Take for example this chart currently going around Facebook... AGAIN:
The chart was originally created by Rep Pelosi's office and has been debunked by several newsorganizations.
I tried to explain to my friend that the chart is bogus but he first claimed it was made by the Treasury so it had to be accurate. I then pointed out to him that as the size of the national debt rises percentage increases will decline if the rate of debt growth stays the same. (If I owe you $1 and borrow another $1 my debt to you has increased by 100%. If I then borrow another $1 my debt only increases a further 50% or if I borrow $1.98 my debt only increased by 99%! Look, the debt growth rate went down!!!)
Pelosi's office eventually did "fix" the chart but it is still misleading:
Well yeah... I mean, if it's about protecting a life, then why should it matter how that life came into being? The whole rape exception thing never jived with the justification they generally cite for banning abortion.
Well yeah... I mean, if it's about protecting a life, then why should it matter how that life came into being? The whole rape exception thing never jived with the justification they generally cite for banning abortion.
Yep. It does make complete sense with his stance. The rape exception thing only makes sense if you think this way about abortion:
You choose to have sex, therefore you should be choosing to procreate (or at least be prepared to procreate). Regardless of the protection you use, sex makes babies. Therefore if you get someone pregnant (or get pregnant) you have no right to destroy a life you create.
The rape exception fits in there because you're not choosing to have sex if you're raped.
That reasoning still doesn't quite jive with me. Life is more valuable if you make a conscious choice that leads to its creation? Either life is inherently valuable or it isn't. There's no special significance to it just because you knew it might happen.
The reasoning seems to be more based on taking responsibility for your actions. You had sex, now deal with the consequences. Well, choosing to terminate a pregnancy you can't handle and prevent a baby from being brought into poverty or abandonment is a responsible choice. Arguably, it is more responsible than having a baby and subjecting it to poverty or abuse. So what is the real justification for that viewpoint?
Sounds like the justification is "this is your punishment for having sex." Which is stupid.
That reasoning still doesn't quite jive with me. Life is more valuable if you make a conscious choice that leads to its creation? Either life is inherently valuable or it isn't. There's no special significance to it just because you knew it might happen.
The reasoning seems to be more based on taking responsibility for your actions. You had sex, now deal with the consequences. Well, choosing to terminate a pregnancy you can't handle and prevent a baby from being brought into poverty or abandonment is a responsible choice. Arguably, it is more responsible than having a baby and subjecting it to poverty or abuse. So what is the real justification for that viewpoint?
Sounds like the justification is "this is your punishment for having sex." Which is stupid.
It is stupid, but that's the argument.
To continue playing devil's advocate, you don't have to take care of the baby yourself. You could put the child up for adoption or something like that. There's no reason to end someone's life just because they were planned. That person could grow up to be someone incredible!
It's less about punishing the mother and more about not punishing the unborn child.
(Note that these were all arguments I used to believe when I was a fundamentalist Christian who would argue against abortion)
For seriousness though, it seems like a lot of this is rooted in a historical belief that "sex is bad except in marriage". They associate unplanned pregnancies ending in abortion to sex outside of marriage and irresponsibility, and want to make the prospect of sex outside of marriage completely unappealing.
It's not a very logical side of the argument. I honestly can't really force myself to figure out their arguments in a sense that makes sense to me, without resorting to a more simplistic way of thinking.
Here is a copy/paste of the article sans sad picture.
Ken Aden’s Campaign Manager Comes Home To Find Cat Killed; “LIBERAL” Written On Its Corpse January 23rd, 2012 By ARDem
This post includes a graphic picture. It is included here not for shock value, but to show just how heinous some people can be.
Last night, I got the most chilling phone call I have ever received. It was Jake Burris, Ken Aden’s campaign manager. Last night, Jake and his four kids had come back to their Russellville home. As they were getting out of the car, one of his children discovered their family cat dead on the front porch. One side of the animal’s head had been bashed in and an eyeball was hanging out of its socket. But there was something even more horrifying to be found on the corpse.
Written across the animal’s fur in black marker was the word “LIBERAL“.
