his worst instincts.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/07/10/all-ways-trump-not-his-foes-sought-weaponize-government/
The far right naturally continues to the this country's greatest threat.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/far-right-violence-a-growing-threat-and-law-enforcements-top-domestic-terrorism-concern
Even Trump's own DHS came to the same conclusion in 2020
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/09/04/white-supremacists-terror-threat-dhs-409236
You started by citing National Review. I will cite them for quoting what Trump's Chief of Staff, Marine General John Kelly said about Trump
https://www.nationalreview.com/news/god-help-us-john-kelly-confirms-trump-mocked-veterans-during-arlington-memorial-service/
"Kelly condemned Trump for failing to understand the essence of America. Trump is a “person that has no idea what America stands for and has no idea what America is all about. A person who cavalierly suggests that a selfless warrior who has served his country for 40 years in peacetime and war should lose his life for treason — in expectation that someone will take action. A person who admires autocrats and murderous dictators. A person that has nothing but contempt for our democratic institutions, our Constitution, and the rule of law.”
“There is nothing more that can be said,” the former chief of staff concluded. “God help us."
A person who cavalierly ...
DeleteEvery time you put in "a person who...", I put in Biden, and every time it works. I don't know if Trump did it too, but Biden certainly did. Weaponized the DOJ to pursue the "extremist" large families who homeschool and go to church on Sunday, disregarded the service of men and women, and all the rest.
Insofar as I was not 'with' the religious/political tie-in on this, I was going to leave it alone. Then, I thought: oh, hell. My mind recalls the notion of *authoritarian populism*---a term, lasting less than forty-eight hours. I could not get a definition. It was quickly, DOA. Since then, I deduced that AP was a modified version of anarchy. Which explains, in part, why it was quickly erased. But, was it? I think DT is an AP. That label might resurface. Keep eyes and ears open.
ReplyDeleteI suspect that Trump's anarchic tendencies are more like his preferred method of keeping the media awash in bloviation of a 100 different directions, so he can pursue his actual agenda while they waste their time on words. He is not anarchic in his actual goals, I think. And he didn't pursue anarchic governmental behaviors in his first term. If you were to set aside his bloviating as an intentional smoke-screen which he never intends to be taken seriously, (unlike people like Gavin Newsom who lies at every second sentence but who DOES want people to take it all seriously), and pay attention to what he actually pursued in office, it would make a certain amount of sense, I think, and not as "let's destroy government" sense.
DeleteTimely post. Readings today in the Catholic liturgy are timely, too. https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/071524.cfm
ReplyDeleteAlso, Dr Feser
ReplyDeleteI think you should have made it clear that it's at the end of the day a matter of principle, win or LOSE.
I think that if you make it clear as you did on twitter that we have to stand by the principle even if we lose, you would draw a lot less ire.
Your attempt in this article to say that
"Trump is winning anyway" is probably the main reason why you are probably drawing a lot of ire online. All the people who are responding are doing so with the retort of electability and winning. Republicans were predicted to win with a landslide in 2022 and got slaughtered namely because of the abortion issue. Ofcourse,That doesn't mean we should abandon the principle as you said. But it can be maintained while being honest about political realities.
I don't know which polls you have been following but most do indicate that our catholic position is extremely unpopular of abortion with no exceptions. Infact in the 2020 election, Only 3% of the 75 million people who voted for Trump held that position.
None of this means that the platform should have been changed, obviously.
And I stand with you in opposing it. But a lot more people would take the point more seriously if you'd remove that argument of "he is winning anyway, look even his enemies say so".
Because it's just unrealistic political analysis which doesn't take into account actual data. And why stick to that sort of empirical argument when it's not even your forte.
We are also probably yet to deal with an onslaught of democratic campaigning on abortion in a bid to activate blue voters in light of which Trump will probably feel better about his decision. But it still doesn't change the fact that it's wrong.
You mentioned on twitter that you are open to hearing good arguments, I hope you consider this and abandon that empirical claim.
I would greatly doubt that any polling that claimed this was presented in the right frame. For example, if 3% said yes to "would you support laws that outlaw all abortions even in the cases of rape, incest, and when the mother's life is at risk, with the abortionist and mother being prosecuted for murder", well yeah, you are going to get few positives. But if the question were "would you support the same total ban on abortion that existed in 1960s if every at risk pregnancy were supported by state funding, charity-provided homes, medical care, and a guarantee of support after birth?" you are going to get a different number. And even more: would you favor a return to the legal and social standards of family integrity, chastity and modesty supported by appropriate laws and customary social constraints (which to some extent existed before Roe v Wade and the Pill), reducing the so-called "need" for abortion by 90%", again the number would be different.
DeleteHi Tony
DeleteWhat you say will alienate social conservatives I think, I doubt Dr Feser himself would support such a proposal given his strong anti socialist underpinnings. Infact to him and even myself, it would seem like making adherence to principle contingent upon economic realities. Although in certain cases I would gladly support your proposals.
I don't know about Dr Feser, but personally I am in favour of providing full goverment assistance and child support in cases of assault and even to single mothers including housing etc.
Well, if I had my druthers, none of that would be necessary (it wasn't in 1950), but given that we need to change from a abortion-at-any-point system, some social conservatives could accept some compromises to make that change. For example, I would always try to funnel any state funding through the charities. And push to turn around our eradicating marriage as the normal sphere of sexual permission.
DeleteMy point is that social conservatives were fine with state laws against abortion in 1960, they didn't think such laws interfered with freedom properly understood. But even if many of them have been frogs boiled slowly in terms of taking advantage of divorce when it suits them, they still don't THINK of divorce as a good outcome for marriage - and somewhat similarly for other cultural damages we have suffered. So, yes, many conservatives (or "conservatives") don't put up a huge fight when they "accidentally" get their girlfriend knocked up and she gets an abortion, there are plenty left (more than 3%) who would prefer a legal landscape more like 1960 than like now on the sexual morals front.
I also like some of Ramaswamy's proposals namely changing the culture around sex before marriage, DNA tests to hold father's responsible and accountable for their progeny. The latter is especially popular on both sides and if anything should be pushed at a federal level it should strict rules and laws regarding fatherhood and responsibility. The culture in developing countries like Japan and India have still retained their values of sex only after marriage. In fact policy makers in these countries regularly point to how it has eroded the West. Infact as recently as last year the govt of India successfully defended traditional marriage in the Supreme Court with the attorney general citing the dissent of Chief Justice Roberts in Obergerfell against legalising gay marriage. That's quite something.
DeleteThe latter is especially popular on both sides and if anything should be pushed at a federal level it should strict rules and laws regarding fatherhood and responsibility.
DeleteOddly enough, apparently (so I have heard) in France it is illegal to get a paternity test. It seems that so many kids' fathers are not the husband of their mother that they cannot stomach the revelations that would come forth. Talk about a deranged society!
Thank you, well said.
ReplyDelete"Suppose Trump allowed the federal ban to remain a part of the party platform but citing political realities he says he would veto such a proposal if it passed (say by very slim majorities in such a way that it's unlikely to be upheld and would invite further political backlash). Would that be morally licit ?"
ReplyDeleteYes, because nothing in the constitution gives Congress the authority to enact such a ban.
And nothing in the Constitution authorizes Congress to nullify state laws banning it.
DeleteThe 14th Amendment gives Congress that authority. Until Monday, the official position of the Republican Party was that abortion was unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment.
Delete@Anonymous: Nothing in the 14th Amendment authorizes Congress to impose a regulation the Constitution itself reserves to the States.
DeleteExcellent post.
ReplyDeleteTrump, through his appointments to the Supreme Court, was instrumental in overturning Roe vs. Wade, easily the greatest conservative policy victory of my lifetime.
Yet, it would be a great coup by Satan and a true tragedy if by that very victory, the Republican Party were to abandon its opposition to abortion and social conservatives were to allow the abortion issue to slide into irrelevance out of political calculation.
The greatest achievement of the pro-life moment was not in overturning Roe vs. Wade, nor any of the important restrictions on abortion they helped implement at the state level, but rather, the fact that they were able to keep abortion a controversial issue. By making abortion forcibly present in the social consciousness, they undoubtedly saved countless souls who would have otherwise been indifferent to or accepting of abortion.
If social conservatives, out of a misguided sense of ‘choosing the lesser evil’, give their support to politicians who want to abandon principled opposition to abortion, the overturning of Roe vs. Wade will have ended up making abortion more acceptable than it ever was under Roe vs. Wade. The height of demonic irony.
And this would be a paradigmatic example of how liberal democratic politics corrupts us all.
R.R Reno wrote something which is pertinent to the JD Vance situation given that Dr Feser has been aggressively going after JD Vance of late.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I honestly don't know what to make of the R R Reno comment. He seems to be supportive of Vance albeit with the qualifier that he could have added some side-effects of the drug.
"As citizens and voters, we too must exercise prudence. It is counterproductive moralizing to denounce politicians who refuse to promise what cannot be done. The case of the chemical abortifacient mifepristone is a signal example. A supermajority of Americans supports legal access to it. For pro-life advocates to denounce politicians who are otherwise supportive of the cause of life, because they refuse to commit to banning mifepristone, is simply unrealistic. (Although they can point out that its widespread use courts many medical dangers.) "
The comment seems related to the Vance situation,but
Saying "you support legal access" and refusing to commit to banning it is markedly different right?
Congress can’t pass a federal ban on abortion for the same reason why the Supreme Court couldn’t strike down pro life state legislation. Abortion is not in the constitution. It works both ways. You’d need a constitutional amendment to give Congress the power to legislate.
ReplyDeleteThere is a good article by Rusty Reno at First Things on this topic. https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2024/07/the-republican-party-sidelines-the-pro-life-cause
ReplyDeleteHi Tim
DeleteWhat do you make on Reno's take on the abortion pill situation. Do you think it's supportive of Vance ?
