I fail to see how disalowing abortions is in any way good... Just picture it:
Teenage Girl gets knocked up by his boyfriend. Boyfriend gets scared and flees, but Girl can't flee, she is stuck with the child and not allowed to abort. The child will be born, and she will not be able to support it by herself, and perhaps her parent's can't give her enough money even if they wanted to. The child is brought up in missery, perhaps in a bad part of town and quite quickly gets into crime and what not. The mother might start doing drugs to flee the harsh reality.
Picture Girl a few years later, when she is married to Boyfriend and they decide to have a child together. This time they both have jobs and the child is wanted. As it is better planned out they are able to save up money for college funds and what not, perhaps can afford to live in a good house or apartment.
A family with children who are wanted have a larger chance to get raise children who are good for society too. They can provide for themselves and the society.
*sighs* I don't get the goverment sometimes... by abortions they probably save money, heck, even earn more money in the long run.
unfortunatley this is where the ultra right in America fail. They seem to believe that rapes and incest do not occur. They dont want to look down the path at the disaster this can cause or the emotional damage done.
Ultimatley this is not about protecting the rights of the unborn child but the abuse of women by terrifed men who are scared of the power women have. If all women across the world suddenly decided to (a) stop work of all kind and (b) stop having children the world as we know it would collpase.
It's not so much that they don't believe that rapes or incest occur. It's more that they feel that when women are raped, or victims of incest, that they have brought it upon themselves. That they've dressed "too provocatively", or that they've "sent signals" that have led their molestor to his actions. But you are right that they don't want to think about the consequences of rape and incest.
And you are right, a good deal of this is about trying to force women to "remain in their rightful place". There's a joke about how these people view that as "barefoot, pregnant and in the kitchen", but the joke just isn't that funny any longer.
See, the sane secularists in the US get the many reasons why allowing abortions would be a good thing, even if we don't necessarily like abortion. The problem is that this country has a very vocal minority of religious fundamentalist psychos (who aren't all that different from their Muslim counterpart whom they ridicule), and they have boiled the argument down to an overly simplistic "baby-killers" emotional appeal.
As you point out, the child could be born into a situation were there's not the money to support the child. And contrary to the popular belief in the US, the social safety net for these children won't have the family living high on the government hog, either. And the mothers are usually made to work at least one job, if not two, in order to "earn" the benefits that the government will give to her.
Of course, there are many other problems in this nation that can be traced to the religious fundamentalism. Once upon a time, children in this country were getting good sexual education that taught us all about how babies are "made", how to avoid pregnancy, how to avoid disease, and so on. And these classes did tell us that the only 100% method to avoid unplanned pregnancy or getting STDs was to not have sex. But they also taught us about safer sexual practices, knowing that you weren't going to convince every teen to not have sex. As a result, when my generation was coming of age, we had some of the lowest abortion rates since abortion was "legalized". But in the mid 1990s, when the rightists took power, they shifted the focus of sexual education to "abstinance-only" programs; those that only teach about abstaining from sex, and not educating about sex itself. Since then, abortion rates have been rising again, and so have STD infection rates. Teens see oral and anal sex as "not sex" and perfectly safe. It's really sad, and it's going to cost our government billions in the long run, simply because they wanted to force through their religious agenda.
Ah! That's so fucked up I get angry when I think about it. Science and religion doesn't mix, just look at Jehova's Vitnesses and you'll get a quite clear image of that.
But what is even worse is trying to mix politics and religion. That's impossible. It should never ever be done. A president should not be elected 'due to that he is a good christian' which was one of the most major reasons why Bush seemed to be elected (according to a 'let's ask random persons on the streets'-thing they showed in Sweden).
Swedish politics never take religion into account. We are just as likely to have a muslim primeminister as a christian or a jewish one. In theory at least, Swedes are quite rasistic and can be quite nasty towards other religions at points, not rabidly so, but quite distasteful still. But I don't even know if our current prime minister believes in god at all. I bet he is an atheist, but I have no idea, and frankly, I couldn't care less. I care about his politics, not if he want to use god to get oil in some eastern country.
I've heard that religion have come to be quite a problem in the states when it comes to education (sexual or otherwise), but I had no idea that it was at that a large extent. And hearing that they deprive people of knowledge due to religious nonsense makes me downright angry and scared. I'm not an atheist who think religion is wrong, I think it is okay that my mother is a christian and such, because I can talk to her and discuss it. She is very openminded and gladly let her daughter have a buddhist boyfriend and they could have contructive discussions for hours about religion and religious views. (it was only when my mother's church started doing something called 'cell meetings' when things got out of hand and she was devastated for months when she learned that due to an american cell-meeting-model she was a bad christian)
Ugh, I best stop, discussing the bad sides of religion always lures the worse out of me.
