Cecil Adams and the Abortion Fracas

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So recently, my favorite person Cecil Adams decided to take on the difficult topicsAs a quick aside, I'll note his snide treatment of the actual questioneer is not particularly surprising; he does that with everyone who writes in, no matter what the topic. So it's not a special case, if you've never read his stuff before

Comments

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Well, I should just say that as someone with a very pro-life view, I don't think there is a way to compromise on this. Should we really be compromising on something that essentially kills craploads of people regularly and legally and "safely"? That's insane.

I think both sides can and should work together to reduce a need for abortions, but as for abortion itself, I can't see how the pro-life view could accept slaughter as part of a compromise.

Yeah, politicians take advantage of that kind of polarization, and yeah, single-issue voting is generally a pretty bad idea. Alas.

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The single greatest road to compromise is humility; the absolutist view on either side is detrimental to any sense of perspective.

It may be your belief that abortion is always, always, always killing, but not everybody has that belief, nor has everybody who championed your cause in the past even held that absolute a view. The refusal to acknowledge that you might be wrong (I pick on you, this goes for anyone) means precisely that you are unwilling to compromise, and the cost is great.

Thinking absolutely leads to upheaval, revolution, and bad blood. Thinking practically leads to solutions.

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Well people are obviously free to think differently, and there are clearly plenty that do, as evidenced by the fact that my views are not law.

I can't really give a crap about revolution, upheaval, or bad blood when the alternative is sanctioning free-for-all killing for a specific developmental phase only, but that's just me. I know that it is considered ridiculous to compare abortion (or really, anything) to the Holocaust, but really, there's no better example than this: would you endorse compromising on the whole genocide thing because absolutism is detrimental to any sense of perspective?

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In answer to your question, that's sort of what we're going to have to do in Iraq, for example.

The options are Genocide of Side A, Genocide of Side B, back both of them (and no one win), or back out and let one or the other genocide happen.

Would you still endorse banning this sanctioned killing (it's not free-for-all by the way, most free-for-alls don't have buy-in costs or allow one to simply abstain), if it meant the entirety of American politics was going to crap, or resulted, albeit roundabout, in the killing of full-grown people in other countries?

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I clearly don't know enough about Iraq then, as I don't see why we have to endorse genocide in Iraq or let it happen. I mean, why not just let people do whatever, and then if genocide starts happening step in? Maybe that's a simplistic way to look at it, IDK?

As for American politics, I'm pretty sure that's already crap. I'm one of those third-party voters, so clearly I've given up there.

As for the killing of full-grown people in other countries, I'm going to have to ask for a specific description of what you're talking about... or is this just supposed to be a hypothetical? Or do you mean in terms of politicians and voting and the lack of real choices we have available out of those running for office, where the choice comes down to Pro-war-anti-abortion-Idiot-#1 vs. Anti-war-pro-abortion-Idiot #2? Because as I said earlier, that's not how I vote anyway - 3rd party yay.

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I'll say that I applaud you for voting 3rd party but also that it really is disgusting and frustrating when people pull that out as a "get out of responsibility" card. There's a lot more to democracy than just voting. If you think that simply voting 3rd party will enact any sort of healing to the American politic, instead of just hurting it, you're deluding yourself.

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You're right that there is more to democracy than voting, but I never said anything about what I think about other avenues of activism.

I don't think that sticking to the two major parties helps anything. I don't see why looking at alternative choices, however unpopular they may be at this time, is a bad thing. I'm pretty convinced that the two major parties are essentially the same at core - utter shit - so why waste my time with a false choice?

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Because the 3rd party options are usually even more extreme and left/right of center than the Republicans and the Democrats?

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Okay, but it still isn't bad to look at alternative choices. For that matter, who says that the moderate position is the most valid one? Maybe the best choice IS extreme left or extreme right of center.

I do know that I completely disagree with both major parties, so why waste my time getting involved with it when I don't agree with it? I certainly don't want to support politicians because "well, you're a smidgen better than the other jerk" or anything.