This popped up in the New York Times a week or so ago (10/12/08), and I flagged it for later consideration. (One of the nice features of ShareThis, which I have been using a lot lately, is that I can save items to my Blogger draft folder for later consideration. It only saves the link, which is kind of a nuisance, but perhaps there's a setting that I haven't explored that allows me to save the whole item.) If you get a sense of deja vu, go with it:
Editorial
Abortion Rights on the Ballot, Again
Published: October 12, 2008
Once again this year, opponents of women’s reproductive rights have managed to get initiatives aimed at ending or limiting abortion rights on ballots — in South Dakota, Colorado and California. These measures, which violate women’s privacy and threaten their health, have implications far beyond those states. If voters approve them, they will become a weapon in the right-wing campaign to overturn Roe v Wade.
The South Dakota initiative is a near twin of the sweeping abortion ban handily rejected by South Dakota voters just two years ago. To make the ban seem less harsh, its backers have included language purporting to make exceptions for incest, rape or the life and health of the mother. But no one should be fooled. The exceptions were drafted to make it nearly impossible to get an abortion, even during the first trimester of pregnancy.
Ah yes. One loves how, on their "moral" crusade the great and good "Christians" who are so intent on shoving their point of view down everybody else's throats think nothing of lying to get their way (see "no one should be fooled," above), and have so little regard for the democratic process that the voters having decided a year ago to leave the decision up to families, and not the government, means nothing to them also. They will simply put a new picture on the yard signs, lie about what the measure actually means, and keep slugging.
But to what end? Locally, at least, it's near impossible to find any hard numbers, any way to pin the anti-choice crowd down on the salient question: Precisely how many "babies" will you save per annum by taking away families' right to choose their own medical options? One can hardly believe it is much of a number. I know, I know: If we save even one "baby," etc. I wish these people would devote half their energy to doing something about South Dakota's abysmal infant-mortality rate, one of the worst in the nation--a nation which has one of the worst infant-mortality rates in the industrialized world. I guess the real babies are on their own.
But as the Times rightly points out, part of the anti-choice crowd's lie is that they want to "save babies" here in the heartland. Balderdash. Since it stands to reason that South Dakota's abortion rate is pretty low (after all, we have only about 700,000 residents to begin with, and I know I have never had an abortion, nor ever will), one has to wonder why the big push here in the Mt. Rushmore State. And the answer:
The measure is clearly unconstitutional under existing Supreme Court rulings, and that’s just the point. The underlying agenda is to provide a vehicle for challenging Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that legalized abortion.
Ah, of course! The great "moral" folks behind the big lie wish to not only cram their anti-choice legislation down everybody's throat, they want also to thumb their snotty noses at the United States Supreme Court--for they have no regard for law, let alone democracy--in the hope of thereby imposing their will upon every family in the country.
Which sounds an awful lot like tyranny, not "morality."
But again, they care not. "Morality," "Christianity," "family values"--those are mere facades, cloaks which they don like KKK sheets in order to pass into whatever group they must pass in order to gain control over other people.
It's not about "babies." It's not about "morality," It's certainly not about God! It's about power. It's about them wanting to make sure that nobody does anything that they don't like.
And they're more than happy to purposely break the law--and then spend millions of taxpayers dollars to defend themselves--as part of their "moral" crusade.
Tyranny, yes. Also grand theft.
Several weeks ago I was driving a carload of soon-to-be high-school freshmen out to darkest suburbia. I had a copy of Newsweek in the car, to wile away the time whilst waiting for the aforementioned freshmen. One of them--who I happen to know is, like me, Catholic--commented on the photo of Barack Obama on the cover and inquired as to his fellows' opinions. A few noncommital words were uttered (how quickly we learn to avoid such discussions, but it is true that we live in a time--and, for me, a state--where putting the "wrong" sign in the yard cand and does end friendships and even employment), after which the originator of the "conversation" said that he likes Obama except that Obama "supports abortion" and "that just isn't cool."
It is not my habit to engage fourteen-year-olds in political discussions, and so I did nothing save utter a silent prayer of thanksgiving that he isn't old enough to vote.
