Slashdot Mirror

East of Nevada - a place for theists who want things like pro-life

Why does every always assume that the only pro-lifers are religious types?

I do recognize certain cases that warrant abortion, but I think that abortion for birth control is immoral and violates the human rights of the fetus. I am agnostic.

Also: http://www.godlessprolifers.org/home.html

Give them a hardcore left liberal, but who happened to be pro-life, and neutral/quiet on gay issues, and you'd have a viable candidate for the nation's republicans. IT IS the only reason many people vote republican.

How true. Abortion is a powerful and polarizing issue.

Abortion is the biggie because many of us cannot in good conscience vote for "pro-choice" candidates, although we might be in favor of the more compassionate liberal agenda as it pertains to social programs and civil rights. This leaves us with a no-win situation and we just end up choosing the lesser of evils, which is often a "pro-life" candidate.

The reason those women voted for Bush is because their church told them they should.

That's a little condescending don't you think? While some people *do* march in lockstep, many of us have wrestled mightily with this issue and come to our own conclusion through our own reasoning processes. After all, if people unflinchingly did what their churches told them to, then we would see churches with a lot more money ( http://www.adherents.com/misc/giving.html ). Although many of us are coming from a religious perspective, there are also secular "pro-lifers" ( http://www.godlessprolifers.org/home.html ) as well.

First off Gore wasn't "my guy", I didn't vote from him either.

Did I say Gore?

Small states, like Wyoming and the Dakotas will unfortunately fight tooth and nail to keep it because it gives their votes disproportionate weight compared to voters in places like California and New York.

They don't really have to fight all of that hard. It will take 2/3 of state legislatures to amend the constitution and eliminate the EC. So, will 17 states vote it down? Let's think about it.

Why would Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Massachussets, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, Wisconsin or Wyoming EVER give up the power that they have to placate cry babies in bigger states?

I don't know a damn thing about your religion and I don't really care.

Then why do you keep bringing it up?

Maybe you are an atheist who happens to be pro life but the odds of that are low.

Yeah, there are none of those out there.

The changes in abortion and gun law have been insignificant in the last 6 years.

On abortion, you're spot on. There have been no major changes in about 12 years. You couldn't be more wrong about Gun Control. The Clinton gun ban's sunset clause eliminated it 2 years ago.

Like I said I'd love to see Roe V. Wade get overturned because it would lead to a political bloodbath for the Republicans and social conservatives because there would be a massive surge of one issue voters, mostly women, voting pro choice.

Are you trying to say that women voters are stupid one issue voters.

As I've said before and you've never rebutted you would put Adolph Hitler in the White House as long as he pushed your two buttons and his opponent didn't.

I'm not going to even consider the possibility because it's a logic trap. I've been doing this for a long time. Adolf Hitler was not pro life and he was not pro gun.

LK

Abortion is an issue that is not necessarily religious. For example, the Catholic church's position is religious, but there are non-religious pro life arguments as well.

Either way, if it's acceptable for one side to demand a litmus test, then it's perfectly reasonable that the other side will as well.

LK

you will inevitably run into a condition where an abortion would make logical sense, but is not covered by the law, and thus is illegal.

If you make it illegal to deliberately crash an airplane, you will inevitably run into a condition like United Flight 93 where it would make logical sense to break that law. Therefore, we must allow people to crash airplanes whenever they want.

Hard cases do not make for good law.

I will not, under darn near any circumstance, impose my belief on another, thus my vote being firmly pro-choice.

You're trying to equate the Holocaust with abortion. While abortion is abominable, even in my eyes (partial birth particularly so) it is not the Holocaust. The Holocaust was about eliminating a human genome from the planet, a far more insidious thing.

So it's OK to do something "abominable" as long as it's only for personal benefit and not for racism?

Furthermore, if abortion is legal for any reason at all, what's stopping people from using it for genetic engineering?

Get over your bible belt, moralistic, dictatorial views on abortion.

Yes, because everyone wanting to ban abortion are right-wing theocrats, including gays and atheists. They probably have "bible belt, moralistic, dictatorial views" about murder, rape, and theft as well -- how dare they!

Roe V Wade was a Good Thing (tm) and should be allowed to stand.

So it's a Good Thing for a lawyer to coerce a woman to commit perjury ("Jane Roe" was never raped) in front of the Supreme Court? It's a Good Thing for a court to blantantly ignore important issues like "the difficult question of when life begins"? It's a good thing to let appointed-for-life judges make the laws? (If the "pro-choice" movement had as much popular support as they claim, then surely abortion would stay legal through democratic means.)

It's a religious issue. No one else cares. Abortion will continue, whether it's legal or not. So please leave your sentimental bullshit at home, along with your ugly cross and all the other morbid crap that Christianity has foisted upon the world.

Really? I guess you should tell that to the Atheist and Agnostic Pro-life League.

Though I am currently a Roman Catholic, I believed abortion was unilaterally wrong before I believed God existed, much less actually became Catholic. Abortion is an abomination that is in direct violation of the natural law (as taught by the likes of Plato and Aristotle, and MUCH later, the Roman Catholic Church).

Says quite a lot of physicians and embryologists. Also the English dictionary. "Human being" means "homo sapiens". Biologically a fetus is an instance of the species homo sapiens.

Some references for you. I'll make sure they all come from non-religious sites, since I wouldn't want to offend your sensibilities with articles of faith...

Atheist and Agnostic Pro-Life League
Libertarians for Life

Some specific articles:

Abortion and the Question of the Person, and, Why a Human Embryo or Fetus is Not a Parasite

While this is IMO largely a construction of the church, I know people who believe it and have no religious leanings of any kind.

Such as the Atheist and Agnostic Pro-Life League, for example.

Most pro-lifers don't oppose stem cell research. They do oppose killing embryos for stem cells, on the same ethical grounds they would oppose killing you for stem cells. God's existence isn't necissarily a question.

Where God comes into play is that God is a basis for many people's ethics. You may base your ethics on other things, but I assume you have some basic ethic keeping you from killing people.

I've met some of the people for libertarians for life when I went to the march for life in 2001, good folk. I don't think the atheists made it that year, but the leader hates me anyway (he is an ex military person).

There are athiest prolifers: http://www.godlessprolifers.org

And there are libertarian arguments against abortion: http://www.l4l.org

To view the issue as a "religious issue" is as incorrect to view slavery as a religious issue simply because many of the arguments surrounding its practice in the US were religious in nature.

Ever hear of VAAPCON (for Violence Against Abortion Providers Conspiracy? Well this is Janet Reno's little demon child that subverted the rights to privacy of some very dear friends of mine Feminists for Life, Atheist and Agnostic Pro-Life League, and many other pro-life groups that I am not in contact with because they are anti-homesexual/anti-birth control.