Norm,
DeleteI am not sure on that. Reno identifies as postliberal (Deneen admits stealing this term from "postliberal theology" where it had a very different meaning from its usage in The Postliberal Order, but Reno's influences also include Hans Frei, who helped found postliberal theology). Vance and DeSantis have both been mentioned as candidates who could carry out some form of national conservatism or postliberalism. Both of them are unapologetically pro-Israel and likely represent the more positive attitude toward Jews found in Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI rather than the anti-semiticism found in many of the regimes favored by some postliberals/integralists (Vichy France, with its roots in Action Francaise [the still earlier Louis de Bonald fits this integralist philosophy also], Franco's Spain with its Jewish-Masonic conspiracy theories, the Ustashe regime in Croatia which blended Catholicism with ultranationalism and participated in the genocide of Jews, Gypsies, and Serbs; recently, Nina Power at the postliberal Compact magazine had to resign for her previous comments praising Mein Kampf, Protocols of the Elders of Zion etc.)
In case it is not clear, I see both Ed Feser and Rusty Reno as holding to a form of integralism that departs from the antisemiticism of previous integralist regimes. Viktor Orban (an evangelical who promotes Catholicism as the norm in Hungary) is an example of the more philosemitic integralist. [He was accused of being anti-semitic by leftists because he attacked George Soros, but that was a bogus accusation. His record on Jewish relations is very good.] Antisemitic postliberalism has failed everywhere it has been tried and it has been tried several times. If postliberalism has a future, it must abandon fond references to antisemitic regimes. Someone like DeSantis might be a step in the right direction.
DeleteRegular voters still matter to a limited extent in our system. While the system is not a perfect democracy, it retains democratic procedures and basically free elections. If 60% of the country wants abortion legal, and a minority sneaks through a ban on abortion, that minority faction will be thrown out in the next election, and their accomplishments erased. The problem isn't Trump being a NY liberal. Any GOP leader would be compelled to act this way. They still need to win popular elections.
ReplyDeleteAbortion isn't like the Glass-Stegall Act, something Congress can legislate on without most people knowing about it or having a strong opinion that will inform their vote. A clear majority of the population supports abortion and has for decades, and the trend is if anything bad as the country becomes more secular.
"But what about gay marriage? Didn't an activist minority sneak that through via a SCOTUS case? Then everyone just when along with it, and often changed their view to conform with the state? Why can't banning abortion be like that?"
(1) Gay marriage was becoming gradually more popular before the ruling, in line with the general trend of secularization and "nones".Eventually Congress was going to legalize gay marriage if SCOTUS did not, it would have just taken a few more years. Not so with the pro-life position. As Feser notes, few institutions remain social conservative.
(2) Gays are 1-2% of the population. Most people simply don't care that much and have little reason to if they lack strong moral or religious opinions. Any person can be directly impacted on a very intimate level by the banning of abortion. People who are not pro-life do not want to be a situation when they or a family member "needs" an abortion and its illegal to get one. These are plausible situations faced by people all the time. For the non-pro-life majority, if abortion gets banned, their life just got significantly worse in a very clear way. Morally, this attitude is wrong, but that's just how it is.
I'll go a step further. Even if the US was somehow taken over by a right-wing authoritarian Junta of some sort, that regime would probably still keep abortion legal. It wouldn't want the headache that would come with banning it. Authoritarian states still need popular legitimacy to some extent.
Liberal Catholics talk about limiting the number of abortions through strengthening the welfare state rather than bans, and this sounds like weak sauce to conservatives. How many babies would really be saved if we had Medicare for All, compared to bans backed by the state? But the situation is simply that bad. The relatively small number of babies saved indirectly by anti-poverty measures are probably the best we can do under these conditions.
A clear majority of the population supports abortion and has for decades, and the trend is if anything bad as the country becomes more secular.
DeleteBut even as the country has become less churched, they have also become more nuanced on abortion. Well over 50% would prefer SOME limits on abortion, and something like 90% are revolted by abortion done because "I didn't get the sex I wanted for a kid".
Liberal Catholics talk about limiting the number of abortions through strengthening the welfare state rather than bans, and this sounds like weak sauce to conservatives. How many babies would really be saved if we had Medicare for All,
No, more to the point, conservatives can point to the terrible record the welfare state has been in causing the conditions that foster broken families and ever more abortion. It's not that more money for the welfare state might not save many babies, it's that the welfare state is a major cause of the problem to begin with.
On your first point, you are basically right. A 16 week federal ban might actually have been palatable to the average voter. Much of the EU has 12 week bans. It reflects very poorly on Trump that he didn't think he could back something like that. But even that would still be a "soft pro choice" position. A federal heartbeat bill or banning the abortion pill wasn't happening.
DeleteAs for the welfare state, this is a prudential issue, and people are going to disagree in good faith on public policy or economics even if they have the same goals. I think its notable that Americans United for Life supported a "Make Birth Free" proposal (a welfare state measure by definition), while two of the main sources of the idea that welfare state incentivizes immoral behavior, Charles Murray and Isabell Sawhill, are atheists and borderline eugenicists who view birth control and abortion as antipoverty measures.
Trump follows the logic of Conservative ideology. It's guided, not by absolute, universal principles to which each society should submit, but by the evolution of society's conventions. Even if Trump believed in God (perhaps recent experiences have made an impression on him), or wished to save the unborn, to be loyal to Burkean Conservatism he would have to submit the social consensus of the day.
ReplyDeleteSociety needs to recognise Christianity as the standard for its conventions, not the reverse. No more Enlightenment ideologies, please.
Maybe if the pro-lifers (and hierarchy) hadn't caved on the Covid "vaccine" they would've expected a fight. Trump promised to overturn Roe v. Wade, something other republicans promised for years. He delivered, but when it was time for us to step up, we failed.
ReplyDeleteWe failed because the electorate isn't ready to ban abortion, plain and simple.
Delete"Trump himself now not only favors keeping abortion legal in cases involving rape, incest, and danger to the mother’s life, but declines to say much more, other than that the matter should be left to the states."
ReplyDeleteJust wondering - do you not favor abortion being legal in cases where pregnancy threatens the mother's life?
I'm a pro-life liberal (we exist), but I do favor exceptions for rape and the life of the mother. I thought that was also a common belief even among conservative pro-lifers. Am I misinformed?
that would not amount to abortion. It is up to the mother to decide in that specific case whether to keep the baby or her life.
DeleteScrewtape Jenkins,
DeleteI'm a pro-life liberal (we exist), but I do favor exceptions for rape and the life of the mother. I thought that was also a common belief even among conservative pro-lifers. Am I misinformed?
The pro-life position is that the intentional killing on an innocent human being is always wrong.
Killing an innocent baby because the mother was raped is therefore immoral. I'm curious. Why do you think it is moral?
Regarding the life of the mother. Although it is rarely the case that a pregnancy threatens the life of the mother, it is morally licit to treat the mother as long as that is the intent. Ideally, the treatment would preserve the life of both mother and child, but there could be an unavoidable risk to the child due to the treatment. In that case it would be unfortunate but morally licit.
I'm not sure where Michele Arpaia got his opinion.
There have been multiple cases where a mother has refused to be treated to save the baby. It was discretional. She could have legitimately decude otherwise.
Deletebmiller:
DeleteI don't think it is always wrong to intentionally kill an innocent human being. Imagine a scenario where a person was hypnotized into attempting to kill you. It would not be morally wrong to kill this person in self-defense, even though they are innocent. The right of self-defense is absolute; no one has the obligation to allow themselves to be harmed even by an innocent person. I think it's reasonable to consider a pregnancy due to rape as a continuation of the assault, and an abortion in that scenario could plausibly be considered an act of self-defense.
Like the hypnotized assailant, the baby would be innocent, but as in the case of the hypnotized assailant, the woman is under no obligation to allow the assault on herself to occur.
Screwtape Jenkins,
DeleteI'm not sure I understand your point.
Do you think the innocent baby is continuously raping the mother by merely existing in a manner all babies have always done? Even you when you were a baby?
It is not existing in the manner all babies have always done, because all babies aren't involuntarily and violently imposed upon their mothers. The baby is inflicting extreme physical and emotional distress on the woman through absolutely no fault of her own. As with the case of the hypnotized assailant, in my view, she is under no moral obligation to endure that, even if the perpetrator is innocent.
DeleteOK, now I understand a little better. You don't consider it a continuation of the act of rape.
DeleteThe baby is inflicting extreme physical and emotional distress on the woman
I understand the fact that carrying a child after a rape can cause emotional distress, but physical distress? How so more than an ordinary pregnancy?
Let me ask a question. Do you think it should be allowed to execute rapists?
I don't think your analogy of a hypnotized assailant works in this case. A normal pregnancy is in no way similar to fending off an armed assailant with intent to harm hypnotized or not. A pregnancy is life affirming, not life denying.
An ordinary pregnancy inflicts a lot of physical distress. Childbirth is extraordinarily painful and the recovery from it can take weeks. Pregnancy can literally change your body forever. Any physical ordeal that can permanently alter your body and land you in a hospital for a week or more is an assault, if that ordeal was forced upon you. I just don't see an argument as to where somebody is morally or legally obligated to have even the ordinary physical distress of pregnancy forced upon them.
DeleteI completely agree that it is immoral to force a pregnancy on someone. Whoever does that should be punished. Do you think the perpetrator deserves the death penalty?
DeleteI mean if anyone does deserve punishment it should be the perpetrator shouldn't it? And since it seems the only punishment we are discussing is death then shouldn't it apply to the perpetrator rather than to one of the victims?
The abortion in the case of rape wouldn't be a "punishment" on the unborn child, it would just be the unfortunate result of an act of self-defense.
DeleteTo be clear, I think the most morally exemplary thing a woman could do in that situation would be to have the child. But I don't think it is morally obligatory, much less that it should be legally required.
Screwtape Jenkins,
DeleteIt seems that you are in favor of the mother being able to make the decision to kill her child or not during a physically normal pregnancy. That is a common position but I don't see why you would call that a pro-life position. I understand that in this case the woman was raped and the pregnancy was a result of the assault but I don't see much objective difference between this situation and the one in which the woman simply doesn't want a child even if she wasn't raped. If it's true that all pregnancies are the same as being physical assaulted, then all babies are assaulters regardless of how they got there. This is a the argument I often hear from the pro-choice side.
