(the deepest of sighs here)
It must be a full moon.
PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) has one-upped themselves this week. This organization is so far over-the-top that it destroys its own credibility; in fact, it is almost dangerous in its new attempt to provide "comic" book and trading card messages to teens in an attempt to foster kids' thinking along its own skewed lines. The message PETA is now trying to sell is that kids should look at their dads with contempt when he kills a fish by hooking its mouth and allowing it to suffocate out of water. The "comic" book artwork depicts a father ripping the innards out of a fish and warns kids that their fathers may do just the same to the family's pet dog or cat. This is irresponsible caterwauling, and I'm personally sick to death of it. How many of us can actually look at this recent attempt by PETA to cajole us into vegetarianism with anything but disgust? I like animals as much as the next person, but there are some parts of our society that have taken a reasonable cause and made it a joke. In fact, it's not a joke any more. This organization needs a good dose of salts in an effort to cleanse itself of its insane vitriol.
(sigh, sigh again)
Tuesday, November 22, 2005
Wednesday, November 16, 2005
THE IMPORTANCE OF FRIENDSHIP
(sigh)
I have a friend in Albuquerque whom I have known and loved for 32 years. A friend who understands me and all my shortcomings and loves me anyway. A friend who has helped sustain me through some terribly emotional times, who has listened, sighed, cried, supported me even when I'm sure she didn't agree with my thought processes. A friend who has ALWAYS been there, no matter what was going on in HER life. A friend who has given me her best counsel ALWAYS without preaching EVER. A friend who has the gumption to tell me when she thinks I'm off on a tangent or not using my best judgment. I know I can bounce things off her and she will, if ASKED, give me an honest appraisal. She has seen me at my very worst, my very lowest, my very saddest, and a few times at my very best. I don't see her often because of the miles between us, but we talk regularly and share our lives.
She and her family and my family and I were living in Indiana when we met. Our sons were the same age and were great friends immediately. They explored childhood together doing all the wonderful (and sometimes questionable) things little boys do, played on the same sports teams, went to the same school, fished the same ponds. They spent hundreds of hours with those fishing poles, and it didn't seem to matter whether they actually caught anything or not. They just enjoyed the adventure and the camaraderie.
My family moved to Virginia in 1979, leaving those wonderful friends in Indiana, but we always stayed in touch. The boys visited back and forth from Virginia to Indiana in the summers, never missing a beat in their friendship. One June morning I got a call from this amazing woman who is my friend, telling me that her son (and who I felt was MY son, too!) had been killed the night before in an automobile accident.
THERE ARE NO WORDS HERE. THERE IS NOTHING THAT CAN BE SAID TO DESCRIBE THE ANGUISH ALL OF US FELT, AND CONTINUE TO FEEL EVEN AFTER ALL THESE YEARS.
The funeral was the most emotional event I have ever attended. The loss to those parents, sisters, grandparents, friends was indescribable. My son was inconsolable. Seeing his grief at the loss of his friend at such a young age was one of the most difficult things I have endured. I cannot IMAGINE what my friends have suffered in losing a son.
But life goes on. We have survived moves, life-threatening health events to our loved ones, divorce, death of parents, you name it. But through it all, she and I have remained as close as ever, and I value her friendship as much as I do breathing....sometimes more. She is married to a wonderful man, also my friend, and they have sustained one another throughout his open-heart surgery, the loss of that son, years of life-altering events. They have remained steady, reliable, compassionate, wise. The quote in my blog profile by Emily Dickinson, "My friends are my estate," refers first and foremost to these two wonderful people. I love you, Diana and Randy.
(sigh)
Monday, November 14, 2005
HOW TO BE SINGLE, FEMALE AND SURVIVE TRADING CARS
(sigh)
They see us coming, you know.
They know we don't know the difference between torque and throttle (see, I didn't even know what to COMPARE it to!).
