I also stand against racial discrimination. We're programed by culture to have certain prejudices. I'm still trying to detox myself of all the racist vestiges of American culture. Non-white ethnicities should not be subjected to mistreatment just because of their appearance or origin. "Race" can tell us about each other, but it is never an indicator of value. It's not that I think that non-white people are more important than white people. It's just that whites aren't having the same chronic problems with race-based discrimination.
Really, I stand for all people. There are lots of superficial reasons why certain people will mistreat certain other people. We see people hurt one another for things such as religion, gender, body type, ability, intelligence, nationality, age, etc... It is appropriate to treat one person differently than another person because all people are unique; but it's not appropriate to treat one person worse than another person based on individual differences.
Human Rights!
Ironically, I don't believe in rights at all. I don't believe we have any inherent rights. We're all rotten and hateful creatures who deserve to die. But not a single one of us is more or less deserving of our rightful demise, so we really don't have the authority to make such judgment calls. Damnation is a sentence we all equally deserve.
But I fight for "rights" because it is essentially the idea that we have been given the purpose to treat our neighbors better than they deserve so that we ourselves also will be treated better than we deserve. Since we were not created to be judges, we ought to promote self-preservation by protecting and caring for one another. The idea of human rights, to me, is this: Who am I to expect to be treated more kindly than the worst of how I treat others? I will strive to treat the lowest and most helpless of people with kindness because, if our souls switched bodies, this is how I hope someone would treat me.
You didn't see how long this would be, did you?
On some issues, I have a hard time explaining my stance because every time I start sharing my views, somebody starts crucifying me. So I want to give as untainted an explanation as I can for what I believe here and I hope I'm being unbiased.
If someone contracts an aggressive but easily treatable bacterial infection, what do we do? The choices are:
A) We let the infection run its course, causing discomfort, pain, shame, and risk to health; hoping that no lasting damage takes place.
B) Treat it as quickly as possible and avoid as much inconvenience and discomfort to the patient as possible.The answer is easy, right? We obviously choose the way that's better for the patient and we treat the infection! Even if the threat isn't lethal, the right choice is to prevent the most harm.
Conflict of Interests
Now, suppose I have a dilemma in which two people are involved: Option 'a' helps the first person but harms the second and option 'b' helps the second person but harms the first. These are difficult, right? Two people are in such a position where their preferred solution to the situation is not mutually beneficial. Meet Jane and Nancy. They are great women who have never met each other and are shining examples of healthy, prudent, and intelligent human beings. They have a conflict of interests thanks to the violent act of an unrelated third party, though, and a solution must be chosen. The dilemma is as follows:
A) This option is really great for Jane. Jane will be able to live her life as normal while making no sacrifice for it, but this will result in a tremendous physical and financial troubles to Nancy, not to mention being horribly inconvenient and essentially ruining her social/dating life for the next year. Everything that happens for the next year is an entire violation to her right to body autonomy. Some lasting damage is likely, although recovery is not impossible and the two women can go their separate ways when all is said and done.
B) This option is fantastic for Nancy. Nancy lives her life as normal while making no escapable sacrifices. By choosing this option, she can avoid the stigma and burden of option "a" almost completely. Nancy will be able to continue living the life she worked so hard to achieve uninterrupted. We all love her and she really deserves the best. The downside is that Jane must make a pretty staggering sacrifice, which is that she is killed. And the decision is entirely in Nancy's hands.
What would you do? We all know that Nancy doesn't deserve any of this shit, but doesn't killing Jane seem a little extreme? Option "A" allows both women to live and option "B" kills one of them. It seems a no brainer that you would want the option that allows both women to live. Neither of them has done anything wrong. We're not playing favorites. It's not that I care about Jane more than Nancy, but the choice is whether to kill Jane or to horribly inconvenience Nancy primarily for around a year (or possibly more). Wouldn't you think it's selfish for Nancy to refuse to sacrifice a little so that Jane doesn't have to lose everything? Nancy doesn't owe Jane anything, but Jane cannot live unless Nancy's freedom is significantly stifled for the next year. When the choice is between Nancy being injured or Jane being killed; all human life being equal, if Nancy and Jane can't both be saved from their respective horrors, the most ethical thing is that the lesser of the horrors is allowed.
