"Most people in food-growing regions are conservative, so we all must bow down to conservative interests" is a tiresome and ridiculous ultimatum that American politics needs to get past.
Obstetricians are strongly left-leaning. Do we need to bow down to them if we want babies? Should they get 5x the vote because otherwise women and babies will all die in droves in childbirth?
Most people benefit from and choose to participate in society, and in exchange each person should get the same voice as the rest. We don't need to grant them any special political status above everyone else in order to entice them to do their chosen jobs. If someone decides they won't sell food in a city that voted for Biden or deliver babies for people from a Trump county, great have fun with that. Most people are less mindkilled on politics and will fill in the gap.
Political opinions matter when they affect your daily life. For instance, after the Dobbs decision last year, Texas passed an anti-abortion law which made it illegal to terminate pregnancies even when the fetus had no chance of survival and continued pregnancy was a mortal risk to the mother. This was finally changed last month, but the situation persisted for over a year. For women at high risk of miscarriage (for instance, my sister-in-law who moved to Texas and has previously had a miscarriage), their neighbours' political opinions could actually kill them.
Perhaps it's an American thing because the American political system has resulted in a complete lack of common-sense legislation; but it's absolutely justified.
(My background here: I'm an American living in the UK. I've been consistently surprised by the number of common-sense laws and regulations that are supported by even conservatives, or if not supported, are not immediately repealed once conservatives gain power.)
Bullshit, seriously what are you smoking? Nobody is doing this because of nanny state anything. Anti-abortion activists are the same people who scream against nanny state crap. The people who voted for Trump, and in turn the new Justices are the people who say that safety is for pussies.
The reason why anti-abortion rhetoric lands with conservative voters is that american christians have spent decades telling each other that abortion is murder. These christians see any diversion from a christian theocracy by the rest of the nation as a direct affront to them personally, and largely their power and status as top dog traditionally. They refuse to accept that other people having rights does not prevent them from practicing their religion or avoiding abortion. These people actively fight the concept of religious freedom. They claim an alternate history where the US is not only a religion based nation, but a modern southern christian one. They claim that because their religion tells them abortion is forbidden, that they should be allowed to push that religious belief onto people who don't even believe in their god.
The call for better regulation is not inherently in conflict with this being a people / culture problem. There is no set of rules that cannot be subverted from within if those enforcing the rules wish to subvert them. Presently the U.S. is experiencing a culture war where a significant group of people are “the ends justify the means” types. No system can withstand that sort of attack indefinitely. On top of that, I notice a fatalism in U.S. politics which results in reasonable people bowing out of trying to make things better. You single out the conservatives, but I see plenty of reason as an outsider to also point fingers at the liberals.
Speaking specifically to pro choice vs pro life both of the viewpoints have merit, but because people in the culture war are so entrenched in their “side” this can no longer be admitted. Back in reality though everyone agrees there is a time past which the child has a right to exist that trumps the mother’s right to choose, even if for some that is at 8 months of pregnancy and for others it is at conception, and everyone agrees that it is wrong to force a woman to carry a child she does not want. So, in a sense, everyone is both pro choice and pro life. All we’re talking about is at what point in the pregnancy one gets priority over the other. This can be negotiated like anything else, and the usual principles of negotiation apply. But, because of the culture war, people have stopped negotiating and are trying to get the rules (supreme court) to protect their point of view, which as a rule cannot provide a lasting solution. People have got to learn again how to talk with each other.
> Where you fall on the line, from "no abortions, ever" to "abortion up to a week after birth, no questions asked"
This is the false dichotomy so often pushed by right-wing ideologues. Literally nobody on any side of the abortion debate advocates for "abortions up to a week after birth" or anywhere close to that. This sort of boolean thinking is the root of our (especially current) toxic political climate.
Well yes, the conservative viewpoint is that women should not have bodily autonomy, and contraception and IVF are both that. It’s why pharmacists are allowed to force their religious beliefs on others: it would be a violation of a pharmacist’s religious freedom to require them to do their job if a women comes in for birth control.