But what I said to my son later (so I guess I do engage in political discussions with at least one fourteen-year-old) was twofold:
First, no one "supports" abortion. No one is "in favor of" abortion. No one thinks abortion is a "good idea." Not a single person. I believe, and am on record stating my belief, that abortion is a bad deal on many, many levels. But I believe that that is a reason to work to change the circumstances that put women and families in such a position that abortion is their only option--not strive to make a bad situation worse by making them criminals for pursing that course.
Second, to be pro-choice imposes nothing upon anybody else. I'm pro-choice: so what? It doesn't mean you have to do anything at all. It doesn't require you to get an abortion. It doesn't force anyone to do anything, ever.
But the so-called pro-life position...ah, that's something else again. It is in fact anti-choice, for it says that it is not enough for me to have my beliefs, but you have to believe that way too! And since I can't make you believe anything, well, I have to make sure that you act the way I want. It's not enough for me to say, I don't approve of X so I won't do it...I have to impose my will on you and make sure that you don't do X either, because I don't like it.
And, frankly, I think that "just isn't cool."
So. Back to the polls next month (what part of "no" do these people not understand). And, probably, again in two years.
Eternal vigilance, as they say.
Showing posts with label abortion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label abortion. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
A Catholic Shift to Obama?
E. J. Dionne Jr. in today's Washington Post column, "A Catholic Shift to Obama?," writes:
It has become commonplace in American politics: Certain Roman Catholic bishops declare that the faithful should cast their ballots on the basis of a limited number of "nonnegotiable issues," notably opposition to abortion. Conservative Catholics cheer, more liberal Catholics howl. And that is usually the end of the story.
Well, it's usually the end of the story because that's as far as the mainstream media prefer to take the story.And I suppose it hearkens back to those halcyon days when whatever "Father" said was the final word.
For a lot of my fellow Catholics, it's still that way, of course. And for a lot of them, it isn't.
It's just that those of us in the latter group tend not to yammer on about it much because, really, what would be the point? Those who want "Father says" to be the end of the discussion will view it as the end of the discussion; those who prefer to do their own thinking will not.
So that part of the tale is not noteworthy. What is noteworthy, however, is that Catholic bishops as a class seem way less worked up about The Issue than in the past. Oh, there's not a one of 'em who's pro-choice, of course, but there seems to be a lot less saber-rattling in re hellfire and damnation for any candidate who dares deviate from Rome's party line, and ditto for anyone who votes for such a candidate.
Doesn't seem that long ago I had a crazy old lady chew me out in the parking lot of St. Joseph Cathedral forhaving a Tom Daschle bumper sticker on the back of my car:
"You can't be a Democrat and call yourself a Catholic," spews she.
"Yes I can," says I. Touchez!
Anyhow, nostalgia aside, Dionne's next paragraph contains the firecracker:
Not this year. Catholics, who are quintessential swing voters and gave narrow but crucial support to President Bush in 2004, are drifting toward Barack Obama. And this time, some church leaders are suggesting that single-issue voting is by no means a Catholic commandment.
Yikes! Can it be? For as many years as I can remember, the sine qua non, the trump card, The Issue of All Issues for my church has been abortion. You can be the candidate of education, job security, health benefits, liberty and justice for all--hell, you can be the bloody Man of Steel--and none of it counts a tinker's damn if you are in addition to that pro-choice.
Indeed, I know plenty of Catholics--not to mention evangelicals, who are just as rabid--who would unblinkingly vote for Hitler, Stalin, Mao, or Count Dracula, just as long as they said they were pro-life. That's how single- (one might say narrow-) minded they are on The Issue.
But now, Dionne reports, we have this:
In an interview yesterday, Gabino Zavala, an auxiliary bishop in the Los Angeles Archdiocese, said his fellow bishops have long insisted that "we're not a one-issue church," a view reflected in their 2007 document "Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship.
Excuse me. I have to sit down. Is there any brandy?
Dionne continues:
"But that's not always what comes out," says Zavala, who is also bishop-president of the Catholic peace group Pax Christi USA. "What I believe, and what the church teaches, is that one abortion is too many. That's why I believe abortion is so important. But in light of this, there are many other issues we need to bring up, other issues we should consider, other issues that touch the reality of our lives."
It has become commonplace in American politics: Certain Roman Catholic bishops declare that the faithful should cast their ballots on the basis of a limited number of "nonnegotiable issues," notably opposition to abortion. Conservative Catholics cheer, more liberal Catholics howl. And that is usually the end of the story.