This is terrorism. There’s no other word for it. A police report has been filed. Jake said the kids seem to be handling it okay. The one that discovered the cat was too young to be able to read and Jake had quickly gotten the others into the house before they saw it. Pope County is an insanely conservative area and the Aden campaign has been shaking things up even there and it looks like another right wing sociopath with a taste for violence has come crawling out of the woodwork in response. I asked Aden for a comment on the record:
“This is sickening. To kill a child’s pet…I’m at a loss for words…I’ve seen the best and the worst of humanity, but this is something else.”
Both Ken and Jake though made it clear that they weren’t going to back down on the campaign trail, both agreeing that caving to this kind of behavior would only make things worse.
“I’ve got a gun and I know how to use it.”, Jake said. “If I have to protect my kids I’ll do it without hesitation.”
This happened the same night that Gabby Giffords, the survivor of a heinous act of violence, announced she was resigning from Congress. To think of something happening here like what happened in Arizona, the possibility of that happening to Ken or to someone on his campaign team, is frightening beyond belief. This is how serial killers start off after all, torturing and killing animals. Someone who would do this to a cat is not to far from doing it to a person.
There’s no doubting this was political. There’s no doubting it’s another hideous example of right wing terrorism. Personally I would hope that leaders on the right-Steve Womack, the Arkansas Republican Party, etc.-would step up and condemn this as strongly as possible. I would also hope that Steve Womack’s father, owner of a local radio station, would stop giving out the names, phone numbers, and addresses of members of the Aden team or anyone else for that matter on his radio program when ranting about Aden. The elder Womack has done that several times and Aden’s former press secretary got a death threat in the mail soon after her name was mentioned on the program. Clearly there is someone out there that doesn’t need anymore of that kind of information, much less inspiration to act on their hatred. I also hope that the Aden campaign will do whatever they can to up the security at some of their events, for the time being at least. Aden has said he’s going to put out a press release on the matter soon, and we’ll be following this and any developments related to it closely.
That said, our thoughts and prayers are with the Burris family. Jake Burris is a great guy, and he and his kids shouldn’t have to be dealing with this.
Update: I have been trying to update the blog on this for awhile now but the insane amount of traffic this is getting had crashed the site. This is now national news and it’s getting picked up seemingly everywhere. Our analytics on this today are off the charts, dwarfing every story that came before it in a big way. This is huge stuff, but part of me is a little miffed that the press couldn’t pay half as much attention to the good stuff Ken has done-the toy drive for foster kids, the resume building workshop, the stellar campaign in general. But what’s the saying? If it bleeds it leads? Anyway, Womack’s campaign manager Beau Walker put out a strong statement on this today, to their credit and Aden put out a press release dealing with the facts of the matter and stuck up for Womack and his campaign against the finger pointing. Both statements follow:
KEN ADEN NEWS RELEASE
RUSSELLVILLE—On the heels of a weekend of positive news coverage for the campaign of Democratic Congressional candidate Ken Aden, Aden’s campaign manager returned home to find his family pet slaughtered, with the word “liberal” painted on the animal’s corpse. The Russellville Police Department is investigating, and a report will be made to the Federal Bureau of Investigation Monday morning.
Jacob Burris, who has served as Aden’s campaign manager since late October, arrived home with his family Sunday evening, and his four children discovered the gruesome scene as they exited the family vehicle to enter their home.
The family pet, an adult, mixed-breed Siamese cat, had one side of its head bashed in to the point the cat’s eyeball was barely hanging from its socket. The perpetrators scrawled “liberal” across the cat’s body and left it on the doorstep of Burris’ house.
“To kill a child’s pet is just unconscionable,” Aden said Monday morning. “As a former combat soldier, I’ve seen the best of humanity and the worst of humanity. Whoever did this is definitely part of the worst of humanity,” he said.
“It is one thing to engage in civil political discourse, and for Republicans and Democrats to disagree with each other, which is an expected part of the political process. Taking it to this level is beyond unacceptable,” Aden said.