If you're mad at me now because you think you know what I'm talking about...
Don't stop reading yet! I'm not finished!
What if Nancy was raped and is now pregnant with Jane as a result? If we still choose not to discriminate based on body type, ability, age, status, sex, or even race or origin; how are one of these women more valuable than the other? They're both women, but one is substantially younger, less developed, and absolutely helpless. Labels such as "woman," "girl," "infant," and "fetus" are descriptive, but they are not indicative of value.
Or are they? Do we still abide by the archaic ideology that there are superior and inferior types of humans? I mean, if you want to insist that an unborn fetus is less valuable than a fully formed human because of its size or strength, then are bigger and stronger adults more valuable than smaller and weaker adults? I submit that you cannot argue that fetuses are less valuable than adults unless you also believe that women are less valuable than men or that children are less valuable than adults.
How does it make sense that many of the same people who would yell, "Save the women and children first," on a sinking ship would have no problem declining the protection of the smallest, weakest, and most innocent of children. The whole reason to put women and children on boats is because children are weaker than adults and women are weaker than men. The right thing is to protect those who are less strong. Why give the seats on the life raft to people who can swim when there aren't enough seats left for those who can't? Is swimming too big a sacrifice to save a life? I'm not suggesting that pregnancy is a small sacrifice, but it's a hell of a lot smaller than the sacrifice an aborted infant makes for her/his mother.
POWER!
Why do so many men rape women? It's well known that power is what makes it possible. Men have physical and societal power. Unfortunately, far too many abuse that power to get what they want. Men tend to be bigger and stronger and are usually reinforced by power of more men. Though women usually have the power to defend themselves, it's often not enough. Men win, not because they are right, but because they are strong.
The problem is that there is an even more extreme power imbalance between a woman and her unborn child. You can't even make up an excuse for why a fetus is killed in the same way that rapists try to justify their heinous acts.
- "She shouldn't have dressed like that."
- "She was asking for it."
- "I know she wanted it."
- "She was a bitch and needed to be taught a lesson."
- "She shouldn't have gotten drunk if she didn't want to have sex."
Sure, we are good at finding justifications, but we don't even have the luxury to pin the abortion on something the victim of the abortion has done. Someone tell me what those babies did to deserve their execution? Was their sacrifice less than that which their mother would have needed to make in order to save them?
I make exceptions
I'm against most abortion. The very idea makes me sick to my stomach because I can't handle the hypocrisy of defending one person's interests at the expense of another person's life; ignoring the fact that ending life is ending life, no matter how small, defenseless, or silent it is. Now supposing that the dilemma is.
A) Mommy lives and Baby dies.
or
B) Mommy dies and Baby dies.
It's an emotionally gut-wrenching call to make. The scenario is that the pregnancy threatens Nancy's life while Jane cannot be saved. When the dilemma is to A) Save one, or B) save neither; let's at least save who we can. I am not a physician, but I accept that this is often the way cards fall. I believe that the choice should always be made to save every life possible. Very carefully, I submit that in certain scenarios, abortion may be the most ethical choice. When choosing whether or not to terminate a pregnancy, choose the option that saves more lives.
Reality
Life is a flock of birds and it will shit on everybody until we're all wearing dried up bird-shit helmets. We will never change the fact that life sucks big time. The best we can do while we're here is try to be the part of life that doesn't suck. Don't like injustice? I'm sorry that you don't like the best thing that ever happened to you. "Justice," the way we use it, is a relative term. Justice is the word we use to describe the way actuality aligns with ideology. Our standard definition of "justice" is like an algebraic formula where you choose the x to find the y. But by the standards of real justice, the most just thing that could happen to you right now would be that you die and go to Hell, which really is far worse than anything you can imagine.