Well, it's usually the end of the story because that's as far as the mainstream media prefer to take the story.And I suppose it hearkens back to those halcyon days when whatever "Father" said was the final word.
For a lot of my fellow Catholics, it's still that way, of course. And for a lot of them, it isn't.
It's just that those of us in the latter group tend not to yammer on about it much because, really, what would be the point? Those who want "Father says" to be the end of the discussion will view it as the end of the discussion; those who prefer to do their own thinking will not.
So that part of the tale is not noteworthy. What is noteworthy, however, is that Catholic bishops as a class seem way less worked up about The Issue than in the past. Oh, there's not a one of 'em who's pro-choice, of course, but there seems to be a lot less saber-rattling in re hellfire and damnation for any candidate who dares deviate from Rome's party line, and ditto for anyone who votes for such a candidate.
Doesn't seem that long ago I had a crazy old lady chew me out in the parking lot of St. Joseph Cathedral forhaving a Tom Daschle bumper sticker on the back of my car:
"You can't be a Democrat and call yourself a Catholic," spews she.
"Yes I can," says I. Touchez!
Anyhow, nostalgia aside, Dionne's next paragraph contains the firecracker:
Not this year. Catholics, who are quintessential swing voters and gave narrow but crucial support to President Bush in 2004, are drifting toward Barack Obama. And this time, some church leaders are suggesting that single-issue voting is by no means a Catholic commandment.
Yikes! Can it be? For as many years as I can remember, the sine qua non, the trump card, The Issue of All Issues for my church has been abortion. You can be the candidate of education, job security, health benefits, liberty and justice for all--hell, you can be the bloody Man of Steel--and none of it counts a tinker's damn if you are in addition to that pro-choice.
Indeed, I know plenty of Catholics--not to mention evangelicals, who are just as rabid--who would unblinkingly vote for Hitler, Stalin, Mao, or Count Dracula, just as long as they said they were pro-life. That's how single- (one might say narrow-) minded they are on The Issue.
But now, Dionne reports, we have this:
In an interview yesterday, Gabino Zavala, an auxiliary bishop in the Los Angeles Archdiocese, said his fellow bishops have long insisted that "we're not a one-issue church," a view reflected in their 2007 document "Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship.
Excuse me. I have to sit down. Is there any brandy?
Dionne continues:
"But that's not always what comes out," says Zavala, who is also bishop-president of the Catholic peace group Pax Christi USA. "What I believe, and what the church teaches, is that one abortion is too many. That's why I believe abortion is so important. But in light of this, there are many other issues we need to bring up, other issues we should consider, other issues that touch the reality of our lives."
Those issues, Bishop Zavala said, include racism, torture, genocide, immigration, war and the impact of the economic downturn "on the most vulnerable among us, the elderly, poor children, single mothers."
"We know that neither of the political parties supports everything the church teaches," he added. "We are not going to create a culture of life if we don't talk about all the life issues, beginning with abortion but including all of them."
And so, after all these years, it has come down to this: Yours truly finds himself agreeing with an Archbishop on the subject of abortion.
At least, we agree that the world is bigger than just that one issue.
It may be, then, that there is hope after all.
Read the rest of Dionne's column here.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Linguistic Sleight-of-Hand
This from the Los Angeles Times:
And away we go again.
Well, first off, I do wish the bishops of my church could scrape up equal concern for "the sanctity and dignity of human life" when it comes to those who, as children, were sexually abused by a trusted parish priest--and, for all I know, those children who are still in harm's way. From where I sit, rhetoric aside, the bishops have done a better job of blaming the victims, obstructing justice by playing musical-priests, and insisting that anyone who wants justice in the matter is somehow "anti-Catholic." But evidently that's neither here nor there.
Second, I'm always intrigued by what I have come to think of as linguistic sleight-of-hand in "pro-life" parlance. There's the term "pro-life" itself, of course, adopted in place of the original "anti-abortion" label when some members of the we'll-make-your-decisions-for-you crowd thought that "anti" sounded negative. Which of course it does. So--presto!--they dub themselves "pro-life," 'cause they're in favor of life! Well, sometimes. Not too choked up about those guys on death row, you know. And not exactly incensed about innocent lives lost in a misguided and pointless war in Iraq. Nor are we quite as fervent, quite as organized, quite as "pro" about the people of Darfur. And so on.