While the campaign between Aden and incumbent Congressman Steve Womack has heated up in recent months, Aden said they did not believe the Womack campaign to be responsible. “Although we have certainly disagreed and engaged in a great deal of civil discourse, I do not believe in any way that Congressman Womack or his campaign had anything to do with this incident,” Aden said. He noted that, before Christmas, KRUM Radio, a station owned by Womack’s father, actually promoted a toy drive held by Aden’s campaign for children in the Third District. “We suspect this is the action of a rogue individual or group of individuals who are the type of folks that stoop to the lowest common denominator instead of engaging in civil political discourse,” Aden said. “It is unfortunate this has occurred, and we will await the results of the police and federal investigations,” Aden said.
WOMACK CAMPAIGN STATEMENT
The thought of brutalizing any animal to make a political statement, no matter what that statement is, is beyond any standard of decency,” he told The Huffington Post. “The person or people, if there was more than one, who are responsible — they definitely need to be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law. There should be no tolerance in our political discussion here in this nation for this kind of behavior.”
Sounds like the justification is "this is your punishment for having sex." Which is stupid.
And it's very specifically punishing women for having sex. It's a control ploy to keep men in charge, I'd guess. Which is probably the real reason for the hatred of homosexuality: it undermines the patriarchy.
To be honest, I'm not for abortion due to the life thing, but just about to the extent that if someone asked me for advice on whether or not to get an abortion (not that it would happen in all likelihood, but bear with me on this hypothetical), I'd tell them not to.
However, I justify this somewhat by saying that access to birth control in all forms should be easily available, including the morning after pill (which I don't believe causes abortions). I'm of the opinion that if we made it as easy as possible for women not to get pregnant, then the abortion issue would be moot since people wouldn't be having them anyway.
That's also stupid. As if the public system for caring for children is any kind of good place for a child? It is already so overburdened and shitty that the kids who go through/come out of it are irrevocably scarred. Sure, if you have someone lined up to adopt the baby, that is one thing. It is far different to insist someone bring a baby into the world, abandon it, and then fail to provide the public funding to give that child a good environment when there is no one standing up to volunteer for its care.
People who are against abortion should also be in favor of increasing public funding for social services and the foster system. Usually they are not.
On a personal note, I also personally would not choose abortion as an option for both medical and moral reasons. However, I am lucky enough to have an extensive network of family and friends that I know would make sure I was able to care for my child. Not everyone has that luxury, and no one should be forced into parenthood with no other choice.
Why stop at kids in the womb? If the foster and social services system is so bad for kids why not just kill them at any age and spare them a bad life?
A fetus in a womb is not a "kid" or even an autonomous life form. If we're going to classify dependent cells or groups of cells as protected, let's go balls out and outlaw male masturbation and female menstruation. Better make sure those potential persons get their chance to become an individual life!
If that sounds ridiculous, it's because it is. Just like saying a fucking blastula is a person is ridiculous. We DO, in fact, restrict abortions once a child becomes potentially viable, recognizing that it becomes an individual life. Until that point, it is not an individual life any more than your liver.
Though, to be fair, children are parasites until approximately age 3. So if we're going to say that the lack of autonomy should be criteria for abortion, then we should really allow abortion into the 12th trimester.
As long as we're sliding down this new slope, I'll say that the majority of people aren't autonomous. So I should reserve the right to abort a child until that child has moved out of my house.
That'd make grounding a much more effective form of punishment, I think.
People who are against abortion should also be in favor of increasing public funding for social services and the foster system. Usually they are not.
Definitely. If you're not for this, then the whole "only for it due to life" thing goes out the window as you no longer care about them after they are born.
At what point does the unborn gain "viable" status?
The earliest recorded premature birth to survive was 21 weeks and 6 days. Should that be the cut off?
Sperm and eggs on their own are not viable. Though every sperm is sacred.
That is a tricky question, and that number may get smaller as medical technology improves. One day it may even be possible to have an artificial womb that can take even the smallest zygote and nurture it to term. Hence why I think birth control should be as freely available as safely possible -- no unwanted pregnancy, no issue with viability or not.
The only way you are going to guarantee no unwanted pregnancies is to remove reproductive abilities by default and give them back when the parents choose to procreate. Despite birth control measures, life finds a way.
I had a link at one point to a guy who specifically claims that "this should be our last generation". Basically: to minimize suffering, we should stop reproducing and have as awesome a time as we possibly can now while we still have the resources. There are times that sounds totally awesome to me.
