Because the OP expected to be called a “retarded fuckwit” for asking, and didn’t want to disappoint anyone by posting it in a forum where they weren’t allowed to? That’s a joke.
I agree with the OP that some people just take the party line. I avoid political and religion discussions with those people. So I can’t say if they are or are not a majority of all people, because I just don’t have any data on their prevalence in the population. Avoiding those types of people does that. A strategy I highly recommend. It’s saved me countless arguments with my Fundy Xtian brother-in-law (and his wife, AKA my sister).
As a liberal I will describe how I have seen this cross fertilization of stupidity occur on the conservative side.
I have a friend who has been a one issue voter for decades. He is against abortion and he will vote for whoever is more against abortion. This is always the conservative/Republican candidate. So he ends up listening to their position on abortion but also ends up hearing their position on things like global warming the estate tax.
So now he has adopted positions on global warming and the estate tax by osmosis. He can’t defend or back up any of his positions but he knows that the baby killers are concerned about global warming and God’s candidate thinks global warming is a hoax being perpetrated by big money climatological research (boggle) and that the estate tax is going to be levied against his mother’s $100,000 estate.
Using your own argument here, if the fetus isn’t alive until birth, what does it matter if it can feel pain or not? If the argument that life begins at birth was a rational given, excuses like whether or not it can feel pain aren’t necessary. In your own arguments you underline your lack of logic.
If a parent feels that his/her child cannot get a quality education at a public school, why does that parent need to pay for school twice, other than to support the teacher’s union?
Where to begin? Does a premature baby not achieve life until it has exited the womb? What if the mother dies during delivery? What is the justification of delivering the “thing” at that point? According to you, it isn’t alive yet because it hasn’t been born and the mother cannot deliver, so there’s no more reason to deliver than to remove the mother’s tonsils.
There’s also the case of miscarriage. Technically, according to your argument, a miscarried fetus that is evacuated from the womb should be considered alive because it exited the womb and the mother’s body. It can’t be dead before it left the womb because it never was alive. So if being outside the mother’s body is the sole criterion for establishing life, it must be alive.
And why do scumbags like Scott Peterson get convicted of double murder for killing pregnant women? Shouldn’t the law protect him from being charged with “murdering” an unborn mass of cells? Shouldn’t it also be legal to beat a pregnant woman to point of miscarriage? Battery charges obviously would apply, but nothing should be done, according to your argument, involving the pregnancy.
You can honestly find logic in your argument?
You didn’t address my point, you just shouted “choice” as though that is the real trump card here.
Again, you just shout out some drivel claiming that a woman carrying a baby is somehow being forced to do so by men. The tyranny involved here is not men forcing women to give birth, it’s women arbitrarily ending lives as a matter of convenience.
Yes, you caught me, it was all a sinister plan to discuss abortion. Your logic is about as solid as curlcoat’s.
Thus far the argument in favor of abortion as a matter of choice has been choice for the sake of choice (so long as you agree with it), sexism, racism, and the idiocy of all who oppose it. In other words, you can’t plausibly justify abortion in any meaningful way and must resort to name-calling and buzzwords. And thus this thread has come full circle. The thread was about people who can’t rationally defend their beliefs and became one giant shouting match with “pro-choice” advocates doing just that.
I don’t really see how that’s germane. And short of going line-by-line through the Republican Party platform, I’m not sure how to achieve it. You seem to be guilty, as most people are (including myself at times) of believing that conservative = republican and liberal = democrat.
When I say that I tend to agree with conservatives, I’m not speaking of “conservatives” as some monolithic force, but as individuals. For example, I had some problems with George Bush’s ideas on illegal immigration, Ron Paul’s views on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Rudy Giuliani’s pro-choice position, etc.
Again, I’m not sure what this has to do with anything.
Mostly, as I said, I am just curious. It isn’t relevant necessarily that you must disagree with the party line (used metaphorically, not as = Republican) somewhere. I just thought it was interesting that you wanted to to call out the distinction between repeating talking points and forming your own opinions and then seemingly flat-out say that it’s not possible to logically form a different opinion different than your own on abortion and that everyone must just be repeating liberal talking points.
I know it isn’t logically contradictory, but I see some inconsistency in saying both that it’s good to form your own opinions but that it’s not possible to form an opinion different from mine. If you also conveniently agreed with all typical conservative positions as being the "right"position, I’d say it would undermine your claims of being an independent thinker.
If you looked at the thread objectively, I think you’d see that quite the opposite is going on. I haven’t said that any position opposing mine is automatically illogical, but that there is no logical explanation given. The argument that abortion is not murder because a fetus is not life begs the question of when life begins. A flat answer of “birth” and then calling me an idiot is not a logical explanation of that view.
Likewise, the concept that the “school choice” issue is not a matter of choice because Republicans are racist is not logical.
It is good to form your own opinions, but it’s not good to use “if you don’t agree, you’re a ‘retarded fuckwit’” as the basis for those opinions.
You can equally be accused of providing a flat answer and saying anyone who doesn’t agree is stupid (or illogical).
Agreed. But it does seem that you are slightly more inclined to dismiss what people who disagree with you say as contentless insults rather than actual well-formed opinions. And it’s a bit ironic, given the original point of the thread.
Actually, what I said was, “Try to approach this logically. When does life begin, if not at conception? At three months? Six? Eight? Birth? Third birthday? I haven’t unilaterally decided that life begins at conception - it is the only logical conclusion. Any other explanation is arbitrary…”
In other words, I provided some kind of context for my conclusion. Those who disagree have provided airtight logic like calling me an idiot, a retard, and a fucktard (if you can find the “content” in those, more power to you). My “flat answer” posed the question of when life begins (and I even made it multiple choice!). “Birth. Now, you find me a logical, scientific reason to change my mind on that,” is not a well-formed opinion - it is a statement of belief with the burden of (dis-)proof being placed on me. That is not a logical argument.
Except it’s not the only logical conclusion, and it’s just as arbitrary as any other metric. I could easily make a case that it’s just as logical to conclude that life begins when there’s brain activity, or when it’s developed recognizably human features, or when it can survive outside the womb. Your blanket statement that your decision on when life begins is the only correct answer isn’t supported by anything other than “My post is my cite”.
Perhaps the problem is attempting to assign a fixed moment to something that is a gradual incremental process. Any point you pick (even conception) is going to feel arbitrary.
So, then, there is no “life,” no “abortion,” etc.?
And conception is not an arbitrary point at which to define life - there is nothing there before conception (or, if you want to call it “Dave,” go ahead). Once the sperm penetrates the egg something is Daved - there is nothing before that, but something new after.
Take it into a broader context - If you’re asking, “When did this thing come into existence?” the answer is, 'When it was created." That’s pretty tough to dispute, and is hardly arbitrary. To say, “At some point after it was created but was later determined to be in existence,” is awfully shaky. The idea that life begins at some point after conception isn’t formulated to answer the question of when life begins, but to answer that question in such a way that abortion is justified as not being the taking of life.