They know we don't CARE if there is traction control, sport-tuned suspension, stiffer springs, spoilers, speed-sensitive steering, performance exhaust (what IS that anyway???). However, I honestly DID have one salesman, when I mentioned the less advantageous gas mileage between his car and another I had been looking at, tell me that THE CAR HE WAS SELLING HAD AN (OMG) LARGER GAS TANK THAN THE OTHER SO I WOULDN'T HAVE TO PUT GAS IN AS OFTEN!!! I'm blond, but not a DUMB blond! Laughing hysterically, I asked him what that had to do with the MPG the car got.........and you know what? I don't think he knew!!!
What we DO care about is whether there is leather interior so when we spill our coffee it wipes right up; dual cup holders for that coffee AND the other space for our cell phones; an automatic trunk release so after we've been shopping we can open it from 20 paces out and can just drop our packages right in; lighted mirrors so we can check our lipstick in the dark; that the car's the right color and that it matches several of our best outfits; climate control so we can keep those hot flashes at bay; that it has a good warranty to reduce our having to discuss torque, etc., with a service technician who thinks 1) that we're all dumb blonds and 2) that his 3-week vacation to the islands will be paid for by this particular repair job; that it has good, reliable tires so that our chances for a flat are reduced while driving up and down I 95 to the malls -- all the important stuff. (Did I mention I'm not a DUMB blond?)
THEY know WE know how much we can afford to pay each month, and they can screw with the numbers any way from Sunday so long as that monthly payment is no more than what we decided coming in. Twelve cups of coffee, a couple of stale donuts and five trips to the restroom later, my eyes have glazed over. Charge us for transferring the tags or not, undercoating or not, freight, processing fees (yeah, right)..............just give me the bottom line and LET ME OUT OF THAT DEALERSHIP IN UNDER 8 HOURS!!! I HAVE SHOPPING TO DO!
They see us coming, you know.
They know we don't know the difference between torque and throttle (see, I didn't even know what to COMPARE it to!).
They know we don't CARE if there is traction control, sport-tuned suspension, stiffer springs, spoilers, speed-sensitive steering, performance exhaust (what IS that anyway???). However, I honestly DID have one salesman, when I mentioned the less advantageous gas mileage between his car and another I had been looking at, tell me that THE CAR HE WAS SELLING HAD AN (OMG) LARGER GAS TANK THAN THE OTHER SO I WOULDN'T HAVE TO PUT GAS IN AS OFTEN!!! I'm blond, but not a DUMB blond! Laughing hysterically, I asked him what that had to do with the MPG the car got.........and you know what? I don't think he knew!!!
What we DO care about is whether there is leather interior so when we spill our coffee it wipes right up; dual cup holders for that coffee AND the other space for our cell phones; an automatic trunk release so after we've been shopping we can open it from 20 paces out and can just drop our packages right in; lighted mirrors so we can check our lipstick in the dark; that the car's the right color and that it matches several of our best outfits; climate control so we can keep those hot flashes at bay; that it has a good warranty to reduce our having to discuss torque, etc., with a service technician who thinks 1) that we're all dumb blonds and 2) that his 3-week vacation to the islands will be paid for by this particular repair job; that it has good, reliable tires so that our chances for a flat are reduced while driving up and down I 95 to the malls -- all the important stuff. (Did I mention I'm not a DUMB blond?)
THEY know WE know how much we can afford to pay each month, and they can screw with the numbers any way from Sunday so long as that monthly payment is no more than what we decided coming in. Twelve cups of coffee, a couple of stale donuts and five trips to the restroom later, my eyes have glazed over. Charge us for transferring the tags or not, undercoating or not, freight, processing fees (yeah, right)..............just give me the bottom line and LET ME OUT OF THAT DEALERSHIP IN UNDER 8 HOURS!!! I HAVE SHOPPING TO DO!
Sunday, November 06, 2005
CULTURAL COMPETENCE??? GOOD GRIEF!
(sigh)
Have you heard all the recent uproar about the initiative they call "cultural competence" proposed by a handful of liberal-leaning universities? This is nothing more than a fancy name for "sensitivity," which, by the way, was the watchword of the 70s. I never cease to be amazed at the extent to which the political left extends itself toward the soft issues. Not that this particular sidelight is necessarily bad, but the over-reaching is beyond belief. Let me explain.
