I think some are advocating for life-long abstention. If you're not married or don't want to reproduce, Rick Santorum and many others think you should just "put an aspirin between your knees."Originally Posted by Spartana
I think some are advocating for life-long abstention. If you're not married or don't want to reproduce, Rick Santorum and many others think you should just "put an aspirin between your knees."
then i leave you to yourself.
No, you leave me to the mainstream of our legal tradition, and our current laws.
For instance, in my state, one set of examples of acceptable circumstances is in RCW 9A.16.050:
http://apps.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=9A.16.050
Most states have similar laws.
"They" can pay the fiddler IMHO. I think that if we make men more responsible and bear a greater burden for unplanned pregnancies, then maybe they would be more careful when it comes to their sexual activity. And I'm not just talking about a life long financial burden to provide for a child, I'm talking physical caregiving responsibilty too. I think that would go a long way prevent unwanted pregnancies.
And if us girls don't get to play, then the boys don't either :-)!! An equal opportunity asprin for all!! That'll give the guys at the top an incentive to make contraceptiives available to all :-)!
Goodness, I hardly know where to begin.
Ok, three elements.
1. Disparaging the Amish
A. regression
I'm not going to debate the definition. There are several definitions online, and all of them include the word "backwards" in them in either the direct definitions OR in the synonyms lists. You can verify this or not.
That being said, I have already accepted your reframe here, so there's no need to discuss it further.
B. 8th grade
In this last post, I can see that you have attempted to make a general statement, not a specific one.
I still believe that attaching it to the amish is incorrect and inaccurate, and I find the statement that "they are only good for" to be disparaging to anyone (including your friend).
But, based on the information regarding your friend, and the emotive aspect of "difficulty" -- I will accept this as an appropriate reframe and that you had not intended that meaning.
It is a false comparison, but nevertheless, I will take it to a general meaning as opposed to a specific one (applying to the amish).
Relative difficulty, how people do and do not encourage their children (in general) and so on is another topic altogether, and your feelings on it (or mine) are not relevant to this aspect of the discussion.
2. Condescending statements towards me
A. Language vs Feeling
There is a difference between pointing out an issue of language and having a feeling. Other than one comment thus far, I have not felt offended by your statements. Instead, I felt that the language was condescending towards me.
B. Consideration
In essence, I am asking you to consider me (or anyone) when you are responding or writing.
I find it condescending when a person
1. repeatedly demands that i quote them and explain my position, and responds with "did not!" but doesn't reframe or contextualize or apologize (if needed, as I did, btw, for mis-reading)
I grant that you have effectively reframed in regards to the amish. But, you have not dealt with the statements which I have found condescending towards me. So, we are only half way there.
2. repeatedly asserts victimhood, but refuses to provide evidence of the accusations of name-calling, demonizing, etc;
3. asserts that a person doesn't know what they are reading or writing -- and in the first one, crows about it after the person has explained, not that she has not-read, but that she must have mis-read and why and then asserts that it is a "crack up!"
As i stated in my prior post, I must have misread, and I apologized for misreading. Now you crow that it is evidence for not-reading, when this is not the case.
As I stated before, though I admit this current post has far better spacing, I have found your statements very difficult to parse out because multiple ideas that are often different in nature are jumbled together into the same paragraphs.
Many of your statements (like mine) are quite long, and when reading through them, I can loose my place, go back to see if you have written of that idea before, see where it connects to other ideas in the future.
I also get interrupted by phone calls, neighbors, 3yr olds, work, and so on when reading.
And finally, regressive and repressive are very closely spelled, so my mind may still read 'regress' instead of 'repress' where this statement was made.
As yet, I haven't had the time to read every post to find where this recant was, even, but -- benefit of the doubt, I trust that you did state so.
Why not provide the same consideration? That I am -- in fact -- reading your posts, responding as clearly and effectively as possible? Benefit of the doubt that I am reading your posts? that it is possible for a person to make a mistake in their reading, or to have missed something?
And, I did apologize for it. Who crows when someone apologizes? How is that not condescending?
