Abortion: Is searching for "common ground" a "right" thing to do.

Great Debates
1

In 1994, an abortion foe went on a killing spree, killing two women and wounding several others in the Boston area. In the days following that, the Public Conversations Project in Watertown, Mass arranged for six pro choice and six pro life leaders to have secret “dialogues”. They met for five and a half years and then wrote an article in the Boston Globe about their experiences.

http://www.natcath.com/NCR_Online/archives/011703/011703f.htm

http://www.publicconversations.org/pcp/resources/resource_detail.asp?ref_id=103

Text of Boston Globe article.

http://www.npr.org/news/specials/roevwade/conversations.html

As someone who has participated in more than his share of debates in this forum, I find the process that these six (I consider them brave) women went through to be quite interesting. Even agreeing on “ground rules” proved to be difficult for both sides.

Perhaps for similar reason, perhaps for different reasons…Senator Hillary Clinton has made similar kinds of statements related to finding “common ground”

The name of the Boston Globe piece was “Talking To The Enemy”.

Pro life and pro choice (or undecided) folks: Is there anything meaningful to be gained by folks in your camp “talking to the enemy”? Are folks who engage in those sort of dialogue naieve in thinking that they will effect positive change? Are they “traitors” to your cause?

2

Quick addendum…my answer (in case it’s unclear) to the OP is “yes” :wink:

3

My stance on abortion was changed through debate and a shift in my own circumstances. I couldn’t tell you which was the more significant aspect, but I do know that debate can change minds.

I’m not sure if that’s really the question you’re asking. I haven’t had nearly enough caffeine yet, and am still bereft of Corn Nuts. This affects my reasoning ability. :smiley:

4

As a person who has long, long ago lost interest in abortion related threads as the ultimate in futility excercises I will say this:

It is always (or nearly always) good to keep talking. As long as opposing views are willing to talk in good faith, than I can’t see any downside.

But that is rarely the case. Most people are hardened in their views, and seek to convert/convince/debate/harrass etc the opposing view.

And frankly that desribes me as well. I believe that life begins at conception, and see no compromise that allows for what I consider to be [state sanctioned] murder. (no matter how ‘noble’ the purpose)

Those are my personal feelings. I do not involve myself in the political processes and or/debates. (other than an occasional, brief distraction)

So…communication is good, and I would supprt it. But this issue is not one that lends itself easliy to “common ground”.

5

Frankly, you contradict yourself (“communication is good” =/= “I do not involve myself in . . . debates”), and offer a good example of why continued discussion, though it is obviously a good thing, will never universally eliminate disagreement. As long as you have people, on either side, saying “Those are my personal feelings,” and closing themselves off to examination of those feelings, you’ll have an impasse.

6

You don’t seem to be able to read! Or to keep yourself from quoting the entire post that everyone can see is right there!

Let me explain. In general, dialog is a good thing. However, the raindog has spoken to the other side, and found them unwilling to engage in meaningfull dialogs.

7

This quote seems to summarize the debate, though only in a certain sense:

I usually feel that way on this board. So why do I continue to debate? For a few reasons, I guess. First of all, for an issue such as this, I feel one can’t remain silent, that a person who believes with passion that human life is at stake must speak up for those who can’t. I also find it useful to have my position tested, to see other people’s viewpoints to understand my own.

But if there’s anything at all that is always valuable, it is when we can achieve something like the women in the article did: a recognition that the other person is not a devil or maniac, that her belief–however abhorrent we find it–does not render the other participant something other than, well, a human being.

I won’t stop debating, here or elsewhere.

8

Although I am at the opposite end of the abortion-debate spectrum from Stratocaster, I must say that this quote very eloquently sums up why it is so important that we continue to communicate not only over abortion, but every subject that polarizes us as a society.

Lack of communication breeds contempt and feeds into the mindset of “us against them”.

9

I guess I should be more clear than (and the linked article speaks to this). In ADDITION to any debates one might have with folks who hold a different point of view, is engaging in dialogue (in the manner of the women in the OP), with the express intention of finding common ground in this debate, a worthwhile activity?

10

Yes. It’s just not a particularly efficient dialogue, I suppose. But I don’t believe it’s completely futile, or I wouldn’t take part. My wife could tell you of my selfless devotion to shining the light of my opinions on those less spiritually advanced, regardless of how welcome the illumination is. We do-gooders have our work cut out for us. :wink:

11

My wife would just usually call me stubborn…I’m still working on whether that’s a good thing or not :wink:

I figure that I’m doing my purgatory during this season of Packers football though…so I should be okey dokey in that dept.

12

I’m a Philadelphia sports fan. If long-time suffering counts toward purgatory, I should have a very low number at that deli line.

13

Pfft. I’m a Cleveland sports fan.

I revel in futility.

14

Well, I suspect that a majority (not a big majority) of Americans COULD find enough common ground to put together a compromise of sorts… but not one that would please us on the far right or anybody on the far left.

My sense is, about 15% of the US population is adamantly pro-abortion, and unwilling to compromise a whit. These are the people who think, “You’re against abortion? Then don’t have one,” is a clever and irrefutable argument.