Cultural competence is defined as "a set of congruent behaviors, attitudes, and policies that come together in a system, agency or among professionals and enables them to work effectively in cross-cultural situations" (Cross et al., 1989; Isaacs & Benjamin, 1991). Bottom line: Know your audience. If you are a Caucasian teacher instructing a classroom of African-American children, it behooves you to be as knowledgeable as possible of their culture and customs so as 1) not to offend and 2) to be effective. But some of the materials on cultural competence which offer "insight" into what works is so far "out there" as to be laughable. Take, for instance, the information put out on the Cultural Competence home page which suggests that even though African-American adults use eye contact and facial expression to discipline their children, this is not effective with ALL African-American youngsters. Duh. It suggests that while this method works with some that one may need to use loud and demanding tones in order to achieve the same result with others. Okay. It's common sense that everything does not work for everyone in every situation, but to imply that Caucasian teachers in a similar situation should be AWARE AND KNOWLEDGEABLE of all intra-group differences is absurd.
This home page is an interesting read because it brings to light how diverse we are in this country with cultures within cultures, ad infinitum. I was overwhelmed when reading it because it's so very obvious that employment of even a fraction of the suggestions put forth is, at the very least, impractical. A couple of the examples given are that in some matrilineal societies the father resides in a different domicile and has little interaction with the children, but the maternal uncle has a large role to play in the children's upbringing. This implies that school faculty members should know NOT to call a child's father but to instead call the child's UNCLE, and a MATERNAL UNCLE, at that! Additionally, some cultures do not recognize TIME as being a factor in everyday living and therefore children have difficulty arriving for classes in a TIMELY fashion. Some cultures rely only on oral communication in learning and are therefore flummoxed by textbooks. Are we to expect our public schools to cater to the kaleidoscope of nuances of each and every culture and sub-culture?
The University of Oregon's mandate of cultural competence by its professors has met with scathing remarks by other educators, the most compelling being those from Rutgers Professor Norman Levitt. Read what he has to say about this:
" 'Cultural Competence,' or rather, your presumed lack thereof, is what you will be clobbered with if you are imprudent enough to challenge or merely to have qualms about 'affirmative action,' 'diversity' and 'multiculturalism,' as those principles are now espoused by their most fervent academic advocates.
...In the context of higher education, cultural competence necessitates abject refusal to articulate or defend ideas that might make certain protected groups uncomfortable. Professors can only be deemed 'culturally competent' if they openly profess the approved corpus of received values."
Professor Levitt continues by saying that administrators at the University of Oregon "prescribed a draconian regime of attitude adjustment aimed at professors and instructors. They proposed that all faculty be required to 'participate in ongoing cultural competence professional development' under their tutelage. But this was just the beginning. The drafters further called for academic departments, across the board, to reconstruct their hiring policies so as to make affirmative action the central factor in generating job offers. They insisted that every course in the school be scrutinized for its consistency with multicultural doctrine. Above all, in hiring, promotion and determination of salary, they called for a formal evaluation of the candidate's cultural competence! Stripping it down to its essence, the message to faculty was this: you're going to adopt our sociopolitical point of view (or pretend to) or pay the price; so far as hiring and retention is concerned, your professional standards shall be modified or overruled to insure the predominance of people of whom we approve because of their race, sex, sexuality or doctrinal purity; if you give us any trouble, lacking tenure you'll be out on your ear and even with tenure you'll be out a lot of money."