Why do you consider yourself pro-life then? Are you outlawing abortion in all other cases than the 2 you've identified?
Regarding punishment. You haven't answered me if the rapist should be put to death. Wouldn't he be responsible for the mother killing? Like the evil hypnotist that sent the innocent hypnotized person to kill the mother? Wouldn't it have been better to kill the hypnotist than the one hypnotized?
BTW, thanks for the calm discussion. I think we both realize positions won't be changed, but I am grateful for you explaining your reasoning. I hope I am helping you understand mine.
"It seems that you are in favor of the mother being able to make the decision to kill her child or not during a physically normal pregnancy. "
DeleteNo. It seems I am in favor of the mother being able to make a decision during a physically normal pregnancy *if the pregnancy resulted from rape.*
"If it's true that all pregnancies are the same as being physical assaulted, then all babies are assaulters regardless of how they got there. This is a the argument I often hear from the pro-choice side."
I never said all pregnancies were the same as being physically assaulted. I said pregnancies *that result from rape* are *akin* to physical assault.
You're speaking as if I said that the relevant distinction is whether or not the woman wants the child. I never said or implied anything of the kind. My position is clearly that the relevant distinction is whether the pregnancy was forced on her or not.
This is a common moral and legal distinction we all make. If someone puts a gun to your head and forces you to run over a pedestrian, you are not at fault for the pedestrian's death. However, if you get drunk and get behind the wheel of a car and run the same pedestrian over, you are responsible for that death. In neither case did you *want* to kill anybody, but in the second case you knowingly put yourself in a position where that could occur, so you bear a different level of moral responsibility.
It's not about whether they want the child or not, it's about their responsibility for the pregnancy.
It would not be just to kill the hypnotized person in self defense if you were the one who hypnotized them to attack you!
"Why do you consider yourself pro-life then? Are you outlawing abortion in all other cases than the 2 you've identified?"
Yes, I would consider abortions in all other situations I can think of to be immoral.
"Regarding punishment. You haven't answered me if the rapist should be put to death. Wouldn't he be responsible for the mother killing? Like the evil hypnotist that sent the innocent hypnotized person to kill the mother? Wouldn't it have been better to kill the hypnotist than the one hypnotized?"
I don't see the relevance the specific punishment we give to the rapist has for this discussion, but I wouldn't object in principal to the death penalty for rapists.
Screwtape Jenkins,
DeleteNo. It seems I am in favor of the mother being able to make a decision during a physically normal pregnancy *if the pregnancy resulted from rape.*
Yes, I mentioned that I understood that after the part you quoted. I was looking for why you think the unwanted child can be justifiably killed only if the pregnancy was due to a rape rather than an unwise prior decision. In neither case will killing the unborn undo the act that produced the child. You've said that the baby is inflicting extreme physical and emotional distress on the woman but wouldn't those 2 factors be the case in any unwanted pregnancy?
I never said all pregnancies were the same as being physically assaulted. I said pregnancies *that result from rape* are *akin* to physical assault.
Up to this point I had thought your argument was that the baby was inflicting physical harm upon the woman (as I just noted) and was like a hypnotized assassin, unwittingly inflicting this physical harm. But if a baby in normal pregnancy is not physically assaulting the mother, then what is the baby that results from a rape doing that is different? That is "akin" to physical assault? I can understand the mother can be suffering from emotional distress but I just don't understand the physical claim.
You're speaking as if I said that the relevant distinction is whether or not the woman wants the child. I never said or implied anything of the kind. My position is clearly that the relevant distinction is whether the pregnancy was forced on her or not.
Sorry, I didn't mean to imply that was what your point was. I mentioned that I thought there was not much of an objective difference if someone held that all pregnancies were the same as being physically assaulted. In that case all babies are assailants if the mother chooses to think they are.
It would not be just to kill the hypnotized person in self defense if you were the one who hypnotized them to attack you!
Not sure I understand this. Is this a reference to all babies being assailants again if the mother decides they are?
Yes, I would consider abortions in all other situations I can think of to be immoral.
I asked if you were for outlawing abortion in all other situations. Is your answer a "yes"? Something being immoral is different than being unlawful as I'm sure you know.
I don't see the relevance the specific punishment we give to the rapist has for this discussion, but I wouldn't object in principal to the death penalty for rapists.
I think it's relevant since we are talking about someone being killed as an outcome of an actual assailant's action. If someone's intentional act results in the foreseeable outcome of an unwanted pregnancy thereby resulting in the death of another person then it sounds like the rapist is guilty of murder.
"You've said that the baby is inflicting extreme physical and emotional distress on the woman but wouldn't those 2 factors be the case in any unwanted pregnancy?"
DeleteDo you not recognize that there is a moral distinction between being under extreme physical and emotional distress as a result of your own actions and having extreme physical and emotional distress forced upon you?
I have to assume you can, so why are you treating these two *clearly distinct* scenarios as if they were morally identical or equivalent?
"But if a baby in normal pregnancy is not physically assaulting the mother, then what is the baby that results from a rape doing that is different?"
Why do you think the relevant moral distinction here involves the baby "doing" something as opposed to how the baby came to be there?
Let me use a different analogy. If someone walks up to you in the street and kicks you brutally, in the face, without warning, that's an assault. If you sign up for a kickboxing match and someone kicks you, brutally, in the face, that's not an assault. In the first place, you're entitled to use any means or weapon as self-defense, up to and possibly including lethal force. In the second place, you are not, because you signed up for a kickboxing competition knowing that entails the possibility of being kicked in the face.
This is not a hard concept to grasp.
"I can understand the mother can be suffering from emotional distress but I just don't understand the physical claim."
If you sign up for a kickboxing match, you forfeit any right to go to the police over being kicked in the face. Even though being kicked in the face can cause lasting damage, pain, and even death. The pain is a forseeable outcome of something you signed up for.
Obviously, that does not apply if you did not sign up for a kickboxing match.
Labor sometimes involves 12-48 hours of intense pain. No one, not even an innocent person, has the right to force that on a woman *if the woman is pregnant through no fault of her own.*
"Not sure I understand this. Is this a reference to all babies being assailants again if the mother decides they are?"
It's a refence to the obvious relevant moral difference between someone who is pregnant through no fault of their own and someone who is pregnant as a foreseeable result of their own choices.
If you hypnotized a person to kill you, you can't kill them and claim self defense.
If you signed up for a kickboxing match, you can't kill the person for kicking you and call it self defense.
If you engage in an act you know has the possibility of resulting in life, you can't kill that life and call it self defense.
I literally cannot make this any more obvious and clear and I'm not going to try to anymore. If you don't get it yet, you don't want to.
Screwtape Jenkins,
DeleteIt's not that I don't understand the moral distinction you're making, it is that I am examining it in light of your pro-life stance. You're right that this is the position of some conservatives who claim they are pro-life.
Let me restate your position so you can check my understanding:
A woman gets raped. The rape results in a pregnancy. This particular kind of pregnancy is especially physically and emotionally distressful dut to how it came about. So the woman is justified in killing the baby and ending her physical and emotional distress.
I think I got that right. If I didn't please let me know what I got wrong.
The reason I am raising questions is because you claim you are pro-life and this is a case of the deliberate killing of an innocent person. It also seems to clearly not to be a case of life or death self-defense since we are positing a normal pregnancy and so there is no threat to the life of the mother.
Your reasoning is that although there is no threat to the mother's life, there is still the unwanted/unplanned physical hardship and emotional distress brought on by the pregnancy as the result of the violent action against the woman. We agree that there is physical hardship and potential emotional hardship exerienced by the mother. I say potential emotional hardship since the mother could be pro-life.
Let me assure you I understand the moral distinction you are making between a pregnancy with all the associated physical distress forced upon a mother and the same physical distress resulting from the mother's deliberate choice or accident. It was through no fault of her own that she is in this condition. But it is also no fault of the baby. It is entirely the fault of the rapist.
The physical distress of the pregnancy is the same as all other pregnancies and so we know, although unpleasant, it isn't life-threatening and will end after 9 months. Certainly the mother should be compensated and counseled whether she decides to keep the baby or put the baby up for adoption.
Let me use a different analogy. An attacker injures a woman and an organ of the woman is damaged. She is in great emotional and physical distress. So much distress that caring for her children is a great ordeal. Her organ will heal in 9 months but she will be in distress the entire time. So she arranges to extract the organ from her youngest child, killing the child, and transplanting the organ to herself. She has relieved her distress at the unfortunate cost of the life of her innocent child. Is this justified?
It's probably not a perfect analogy, but I contend it is a better analogy than a baby being an unwitting assailant to his mother only if the mother decides he is (ie decides to either abort or not).
"Let me restate your position so you can check my understanding:
DeleteA woman gets raped. The rape results in a pregnancy. This particular kind of pregnancy is especially physically and emotionally distressful dut to how it came about. So the woman is justified in killing the baby and ending her physical and emotional distress"
No. Not even close.
It is not the physical or emotional distress itself that justifies it. It is the fact that the physical and emotional distress were involuntarily forced upon her through no fault of her own.
Let's walk - ever so slowly - through the kickboxing analogy yet again.
Being kicked in the face causes emotional and physical distress. This is true whether or not you are kicked in the face on the street, or kicked in the face during a kickboxing match. But despite the fact that being kicked in the face is a nearly identical experience in both cases, you are allowed to use any means necessary, up to and including weapons and lethal force, if you are kicked in the face in the street, but you are not allowed to use it in a boxing ring.
Why? Because it is not the physical distress that makes the relevant moral difference, it is the responsibility you bear for the physical distress you are in.
"It also seems to clearly not to be a case of life or death self-defense since we are positing a normal pregnancy and so there is no threat to the life of the mother."
This is not relevant to the point, but of course there is a threat to the life of a mother. There is always a non-zero risk for serious, life-altering complications and death in every pregnancy.