So, really, not so much pro-life. per se, as...well, anti-abortion.
Or, more honestly, anti-choice. Abortions are still going to happen, legally or otherwise, just as they happened before Roe v. Wade. The question inevitable comes down to who gets to make the decision.
The other aspect of this linguistic sleight-of-hand (or, if you prefer, dishonesty) is in labeling those of us who support a woman's right to make her own health-care decisions as "pro-abortion."
For the record, no one is pro-abortion. I'm so confident in that statement that I'll say it again: There is no such thing as someone who is "pro-abortion." There is no woman on the planet who takes the decision lightly. There is no one who thinks it's a "good" idea. Those are fabrication invented by the anti-abortion lobby*, a way of demonizing those who hold a contrary opinion.
So, too, is all this "culture of death" nonsense. If you're worried about a "culture of death," dear bishops, then have the stones to really, really come out against a war that was built on the lies and incompetence of the denizens of Pennsylvania Avenue. Be as forceful about it as you are about abortion: Tell politicians that they put their immortal souls in peril if they do anything at all to support this illegitimate war. Ditto fro capital punishment: You've spent the past quarter-century "urging" governors to refrain from employing the death penalty. Gutless. If you're really "pro-life," if you're really concerned about a "culture of death," then start telling these governors that they're going to hell if they throw the switch or jab the needle. And start preaching to your congregations that they're going to hell if they vote for a politician who favors of capital punishment.
Fair, after all, is fair, and honesty is honesty. If you're pro-life, then be pro-life. If you're "pro-life" but also pro-death penalty, then you're not pro-life, are you? You're just anti-choice, and you should have the courage to identify yourself as such.
And so it is that despite my bishops' best efforts to control my thoughts, heart, and consciene, I will continue to use the gifts God gave me to weigh and measure that which is put before me, thank you very much, in full confidence that my soul is not imperiled by my belief that a woman who faces the decision to undergo an abortion is in the best position to decide for herself what she must do--a better position than a bishop, a priest, a legislator, or the nutbar who is so "pro-life" that he's getting ready to blow up the women's clinic.
Indeed, I believe that our souls are more at risk when we abandon those gifts of the Creator--conscience, reason, rationality--and surrender our intellect to someone else. I'm enough of a Catholic to believe in Judgment Day, and I believe that when that day rolls around, it will not count in my favor that even thoughconscience, reason, rationality, and simple humanity told me that X was right, I ignored it because a priest, pastor, a televangeist succeeded in bullying me into doing Y.
And since I am not "pro-abortion," no matter how anyone may wish to tar me, I shall continue in my fervent prayer that our society might someday, somehow reach a point where no woman is confronted with that no-win decision.
* I use "lobby" purposely, for I have come to believe that there exists a whole industry built on anti-choice, "abstinence only," I-know-what's-best-for-you philosophies. Indeed, I am cynical enough to believe that the last thing these people really want is for Roe v. Wade to be overturned, for it would take away a goodly portion of their reason to exist. If there's no "enemy" then we have nothing to fight, and if we have nothing to fight then people will quit sending us money to fight it. It is in their best interests to be constantly "at war." Ditto for the right-wingnuts who insist on portraying Christianity as "under assault." Nonsense. But everybody loves an underdog, and the "under assault" fiction is invariably followed by the pitch for money to "keep fighting for Christ." As they say, follow the money.
- Bishops issue guidelines for Catholic voters
They say church members who back candidates for their support of abortion or other 'assaults on human life' are guilty of cooperation in 'grave evil.'
By Theo Milonopoulos, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
November 15, 2007
BALTIMORE -- -- Catholic voters who back candidates because of their support for abortion or other "assaults on human life" would be "guilty of formal cooperation in grave evil," according to a statement adopted Wednesday by U.S. Catholic bishops.
The bishops defined what they called "threats to the sanctity and dignity of human life" as human cloning, embryonic stem cell research, racism, torture and genocide. (The rest is here.)
And away we go again.