So troubling in Oregon's journey into the absurd is the underlying thesis that there should be a forfeiting of our personal value systems in order to cater to these newly-defined cultural essences. This is not a sacrifice for the greater good but a dumping of our own psychologies to accommodate an outre educational hierarchy's quest for cultural correctness. We have become such a litigious society and are so quick to take a whack at our fellow man that we have lost sight of the fact that it is not possible to mandate and legislate every aspect of our cultures. We shouldn't WANT that anyway. To be sure, most of us can use a little diversity honing, but a sensitivity to and an awareness of (rather than a proficiency in) cultural competence should be enough to move us forward. (sigh again)
Have you heard all the recent uproar about the initiative they call "cultural competence" proposed by a handful of liberal-leaning universities? This is nothing more than a fancy name for "sensitivity," which, by the way, was the watchword of the 70s. I never cease to be amazed at the extent to which the political left extends itself toward the soft issues. Not that this particular sidelight is necessarily bad, but the over-reaching is beyond belief. Let me explain.
Cultural competence is defined as "a set of congruent behaviors, attitudes, and policies that come together in a system, agency or among professionals and enables them to work effectively in cross-cultural situations" (Cross et al., 1989; Isaacs & Benjamin, 1991). Bottom line: Know your audience. If you are a Caucasian teacher instructing a classroom of African-American children, it behooves you to be as knowledgeable as possible of their culture and customs so as 1) not to offend and 2) to be effective. But some of the materials on cultural competence which offer "insight" into what works is so far "out there" as to be laughable. Take, for instance, the information put out on the Cultural Competence home page which suggests that even though African-American adults use eye contact and facial expression to discipline their children, this is not effective with ALL African-American youngsters. Duh. It suggests that while this method works with some that one may need to use loud and demanding tones in order to achieve the same result with others. Okay. It's common sense that everything does not work for everyone in every situation, but to imply that Caucasian teachers in a similar situation should be AWARE AND KNOWLEDGEABLE of all intra-group differences is absurd.
This home page is an interesting read because it brings to light how diverse we are in this country with cultures within cultures, ad infinitum. I was overwhelmed when reading it because it's so very obvious that employment of even a fraction of the suggestions put forth is, at the very least, impractical. A couple of the examples given are that in some matrilineal societies the father resides in a different domicile and has little interaction with the children, but the maternal uncle has a large role to play in the children's upbringing. This implies that school faculty members should know NOT to call a child's father but to instead call the child's UNCLE, and a MATERNAL UNCLE, at that! Additionally, some cultures do not recognize TIME as being a factor in everyday living and therefore children have difficulty arriving for classes in a TIMELY fashion. Some cultures rely only on oral communication in learning and are therefore flummoxed by textbooks. Are we to expect our public schools to cater to the kaleidoscope of nuances of each and every culture and sub-culture?
The University of Oregon's mandate of cultural competence by its professors has met with scathing remarks by other educators, the most compelling being those from Rutgers Professor Norman Levitt. Read what he has to say about this:
" 'Cultural Competence,' or rather, your presumed lack thereof, is what you will be clobbered with if you are imprudent enough to challenge or merely to have qualms about 'affirmative action,' 'diversity' and 'multiculturalism,' as those principles are now espoused by their most fervent academic advocates.
...In the context of higher education, cultural competence necessitates abject refusal to articulate or defend ideas that might make certain protected groups uncomfortable. Professors can only be deemed 'culturally competent' if they openly profess the approved corpus of received values."
Professor Levitt continues by saying that administrators at the University of Oregon "prescribed a draconian regime of attitude adjustment aimed at professors and instructors. They proposed that all faculty be required to 'participate in ongoing cultural competence professional development' under their tutelage. But this was just the beginning. The drafters further called for academic departments, across the board, to reconstruct their hiring policies so as to make affirmative action the central factor in generating job offers. They insisted that every course in the school be scrutinized for its consistency with multicultural doctrine. Above all, in hiring, promotion and determination of salary, they called for a formal evaluation of the candidate's cultural competence! Stripping it down to its essence, the message to faculty was this: you're going to adopt our sociopolitical point of view (or pretend to) or pay the price; so far as hiring and retention is concerned, your professional standards shall be modified or overruled to insure the predominance of people of whom we approve because of their race, sex, sexuality or doctrinal purity; if you give us any trouble, lacking tenure you'll be out on your ear and even with tenure you'll be out a lot of money."