Do we agree with the principle of the "Golden Rule": "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"? So if I had a time machine and was able to go back in time and have you aborted, would that be cool with you? If not, then why would it be okay to do to someone today without the use of time travel? I don't understand why people can say, "Well, I wouldn't want someone telling me what I can and can't do with my body," but the same thought process isn't translated to, "I wouldn't want someone killing me before I get a chance to grow up and be awesome!" Life's shitty to all of us, but that doesn't give us the justification to turn around and be horrible to other people because of it. It doesn't fix anything. That's why we should be the part of life that doesn't suck. If you don't like cruelty, don't be cruel! If you switched souls with the fetus, is abortion the kind of chance you would want at life? Is nine months of misery really a worse fate than being denied the chance to grab life by the throat and punch it in the eyes?
As humans, we have a hard time seeing reality through the eyes of others. What is escape in Nancy's world is death in Jane's world. We're best at serving our own agenda. It makes sense that we are designed that way, but it easily becomes problematic when we no longer hear or care about the voices of those hurt by the pursuit of our own interests. The societal problems in this world can be traced to a lack of love. There is no love without sacrifice. We are right to pursue our interests, but it is better to sacrifice for someone else's needs.
The argument for aborting a baby because he/she is the product of rape is stupid to me. If someone comes into my work and treats me horribly, does it make it okay for me to go to another store and be rude to someone there? Even if I treated the associate no worse than I was treated while I was at my job, it's wrong. So it's not any better if I do something worse than was done to me. The last time someone ruined my evening with their incessant screaming and name-calling, I ran errands to five different businesses afterwards and made sure I was the most easy and enjoyable customer possible!
If you want to balance your "humours," dish everything back out that's thrown at you. If you actually want to be a good person, then pay back the evil that was done to you by showing this whole damn world what it looks like not to fuck the innocent. It can be done and you can be the one to prove it. Let it be your motto that, "The Shit Stops Here." We can make the world a better place if we choose to make love our response to hate.
Aaaaaaaaand..... *deep breath*
I don't identify as anti-abortion/pro-life because of any right-wing agenda. Really, I don't give a crap about party lines. What I care about is people. I love people. My religious faith flows from love and my love flows from my faith. Christ, who was utterly blameless, gave his life on the cross for me; which he did willingly. Because of God's great love, proven by the gift of Jesus Christ, my response should be love. I want my life to be a service to the human life that God treasures so much that he lived among us and then bore our punishment to set us free. If the son of God poured out himself to the aid of people, then I ought to also offer the gift of this short life to the aid of people.
What that means is that I will love God by loving those he loves. Since he loves every single person, so should I. God can gain nothing from what I have to offer, but people Jesus died for can. If God loves people but I don't also love people, then I am not really loving God. I cannot love God while hating the things he loves.
I can demonstrate the love of God by kindness, generosity, and grace in everyday mundane things. There are things I can do to improve the quality of people's lives on this earth. But Jesus didn't die to make this life more comfortable for us: He died to give us a better life after this one ends. So the higher purpose of my life is to share the Gospel. It cannot be preached if it is not shown, so I will do my best to show the Gospel. I cannot be the Gospel, but I want to illustrate it with my life so that people will understand the Gospel of Jesus Christ. To love is to fight for the good of others. Nothing better can happen to a person than knowing Jesus and being saved, so that's what I want to help happen to everyone. Until we get to heaven, how much more beautiful are our few moments in this life if the news and example of God's love abounds in the hearts of this earth's inhabitants?
So what I suggest sucks. Should a woman bear temporary suffering to spare the innocent from death? I don't have the place to decide right and wrong, but I know that Jesus bore temporary death to spare the guilty from eternal death. If you believe in Jesus, then what more do you need to convince you that preservation of the innocent is the right choice? Regardless of who we are (man, woman, young, or old), I believe Christ makes a strong case against abortion - he who paid the fees to spare us certain death and adopt us as his own.
If you don't believe in Jesus, is not the "pro-choice" fight a fight of love for the underrepresented? If so, then why not take love even farther, to those who have no voice? If it is for nothing else than that the mercy might be extended your way, then why not extend mercy to those who need it the most? Maybe you see my point and maybe you don't, but if mercy is what you want, how is Jesus not the answer you're looking for?
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