[Peace-discuss] Obama gets another one right

[John W.]

On Sun, Jan 25, 2009 at 10:04 PM, Brussel Morton K.
<mkbrussel at comcast.net>wrote:

I believe you understand, but you'll never admit it. I obviously have no
> power to stop anyone from saying anything, but I do have opinions as to what
> is appropriate. This list serve is intended to be a peace forum , not an
> evangelist soapbox. This is a not untypical distortion, of the  bait and
> switch variety. --mkb


The Bible (as well as other religious texts) has much to say about peace.
In fact, it speaks of the "peace that passeth understanding."   I will not
draw the obvious conclusion here, for fear of being accused of more "ad
hominem".  :-)




> On Jan 25, 2009, at 4:21 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>
>  Goebbels was in favor of free speech for views he liked. So was Stalin. If
>> you're really in favor of free speech, then you're in favor of freedom of
>> speech precisely for views you despise. Otherwise, you're not in favor of
>> free speech.
>>
>>
>> Brussel Morton K. wrote:
>
>
>>  Indeed, I wish and recommend that discussions of God's immanence, how
>>> "we" are a Christian country, and why women's ability to decide their own
>>> lives should be forbidden are inappropriate for a peace-discuss list. (I
>>> wouldn't recommend Nazi propaganda on the list either, but I suppose to some
>>> that would be bigoted.)  --mkb
>>> On Jan 25, 2009, at 3:15 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>>>
>>>> This is an assertion of settled religious prejudice, joined to the
>>>> anti-liberal view that people who disagree with such bigotry should just
>>>> shut up.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Brussel Morton K. wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> A fine discussion, Ricky, but I for one am less forgiving of the
>>>>> religious fundamentalism-ideology that largely supports the
>>>>> anti-abortion/anti-contraception/anti-sex education/anti-women's rights
>>>>> movement in the USA, and those who now speak up for it on this listserve.
>>>>> They are beyond convincing because of their "faith".  I can understand that
>>>>> you may not want to get into a discussion of the myths , religiously
>>>>> inspired, that form a basis of this movement, a movement largely of willful
>>>>> ignorance and lack off empathy for many woman's problems when confronted
>>>>> with a pregnancy. They have unreasoning empathy only for the myth of the
>>>>> humanity of a sperm which happens, divinely, to meet an egg. --Mort
>>>>> I admired your remark: " the values of libertarianism require also the
>>>>> values of socialism to be logically and humanly consistent", although I
>>>>> think that the libertarianism of Wayne et al. are contradictory to broader
>>>>> social(ist) values and responsibilities. And I agree with others that this
>>>>> kind of fundamentalism has no useful place on this list. On Jan 25, 2009, at
>>>>> 2:11 PM, Ricky Baldwin wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> Wayne,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I appreciate your concern, as always, for the downtrodden, but I'm
>>>>>> afraid it's misapplied here.  Many people I agree with on most issues would
>>>>>> dismiss yours and others' anti-abortion views as another example of your
>>>>>> religious blinders; I don't.  My guess is that you are both as sincere and
>>>>>> as misguided and the many good humanitarians who supported, e.g. the US
>>>>>> attacks in Kosovo (to save the ethnic Albanians from Serbian aggression) or
>>>>>> the US conquest of the Philippines (to save the locals from Spanish tyranny,
>>>>>> etc.) or the British conquest of India (to rid the Indians of superstition
>>>>>> and slavery, etc.).
>>>>>>
>>>>>> But for starters, I think you will have to admit that the ethical
>>>>>> question of abortion rights has little to do with Margaret Sanger's infamous
>>>>>> Social Darwinism (which is anyway not quite the way her later critics
>>>>>> portray it, it seems to me), any more than your own Christian views are
>>>>>> questionable in light of the Crusades, the Inquisition, the European
>>>>>> 'civilizing' campaigns that masscred millions of indigenous people on one
>>>>>> continent after another, or the many other Christian atrocities against the
>>>>>> poor and downtrodden of the world.
>>>>>> The question of whether abortion is a form of racism, or class
>>>>>> oppression, is more complex in some ways, though actually very simple if
>>>>>> looked at rightly, I'd argue.  True, abortion has been visited on the poor
