Posted on 06/13/2009 12:18:29 PM PDT by wagglebee
In his commencement address to the University of Notre Dame’s 2009 graduating class last month, President Obama recognized an obvious truth with his statement that pro and anti abortion advocates have certain irreconcilable differences. Those differences were obvious when Obama’s invitation to Notre Dame was subject to controversy and pronounced public disagreement. It was obvious again during the President’s commencement address when anti-abortion advocates vocally challenged the President and were, in turn, vocally challenged by others in the audience. What might not be so obvious, however, is that one of the differences between the two sides of this issue, whether irreconcilable or not, is in the area of logic.
Beyond the questionable logic of defining as a human being the primordial parasitical conglomeration of human cells attached to the female uterus; beyond the questionable logic of considering the medical use and destruction of human stem cells to be a form of homicide; beyond the questionable logic of condemning birth control as immoral; beyond all of this questionable logic is the flawed logic found in the narrow, fervent focus on the “unborn” by so called pro-life advocates. Ultimately, they are not pro-life.
Life on earth is more than the animate existence of the human species regardless of what state of development it is in, or could develop into. It is, in fact, an interdependent, complex, network of many species that depend on a careful balance among them all to sustain them all. Because they all share a finite planet with finite resources upon which they all rely for continued existence, their mutual survival is threatened by the disproportionate procreation of any one of them.
Because human population on this planet has grown to a disproportionately high level, it has done extensive damage to the network of life, and now threatens the very existence of many species including humans themselves. Those so concerned about the sanctity of life that they seek to criminalize abortion, condemn, and even persecute those who support it are not thinking past myopic moralities. Birth control methods actually preserve life by preventing continued irresponsible increases in human population.
While, for most of us, abortion is not the preferred method to prevent unwanted births, those who think that abstinence is the only acceptable method of preventing pregnancies are as likely to have as much success by grounding all the world’s storks. The realities of human behavior and of the conditions among the Third World’s burgeoning populations of despairing, illiterate, indigents defeats less direct methods of reducing population growth—currently rocketing along at the catastrophic rate of 78 million per year. “Not tonight, honey, I have a headache”, has not proven to be an effective contraceptive. Nor, when it comes to basic instinctual behaviors like sex, does theology triumph biology, not even, as we have repeatedly seen, among the “celibate” clergy.
Where abortion is illegal or unavailable, the mortality rate among women, desperate to prevent unwanted births by utilizing crude, unsafe, methods, accounts for 13% of the world’s maternal mortalities each year. This is not pro-life.
Bringing children into the world only to have them suffer and die from lack of sufficient resources is more reprehensible than preventing their births. Thousands of infants and children die each year from starvation and disease. If it is murder to abort a fetus, is it murder to give birth to a child who must surely starve to death? This is not pro-life.
The argument that a reallocation of world resources will solve this Malthusian nightmare is ultimately based on an expectation of the miraculous—both economic and ecological. The problem is demand, not supply. The world is simply running out of the basic finite resources, water, arable land, and sea life, needed to create food. The solution, therefore, is not going to come from increasing supply; it must come from reducing demand, which means reducing population, which, in turn, means effectively controlling birth rates.
Abortion is one effective method to do that, but just one. The number of abortions can be reduced by availing women of birth control methods, devices, and pharmaceuticals that can prevent conception, but when public policy is polluted with theological moralities, as it was under the Bush Presidency, these birth control alternatives can be denied the world’s women who need them the most. This moral arrogance only results in more death by abortion, starvation, and disease. This is not pro-life.
Abortion is pro choice, and, until human population is reduced to a sustainable level, it is also pro-life.
This is an OUTRIGHT LIE!
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war is peace, slavery is freedom, up is down
Haven’t you heard? Death is the new life.
People all that worried about the world running out of food have an obligation to dispose of themselves FIRST.
These deranged eco-nazis do serve a useful purpose however: they illustrate with their own drool the fact that liberalism is energized by hatred for humanity.
Since RvW in 1972, millions of libs are NOT being born and as a result, this year for the first time since Gallup has been polling the question, 51% of respondants are Pro-Life.
The vast majority of proabortionists are left wingers, more abortions by lefties leads to fewer baby lefties and fewer lefty voters.
Note that the abortions of 1972 would now be 37 years old. So for the last 19 years the ranks of the lefties have been reduced by probably more than 20,000,000 voting age folks who didn't live to see the light of day!
The law of unintended consequences is as sure as that of gravity.
The number is actually much HIGHER than that. Many of those aborted would now be having or killing children of their own.
From 1973 through 1991 (18 years ago), over 23 million children were killed. If you make the entirely reasonable assumption that each of them would have had at least one child (actually each of the women would have two), there have been about 75 MILLION lives lost since 1973.
"Abortion is pro choice, and, until human population is reduced to a sustainable level, it is also pro-life."
Consider that statement. Now consider the fact that America alone - a land whose capacity to sustain human life is very far beyond current population levels - kills a million plus innocent kids each and every year.
And the vast majority of the victims are not sacrificed even for the glory of the "green" god, but rather for the simple convenience of the truly irresponsible.
But, if we are now so backwards in our responsibility analysis and so lopsidedly in favor of non-human creatures' existence, then consider this: one single blob of "non-viable" human "tissue mass", if allowed to complete its natural course of construction will eventually be a fertile home to numbers of bacterial and other life that would dwarf even Obama budget figures.
I've heard that roses are red mommy,
and that violets are blue.
Please, please let me see for myself,
if this colorful saying is actually true.
And if it's not too inconvenient to follow this through,
then please, please let me live mom,
so when you're timeworn and burdensome,
perhaps I can "choose" the same for you!
I understand the reasoning of you fine fetus friendly freepers. And it's interesting to run those numbers. But, keep in mind that many morally lazy folks who abort also do bring a kid or two or more to term...when it's convenient for them. They are not anti-creation necessarily, just tragically pro-convenience.
Also consider that all humans only can create more humans whereas most liberals are actually born in the public school system.
We all know he makes up stuff right and left. AFAIK, there is not a single place in the world where people who have enough money to buy food cannot obtain it.
You have coined the pro-choice, pro-death crowd perfectly!
They are pro-convenience!
Barring some sort of extreme drought, ALL food shortages are caused by leftist governments or wars.
And yet it is asking too much for the media and schools to disclose this simple truth.
These are all very good arguments for cannibalism, too.
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