[Peace-discuss] Obama gets another one right

Fri Jan 23 20:18:54 CST 2009

One of my mothers friends worked as a nurse for many years until a back
injury forced her to engage in a career change. Both she and my mother came
of age prior to Roe v. Wade and she witnessed some of the horror stories
that resulted from botched abortions.

Does class and privilege come into play here? Certainly and prior to Roe v.
Wade women of education and means were in a position where they could find a
trained professional to take care of 'female' problems. There were doctors
who performed abortions despite the threat of prosecution. Until we find
better ways to prevent unplanned pregnancies then abortion is going to
remain a hot button issue.

As for the argument that fathers should have the 'right' to not support any
progeny my response is this. If a man is determined to not have children
then he can wear a condom. Or he can go see a doctor and get a vasectomy.
If a man is mature enough to have sex then he ought to be mature enough to
take responsibility for his actions.

What this discussion fails to address is how women are disadvantaged as a
result of pregnancy and childbirth. Other civilized nations offer access to
health care, child care, maternity leave, and other benefits which enable
women to be able to support themselves and their children regardless of
their socioeconomic and marital status.

On a personal note when I gave birth to my own daughter I had to wait until
she was two before I could find a licensed child care facility. Additionally
when I became pregnant her father chose to skip town and it took around two
to three years before the state ordered him to pay support. Once my kid
turns 18 his legal responsibility to her ends. My own opinion is that my
daughter has the right to receive support and it's not about me or him.
People who turn child support into a battle ground only end up hurting the
kids.

The main reason why I have been able to raise my daughter is because I have
some of the advantages that comes from being white, educated, and having the
support of my family. Years later after my treatment for breast cancer at 35
I made the choice to have my tubes tied so I can no longer have children. I
have no regrets over the choices I have made, but it's an experience that
has also taught me to be far less judgmental of what women go through in
facing these situations. Being pregnant and abandoned by the father is not
something I would wish on anyone and until you have walked in those
footsteps you can have no possible idea. As such I cannot in good faith
judge a woman who may find it necessary to have an abortion.

One interesting thing to note is that countries that have the most liberal
laws on abortion also have the lowest abortion rates. This may be something
that people who oppose abortion on moral grounds might want to consider.

On Fri, Jan 23, 2009 at 7:44 PM, Jenifer Cartwright <jencart13 at yahoo.com>wrote:

> Physiologically speaking, this can't be an equal rights issue unless the
> couple is using a surrogate mother.
> Yeah, guys definitely be thinking about all this stuff before having sex
> whenever impregnation is a possibility.
>  --Jenifer
>
> --- On *Fri, 1/23/09, John W. <jbw292002 at gmail.com>* wrote:
>
> From: John W. <jbw292002 at gmail.com>
> Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] Obama gets another one right
> To: "E. Wayne Johnson" <ewj at pigs.ag>
> Cc: "peace discuss" <peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net>
> Date: Friday, January 23, 2009, 6:45 PM
>
>
> Here's yet another perspective on the abortion issue.  I'm embarrassed to
> say that it was posted on The Fox Forum, but I think the author has much to
> say that should be considered.
>
>
> January 22nd, 2009 1:48 PM Eastern
> Roe vs. Wade and the Rights of the Father<http://foxforum.blogs.foxnews.com/2009/01/22/deseno_roe_wade/>
> *By Tommy De Seno
> Attorney/Writer*
>
> *The emphasis must not be on the right to abortion, but on the right to
> privacy and reproductive control.*
> –Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg
> Today marks another anniversary of Roe vs. Wade, the Supreme Court
> decision which overturned all state laws that would stop a woman from having
> an abortion in the first trimester.
> While the topic I have chosen here, "Roe vs. Wade and the Rights of the
> Father" may sound interesting, actually there is nothing to write about.
> There are no such rights.
>
> A father can't stop an abortion if he wants his child, nor can he insist
> upon an abortion if he doesn't want his child.
> This situation should trouble everyone, not from a religious point of view,
> not from a personal choice point of view, but rather from an Equal Rights
> point of view.
> Equal Rights for all people is difficult for any nation to achieve
> peaceably, because it requires the group in greater power to yield to the
> group of lesser power. This is usually accomplished only through war. Our
> own Civil War is a perfect example of equality being created by force,
> instead of reason and fairness, as it should have been.
> This week as I watched and read opinions about Roe vs. Wade, I could find
> nothing, not a word among millions that addressed a father's relationship to
> his unborn child.
> Two weeks ago I tried an experiment in anticipation of writing this column.
> I wrote a column about gun control and posited that only men should vote on
> the issue of guns. The logic (rather illogic) used by me was that men buy
> guns the most, men are called upon to use them most (when a burglar enters
> our home) and we get shot the most. Why shouldn't men have the only voice on
> the issue?
> I wanted to gauge people's reactions to the thought that in America we
> would ever give more weight to one person's view than another's because that
> person can show the issue affects him more.
> As I walked around my city during these past two weeks, I was accosted by
> people who wanted to take me to task for suggesting that women lose their
> right to vote on an issue just because they may be affected by it less than
> men. Some pointed out, quite rightly, that even if there was an issue that
> didn't affect women at all, *as equal members of society*, they should
> still have a voice in all decisions America makes.
> Quite right indeed.
> So where are all these well-reasoned arguments when it comes to a father
> and his unborn child? Why do people who have Equal Protection claims at the
> ready on other issues suddenly suffer constitutional amnesia when abortion
> is mentioned?
> During every abortion a father's child dies, so fathers are affected. There
> is much written about the post-abortion depression of women. Nothing is
> mentioned about the father. A good father knows his role is protector of his
> child. His depression must be crippling when the law allows him no chance to
> save his child from death by abortion.
> In the Roe vs. Wade decision the Supreme Court found a privacy right in
> the 14th Amendment, which doesn't have the word "privacy" in it. Then they
> found that the privacy right had a "penumbra" containing other rights
> (penumbra means the shadowy area at the edge of a shadow). In that shadow
> they found the abortion right. That bit of mental gymnastics aside, it
> wasn't the most terrible part of the decision. This was:
>
> The Court said that a woman my not be mentally ready to handle a child at
> this stage in her life, or the child might interfere with her career path,
> and that is so important to her that the State has no right to make a law
> against it. So I ask today: Might a father find himself mentally not ready
> for a child? Might a father find a child inconvenient to his career path? If
> these are the rights women get to protect by choosing abortion, why not
> allow fathers "the right to choose" also?
> I propose a "father's abortion." Let a father petition the Court to
> terminate his own parental rights to his child before or after the child's
> birth. He would be rid of his obligations to that child in favor of his
> mental health and finances, the same as a woman does when she aborts.
> As Justice Ginsburg said in the quote that appears at the top of this FOX
> Forum post, the emphasis is not abortion, rather an individual's right to
> control his own reproduction. If we protect such a right for women, can we
> constitutionally deny it to men?
> I propose this not because it would be in any way good. I propose it
> because constitutional Equal Protection demands it, and to show the danger
> created when judges destroy democracy by making up laws that don't exist.
> "Father's Abortion." It's high time for a test case.
> Any father with such a case can call me and I'll take it for free.
>
>
>
> On Fri, Jan 23, 2009 at 5:13 PM, E. Wayne Johnson <ewj at pigs.ag> wrote:
>
>  Ricky,
>>
>> I find Obama to be quite consistent in his policy.  He supports the
>> killing of innocents both at home and abroad,
>> both with his warfare and with his "welfare".  One can't say that Obama is
>> incoherent as an international minister of death.
>>
>> Abortion is the most explicit expression of racism and class warfare in
>> our contemporary world.
>> It is the most dastardly and cowardly of all human rights violations,
>> since it violates the most fundamental Natural Right,
>> the Right to Life, and it attacks the Unborn, who are completely helpless.
>>
>> The operative social purpose of abortion is to rid the society of "human
>> weeds".  The founders
>> of Planned Parenthood identified as the poor and the Negro as undesirables
>> who should not be allowed to reproduce.
>> Have you read Margaret Sanger's writings? Have you read about her "Negro
>> Project"?
>>
>> I have some commentary at my website:
>> http://www.liberty4urbana.com/drupal-6.8/node/43
>> I hope that you will watch the three videos there and then report back
>> with your take on those issues.
>>
>> Also, *Lux Libertas* will be broadcast again on UPTV-6 at 10 pm Sunday
>> night.
>>
>> Trent Cloin and I discuss the paradox and error of Abortion in America in
>> the first 30 mins.
>> In the 2nd 30 minutes we discuss MLK's April 9, 1967 speech "The Three
>> Dimensions of a Complete Life" which was
>> given in Chicago just 5 days after the "Beyond Vietnam" speech we all
>> heard last Sunday afternoon.
>> "Three Dimensions" does significantly address aspects of the "Revolution
>> of Values" which King called for in "Beyond Vietnam".
>>
>> Wayne
>>
>> Ricky Baldwin wrote:
>>
>> Put this one in the column of real differences, differences that matter to
>> poor people's lives, among US presidents:
>>
>> http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090123/ap_on_go_pr_wh/obama_abortion_ban
>>
>> This is not as groundbreaking as closing Guantanamo Bay prison.  As the
>> article says, Clinton did the same.  Still, it speaks to the tone Obama is
>> setting in his first week in office.  And if Obama didn't do this, we'd be
>> right to call him out for failing to act.
>>
>> Ricky
>>
>> "Speak your mind even if your voice shakes." - Maggie Kuhn
>>
>>
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