>>>>>> and people of color in this country and others as an oppressive campaign at
>>>>>> times.  We can go further: forced abortions and forced sterilizations have
>>>>>> been practised as genocide for at least generations.  Less overtly public
>>>>>> welfare policies have targetted oppressed groups in many ways from the days
>>>>>> of workhouses, -- up to and including reproductive policies my fellow NOW
>>>>>> organizers and I encountered (as an example) in Mississippi in the 1990s
>>>>>> whereby the locally administered Medicaid program would pay for poor  women
>>>>>> to have subdermal contraceptive Norplant insertions BUT NOT pay to have them
>>>>>> removed, regardless of the woman's wishes or even of the side-effects or
>>>>>> allergic reactions, which were not uncommon.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> It may surprise some honest abortion-foes to learn that NOW fought
>>>>>> such policies vehemently, by the way.  The reasoning is relevant here.  NOW
>>>>>> and other wrongly described "pro-abortion" groups currently working in the
>>>>>> US support a basic principle that simplifies the whole issue: the individual
>>>>>> liberty, autonomy, freedom, however you want to describe it, of a woman as
>>>>>> well as a man to decide what happens to her physically, sexually, and in
>>>>>> particular in terms of being pregnant or not.  As such it is the most
>>>>>> fundamental libertarian political right.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Critics of the "pro-choice" movement rightly point out that such
>>>>>> decisions, often difficult enough in themselves, do not happen in an
>>>>>> economic vacuum - and so are not truly "free" choices.  Women and their
>>>>>> families or support networks (spouses, partners, siblings, parents, close
>>>>>> friends) must at times make tough decisions based on economic realities not
>>>>>> of their own choosing.  Nowadays there are convincing statistical arguments
>>>>>> that women overall have very nearly caught up with men in terms of earning
>>>>>> power, and the biggest difference that lingers is that when women hit their
>>>>>> child-bearing years they fall behind and usually never catch up again.  Of
>>>>>> course some men encounter the same problem, but overall it is women.  For
>>>>>> these and many other reasons (oppressive parents, drug-use, birth defects)
>>>>>> abortion is not always a "free" choice any more than a large family has been
>>>>>> a real choice for billions of women for thousands of years - they do it in
>>>>>> part because their choices are severely constrained.  This is not the only
>>>>>> reason to support abortion rights of course.  The basic argument for the
>>>>>> right is an argument for human dignity and autonomy, as I've said.  But this
>>>>>> is the economic context that can't be ignored.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> So publicly-funded childcare, maternity and paternity leave and other
>>>>>> employment considerations, free access to birth control and family planning
>>>>>> services, rational sex education, and free abortion on demand are and must
>>>>>> be all part of a comprehensive program of human rights that includes women
>>>>>> as valued equal members of society and not second-class citizens.  It is
>>>>>> part of why I believe the values of libertarianism require also the values
>>>>>> of socialism to be logically and humanly consistent.  It is why
>>>>>> conservatives who want to say they support women's rights and oppose racism
>>>>>> and oppression must pick and choose which freedoms they support, which
>>>>>> pieces of the overall reality they bring into their arguement.  And it's why
>>>>>> liberals who want to support abortion rights are not always allies in the
>>>>>> struggle for women's rights, but their programs do sometimes coincide.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Obama's move against the vicious "Mexico City" policy is progress,
>>>>>> toward allowing poor women and families in communities whose livelihoods we
>>>>>> have wrecked to at least find some maneuvering room in that disaster.
>>>>>>  Reagan's and both Bushes' policy of limiting the options of the global
>>>>>> poor, often our own victims, is oppression on top of oppression; lifting
>>>>>> that ban is at least mild relief.  It isn't enough, but it is a step in the
>>>>>> right direction.
>>>>>> Ricky
>>>>>>
>>>>>> "Speak your mind even if your voice shakes." - Maggie Kuhn
>>>>>
>>>>>
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