I’d say about 20% of the populace is adamantly anti-abortion, and not willing to entertain any arguments with the notion that life begins at conception.

THOSE groups have nothing to say to each other. Even if there are nice people on both sides (and, obviously, there are), they don’t speak the same language or even THINK the same way.

To the hard-core “It’s My Body” crowd, “compromise” would mean, “Well, look, since both sides agree that abortion, while necessary, is regrettable… so tell you what, why don’t we all agree to full, graphic sex education from kindergarten on, and to free birth control dispensation. That would reduce abortions, and we’d both be happy. Right?”

And, in their own minds, THAT really IS a reasonable compromise! Just as, to a fundamentalist Christian, “Tell the kids to stay chaste til marriage! That’s all we have to do,” seems like a perfectly logical solution.

See any copmmon ground yet?

HOWEVER, let’s forget about those two groups for a moment. Without them, we still have 65% of the populace that just isn’t sure about abortion. Press them for a yes/no answer, and they’re likelier to say “yes” (which is why you usually hear that 66% of the American people are pro-choice), but that’s not the whole story. MOST of those nominally pro-choice folk would support any number of restrictions on abortion that NOW would find intolerable (parental consent, waiting periods, et al).

So, while hard-core pro and anti forces could NEVER find the slightest common ground, I think the majority of Americans COULD hammer out some kind of compromise- one that restricted abortion far moire than the Left would like, but allowed it WAAAY more than the right would prefer.

15

Here are my assumptions about the efficacy of such dialogs:

  1. For those on the extreme of the “pro-life” position, their view that life begins at conception/fertilization derives from religious conviction. I can’t imagine anyone who approaches the world from a scientific viewpoint holding that view.
  2. For those on the extreme of the “pro-choice” position, their view that the woman’s right to choose and ownership of her own body is paramount to all other considerations are (again, my opinion) driven by irrational emotion. Not the same as religious conviction, perhaps, but probably just as strongly resistant to suasion.
  3. It is pointless to try to find common ground between someone operating from religious conviction or irrational emotion, and someone who is operating from a rational/scientific viewpoint. (Please read to the end before tearing this point apart).

However, I believe there can be common ground among the (say) 70% of the great middle who can see points on both sides (I count myself among these). This is very much worth seeking, so please, let us talk. We should be able to filter out the noise of the extremes, and make some sense out of this issue.

A rational/scientific viewpoint would at a minimum include a mind open to evidence, the ability to distinguish between actual evidence and wishful or magical thinking, and a desire to find the truth where it is even remotely available. Perhaps it is vanity, but I also count myself among these.

16

There is definitely an area in which the two camps can engage in constructive dialogue and achieve some good.

That’s in the realm of reducing the factors that lead women to seek abortions. This includes more reliable and accessible contraception (including emergency contraception) and education to reduce the incidence of unwanted and/or hazardous pregnancies.

A little more effort at constructive dialogue, and we can hope to cut down on the demonization of both sides, starting with the elimination of the type of harsh rhetoric that claims that one element is “pro-abortion” (virtually no one is “pro-abortion”) or “anti-choice” (there exist radically different constructs as to what “choice” really is in this matter).
On the larger issue of whether legalized abortion should be allowed, there is scant room for compromise via dialogue, as you have two vocal camps steering the debate, each convinced that it holds the only moral and acceptable view. So in answer to the final three questions in the OP, I’d say

  1. Yes, in a quite limited sense,

  2. Yes, to a large extent, and

  3. No.

17

There is nothing ascientific about that view. Science doesn’t, and can’t, address whether it is a “person,” or a “rights bearing entity,” or if its destruction is “murder.” But science can address whether it is “alive” or “unique.”

It is and it is, and I don’t care that it is and it is, since the status of the embryo/fetus isn’t very important to me.

When pro-abortion rights believers say the e/f isn’t “alive,” they generally use it in a colloquial sense of not having consciousness (never having had it) or personhood. Don’t mistake these for scientific arguments. They aren’t meant to be.

18

It’s vital to search for common ground on any imporant issues where people are strongly divided, because otherwise, the extremists win by default. Not communicating and not trying to find a middle ground is what they’re all about. The great victory of communication and an honest attempt to reach a compromise is that it marginalizes the extremists on both sides of the disagreement, as they should be.

19

That may be your understanding of the meaning behind the phrase, but FWIW…I’ve debated numerous folks in this forum about whether a z/e/f is “alive” (and they were NOT making points about personhood, sentience or other similar traits). Lots of folks have said that a z/e/f is no more “alive” (or “a life”) than a sperm cell, skin cell or tumor.

20

I consider this semantic quibbling. I am no more alive than a sperm cell, skin cell, or tumor. There is alive and there is not alive. It isn’t a value statement to say that an embryo is alive in the same way a sperm cell is alive. When you throw in “a life,” you are bringing in value statements. “A life” might mean “something that is alive” or it might mean “something that is distinct, discrete, and valuable.”