So troubling in Oregon's journey into the absurd is the underlying thesis that there should be a forfeiting of our personal value systems in order to cater to these newly-defined cultural essences. This is not a sacrifice for the greater good but a dumping of our own psychologies to accommodate an outre educational hierarchy's quest for cultural correctness. We have become such a litigious society and are so quick to take a whack at our fellow man that we have lost sight of the fact that it is not possible to mandate and legislate every aspect of our cultures. We shouldn't WANT that anyway. To be sure, most of us can use a little diversity honing, but a sensitivity to and an awareness of (rather than a proficiency in) cultural competence should be enough to move us forward. (sigh again)
Tuesday, November 01, 2005
THE IMPORTANCE OF PRESERVING ROE V. WADE
(sigh)
I don't know why I'm bothering to write about this subject since it is such a controversial issue involving religious, political, medical and personal viewpoints that most likely will never find accordance in my lifetime. I do, however, feel strongly about the survival of Roe v. Wade and hope, in fact, that in the near term there will be further clarification of women's right to choose so as to diminish some of the controversy surrounding
it.
This blog is not the place to debate the religious aspects of abortion, and I'm not going to. While I concede that reverent viewpoints are paramount in many individuals' opinion on the subject, this post is not going to touch on that. Some of the controversy could be put to rest if there could be agreement on one or two points, which I'll discuss shortly. The bumper stickers that exclaim, "It's a child, not a choice," or "Abortion -- the hand that robs the cradle,"offer simplistic offerings of a highly volatile issue. So, too, do the divergent ones which state, "If you can't trust me with a choice, how can you trust me with a child?" or "U.S., out of my uterus!" So, with that in mind, here goes.
The issue of when "human personhood" begins is the root of the abortion debate. If there could be consensus on the definition of this, more clarity could be afforded to legislation and to those amorphous terms surrounding abortion. Pro-lifers generally feel "human personhood" occurs at conception, and pro-choicers generally feel the occurrence is at a much later stage of pregnancy. Therein lies the problem. Even medical doctors and ethicists do not agree here; and that is primarily because their own personal upbringing, viewpoints, and religious teachings have a way of creeping into their thought processes and influencing even the most practical scientific minds. And because of this, Justice Blackmun in 1973 wrote, "...We need to resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate." That was 32 years ago, and we are no closer to consensus today than we were then.
Therefore, since it appears we are still eons away from a LEGAL definition of "human personhood," let's examine a few of the more practical sides of dealing with an unwanted pregnancy. A woman -- whether married or unmarried, young or older, healthy or sick, pious or not -- still faces enormous emotion when learning she is carrying a child. Indifference usually is not a factor here. Pregnancy and child rearing are major events in the life of any woman, fostering intense emotional, financial, and physical demands for many years. For those women whose religion does not allow the employment of birth control or for those who are remiss or just uninformed in the use of contraceptives, an unwanted pregnancy may wreak havoc on that individual's ability to provide appropriate nurturing (at all levels) to the child.
It is somehow unthinkable that legislators' opinions, which have been formulated by their own upbringing and environment, should be rendered law to an individual who is not capable emotionally, physically and/or financially to provide for a child. To force parenthood on someone unable or unwilling to adequately deal with raising a child, who may even eventually neglect or abuse that child, seems more a crime than the termination of the pregnancy. Yes, I know the argument....There is always adoption. But the reality of it is that less than 2% of individuals faced with unwanted pregnancy actually place the child up for adoption, and "those who relinquish tend to have higher education and income levels, higher future career and educational aspirations" (National Adoption Information Clearinghouse, 2005). This suggests that those women least likely to have the means financially to obtain adequate pre-natal and post-natal care and to provide essential provisions for that child are the ones who are opting to ignore the adoption option. My daughter is adopted, and I am grateful for her biological mother's decision to give birth and allow me to have had another child to love and care for. But there are some who don't have the insight and a view of the bigger picture to propel them toward making that decision. While they may personally not be able or willing to provide for the child, they may be equally unwilling to allow it to be placed for adoption.