"Let me use a different analogy. An attacker injures a woman and an organ of the woman is damaged. She is in great emotional and physical distress. So much distress that caring for her children is a great ordeal. Her organ will heal in 9 months but she will be in distress the entire time. So she arranges to extract the organ from her youngest child, killing the child, and transplanting the organ to herself. She has relieved her distress at the unfortunate cost of the life of her innocent child. Is this justified?"
Of course not, because your already existing child is causally unrelated to the rape, whereas the child in the womb is the natural consequence/extension of the rape.
It just so happens that the only way to defend yourself against the damage and pain your body has to endure from a pregnancy forced upon you is to end the pregnancy. Like the hypnotized assailant, the baby is innocent, but that doesn't mean the killing is unjustified.
Let me ask you a direct question: do you agree that a person is justified in killing a person hypnotized into attempting to kill them? If so, then you must agree that it is sometimes justifiable to kill an innocent person. So can you make an argument as to how you know aborting a pregnancy that resulted from rape isn't one of those times?
And if you don't agree, can you tell me how the hypnotized assailant example fails to show that it is sometimes justifiable to kill an innocent person?
Screwtape Jenkins,
DeleteNo. Not even close.
It is not the physical or emotional distress itself that justifies it. It is the fact that the physical and emotional distress were involuntarily forced upon her through no fault of her own.
Thanks for the feedback. I meant to imply that when I stated that the pregnancy was especially distressful due to how it came about but apparently I was not clear. I accept your correction.
First let me answer your last question in general. I agree that a person has a right to self-defense, but the response should be proportional. By that I mean if an unarmed person slaps you I don't think that gives you the right to kill him. If there is a reasonable expectation that your life is in danger then yes, at that that point you can take the assaulters life if there is no other way. I think this is how the law works in most everywhere in the US. So this would also apply to a hypnotized person attempting to kill someone and you can consider this the answer to your direct question.
So can you make an argument as to how you know aborting a pregnancy that resulted from rape isn't one of those times?
I have been making that argument by positing that the resulting pregnancy is a normal pregnancy and normal pregnancies do not threaten the life of the mother. If a pregnancy did threaten the life of the mother then we would be talking about the other exception you have for prohibiting abortion (although you never answered me if you wanted abortion outlawed). It seems to me you think the same since you've made the distinction between "life of the mother" and "in the case of rape" as 2 distinct exceptions.
Let me pause here for a moment and bring in some perspective. The number of children aborted due to rape is insignificant compared to the number of all abortions so practically if everyone would agree to outlaw abortion except when the pregnancy was due to rape otherwise no restrictions, then I would vote for that position. I would want the rapist brought to trial, but so would you. Or so I would assume. So I am not emotionally invested, only intellectually curious.
However I do think that it is best to give the best sound intellect argument for your position and to help allies to shore up theirs.
I've given you my reasons for being pro-life. It's simply the Catholic position. Although everyone is entitled to the right of bodily autonomy everyone is also entitled to the right to life. If there is a conflict, one should come down on the right to life over the right to bodily autonomy. Maybe it's time for me to ask you if you think the right to life supersedes other rights and why?
Also, do you, as a pro-lifer, favor outlawing abortion with the exception of the 2 cases you mentioned? Legally?
I agree that a person has a right to self-defense, but the response should be proportional. By that I mean if an unarmed person slaps you I don't think that gives you the right to kill him. If there is a reasonable expectation that your life is in danger then yes, at that that point you can take the assaulters life if there is no other way.
DeleteAnd to extend bmiller's point:
In the effort to save your own life, you cannot take steps like shooting at some innocent bystander whom maybe the rapist loves, to get him away from you. That's not the kind of proportionality involved.
I assume the application to the baby is clear.
(This assumes, as with bmiller's comment, that we are keeping distinct the rape exception and the exception of the baby himself medically causing grave danger to the mother's life.)
" I agree that a person has a right to self-defense, but the response should be proportional"
DeleteWhat is a proportional response to a rape? And a pregnancy that results from rape?
Say the hypnotized man isn't coming to kill you, but just to break both of your legs. And say you are a woman and the man outweighs you by 100lbs. So the only realistic chance you have to stop him is to shoot him. If you shoot him, is that justified? Or does the concept or proportionality only allow you to break his legs?
I don't think the law actually works the way you think it works. I think you can kill in self defense if you reasonably believe the person is going to inflict serious bodily harm, and there is no other way to stop them. They don't need to actually have lethal intent. The woman in this scenario isn't obligated to let the hypnotized man break her legs just because there is no perfectly proportionate response available.
The pregnant woman is in the same situation. There is no perfectly proportionate response available. So does that mean she has no option to defend herself from a pregnancy forced upon her?
"I have been making that argument by positing that the resulting pregnancy is a normal pregnancy and normal pregnancies do not threaten the life of the mother."
Yes, and getting kicked in the face in the street entails the same risks as getting kicked in the face in a kickboxing ring. But in the latter case you are not allowed to use potentially lethal force in response and in the former case you are.
You are not accounting for how your responsibility for being in the distress you are in changes the moral calculus. Just because the physical event is the same doesn't mean the moral dynamics are the same.
"Maybe it's time for me to ask you if you think the right to life supersedes other rights and why?"
Yes, the right to life supersedes all other rights in theory, but in practical application, this does not always yield neat results.
Take the earlier example of a woman attacked by a hypnotized man who is coming to break her legs. Let's say somehow she knows that this is all he intends to do. But being he outweighs her by 100lbs, she has no reasonable option to stop him in the moment other than by shooting him. Is she justified in shooting him? I think most people - and the laws of most countries - would say yes.
Sometimes there is no perfectly proportional option to use in self-defense. In those cases, I still think a person has the right to defend themselves, even if it causes the death of another person.
At this point in time, there is no other option to defend oneself from a pregnancy that results from rape other than to end the pregnancy. One day fetal transplants may be possible and on that day, I would say ending a pregnancy by rape would be wrong, because there is a more proportional response available.
My answers to your direct questions about abortion are complicated and I didn't want to get distracted. I want abortion to eventually be illegal but I was against overturning Roe because I feared it would trigger exactly what it has triggered: a wave of people becoming even more entrenched in establishing abortion as a Constitutional right.
Screwtape Jenkins,
DeleteI'm not sure if all jurisdictions allow the use of deadly force in order to avoid a potential rapist. There probably is some consideration given to any attempt to flee or de-escalate. Once a rape has been committed, does one have the right to kill the rapist then? A month later? Isn't that how long it takes to find out one is pregnant?
The pregnant woman is in the same situation.
I just don't agree that being pregnant is the same as having a hypnotized man threatening to break your legs. It was the rapist who did the assault and he is responsible for any damages done to the victim. But the damage has been done.
Yes, the right to life supersedes all other rights in theory, but in practical application, this does not always yield neat results.
I don't know what you mean by "neat results". Bad things can happen to people and sometimes we have suffer unjustly. Killing someone else to ease one's temporary distress just compounds injustice rather than fixing it.
There is an angle to this position that abortion advocates see as something they can exploit. Abortion advocates say that bodily autonomy supersedes the right to life in the case of an unwanted pregnancy. Pro-life people say that the right to life supersedes bodily autonomy in the case of any pregnancy. The exception for rape just is the position of the abortion advocates since it places bodily autonomy above the right to life.
Your argument about an unwanted assailant causing physical and mental harm to a woman who doesn't want to be pregnant just is a typical argument abortion advocates use. You may say "tough luck" to the woman if her contraception failed during consensual sex, but to her only the sex was consensual, not the pregnancy. Her baby is now the hypnotized killer you've been talking about and how will you explain to her that it's her own fault she should just let herself be killed. Who would agree to that?
I want abortion to eventually be illegal but I was against overturning Roe because I feared it would trigger exactly what it has triggered: a wave of people becoming even more entrenched in establishing abortion as a Constitutional right.
I don't understand. Wasn't Roe already considered as establishing a Constitutional right for abortion?
I also don't understand a strategy that seeks to outlaw abortion by seeking to keep it legal. If someone told me I should support slavery as a strategy to outlaw it I would tend to think that they supported slavery and thought I wasn't very smart.
"I just don't agree that being pregnant is the same as having a hypnotized man threatening to break your legs. It was the rapist who did the assault and he is responsible for any damages done to the victim. But the damage has been done."
DeleteThis is tedious and pointless because you aren't even trying to see what I'm trying to say.
All of the damages have not already been done. The pregnancy will do further damage. Pregnancy is debilitating, risky, and potentially life-altering.
You will now tediously repeat that all pregnancies have the same risk, ignoring that I have said time and time and time again that I believe what makes the moral calculus different here is that the pregnancy was forced upon the woman pregnant by rape.
And then we'll get back on this useless cycle because you refuse to grapple with the moral implications of this specific point.
"I don't know what you mean by "neat results". Bad things can happen to people and sometimes we have suffer unjustly. Killing someone else to ease one's temporary distress just compounds injustice rather than fixing it."
I made it perfectly clear what I meant.
Sometimes there is no perfectly proportionate response. So when you are in situation where your only two options in defending yourself are a disproportionate response and no response, I believe simple morality and the law would say it is licit to use a disproportionate response rather than to do nothing and allow yourself to be greviously harmed.
You will no doubt again say that normal pregnancies entail the same risk, yet again ignoring the moral distinction I've laid out half a dozen times - the law makes distinctions between the legal options available to you when you invite harm upon yourself versus when you are harmed through no fault of your own. Now proceed to ignore this distinction again so we can go through this tedious exercise again. ( I kid of course - if you ignore the distinction again and just nakedly assert again that they are identical situations, I'm walking away.)
"The exception for rape just is the position of the abortion advocates since it places bodily autonomy above the right to life."
I never mentioned bodily autonomy. I mentioned self-defense, which *is* the right to life. It's the right to life all the way down.
Again, you'll say the baby poses no threat greater than an ordinary pregnancy. I'll say getting kicked in the head is the same thing on the street or in a kickboxing ring. But the law gives you legal options if you are kicked in the street that you do not have in the boxing ring.
You will of course ignore this and repeat your same assertion that a pregnancy is a pregnancy is a pregnancy...