I do understand how you feel, though. It is very frustrating to watch people allow religion to overtake rational thought when it comes to political matters. And the fact that there are people who believe that God will judge them based upon which politicians they voted for bothers me. It would seem to me that God has more important matters to worry about than who you vote for. But that's just how I see it. And I blame these pastors who get on the television and tell people that they are only a good Christian if they give a certain amount of money to the church (usually meaning the pastor himself) and if they vote a certain way, and if they don't do what the pastor says, they will be bound for Hell. To me, it awful that anyone would seek to exploit people and their faith in such a way.
I could continue to rant, but it's really only going to get me upset, too. I've had religion become an issues with the parents of some of the girls I've dated in the past. Never a fun thing. Especially considering that the one girl, her parents are the sort who will vote based on how good of a Christian someone is. I had to bite my tongue quite often on those matters.
Teenage Girl gets knocked up by his boyfriend. Boyfriend gets scared and flees, but Girl can't flee, she is stuck with the child and not allowed to abort. The child will be born, and she will not be able to support it by herself, and perhaps her parent's can't give her enough money even if they wanted to. The child is brought up in missery, perhaps in a bad part of town and quite quickly gets into crime and what not. The mother might start doing drugs to flee the harsh reality.
Picture Girl a few years later, when she is married to Boyfriend and they decide to have a child together. This time they both have jobs and the child is wanted. As it is better planned out they are able to save up money for college funds and what not, perhaps can afford to live in a good house or apartment.
A family with children who are wanted have a larger chance to get raise children who are good for society too. They can provide for themselves and the society.
*sighs* I don't get the goverment sometimes... by abortions they probably save money, heck, even earn more money in the long run.
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Ultimatley this is not about protecting the rights of the unborn child but the abuse of women by terrifed men who are scared of the power women have. If all women across the world suddenly decided to (a) stop work of all kind and (b) stop having children the world as we know it would collpase.
Reply
And you are right, a good deal of this is about trying to force women to "remain in their rightful place". There's a joke about how these people view that as "barefoot, pregnant and in the kitchen", but the joke just isn't that funny any longer.
Reply
As you point out, the child could be born into a situation were there's not the money to support the child. And contrary to the popular belief in the US, the social safety net for these children won't have the family living high on the government hog, either. And the mothers are usually made to work at least one job, if not two, in order to "earn" the benefits that the government will give to her.
Of course, there are many other problems in this nation that can be traced to the religious fundamentalism. Once upon a time, children in this country were getting good sexual education that taught us all about how babies are "made", how to avoid pregnancy, how to avoid disease, and so on. And these classes did tell us that the only 100% method to avoid unplanned pregnancy or getting STDs was to not have sex. But they also taught us about safer sexual practices, knowing that you weren't going to convince every teen to not have sex. As a result, when my generation was coming of age, we had some of the lowest abortion rates since abortion was "legalized". But in the mid 1990s, when the rightists took power, they shifted the focus of sexual education to "abstinance-only" programs; those that only teach about abstaining from sex, and not educating about sex itself. Since then, abortion rates have been rising again, and so have STD infection rates. Teens see oral and anal sex as "not sex" and perfectly safe. It's really sad, and it's going to cost our government billions in the long run, simply because they wanted to force through their religious agenda.
Reply
But what is even worse is trying to mix politics and religion. That's impossible. It should never ever be done. A president should not be elected 'due to that he is a good christian' which was one of the most major reasons why Bush seemed to be elected (according to a 'let's ask random persons on the streets'-thing they showed in Sweden).
Swedish politics never take religion into account. We are just as likely to have a muslim primeminister as a christian or a jewish one. In theory at least, Swedes are quite rasistic and can be quite nasty towards other religions at points, not rabidly so, but quite distasteful still. But I don't even know if our current prime minister believes in god at all. I bet he is an atheist, but I have no idea, and frankly, I couldn't care less. I care about his politics, not if he want to use god to get oil in some eastern country.
I've heard that religion have come to be quite a problem in the states when it comes to education (sexual or otherwise), but I had no idea that it was at that a large extent. And hearing that they deprive people of knowledge due to religious nonsense makes me downright angry and scared. I'm not an atheist who think religion is wrong, I think it is okay that my mother is a christian and such, because I can talk to her and discuss it. She is very openminded and gladly let her daughter have a buddhist boyfriend and they could have contructive discussions for hours about religion and religious views. (it was only when my mother's church started doing something called 'cell meetings' when things got out of hand and she was devastated for months when she learned that due to an american cell-meeting-model she was a bad christian)
Ugh, I best stop, discussing the bad sides of religion always lures the worse out of me.
Reply
I could continue to rant, but it's really only going to get me upset, too. I've had religion become an issues with the parents of some of the girls I've dated in the past. Never a fun thing. Especially considering that the one girl, her parents are the sort who will vote based on how good of a Christian someone is. I had to bite my tongue quite often on those matters.
Reply
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