Our learned family values, perceptions, personal circumstances all mirror to some extent our views on issues of substance. Abortion is no exception. We may be able to understand another side to an issue, but our final judgment will be reflective of our own life experiences. That's what makes the right-to-choose issue so controversial and so very, very personal. We can apply principles to some degree from other times, but we cannot always measure their impact on today's issues. Times change. People change. And, unfortunately, core values are often eroded. Things that were so very important when I was a child are no longer viewed as necessary. There really isn't such a thing as "polite society" any longer...we rage on the road; we curse at our neighbor; we want it all at the expense of our children, who are rude, loud and out of control. Do we want more of this? I don't think so. We need to examine carefully our roles as parents and our ability to raise children of character, children who have integrity and who are possessed with self esteem. To do that and to be successful at it, we need to WANT to be parents.
Should we be concerned about the fate of Roe v. Wade? Should we be pro-active in defending women's right to choose? A resounding YES to both.
I don't know why I'm bothering to write about this subject since it is such a controversial issue involving religious, political, medical and personal viewpoints that most likely will never find accordance in my lifetime. I do, however, feel strongly about the survival of Roe v. Wade and hope, in fact, that in the near term there will be further clarification of women's right to choose so as to diminish some of the controversy surrounding
it.
This blog is not the place to debate the religious aspects of abortion, and I'm not going to. While I concede that reverent viewpoints are paramount in many individuals' opinion on the subject, this post is not going to touch on that. Some of the controversy could be put to rest if there could be agreement on one or two points, which I'll discuss shortly. The bumper stickers that exclaim, "It's a child, not a choice," or "Abortion -- the hand that robs the cradle,"offer simplistic offerings of a highly volatile issue. So, too, do the divergent ones which state, "If you can't trust me with a choice, how can you trust me with a child?" or "U.S., out of my uterus!" So, with that in mind, here goes.
The issue of when "human personhood" begins is the root of the abortion debate. If there could be consensus on the definition of this, more clarity could be afforded to legislation and to those amorphous terms surrounding abortion. Pro-lifers generally feel "human personhood" occurs at conception, and pro-choicers generally feel the occurrence is at a much later stage of pregnancy. Therein lies the problem. Even medical doctors and ethicists do not agree here; and that is primarily because their own personal upbringing, viewpoints, and religious teachings have a way of creeping into their thought processes and influencing even the most practical scientific minds. And because of this, Justice Blackmun in 1973 wrote, "...We need to resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate." That was 32 years ago, and we are no closer to consensus today than we were then.
Therefore, since it appears we are still eons away from a LEGAL definition of "human personhood," let's examine a few of the more practical sides of dealing with an unwanted pregnancy. A woman -- whether married or unmarried, young or older, healthy or sick, pious or not -- still faces enormous emotion when learning she is carrying a child. Indifference usually is not a factor here. Pregnancy and child rearing are major events in the life of any woman, fostering intense emotional, financial, and physical demands for many years. For those women whose religion does not allow the employment of birth control or for those who are remiss or just uninformed in the use of contraceptives, an unwanted pregnancy may wreak havoc on that individual's ability to provide appropriate nurturing (at all levels) to the child.
It is somehow unthinkable that legislators' opinions, which have been formulated by their own upbringing and environment, should be rendered law to an individual who is not capable emotionally, physically and/or financially to provide for a child. To force parenthood on someone unable or unwilling to adequately deal with raising a child, who may even eventually neglect or abuse that child, seems more a crime than the termination of the pregnancy. Yes, I know the argument....There is always adoption. But the reality of it is that less than 2% of individuals faced with unwanted pregnancy actually place the child up for adoption, and "those who relinquish tend to have higher education and income levels, higher future career and educational aspirations" (National Adoption Information Clearinghouse, 2005). This suggests that those women least likely to have the means financially to obtain adequate pre-natal and post-natal care and to provide essential provisions for that child are the ones who are opting to ignore the adoption option. My daughter is adopted, and I am grateful for her biological mother's decision to give birth and allow me to have had another child to love and care for. But there are some who don't have the insight and a view of the bigger picture to propel them toward making that decision. While they may personally not be able or willing to provide for the child, they may be equally unwilling to allow it to be placed for adoption.