This was never about just abortion, every conservative state has taken the position that morning after and birth control pills are also the same as abortion. This is documented fact, and anyone who votes in support of those people, is explicitly stating that they are anti basic women’s rights.
"not like conservatives are forced to get abortions"
What if the conservative hasn't been born yet? Maybe they wouldn't want to be aborted. Do they get a choice, or should we reduce their liberties and victimize them?
See, you're ignoring a person's rights. There is more than one person involved, but for only one person is the issue literally a matter of life and death.
The fact that such a person can't live alone is no different than the fact that some elderly and paralyzed people can't live alone. The unborn have brain waves; with that you normally are not allowed to euthanize a person.
To the conservative, you are asking them to stand aside while a murder happens, and then you essentially say "It's not like conservatives are forced to commit murder".
The conservatives even commenting on this phenomenon mostly champion personal responsibility. ie. they would prefer you act responsibly before you require an abortion.
The way I see it, the issue of abortion is obviously one of the most controversial things out there, some people think it’s baby murder, other people think it’s no big deal. With something so controversial, why not just let the person who is carrying the baby decide for themselves? You might think a mom is killing her baby, but she might not. Just let her decide for herself. Forcing people one way or another is a terrible solution. Pretty ironic for a party that loves to claim they’re all about personal freedoms and small government.
They'll give a pregnant woman health care, but then at 2 yrs old they assume the baby can fend for itself, and no more health care.
Their bill is literally a George Carlin bit.
“Pro-life conservatives are obsessed with the fetus from conception to 9 months. After that, they don’t wanna know about you. They don’t wanna hear from you. No nothing! No neonatal care, no daycare, no Head Start, no school lunch, no food stamps, no welfare, no nothing. If you’re pre-born, you’re fine, if you’re preschool, you’re fucked.” - George Carlin
The argument ("not like conservatives are forced to get abortions") is denying that there is a difference of opinion here.
Note that you quickly went from "fetus" to "fertilized egg". After a certain point there are brainwaves (what we use to determine death in difficult cases) and even a response to pain. If that doesn't count, then why not pull the plug on anybody needing life support equipment?
Not every conservative is insisting on personhood for fertilized eggs. For example, Bobby Jindal accepted early termination pills.
Yeah, that's absolutely swinging back too far. Both extremes are pretty stupid IMO. And this completely undermines majority of people who actually hold more moderate views.
(Abortion is a states responsibility, not federal, and should be limited to the first trimester, are my views, for example)
And women that want to can still go trough with pregnancy and adopt the child out if they want to. It is their right to choose if they want to dedicate 9 months of their lives to giving birth, including sacrificing their body and possibly going through the most painful and dangerous part of the lives. Made even more difficult now as many hospitals in red states are holding back needed medical care just so they don't get accused of supporting abortions.
It is certainly not our right to demand this so we can get cheap labor.
I do agree with this point and have adapted my arguments to point this out when I'm discussing with people who care about abortion rights. But when talking to more conservative types these arguments are often less effective. So a different strategy is needed for them. Though there are definitely turnkey arguments for them. They tend to be easy to convince since despite voting in authoritarians they are also highly concerned with authoritarians. Just the left kind. So s/Trump/{Obama,Hillary,Pelosi}/g and s/abortion/guns.
It wasn't an equation. It was a question to illustrate the other extreme of the dialectic. My point was there's two lives in the balance -- conservatives want to protect the lives of the unborn, not "control women".
Obstetricians are strongly left-leaning. Do we need to bow down to them if we want babies? Should they get 5x the vote because otherwise women and babies will all die in droves in childbirth?
Most people benefit from and choose to participate in society, and in exchange each person should get the same voice as the rest. We don't need to grant them any special political status above everyone else in order to entice them to do their chosen jobs. If someone decides they won't sell food in a city that voted for Biden or deliver babies for people from a Trump county, great have fun with that. Most people are less mindkilled on politics and will fill in the gap.
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