That's also stupid. As if the public system for caring for children is any kind of good place for a child? It is already so overburdened and shitty that the kids who go through/come out of it are irrevocably scarred. Sure, if you have someone lined up to adopt the baby, that is one thing. It is far different to insist someone bring a baby into the world, abandon it, and then fail to provide the public funding to give that child a good environment when there is no one standing up to volunteer for its care.
People who are against abortion should also be in favor of increasing public funding for social services and the foster system. Usually they are not.
On a personal note, I also personally would not choose abortion as an option for both medical and moral reasons. However, I am lucky enough to have an extensive network of family and friends that I know would make sure I was able to care for my child. Not everyone has that luxury, and no one should be forced into parenthood with no other choice.
Agreed 100%. The only devil's argument I'd have for you at this point is: No, just don't have sex unless you're ready to have a kid. That argument is basically just "Nuh-uh!", and is worthless.
The only way you are going to guarantee no unwanted pregnancies is to remove reproductive abilities by default and give them back when the parents choose to procreate. Despite birth control measures, life finds a way.
That is true, no birth control method is 100% reliable. However, we should strive to minimize unwanted pregnancies as much as possible. As Hillary Clinton once said, abortion should be safe, legal, and rare. Granted, I know people don't use abortion as a primary means of family planning, but anything that can be done to make it even more rare would be a good thing.
I had a link at one point to a guy who specifically claims that "this should be our last generation". Basically: to minimize suffering, we should stop reproducing and have as awesome a time as we possibly can now while we still have the resources. There are times that sounds totally awesome to me.
I always wish that people who want this should rush to make sure they are the last generation of their line. My line will continue thank you very much :-p (Most likely :-P)
I had a link at one point to a guy who specifically claims that "this should be our last generation". Basically: to minimize suffering, we should stop reproducing and have as awesome a time as we possibly can now while we still have the resources. There are times that sounds totally awesome to me.
I always wish that people who want this should rush to make sure they are the last generation of their line. My line will continue thank you very much :-p (Most likely :-P)
Dammit, if I'm going to discontinue my line, I'm going to do it in an epic Darwin Award style method!
That is true, no birth control method is 100% reliable. However, we should strive to minimize unwanted pregnancies as much as possible. As Hillary Clinton once said, abortion should be safe, legal, and rare. Granted, I know people don't use abortion as a primary means of family planning, but anything that can be done to make it even more rare would be a good thing.
That is true, no birth control method is 100% reliable. However, we should strive to minimize unwanted pregnancies as much as possible. As Hillary Clinton once said, abortion should be safe, legal, and rare. Granted, I know people don't use abortion as a primary means of family planning, but anything that can be done to make it even more rare would be a good thing.
Comments
The chart was originally created by Rep Pelosi's office and has been debunked by several news organizations.
I tried to explain to my friend that the chart is bogus but he first claimed it was made by the Treasury so it had to be accurate. I then pointed out to him that as the size of the national debt rises percentage increases will decline if the rate of debt growth stays the same. (If I owe you $1 and borrow another $1 my debt to you has increased by 100%. If I then borrow another $1 my debt only increases a further 50% or if I borrow $1.98 my debt only increased by 99%! Look, the debt growth rate went down!!!)
Pelosi's office eventually did "fix" the chart but it is still misleading:
Sometimes I feel like I'm playing whack-a-mole.
You choose to have sex, therefore you should be choosing to procreate (or at least be prepared to procreate). Regardless of the protection you use, sex makes babies. Therefore if you get someone pregnant (or get pregnant) you have no right to destroy a life you create.
The rape exception fits in there because you're not choosing to have sex if you're raped.
The reasoning seems to be more based on taking responsibility for your actions. You had sex, now deal with the consequences. Well, choosing to terminate a pregnancy you can't handle and prevent a baby from being brought into poverty or abandonment is a responsible choice. Arguably, it is more responsible than having a baby and subjecting it to poverty or abuse. So what is the real justification for that viewpoint?
Sounds like the justification is "this is your punishment for having sex." Which is stupid.
To continue playing devil's advocate, you don't have to take care of the baby yourself. You could put the child up for adoption or something like that. There's no reason to end someone's life just because they were planned. That person could grow up to be someone incredible!