"You may say "tough luck" to the woman if her contraception failed during consensual sex, but to her only the sex was consensual, not the pregnancy."
You're just emoting at this point - saying things that you don't believe and that do not follow from anything I said. No matter how many times you repeat the same fallacious assertion without justification, you will never make a normal pregnancy exactly morally equivalent to a pregnancy resulting from rape in the eyes of any sane person or the law.
"I don't understand."
I don't care.
This is the distraction I didn't want to get dragged into, so I'm not going to.
This is tedious and pointless because you aren't even trying to see what I'm trying to say.
DeleteIt's not that I don't understand your position. I just don't agree with it. In fact I think it's evil.
I don't agree that any baby is akin to a hypnotized assassin in the act of killing the mother or a 250lb kickboxer assailing the mother. Regardless of how the baby was conceived.
Your argument for killing the baby is the same one abortion advocates use which would be a peculiar argument for a "pro-life" person to make if one was "pro-life". Almost as peculiar as a "pro-lifer" who opposes a SCOTUS ruling to overturn Roe v Wade. I have a pretty clear idea of what's going on now.
Well. I asked why you why a "pro-lifer" would make the exception you listed and I got my answer. Thanks for the discussion.
"It's not that I don't understand your position. I just don't agree with it. In fact I think it's evil.
DeleteI don't agree that any baby is akin to a hypnotized assassin in the act of killing the mother or a 250lb kickboxer assailing the mother. Regardless of how the baby was conceived."
You can think what you like, but you never made an argument for any of this, nor did you address any of my counter-arguments. So just so we're clear, one of us is making intellectual arguments for our position, the other is just emoting.
All of the damages have not already been done. The pregnancy will do further damage. Pregnancy is debilitating, risky, and potentially life-altering.
DeletePregnancy is a condition that the human female body is designed for. A woman isn't ill as such merely by being pregnant. Pregnancy bears more risks than driving to work in the morning, because the baby's needs in utero are effectively nature's narrow solution to a severe min-max problem: nature needs as much of the woman's resources she can reasonably allocate while staying healthy enough to care for the baby after birth and through to maturity (15-20 years later, vastly longer than any other species), and this necessarily means running significantly closer to the edge of "as much as she can sustain" than other situations, which implies risks. This fact is similar to the fact that MOST athletes who train for the Olympics get injured: they are pushing the human body to the edge of human capacity. But it is in fact a human capacity, and performing at the top of human capacity isn't per se injury.
Breaking your legs is not of like sort. For one thing, breaking a femur bears significant risk of damaging the femoral artery, from which you can bleed out. But besides the risk of death, the human body isn't designed for broken legs.
There are also risks from not getting pregnant. That is, just looking at probabilities alone, there are a number of medical conditions whose risk drops a lot by a woman bearing kids. Endometriosis and related cancers, for example. But it would be nutty to describe that and pregnancy in the same terms, as if both were "debilitating diseases".
Screwtape,
DeleteYou can think what you like, but you never made an argument for any of this, nor did you address any of my counter-arguments.
I think you're confused. I've been examining your claim to be "pro-life" and allowing an exception for abortion in the case of rape. Although I think your basic premises are evil my intent was to show how the exception, leaving aside its evilness, is not pro-life but supports the pro-abortion side.
This is a summary of your argument:
Person A has the right to use deadly force against innocent person B when person B is doing great bodily harm or killing person A by the rule of self-defense but only if innocent person B came about due to a rape. If innocent person B came about by any other way, although the exact same bodily harm and/or killing is being done by person B then person A does not have the right of self defense.
The absurdity seems obvious to me, but maybe I need to elaborate. How does innocent person B's origin story change person A's right not to be killed or maimed by innocent person B? It is as irrelevant to person A having the right of self-defense as the innocence of the person B. Since there is no principled reason to allow self-defense in one case and deny it in the other then, given that person B is maiming and killing person A, there can be no objection to person A killing person B whenever person A encounters a person B. So abortion is permissible in all cases.
Anonymous has explained the difference between biologically normal human development and violent unnatural events and shown how it's nuts to confuse the two by claiming that babies are really hypnotized killers/maimers. But it seems to me to be more than just nuts. It is an inversion of the natural order by characterizing the normal as violence. This inversion then affects the moral order by calling a good evil and allowing evil as a good. It's demonic. Isn't it Screwtape? ;-)
"Pregnancy is a condition that the human female body is designed for. A woman isn't ill as such merely by being pregnant."
DeleteSemantics. If you have a condition forced on you that will definitely severely debilitate you for 9 months, could put you in the hospital for a few weeks, and which could permanently injure you or kill you, you've been unjustly harmed. Call it whatever you like; it won't make a difference to most rational people.
Tell me anywhere else in our legal system where a person is *required*- not by Christian ethics, but by the force of law - to suffer an injury that debilitating with no recourse.
There's what Christian love and charity demands, and then there's what civic law can justly require of *everyone*. As I said, I would agree that the most Christian choice, the most morally exemplary choice, would be to have the child. But you are talking about passing a law that *everyone* must follow. You're talking about 13, 14, and 15 year old rape victims (and from what I've heard - *most* pregnancies that result from rape occur in minor teenagers) being required *by law* to give birth to their rapists' children.
There's a reason in most polls that 90+% of Americans support a rape exception, including close to 80% of Republicans.
This is an interesting philosophical conversation, and a fun way for pro-life dude-bros to try to out pro-life each other to see who's the toughest pro-life SOB on the block, but as a matter of civic discourse it's a completely dead issue.
"Person A has the right to use deadly force against innocent person B when person B is doing great bodily harm or killing person A by the rule of self-defense but only if innocent person B came about due to a rape. If innocent person B came about by any other way, although the exact same bodily harm and/or killing is being done by person B then person A does not have the right of self defense."
DeleteI have explained this by way of analogy half a dozen or more times. Not merely theoretical analogies, but *concrete examples* that show that the law *already recognizes* situations nearly *identical* to this.
Let me try again for the millionth time, and I'll write nothing else, in the (almost certainly) forlorn hopes that you'll actually address it rather than ignore it.
If you are kicked in the head on the street, you may take extreme measures - using weaponry, even firearms, if they are at your disposal - to defend yourself. And the law will recognize that you had every right to defend yourself against an unprovoked kick in the head.
If you are kicked in the head in a kickboxing match, and you pull out a gun and shoot your opponent, you will be charged with murder. Because you volunteered yourself for an activity the end result of which entails that you will get kicked in the head.
So.
The physical situation in both cases *is exactly the same* whether you are kicked in the head in the street or in the ring. Getting kicked in the head entails the same dangers either way.
Just like the physical situation of being pregnant is *exactly the same* whether by rape or by consensual sex. Pregnancy entails the same dangers either way.
But the law *ALREADY, PRESENTLY, TODAY* recognizes that you may take extreme, even lethal action in the one case, but you may not take extreme, even lethal action in the other.
So not only is my position *NOT* absurd, it is *ALREADY* established in law, and recognized as a reasonable moral principle by nearly every rational person.
Do you have a response to this fact - the fact I have repeatedly said does all the moral work in my argument, the fact that you have ignored.
The fact being this: that you do not have the same moral options available to you if you invite hardship on yourself that you have available to you if hardship is inflicted upon you through no fault of your own.
Semantics. If you have a condition forced on you that will definitely severely debilitate you for 9 months,
DeleteIf a woman intentionally gets pregnant, is her condition "severely debilitated"?
The problem with saying yes is that, again, this is what her female physique is designed to accomplish, and when she is doing this, she is accomplishing something uniquely noble and excellent: the birth of a new human person. It is not "debilitating" as such to elect to engage in one pursuit that by its nature precludes certain other pursuits. For example, if a guy decides to pursue being a top-level weight lifter, he is going to undergo strength training that, by its nature, will have the effect of interfering with his pursuing other kinds of excellence at top levels, e.g. concert-level pianist, or ballet, or swimmer. This condition could be called "debilitated" only in the unnatural and qualified/limited sense of "prevented from certain specific forms of excellence". It is, otherwise, highly abled to perform its own proper excellence.
A pregnant woman is limited in many physical activities she can (or at least should) undertake because she is pursuing an excellence that is incompatible with those other activities. This is more properly understood as her being ENabled to bear a new human being to birth, itself a noble goal, than to understand it as being "DEbilitated".
The difference of being forced versus electing to become pregnant is a morally significant consideration of the punishments to be inflicted upon the rapist. And this should mean that a rapist can legitimately be forced to pay legal fines for forcing her into one path of activities to the exclusion of other activities to which she is otherwise legally entitled. (And, of course, to pay for the costs of raising the child (and extra costs due to his being without his father present), that's a no-brainer.) But the difference of being forced versus electing to become pregnant is NOT a fundamental difference in whether the condition of pregnancy is physically the same as a physical injury or not. To call it "debilitating" and treated as an injury is to impose a category mistake. That's not mere semantics.
Screwtape,
DeleteDo you have a response to this fact - the fact I have repeatedly said does all the moral work in my argument, the fact that you have ignored.
Why do you think I am ignoring you position when you quoted me as apparently accurately representing it?
Let me be brief. A kickboxer can stop a match and so stop getting kicked in the head. So although a person signed up for the possibility of getting kicked in the head he can make it stop without killing his opponent. If the opponent does not stop, which your deadly baby assailant would not, then your position is that you have no right to take self-defense measures to make the beating stop. You could only take self-defense measures if you were thrown into the ring with the maniac kickboxer against your will.
Does your deadly baby assailant know he is supposed to stop killing his opponent when the bell rings?
"If a woman intentionally gets pregnant, is her condition "severely debilitated"?"
DeleteYes. Obviously.
"It is not "debilitating" as such to elect to engage in one pursuit that by its nature precludes certain other pursuits. For example, if a guy decides to pursue being a top-level weight lifter, he is going to undergo strength training that, by its nature, will have the effect of interfering with his pursuing other kinds of excellence at top levels, e.g. concert-level pianist, or ballet, or swimmer."
