[Peace-discuss] Fw: CCHCC Annual Dinner & Adbook -- AWARE

[LAURIE SOLOMON]

> ".... Women deserve better, and every child deserves a chance at life."

As a serious question, why?  What evidence do we have for such assertions?
I am willing to grant that one may make such assertions as articles of
faith; but how does one decide among competing articles of faith in less
than violent or power terms ("survival of the fittest and strongest")?

As for the quoted interview as evidence that this is more than a religious
issue centered on abortion, I need only note that organized and unorganized
religions (theocratic or not) have fought over a single item with an eye to
broader future battles.  It makes neither the narrow issue nor the broader
one secular or non-religious in nature.  One could argue that the Catholic
Church opposes birth control not because of religious grounds per se but
because it is the focal item for a bigger battle involving increasing and
maintaining the Church's membership so as to give it influence and control
over future world events and ways of life.  Now that goal can be viewed in
secular terms as a bid for power and dominance in political and social
terms; or one could view that goal in religious terms as a bid to control
world ethics and behavior in moral terms.

-----Original Message-----
From: C. G. Estabrook [mailto:galliher at illinois.edu] 
Sent: Friday, March 27, 2009 12:11 PM
To: Ron Szoke
Cc: Morton K. Brussel; peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net; LAURIE SOLOMON
Subject: Re: [Peace-discuss] Fw: CCHCC Annual Dinner & Adbook -- AWARE

Serrin Foster, president of Feminists for Life of America, in a 2003
interview:

"Until women believe that they deserve better, legalized abortion will
continue. 
But the tide is turning. Approximately 25 million American women know the
truth 
about abortion firsthand, and many are not willing to pass on this terrible 
legacy to the next generation. They are beginning to speak out in
ever-greater 
numbers about the devastating damage -- both physical and emotional -- as a 
result of abortion.

"Our goal is bigger than making abortion illegal. It will not be good enough
for 
us to have laws without resources and support for women. Abortion providers
will 
simply move the front office to the back alley. We need to focus on making 
abortion unthinkable. Women deserve better, and every child deserves a
chance at 
life."

The entire interview is found at
<http://community.livejournal.com/prolife/256155.html>. --CGE


Ron Szoke wrote:
> 1.  Obviously, abortion is, for many people who have opinions about it,
very 
> centrally & crucially a matter of theological dogma & religious doctrine.

> 
> 2.  Are there any good philosophical arguments for the view that abortion
is NOT 
> wrong?
> 
> 3.  Again, aside from the theological & philosophical arguments one way or
the 
> other, remains the fundamental issue of whether the coercive power of the
State 
> should be used to prevent or punish it.  I'm wondering if we will again
get an 
> evasion on this crucial point, as we have done before.
> 
> -- Ron
>