It's less about punishing the mother and more about not punishing the unborn child.
(Note that these were all arguments I used to believe when I was a fundamentalist Christian who would argue against abortion)
For seriousness though, it seems like a lot of this is rooted in a historical belief that "sex is bad except in marriage". They associate unplanned pregnancies ending in abortion to sex outside of marriage and irresponsibility, and want to make the prospect of sex outside of marriage completely unappealing.
It's not a very logical side of the argument. I honestly can't really force myself to figure out their arguments in a sense that makes sense to me, without resorting to a more simplistic way of thinking.
Arkansas: Ken Aden’s Campaign Manager Comes Home To Find Cat Killed; “LIBERAL” Written On Its Corpse.
*WARNING*: It contains an image of the dead cat. I have no more words.
January 23rd, 2012
By ARDem
This post includes a graphic picture. It is included here not for shock value, but to show just how heinous some people can be.
Last night, I got the most chilling phone call I have ever received. It was Jake Burris, Ken Aden’s campaign manager. Last night, Jake and his four kids had come back to their Russellville home. As they were getting out of the car, one of his children discovered their family cat dead on the front porch. One side of the animal’s head had been bashed in and an eyeball was hanging out of its socket. But there was something even more horrifying to be found on the corpse.
Written across the animal’s fur in black marker was the word “LIBERAL“.
This is terrorism. There’s no other word for it. A police report has been filed. Jake said the kids seem to be handling it okay. The one that discovered the cat was too young to be able to read and Jake had quickly gotten the others into the house before they saw it. Pope County is an insanely conservative area and the Aden campaign has been shaking things up even there and it looks like another right wing sociopath with a taste for violence has come crawling out of the woodwork in response. I asked Aden for a comment on the record:
“This is sickening. To kill a child’s pet…I’m at a loss for words…I’ve seen the best and the worst of humanity, but this is something else.”
Both Ken and Jake though made it clear that they weren’t going to back down on the campaign trail, both agreeing that caving to this kind of behavior would only make things worse.
“I’ve got a gun and I know how to use it.”, Jake said. “If I have to protect my kids I’ll do it without hesitation.”
This happened the same night that Gabby Giffords, the survivor of a heinous act of violence, announced she was resigning from Congress. To think of something happening here like what happened in Arizona, the possibility of that happening to Ken or to someone on his campaign team, is frightening beyond belief. This is how serial killers start off after all, torturing and killing animals. Someone who would do this to a cat is not to far from doing it to a person.
There’s no doubting this was political. There’s no doubting it’s another hideous example of right wing terrorism. Personally I would hope that leaders on the right-Steve Womack, the Arkansas Republican Party, etc.-would step up and condemn this as strongly as possible. I would also hope that Steve Womack’s father, owner of a local radio station, would stop giving out the names, phone numbers, and addresses of members of the Aden team or anyone else for that matter on his radio program when ranting about Aden. The elder Womack has done that several times and Aden’s former press secretary got a death threat in the mail soon after her name was mentioned on the program. Clearly there is someone out there that doesn’t need anymore of that kind of information, much less inspiration to act on their hatred. I also hope that the Aden campaign will do whatever they can to up the security at some of their events, for the time being at least. Aden has said he’s going to put out a press release on the matter soon, and we’ll be following this and any developments related to it closely.
That said, our thoughts and prayers are with the Burris family. Jake Burris is a great guy, and he and his kids shouldn’t have to be dealing with this.
Update: I have been trying to update the blog on this for awhile now but the insane amount of traffic this is getting had crashed the site. This is now national news and it’s getting picked up seemingly everywhere. Our analytics on this today are off the charts, dwarfing every story that came before it in a big way. This is huge stuff, but part of me is a little miffed that the press couldn’t pay half as much attention to the good stuff Ken has done-the toy drive for foster kids, the resume building workshop, the stellar campaign in general. But what’s the saying? If it bleeds it leads? Anyway, Womack’s campaign manager Beau Walker put out a strong statement on this today, to their credit and Aden put out a press release dealing with the facts of the matter and stuck up for Womack and his campaign against the finger pointing. Both statements follow:
KEN ADEN NEWS RELEASE
RUSSELLVILLE—On the heels of a weekend of positive news coverage for the campaign of Democratic Congressional candidate Ken Aden, Aden’s campaign manager returned home to find his family pet slaughtered, with the word “liberal” painted on the animal’s corpse.