Well, first off, I do wish the bishops of my church could scrape up equal concern for "the sanctity and dignity of human life" when it comes to those who, as children, were sexually abused by a trusted parish priest--and, for all I know, those children who are still in harm's way. From where I sit, rhetoric aside, the bishops have done a better job of blaming the victims, obstructing justice by playing musical-priests, and insisting that anyone who wants justice in the matter is somehow "anti-Catholic." But evidently that's neither here nor there.
Second, I'm always intrigued by what I have come to think of as linguistic sleight-of-hand in "pro-life" parlance. There's the term "pro-life" itself, of course, adopted in place of the original "anti-abortion" label when some members of the we'll-make-your-decisions-for-you crowd thought that "anti" sounded negative. Which of course it does. So--presto!--they dub themselves "pro-life," 'cause they're in favor of life! Well, sometimes. Not too choked up about those guys on death row, you know. And not exactly incensed about innocent lives lost in a misguided and pointless war in Iraq. Nor are we quite as fervent, quite as organized, quite as "pro" about the people of Darfur. And so on.
So, really, not so much pro-life. per se, as...well, anti-abortion.
Or, more honestly, anti-choice. Abortions are still going to happen, legally or otherwise, just as they happened before Roe v. Wade. The question inevitable comes down to who gets to make the decision.
The other aspect of this linguistic sleight-of-hand (or, if you prefer, dishonesty) is in labeling those of us who support a woman's right to make her own health-care decisions as "pro-abortion."
For the record, no one is pro-abortion. I'm so confident in that statement that I'll say it again: There is no such thing as someone who is "pro-abortion." There is no woman on the planet who takes the decision lightly. There is no one who thinks it's a "good" idea. Those are fabrication invented by the anti-abortion lobby*, a way of demonizing those who hold a contrary opinion.
So, too, is all this "culture of death" nonsense. If you're worried about a "culture of death," dear bishops, then have the stones to really, really come out against a war that was built on the lies and incompetence of the denizens of Pennsylvania Avenue. Be as forceful about it as you are about abortion: Tell politicians that they put their immortal souls in peril if they do anything at all to support this illegitimate war. Ditto fro capital punishment: You've spent the past quarter-century "urging" governors to refrain from employing the death penalty. Gutless. If you're really "pro-life," if you're really concerned about a "culture of death," then start telling these governors that they're going to hell if they throw the switch or jab the needle. And start preaching to your congregations that they're going to hell if they vote for a politician who favors of capital punishment.
Fair, after all, is fair, and honesty is honesty. If you're pro-life, then be pro-life. If you're "pro-life" but also pro-death penalty, then you're not pro-life, are you? You're just anti-choice, and you should have the courage to identify yourself as such.
And so it is that despite my bishops' best efforts to control my thoughts, heart, and consciene, I will continue to use the gifts God gave me to weigh and measure that which is put before me, thank you very much, in full confidence that my soul is not imperiled by my belief that a woman who faces the decision to undergo an abortion is in the best position to decide for herself what she must do--a better position than a bishop, a priest, a legislator, or the nutbar who is so "pro-life" that he's getting ready to blow up the women's clinic.
Indeed, I believe that our souls are more at risk when we abandon those gifts of the Creator--conscience, reason, rationality--and surrender our intellect to someone else. I'm enough of a Catholic to believe in Judgment Day, and I believe that when that day rolls around, it will not count in my favor that even thoughconscience, reason, rationality, and simple humanity told me that X was right, I ignored it because a priest, pastor, a televangeist succeeded in bullying me into doing Y.
And since I am not "pro-abortion," no matter how anyone may wish to tar me, I shall continue in my fervent prayer that our society might someday, somehow reach a point where no woman is confronted with that no-win decision.
* I use "lobby" purposely, for I have come to believe that there exists a whole industry built on anti-choice, "abstinence only," I-know-what's-best-for-you philosophies. Indeed, I am cynical enough to believe that the last thing these people really want is for Roe v. Wade to be overturned, for it would take away a goodly portion of their reason to exist. If there's no "enemy" then we have nothing to fight, and if we have nothing to fight then people will quit sending us money to fight it. It is in their best interests to be constantly "at war." Ditto for the right-wingnuts who insist on portraying Christianity as "under assault." Nonsense. But everybody loves an underdog, and the "under assault" fiction is invariably followed by the pitch for money to "keep fighting for Christ." As they say, follow the money.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)