He would not be *physically* debilitated. A pregnancy is not just a lost opportunity cost. It entails actual physical distress, severe physical limitations for 9 months, extreme pain, hospitalization, etc. That is debilitating, however you slice it.
"The difference of being forced versus electing to become pregnant is a morally significant consideration of the punishments to be inflicted upon the rapist."
Can you give a REASON, a publicly available, persuasive REASON, for why the moral significance should only be limited to the perpetrator?
"To call it "debilitating" and treated as an injury is to impose a category mistake. That's not mere semantics."
If gaining 30-50lbs, vomiting every morning being severely limited in mobility, being severely restricted in travel, all of which terminates in a hospital stay and extreme pain for 12-48 hours is not debilitating, then the word has no meaning.
Just because the human body is designed to endure it does not mean that it isn't debilitating. That doesn't follow at all.
"Why do you think I am ignoring you position when you quoted me as apparently accurately representing it?"
DeleteI have never quoted you as accurately representing it, because to my recollection, you've yet to do it.
You keep speaking as if the only consideration is the pregnancy itself, not how the pregnancy was initiated.
"Does your deadly baby assailant know he is supposed to stop killing his opponent when the bell rings?"
First, to be clear, contrary to your hysterical assertions, I never said that the baby was "actually" an assailant. I made an ANALOGY to a hypothetical HYPNOTIZED assailant, to disprove your position that it is always wrong to kill an innocent person.
Secondly, no, of course the baby cannot stop, just as the hypnotized man cannot stop. That is why they are both innocent.
But the question before us is - does their innocence rob the person debilitated by them of the right to self defense?
With the hypnotized assailant example, we BOTH agreed that the answer is no. A person attacked by a hypnotized assailant has the right to defend themselves against an innocent attacker, even by lethal means, if no other means are available or sufficient.
What no one here has made clear is why this reasoning doesn't extend to the fetus.
The only answers I have been given are:
1) your assertion that this would apply to all pregnancies, which even if true, would not be an argument against it applying to pregnancies resulting from rape.
2) Anonymous and Tony's assertion that because a pregnancy is natural, it therefore isn't debilitating
3) Your assertion that my position is "evil"
None of which suffices to show that my position is untenable or absurd, much less wrong.
Am I wrong in saying that we all agree now that it is not *always* wrong to deliberately kill an innocent person?
If so, then again I ask, how do you know it's wrong to end a pregnancy that results from rape?
Screwtape,
DeleteSecondly, no, of course the baby cannot stop, just as the hypnotized man cannot stop. That is why they are both innocent.
But the question before us is - does their innocence rob the person debilitated by them of the right to self defense?
Please re-read my post on On July 28, 2024 at 11:27 AM, because it seems you are now agreeing with it. Your claim has been that in both cases the baby in innocent but only the mother that had the pregnancy forced upon them has the right to self defense. Otherwise the mother does not have the right of self defense. This position argues that yes, in the latter case the mother is robbed of the right of self defense in a similar fashion to how a kickboxer gives up his right of self defense. When reminded that kickboxers follow rules but hypnotized killers don't, you seem to now allow that one always has a right of self defense against hypnotized killers regardless if you signed up for kickboxing or not. If not please explain why a kickboxer contestant is not allowed to defend himself against a hypnotized killer during a match. Or even what kind of kickboxing match disallows self defense for only one opponent and why anyone would sign up for that?
I have been allowing for the sake of argument your pro-abortion assertion that babies are akin to hypnotized killers. If they are, then rape or not, they are still akin to hypnotized killers. If a person finds out they are being attacked by a hypnotized killer it is reasonable for them to defend themselves regardless if they invited the killer in, left the door unlocked or the killer kicked in the door. That is why if people accept your pro-abortion assertion then it reasonably leads to allowing abortion in all cases, not just rape.
So your #1 just misses the point I've been making and you must have missed the reasons I gave for your pro-abortion position being evil. Tony has done a good job of explaining to onlookers the absurdity of calling the process of sustaining human life a debilitating condition.
"Please re-read my post on On July 28, 2024 at 11:27 AM, because it seems you are now agreeing with it. Your claim has been that in both cases the baby in innocent but only the mother that had the pregnancy forced upon them has the right to self defense. Otherwise the mother does not have the right of self defense."
DeleteI do not think I ever said that anyone at anytime completely forfeits a right to self-defense. Obviously, within the context of a kickboxing match, one is morally permitted to defend oneself within the rules of kickboxing.
My point was, the fact that you signed up for a kickboxing match *limits the range* of your self defense options.
This is an analogy, so of course at some point the comparison will break down because obviously a pregnancy isn't identical to a kickboxing match or being attacked by a hypnotized assailant.
A woman with an unwanted pregnancy does have the right to self-defense, but just like the kickboxer's options are limited by the fact that he signed up for a kickboxing match, her options are limited by the fact that she consented to an act that could result in pregnancy. So I don't know what the analogous self-defense options would be in this scenario - I guess anything that ameliorates the hardship of the pregnancy short of termination. But the relevant point is: we have a moral justification -already recognized in other contexts - for limiting her self-defense options more than the self-defense options for the rape victim.
For clarification, do you agree with this principle: the self-defense options available to you are different depending on whether you invited hardship upon yourself or whether hardship is involuntarily imposed upon you.
"I have been allowing for the sake of argument your pro-abortion assertion that babies are akin to hypnotized killers. If they are, then rape or not, they are still akin to hypnotized killers. If a person finds out they are being attacked by a hypnotized killer it is reasonable for them to defend themselves regardless if they invited the killer in, left the door unlocked or the killer kicked in the door."
No, they definitely do not if *THEY ARE THE ONES WHO HYPNOTIZED THE KILLER TO ATTACK THEM.*
If *YOU* compelled someone to attack you against their will, you could not kill them for the attack that *you caused* and call it self-defense!
That is the analogous position the woman pregnant through consensual sex is in. Not being attacked by an assailant hypnotized by some unknown person, but an assailant hypnotized by *herself*.
Now, no court would blame her if she used some form of non-lethal self-defense to just thwart the attack. But if she killed the assailant (whom she compelled to attack her against his will), that would be murder by any reasonable standard.
"Tony has done a good job of explaining to onlookers the absurdity of calling the process of sustaining human life a debilitating condition."
DeleteSorry, hit publish too soon.
I'll need somebody to explain to my why the fact that something is natural means it's not debilitating.
Bowel movements are natural. But that doesn't mean that if someone unknowingly spikes your drink with laxatives, that they haven't harmed you, or put you in a debilitating condition.
I think it is *obviously* absurd to say that just because pregnancy is natural, a person forced into pregnancy through no fault of their own, at a time not of their choosing - a time which could derail the course of their entire life, either because they're a minor or married or not financially or emotionally secure enough yet for the responsibility - is not suffering an injury or a debilitating condition.
A 13 year old who has to derail her education, drop out of school and go on welfare because she had a pregnancy forced upon her by rape has not suffered a debilitation or an injury???
Maybe it's time to be explicit about why the pro-life position allows for self defense. Double effect.
Delete2263 The legitimate defense of persons and societies is not an exception to the prohibition against the murder of the innocent that constitutes intentional killing. "The act of self-defense can have a double effect: the preservation of one's own life; and the killing of the aggressor. . . . The one is intended, the other is not."65
2264 Love toward oneself remains a fundamental principle of morality. Therefore it is legitimate to insist on respect for one's own right to life. Someone who defends his life is not guilty of murder even if he is forced to deal his aggressor a lethal blow:
If a man in self-defense uses more than necessary violence, it will be unlawful: whereas if he repels force with moderation, his defense will be lawful. . . . Nor is it necessary for salvation that a man omit the act of moderate self-defense to avoid killing the other man, since one is bound to take more care of one's own life than of another's.66
Screwtape,
DeleteSo I don't know what the analogous self-defense options would be in this scenario - I guess anything that ameliorates the hardship of the pregnancy short of termination.
A woman with an unwanted pregnancy does have the right to self-defense, but just like the kickboxer's options are limited by the fact that he signed up for a kickboxing match, her options are limited by the fact that she consented to an act that could result in pregnancy.
You've stated that there can be no proportional self-defense against a baby assailant* other than killing it so you are on record that killing is the only option. That is why I have been making the point I've been making.
For clarification, do you agree with this principle: the self-defense options available to you are different depending on whether you invited hardship upon yourself or whether hardship is involuntarily imposed upon you.
You'll have to be specific because I don't know what you mean. Under what circumstances do you think someone can morally agree to allow themselves to physically beaten up to and including death without defending themselves in any way? Boxing matches are not like that and even duels to the death are not like that.
If *YOU* compelled someone to attack you against their will, you could not kill them for the attack that *you caused* and call it self-defense!
That is the analogous position the woman pregnant through consensual sex is in. Not being attacked by an assailant hypnotized by some unknown person, but an assailant hypnotized by *herself*.
You live in a strange neighborhood where if you accidently leave your door unlocked or invite a stranger in, you've compelled the visitor to attack you against their will.
Although I disagree that women compel their babies to physically attack them against their will, if those mothers cannot use the argument of self defense to defend themselves against this asserted attack then you've just successfully argued against your abortion exception for protecting the life of the mother in any case other than rape.
*I acknowledge you apparently disagree with my term "baby assailant" but your argument is that the baby needs to be killed because the baby is causing severe debilitation just as a hypnotized assailant causes severe debilitation to the victim. It's just a concise description of your assertion.
"You've stated that there can be no proportional self-defense against a baby assailant* other than killing it so you are on record that killing is the only option. That is why I have been making the point I've been making."
DeleteNot true. I mentioned that a fetal transplant would be a proportional response, and I said that once they became available I would withdraw my support for the rape exception. But they aren't available yet.
For the rape victim, there is no proportional self-defense that can prevent all the negative consequences of the pregnancy other than ending the pregnancy. And because the pregnancy was forced on her against her will, I think common morality and legal precedent say in that situation she has that right.
"You'll have to be specific..."
More specific than the half-dozen analogies I've already used to make the point?
Sure, why not. I've got nothing but time.
Let's return to this one.