The Russellville Police Department is investigating, and a report will be made to the Federal Bureau of Investigation Monday morning.
Jacob Burris, who has served as Aden’s campaign manager since late October, arrived home with his family Sunday evening, and his four children discovered the gruesome scene as they exited the family vehicle to enter their home.
The family pet, an adult, mixed-breed Siamese cat, had one side of its head bashed in to the point the cat’s eyeball was barely hanging from its socket. The perpetrators scrawled “liberal” across the cat’s body and left it on the doorstep of Burris’ house.
“To kill a child’s pet is just unconscionable,” Aden said Monday morning. “As a former combat soldier, I’ve seen the best of humanity and the worst of humanity. Whoever did this is definitely part of the worst of humanity,” he said.
“It is one thing to engage in civil political discourse, and for Republicans and Democrats to disagree with each other, which is an expected part of the political process. Taking it to this level is beyond unacceptable,” Aden said.
While the campaign between Aden and incumbent Congressman Steve Womack has heated up in recent months, Aden said they did not believe the Womack campaign to be responsible. “Although we have certainly disagreed and engaged in a great deal of civil discourse, I do not believe in any way that Congressman Womack or his campaign had anything to do with this incident,” Aden said. He noted that, before Christmas, KRUM Radio, a station owned by Womack’s father, actually promoted a toy drive held by Aden’s campaign for children in the Third District. “We suspect this is the action of a rogue individual or group of individuals who are the type of folks that stoop to the lowest common denominator instead of engaging in civil political discourse,” Aden said. “It is unfortunate this has occurred, and we will await the results of the police and federal investigations,” Aden said.
WOMACK CAMPAIGN STATEMENT
The thought of brutalizing any animal to make a political statement, no matter what that statement is, is beyond any standard of decency,” he told The Huffington Post. “The person or people, if there was more than one, who are responsible — they definitely need to be held accountable to the fullest extent of the law. There should be no tolerance in our political discussion here in this nation for this kind of behavior.”
However, I justify this somewhat by saying that access to birth control in all forms should be easily available, including the morning after pill (which I don't believe causes abortions). I'm of the opinion that if we made it as easy as possible for women not to get pregnant, then the abortion issue would be moot since people wouldn't be having them anyway.
That's also stupid. As if the public system for caring for children is any kind of good place for a child? It is already so overburdened and shitty that the kids who go through/come out of it are irrevocably scarred. Sure, if you have someone lined up to adopt the baby, that is one thing. It is far different to insist someone bring a baby into the world, abandon it, and then fail to provide the public funding to give that child a good environment when there is no one standing up to volunteer for its care.
People who are against abortion should also be in favor of increasing public funding for social services and the foster system. Usually they are not.
On a personal note, I also personally would not choose abortion as an option for both medical and moral reasons. However, I am lucky enough to have an extensive network of family and friends that I know would make sure I was able to care for my child. Not everyone has that luxury, and no one should be forced into parenthood with no other choice.
Why stop at kids in the womb? If the foster and social services system is so bad for kids why not just kill them at any age and spare them a bad life?
If so, read this:
http://motherjones.com/politics/2004/09/way-it-was
and this:
http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/rate-of-abortion-is-highest-in-countries-where-practice-is-banned-6292070.html
Are you still in favor of anti-choice laws? Why?
If that sounds ridiculous, it's because it is. Just like saying a fucking blastula is a person is ridiculous. We DO, in fact, restrict abortions once a child becomes potentially viable, recognizing that it becomes an individual life. Until that point, it is not an individual life any more than your liver.
As long as we're sliding down this new slope, I'll say that the majority of people aren't autonomous. So I should reserve the right to abort a child until that child has moved out of my house.
That'd make grounding a much more effective form of punishment, I think.
The earliest recorded premature birth to survive was 21 weeks and 6 days. Should that be the cut off?
Sperm and eggs on their own are not viable. Though every sperm is sacred.