One of the differences I see between our perspectives is our treatment of the distinction between moral and legal. I compartmentalize the two. You recognize the difference, but the difference is just a dotted line. I don't think I have the right to impose my moral truths on anyone else. You're looking to enforce yours with the full force of the government.
You are incorrect in your understanding of my viewpoint. Most things that I think are immoral I don't think should be illegal. This includes a number of things that currently are illegal.
What's true for me is true for me. What's true for you is true for you. I'm prepared to leave you to follow your compass. I expect to be left alone to follow mine. I get cranky when someone tries to impose their truth on me by law.
If you lived in 1850 in South Carolina how would you react to a slave owner making such a statement? How would you react not to a 45 year old man who is having an affair with a 13 year old girl and defended the idea that his actions should be legal based on an arguement similar to yours.
I don't just distinguish between moral and legal. I distinguish between moral and legal and then break the legal side down to what is illegal and what should be. I think some things that are legal should be illegal and some things that are illegal should be legal.
It would be a big time cultural change. I'd like to think that someone had thought it through. I'm not suggesting that you should have, but I don't know that anyone has.
I think I have to a large extent. I answered every one of your questions but that one. Even with in that one area I can say I do think the woman should be held responsible, I'm just not sure if you could call it homicide. That was what I had to think about more.
Hmmmm. It didn't occur to me that abortion would ever be outlawed without making a fetus a person.
It was that way in the past in many states.
I think that X covered this very well so I'll be brief. If the religiously inspired idea has some rational basis, as many of them do, then it can be debated. But many are just other people's truths, as I mentioned earlier, or just plain superstition. There just isn't any way for them to prevail in the marketplace of ideas. It's not discrimination against the source of the idea or the person proposing it. It's that ideas without rational basis are just vapor.
Is the idea that freedom is good simularly vapor. Note I am not talking about the idea that freedom leads to positive results that could to an extant be tested (although what you would call positive results is itself a matter of opinion), but rather the abstract idea that freedom is good and should be infringed apon as little as possible. Or what about the abstract idea that the government should have to provide enough for the poor and disadvantaged that they do not starve? Some people disagree with that idea. It is one of those things that people just "know", or they "know" it to not be true. Often it is inspired by religion. Sometime oposition to abortion has nothing to do with religion. Its one thing if you are talking about truely theological arguements, but all fundimental ideas for frameworks of what the law should be or what rights people have are as much vapor as religious ideas even as much as outright theological ideas (ideas about the existance, nature, and ideas of God).
We never talked about the distinction before so I assumed you were speaking from the position that personhood begins at conception.
I do, but most abortions take place much later.
Which reminds me. One of the anomalies in the personhood argument is the exemption for rape and incest. I don't see how that's logically supportable. Either the fetus is a person or it isn't.
I agree. Thats why I would make no such exemption. BTW I would like to thank you for being polite and repectful despite our strong difference on this frequently emotional issue. Just as you rarely see calm and reasonable pro-life arguements, I often get either emotional attacks against me when I discuss my opinion about this issue. (and I do mean it as an honest compliment not a subtle hint that those who hold your views are crazy :)
Tim |