Do you agree that a person who is kicked in the head in a kickboxing match that he signed up for is more restricted in his self-defense options than a person unexpectedly kicked in the head in the street?
"You live in a strange neighborhood where if you accidently leave your door unlocked or invite a stranger in, you've compelled the visitor to attack you against their will."
So you don't believe that when a person engages in consensual sex, they are responsible for any life that results from that act?
Sounds like you're the pro-choicer, here.
"Although I disagree that women compel their babies to physically attack them against their will, if those mothers cannot use the argument of self defense to defend themselves against this asserted attack then you've just successfully argued against your abortion exception for protecting the life of the mother in any case other than rape."
At some point, ask your mom to explain the concept of an analogy to you.
In the meantime, let me remind you that you are the one who introduced the concept of proportionality. But your assertion that all pregnancies are the same and therefore all the same self-defense options available in one pregnancy are available in all directly contradicts the concept or proportionality.
Your argument leads to the absurd conclusion that a person kicked in the head always has the same self-defense options as anyone else kicked in the head. Whether they explicitly asked to be kicked in the head, or whether they signed up for an activity which entails the possibility of being kicked in the head, or whether they are kicked in the head while they are asleep in their beds.
How does this idea square with your supposed commitment to proportionality?
(Hint: it doesn't.)
"*I acknowledge you apparently disagree with my term "baby assailant" but your argument is that the baby needs to be killed because the baby is causing severe debilitation just as a hypnotized assailant causes severe debilitation to the victim. It's just a concise description of your assertion."
Please point me to where I said the baby "needs to be killed."
This kind of pathetic desperation reeks of a person who knows he's badly losing an argument and is flailing for any handhold, however fallacious, however inaccurate.
What I said *repeatedly* was - it would be the most morally upstanding and Christian thing for the woman pregnant by rape to have the child, but that the law cannot and should not compel all women in that situation to have the child.
What I said was, abortion in the case of rape is not the option I would wish for nor it is it the best option, but consistent with moral and legal precedent in analogous cases, it should remain *an* option.
So, no, it is not a concise description of my assertion, it is a blatant strawman committed by an unworthy opponent.
Screwtape,
DeleteBut they aren't available yet.
OK. There can be no present option other than killing the baby assailant. So your position is that what is moral today is immoral tomorrow.
Do you agree that a person who is kicked in the head in a kickboxing match that he signed up for is more restricted in his self-defense options than a person unexpectedly kicked in the head in the street?
I thought you just agreed that regulated sports are not analogous to being attacked by hypnotized assailants. Kickboxers are allowed proportional responses to their opponents and people being attacked by hypnotized assailants are also. Except, you claim, if a hypnotized/baby assailant comes about via consensual sex. Then the mother must allow herself to be killed.
So you don't believe that when a person engages in consensual sex, they are responsible for any life that results from that act?
Of course I believe they are participants in the creation of a new life. I don't believe a mother compels her baby *against his will* to kill the mother. Just like I don't believe unlocked doors compel passers-by *against their will* to kill the occupant nor do the words "come in" compel the person at the door *against his will* to kill the occupant.
In the meantime, let me remind you that you are the one who introduced the concept of proportionality. But your assertion that all pregnancies are the same and therefore all the same self-defense options available in one pregnancy are available in all directly contradicts the concept or proportionality.
I think you are confused. As I've said many times, I reject your assertion that a baby is an assailant akin to a hypnotized killer, but I have been entertaining that absurd idea for the sake of argument. You have agreed that all pregnancies are same wrt to all babies being assailants. So all mothers are being assailed in exactly the same way. The concept of proportionality is that one is permitted to only respond to an agressor with an proportional response, so all mothers being assailed can only morally respond proportionately. An example I used before was if someone slaps you it is not a proportional response to kill them.
I don't believe for a minute that all babies are akin to hypnotized killer but if they were (again for the sake of argument) then you have been arguing that only mothers that have been raped can prevent their own death by killing the assailant, while anyone else got what they signed up for and so too bad you're gonna die. Again, this is not my argument but yours. You see (don't you?) that you've just argued against the "life of the mother" exception to abortion. The second of the 2 exceptions you've claimed are allowable for your self-proclaimed "pro-life" status. Only mothers that have been raped are allowed to save their lives. NO ONE ELSE! 0Please let that sink in.
Please point me to where I said the baby "needs to be killed."
Good point. I will amend it to say the baby assailant "can morally be killed". Please consider all previous mentions of "baby assailant" to fall under the revised definition.
"OK. There can be no present option other than killing the baby assailant. So your position is that what is moral today is immoral tomorrow."
DeleteYes. When we're talking about self-defense and proportionality, that is to be expected.
If you are in danger of grievous harm and there is no proportional response available to prevent this, a disproportionate response is permissible. When proportional responses become available, the disproportionate response is no longer justifiable.
Do you not agree with this?
"I thought you just agreed that regulated sports are not analogous to being attacked by hypnotized assailants."
I asked you a straightforward question.
I'm trying to see if you agree that your morally permissible self-defense options vary based on the context in which you are defending yourself. For the sake of clarification on this particular point, please ignore all other analogies and just answer the question asked:
Do you agree that a person who is kicked in the head in a kickboxing match that he signed up for is more restricted in his self-defense options than a person unexpectedly kicked in the head in the street?
"You have agreed that all pregnancies are same wrt to all babies being assailants."
Absolutely absurd and false.
What I said was: all pregnancies are debilitating. And I said that you must endure that debilitation if you bring pregnancy on yourself, but the government can't compel you to endure that debilitation if it was forced on you by a rape.
Your shameless dishonesty knows no bounds.
" I don't believe for a minute that all babies are akin to hypnotized killer"
Neither do I, and nothing I said ever implied that I do.
Perhaps we should take the fact that you cannot press your position absent presenting blatant strawmen as a concession of your inability to profitably respond and end the debate.
If someone more capable or honest shows up to discuss what is really an important issue, I'll respond. But you clearly are neither intellectually or morally up to the task.
Screwtape,
DeleteSo I will not accused of ignoring your question:
I'm trying to see if you agree that your morally permissible self-defense options vary based on the context in which you are defending yourself. For the sake of clarification on this particular point, please ignore all other analogies and just answer the question asked:
Do you agree that a person who is kicked in the head in a kickboxing match that he signed up for is more restricted in his self-defense options than a person unexpectedly kicked in the head in the street?
The right of self-defense is to defend one's life. From Wikipedia:
The right of self-defense (also called, when it applies to the defense of another, alter ego defense, defense of others, defense of a third person) is the right for people to use reasonable or defensive force, for the purpose of defending one's own life (self-defense) or the lives of others, including, in certain circumstances, the use of deadly force.[1]
Martial arts are different than self-defense in that they are practice for self-defense but not actual cases of self-defense.
Unarmed
Many styles of martial arts are practiced for self-defense or include self-defense techniques. Some styles train primarily for self-defense, while other combat sports can be effectively applied for self-defense. Some martial arts train how to escape from a knife or gun situation or how to break away from a punch, while others train how to attack. To provide more practical self-defense, many modern martial arts schools now use a combination of martial arts styles and techniques and will often customize self-defense training to suit individual participants.[citation needed]
Your question is based on a category mistake. Although martial arts prepares one for instances of actual self-defense, they are not themselves instances of actual self-defense and so are irrelevant to the morality concerning the use of actual self-defense.
I tried to get this point across when I mentioned that baby assailants are not following kickbox rules and so the situation cannot be like a kickbox match (rape or not).
Looks like only the second my 2 posts got through. So I have to break up the post meant to precede that one into 2 posts:
DeleteScrewtape:
Do you not agree with this?
To be specific, if one is threatened with grave physical harm or death by an assailant then lethal self defense is justified if there are no other means available and as long as the intent is to preserve your own life and not to intentionally kill the assailant.
The context was your contention that mothers during a normal pregnancy suffering the same physical distress as mothers who are pregnant during rape are also allowed to defend themselves but presently the only way to do that was to kill the baby/assailant (July 31, 2024 at 8:08 PM). So all pregnancies and not just pregnancies due to rape are currently permissible according to this, which is different than what anyone would consider a pro-life position. One of the points I have been making.
You've claimed in your favorite analogy that the physical outcome is the same for the one receiving a kick to the head whether from a kickboxer or a street assailant. You claim this is analogous to pregnancy, the baby being analogous to the one delivering the kick, a street assailant in one case and a kickboxer in the other. Your point is that one is restricted in self-defense options in the kickboxer case but not in the case of the street assailant. So in the case of the pregnancy due to consensual sex does the mother of the unwanted baby have the right to kill the baby/kickboxer as you've argued above (because there can presently be no proportional response) or does she have to allow herself to be kickboxed to death or more realistically being street kicked to death since babies don't follow kickboxing rules?
"You have agreed that all pregnancies are same wrt to all babies being assailants."
Absolutely absurd and false.
What I said was: all pregnancies are debilitating. And I said that you must endure that debilitation if you bring pregnancy on yourself, but the government can't compel you to endure that debilitation if it was forced on you by a rape.
So you're saying that some people can relieve themselves of a debilitation and others cannot relieve themselves of the same debilitation if they were complicit in how that debilitation came about. So this confirms that this "debilitation" is the same for all pregnancies, rape or not. This is a "debilitation" which you claim is caused by a baby in a similar manner that a kickboxer or street assailant debilitates the kickee. This is how I got the idea that you're claiming all babies are equally damaging assailants. You've also maintained that the debilitation is like unto death and if that is the case, mother's who were not raped are doomed to die. It is your ridiculous analogy that has put you in this spot so don't get mad at me or call me dishonest. If you think I got something wrong you can point it out to me. As you've seen I've made corrections where you clarified. I have no interest in arguing against a position that no one holds.
(Continued)
Delete" I don't believe for a minute that all babies are akin to hypnotized killer"
Neither do I, and nothing I said ever implied that I do.