4. asserts that the individual needs to "get a grip" and "take a breath" -- which asserts that the individual doesn't have a grasp on reality and/or is too emotional to see clearly and logically;
5. asserts that the person is simply "too young" to understand the pressures that a parent can bring (presuming to know the person's own life experience in this regard);
This is a hot-button issue for me, and I am offended (the one statement that truly causes an emotional response in me).
Why is this? Well, my history.
At 19, I knew what I wanted to do. Quit uni, go to an ashram, get certified to do yoga and massage, return to my uni town and support myself doing yoga/massage, and then get a degree in business as the community college (also considered living at home to do this). I was informed "absolutely not" and actively discouraged.
At 22, I wanted to go to an ashram and get certified to teach yoga and do massage. I'd saved up my own money to pay and been accepted. My family said "absolutely not! You'll hate it eventually! you'll get bored!" When I would speka about wanting to run a business, they would say "you'll never make it! you are too lazy to succeed! You need to be realistic!"
I went to law school for my family. I did well. I hated the practice of the law. I gained $125,000 in debt. I still owe $80,000 of it. I graduated in 2002. I am still paying it -- I'm not trying to beg out of it. But yes, parental pressure lead me to that.
In my second year of law school, my best friend died. The idea of being a lawyer for "25 or so years until you retire and can become a yoga teacher" -- which is what my parents saw for me as a good and valuable life path -- felt terrible.
I had already been apprenticing with my teachers for years, teaching part time for years, with this idea that I would 'some day, when I'd earned it' be able to do what I wanted to do full time. But at that moment -- it was carpe diem. My friend was 24 years old when she passed. I saw that it could have been me. It could have been my husband's friend -- who died on Monday at age 40. Did he live his dreams? DId he do what he loved in the past 20 years when he could have chosen?
I talked to my parents about leaving law school, getting a part-time job, and doing my yoga thing, gearing up to run a business. Can you guess what they said? The pressure that they put on me?
I finished law school. But by then, I'd decided I'd have to accept their disapproval, their criticism. Criticism I *still* receive 13 years later, living in another country, and successfully running my business.
And it doesn't stop there. I'm no longer catholic. I don't raise my son properly. My house is too small, my lifestyle "poor" and so on.
Do they love me? Yes. Do they miss me? Yes. Are they generous and loving towards me? Yes.
Do they approve? no. Do they encourage? In their way, but not absolutely. Do they discourage? I've lived here two years. I've skyped pretty much every week. Both my husband and I hear -- every week -- when are you coming home? when are you going to move back? when will you give up?
and of course "why can't you do that stuff here?"
No, you are absolutely right. I am too young to know about or have experienced any of this, no?
It's condescending, it's offensive for you to even assert that I am too young to understand. It is the young who understand.
And I understand it in regards to my son, too -- trust me. I see how he trusts us implicitly, how much he wants to please us and to be approved. Do you know how hard I work on that? How much I strive to honor him, while also applying gentle (non physical, non punishment/reward) discipline so that he can learn how to walk in the world with manners and with confidence?
You have completely disregarded my own human experience -- without even knowing what that is, based on how old you THINK i am.
6. using absolutisms in her communication such that any counter argument is unreasonable (it just is! this is reality!);
7. asserting that the individual has a romantic view as compared to one's own 'realistic' view even though that realistic view has very little supporting evidence (amish.net, some bible verses, a quoted statement on shunning -- none of which counter any evidence provided, nor particularly bolster one's own argument);
8. attributing positions to the other person that have no evidence to support that claim (you want me to admire them; you want me to ascribe to your worldview and write accordingly; that my assertion is that it is "easy peasy" to transition cultures; trying to convince you that amish parents are "encouraging" in whatever careers; etc).
I actually haven't made any of these statements that you claim of me. I never asserted that it would be "easy" for an Amish teen to get the education that she wants, or to leave her community -- and I know this because it is based in my own experience.
And, comparatively, I do and did have it much easier than an Amish kid.
My only point is that it is *possible* and I gave evidence of this possibility, which you seem to completely disregard. And, you disregard me in the process (with this last statement about how I am young and don't understand).
3. Conclusion
The reality is this: I want to communicate with people -- that includes you.
But I find it incredibly frustrating to communicate with people who condescend towards me.
So, you can either make amends OR I can simply go forth and ignore you from here on out. It's probably long past due that I practiced the latter, but at the end of the day, I like to give people a lot of chances to amend.