Our learned family values, perceptions, personal circumstances all mirror to some extent our views on issues of substance. Abortion is no exception. We may be able to understand another side to an issue, but our final judgment will be reflective of our own life experiences. That's what makes the right-to-choose issue so controversial and so very, very personal. We can apply principles to some degree from other times, but we cannot always measure their impact on today's issues. Times change. People change. And, unfortunately, core values are often eroded. Things that were so very important when I was a child are no longer viewed as necessary. There really isn't such a thing as "polite society" any longer...we rage on the road; we curse at our neighbor; we want it all at the expense of our children, who are rude, loud and out of control. Do we want more of this? I don't think so. We need to examine carefully our roles as parents and our ability to raise children of character, children who have integrity and who are possessed with self esteem. To do that and to be successful at it, we need to WANT to be parents.
Should we be concerned about the fate of Roe v. Wade? Should we be pro-active in defending women's right to choose? A resounding YES to both.
****************************
After I wrote the above piece, I emailed it to a friend whose opinion I respect completely. I asked him to comment on it.............and comment, he did. I knew what his views were on this subject going in, and I knew I would receive a literate, thought-provoking rebuttal. His arguments are so compelling that I had to include them for balance. And while he has not changed my mind about the importance of preserving Roe v. Wade, I believe the scales tip in his favor here. Used with his permission.
*******************************
I think you have made a good case that some women want abortions or are comforted by the thought that abortion is available. Both facts are undeniably true. However, just because something is wanted does not mean that it is right or that it is "a" right, enshrined in the Constitution. Muslims want to kill infidels, children want to subsist on candy. However,I will put aside the debate on whether abortion is right or not and focus instead on whether there is a right to abortion in the Constitution. Of course, there is not. The "right" was found in the emanations and penumbra of the 14th and 4th amendments. How wonderfully expansive, unless you try to make that argument with the second amendment, but I digress. There is no "right" to abortion, the Supreme Court arrogated to themselves the power to force all States to permit the practice. If Roe is overturned, it does not mean women can never have abortions. Abortion will be regulated, like any other medical procedure, by the states. Would that mean abortion would suddenly be declared illegal by every state in the union with women and doctors locked up everywhere? No. Prior to Roe, many states had already moved to permit abortions, many others have since written the right to privacy into their own constitutions. Of course, some states might severely restrict or even eliminate the practice. In a representative democracy, that is the right of the people and their representatives. If the prospect of Utah or Kentucky restricting abortion completely, or of Texas restricting access to abortions to women over 18 or girls under 18 with parental consent frightens women, they have several recourses. Someone can propose a constitutional amendment EXPLICITLY permitting abortion at all times for females of any age. Others can elect legislators who will pass expansive abortion legislation. Put the issue directly in front of the voters. Let the people decide. If your arguments are good, people will be convinced, and abortion will be as available as you desire. There are some good pro-abortion arguments. Abortions are disproportionately performed on women of lower economic stature, so there are fewer children on the welfare rolls, and fewer teenagers committing crime in the future. Essentially, you can pre-emptively exterminate societal problems. Abortions are also performed in higher numbers among politically liberal individuals and in more politically liberal states. Anything that eliminates liberals gives proportionally more power to conservatives and to conservative states and is by definition a good thing. This is known as the"Roe effect" on political balance. Women are a majority in this country. You represent upwards of 75% of college graduates and 60% of law school. Surely, collectively, you can come up with some compelling arguments beyond the feeble justifications of Blackmun in his Roe decision for abortion which convince a majority of your fellow citizens to permit abortion legislatively. If you think this task impossible, then by all means, hold to Roe and do your best to beg 5 justices to continue imposing policy on a resentful public. That is certainly a recipe for good relations across the political aisle.
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