This looks like that implication:
Like the hypnotized assailant, the baby would be innocent, but as in the case of the hypnotized assailant, the woman is under no obligation to allow the assault on herself to occur. July 20, 2024 at 9:27 PM
I will just point out once again, you've claimed pregnancy is a debilitation that some people can relieve themselves of and others cannot. The reason for not being allowed to relieve oneself from the debilitation is if one was responsible for allowing the condition. You've likened it to being "the one who hypnotized them to attack you!"
Let me say this. Your analogy is all about someone doing physical harm to someone else and calling this physical harm a "debilitating condition". But in other places, like below, there is an equivocal use of that term. In that other sense it means lost opportunity or the like and not necessarily related to any physical harm. I have been arguing against your use of the term wrt to physical harm while I think your real motivation is the second sense of the term. If that is the case, then that is what we should be talking and using different analogies than kickboxing and street assailants (which I think are really really bad). Of course I could be wrong, but that's the impression I get. Either way I can't understand the motivation to call yourself pro-life other than social pressure or an attempt at subversion.
July 31, 2024 at 11:45 AM
I think it is *obviously* absurd to say that just because pregnancy is natural, a person forced into pregnancy through no fault of their own, at a time not of their choosing - a time which could derail the course of their entire life, either because they're a minor or married or not financially or emotionally secure enough yet for the responsibility - is not suffering an injury or a debilitating condition.
A 13 year old who has to derail her education, drop out of school and go on welfare because she had a pregnancy forced upon her by rape has not suffered a debilitation or an injury???
I'm not going to reply point by point, because you clearly are either incapable or unwilling to grasp a very basic point:
DeleteYour self defense options are limited by the context in which you are defending yourself.
The actual nature of the debilitation is not the deciding factor. The deciding factor is the context in which that debilitation came about.
Being kicked in the head is debilitating.
If you are kicked in the head in the street, you can use any means necessary, including weapons, up to and including lethal force - to defend yourself.
If you are kicked in the head in a kickboxing match you signed up for, you may not use weapons or lethal force to defend yourself.
This distinction - the one you are unrelentingly, steadfastly, deliberately ignoring - is the key to my argument and it is the only thing I will engage with you on moving forward.
Any responses not on this decisive point will be ignored:
Do you agree that *even given the same debilitating condition* your ethical self-defense options can vary depending on context?
Screwtape,
DeleteI'm not going to reply point by point, because you clearly are either incapable or unwilling to grasp a very basic point:
Your self defense options are limited by the context in which you are defending yourself.
You say I am "either incapable or unwilling to grasp a very basic point:", but again it is not that I don't understand what you're trying to get at it's just that I don't agree with the analogy. One of my recent posts explained why I don't agree. Do you have a response? Briefly, kickboxing is not doing actual, legally defined self defense while fending off an attack from a street assailant is. If a kickboxing contestant started acting like a street assailant then other contestant is entitled to legally defined self defensive actions. No?
Maybe you are thinking about legal recourse in matters of personal injury. One can argue that he shouldn't be held liable for someone falling and injuring himself on his property if there were adequate warning signs posted. It would be another matter if he pushed that person, unprovoked. But in neither case is an innocent third party judged to pay the price.
The actual nature of the debilitation is not the deciding factor.
The nature of the "debilitation" definitely is the deciding factor in the case of lethal self defense. If one is not gravely threatened then one cannot morally or legally use lethal self defense as an excuse for killing someone. You are the only person I've ever run across that claims a normal pregnancy is like that. Everyone else understands that the life and health of the mother is not threatened by a normal pregnancy.
Any responses not on this decisive point will be ignored:
I've noticed. Is that because you don't understand the points I'm trying to make?
Do you agree that *even given the same debilitating condition* your ethical self-defense options can vary depending on context?
Off the top of my head I would say that a killer sentenced to death does not have the same right to use lethal self defense as his would-be victim does. In a war, a soldier can kill an enemy and so on. As I've said many times I think the analogy you insist on doesn't work, is incoherent and ultimately evil.
"Briefly, kickboxing is not doing actual, legally defined self defense while fending off an attack from a street assailant is. If a kickboxing contestant started acting like a street assailant then other contestant is entitled to legally defined self defensive actions. No?"
DeleteDo you not understand that this just further illustrates my point?
That everyone who is kicked in the head doesn't have the same self defense options as everyone else kicked in the head?
That it is not the debilitation that sets your self-defense options, but the context in which that debilitation occurs?
Forget the kickboxing analogy for a moment.
Let's take two people, Person A and Person B.
Person A pays Luke $1000 to savagely kick him in the head. When Luke takes the money and savagely kicks Person A in the head, Person A shoots Luke dead and claims self-defense.
Person B is walking down the street minding his own business, when Luke appears out of nowhere and savagely kicks him in the head. Person B shoots Luke dead and claims self defense.
Both Person A and Person B suffered the same debilitation (being kicked in the head).
Are both of their claims of self defense equally justifiable?
Now: PLEASE DO NOT WORRY YOUR PRETTY LITTLE HEAD ABOUT WHETHER THIS ANALOGY PERFECTLY MAPS ONTO A WOMAN PREGNANT BY RAPE.
THAT IS NOT THE POINT OF THE ANALOGY.
The point of the analogy for present purposes is just to establish whether you agree with the common moral principle that context limits your self-defense options.
So.
Do Person A and Person B both have equally justifiable claims to self defense?
Screwtape,
DeleteDo you not understand that this just further illustrates my point?
It illustrates that kickboxing is not the same as legal self defense doesn't it? Please answer. I've been answering your questions.
Do Person A and Person B both have equally justifiable claims to self defense?
Of course not. Person A is a premeditated murderer and Person B is a victim that may have the right to lethal self defense. But if this is a life-threatening kick, then both Person A and Person B would be dead or severely injured and unable to respond. That is another problem with this kicking analogy. I don't understand why you cling to it.
Now: PLEASE DO NOT WORRY YOUR PRETTY LITTLE HEAD ABOUT WHETHER THIS ANALOGY PERFECTLY MAPS ONTO A WOMAN PREGNANT BY RAPE.
THAT IS NOT THE POINT OF THE ANALOGY.
Then why did you claim these scenarios are analogous to pregnancy. If you hadn't made that claim then I wouldn't have been curious.
We need to take the Republican party back from Trump and his people after this election- and make it strongly pro-life again.
ReplyDeleteIt's happened over and over again that the RICH part of the Republican party has tried to drop any issues that don't deal with MONEY- just read Phillis Schlafly's "Choice not an Echo" or Jeff Bell's "The Case for Polarized Politics."
These are the old "Rockefeller Republicans"... although some libertarians also make these arguments- see Mo Fiorina's "Culture War"
https://pomocon.substack.com/p/rockefeller-republicans
Not voting for Trump would further exacerbate the liberal agenda. I mean, realistically, politics is not there to turn the earth into heaven, we must make do with what we have.
ReplyDeleteMoreover, the entire Catholic tradition — from Augustine, who believed that the elimination of prostitution would lead to social imbalances, to Thomas Aquinas, who stated that 'those in authority rightly tolerate certain evils [...] to avoid encountering worse evils,' from Leo XIII, who wrote that 'human law can or even must tolerate evil,' to Pius XII, who asserted that 'what does not conform to truth and moral norms [...] may not be prevented through state laws and coercive measures [...] in the interest of a higher and more widespread good' — has expressed tolerance towards behaviors or laws contrary to Christian morality when condemnation would result in worse situations."
Michele, the toleration of evil is not the same thing as Trump's support of homosexual "marriage" because for society, its now "just water under the bridge". Voting for Trump will exacerbate the conservative agenda.
ReplyDeletePerhaps taking the advice of Pope Francis you need not harp on what everybody knows anyway, especially when DOBBS just did away with Roe and its offspring. While it is true that protecting human life is a federal issue, you have to ask yourself whther it is politically feasible to advance this issue now and have the proabortion side win the elections so your pure stance has not only nonchance to be implemented but will actually be beaten back even further, or fighting prudently in order to actually have a chance to win?
ReplyDeleteMiguel, I find hard to understand how one who cares about "homosexual marriage" would rather not vote for a President who allegedly holds some un-Christian values. This will inevitably favours the agenda of those who, as a whole - because embedded in their DNA, support all sort of un-Christian values, in addition to little or no possibility to reform their creed.
ReplyDeleteA non-vote, or dispersing a vote, is contributing to Democrats.
(Note: I am not a Trumpster).
A non-vote, or dispersing a vote, is contributing to Democrats.
DeleteDemocrats also say that a non-vote is contributing to Trump. So how is this supposed to work exactly?
Michele. Your example, " because embedded in their DNA, support all sort of un-Christian values, in addition to little or no possibility to reform their creed" also applies to the Republican Party represented by Trump and Vance. Thus is the dilemma. After two centuries, the conservative "lesser evil" has not graduated into anything better. It has only moved with the times. Time to wake up and simply refuse to promote false messages - even if, for the sake of political realism, we do not broadcast the entire truth, as this post argues.
DeleteAs best I can deduce the non-vote position, not voting will favor the stronger candidate in a political race. At this point, given all other circumstances, Trump is the stronger candidate, like it or not. So, if one does not favor Trump, yet fails to vote at all, this supports Trump's candidacy while doing zero for his opponent. It is a classic process of elimination.
ReplyDeleteIf Trump is "the stronger candidate" right now, but Harris (somehow) became the stronger candidate on Monday, Nov. 4 but you didn't hear about that change, does your decision on Oct. 31 to vote for Harris because she is not "the stronger candidate" become a vote for Trump on Nov. 5 when he is no longer the stronger candidate? No, of course not. No more would a different choice not to vote increase Harris's likelihood of winning on Nov. 5.
DeleteThe idea that not-voting "favors" one side is a logical fallacy. Not voting doesn't make the stronger candidate more likely to vote than if you wrote in your own name, for example. Nor more likely than if you vote for a no-name candidate whose third party is only on your state's ballot, none of the other 49. It only makes it more likely than as compared to the likelihood of his winning if you voted for a competing candidate that has a real chance of winning. That's a conditional probability, i.e. constrained by the conditions you place on the scenarios considered.
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ReplyDelete