Last edited by Zoebird; 3-15-12 at 5:48pm.
A child conceived of rape or incest is not complicit in the sins of its father. It is innocent, just as a child conceived of consensual intercourse. In my mind, it has the same rights and interests.
So, I don't see a reasonable moral foundation for carving out a special case for abortion in cases of rape or incest, for treating the two types of fetuses/babies differently. In some ways, I think that direction is a distraction, to assist people in avoiding facing the moral issue at hand: you are killing.
Bad enough some kids are told they were an accident - I can only imagine growing up knowing your existence was just a punishment ("she danced, and she can pay the fiddler") for your mother getting pregnant.
I would counter your argument by saying most of the women who would uncaringly get pregnant and then use abortion as birth control are often the ones who should least have a child.
In the case of rape or incest, you have two innocent parties with potentially competing interests. In the case of a normal pregnancy, you have one innocent party. That's the distinction in my mind. To clarify the term innocent, I mean didn't have a choice in the events that led to the situation.
The further along in the pregnancy, the more it becomes clear to me that the child's interest outweigh that of the mother in any case.
I've already brought it up twice, perhaps three times. So has Alan, so have a few other people. How is it that we are saying "no one?"It's IS ludicrous that no one speaks of the other lifeform, for lack of a better term, that looses in the abortion deal. There is a baby/zygote/mass of human cells/a life or whatever term you want to use, that is wiped out.
It just seems dishonest to me, and tone deaf. But you really cannot expect balance here on this site, now you know better.
For me, it looks like this.
For whatever odd reason (likely a catholic upbringing) I believe that life begins at conception. But consciousness seems to be a developing process (buddhist influence, i guess), and brain development is important (a baby's brain grows astronomically in utero, and in the last month, gains a great deal of size in particular, which is part of what makes prematurity so 'scary' -- not to mention other organ development). I would say that, for whatever reason, i believe that "personhood" is housed n the brain, and that a brain needn't be 200% healthy to create a vibrant person.
From there, I weigh the moral situation around viability. You might say that this is largely because of Thomas Acquinas, as well as my own experience with a miscarriage (6 weeks). Viability is important to me, and prior to that, the morality shifts (for me).
To be sure, after having my son, I have become far less "cavalier" about abortion -- not that I was ever particularly "cavalier" before.
And then lets talk about this ultrasound business.
Perhaps I am unusual.
I know what an infant looks like at every stage of gestation. I have known this since I was very young. The images of a 12 wk old baby are rather ubiquitous in our culture -- because of those Time Magazine photos published in the 1970s and onwards. THe ultrasound doesn't even give that clear of a picture.
I seem to think -- perhaps wrongly assume -- that people understand what a zygote, embryo and fetus look like because of these photos. Because of sex education. Because of the signs that pro-life protestors carry. Because of information available on the internet.
I seem to think -- and perhaps wrongly assume -- that a woman is fully aware that she is carrying a baby in some form (i.e., form being zygote, embryo, fetus), and that being aware of her circumstances and capacities, would be able to make a decision based on that circumstance.
I do not believe that she is ignorant of the person growing within her, or what they look like (in general, not specific).
I fail to see how an ultrasound would convince her otherwise (it wouldn't me, once the decision is made, this would only serve to torment me more, rather than actually convince me against it -- because I would have already weighed everything on measure, and come to that conclusion -- it would not be a flight of fancy, and I assume, perhaps wrongly, that is the case for other women), and in particular, how a particularly invasive one would.
But talking about these things academically does not mean that one is entirely disregarding the life within, the value of life inherently, or not comprehending the construct of killing.
And to that, as someone brought it up, the reality is that killing has many 'amoral' functions. I consider, for example, killing for food to be appropriate. It might also be appropriate in the cases of just war. Self defense and defense of other are also considered valid reasons to kill (a human), and so here we are opening whether or not *this* killing is morally appropriate.
The law has asserted (which means our community has decided) that when the state attaches personhood to the child -- usually based on viability -- then the legal implications attach.
Which would indicate that, morally speaking, we are following Acquinas.
(and bae, if you can grow tomatoes, I think you are a wizard!)
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