Townhall.com Ben Shapiro June 21, 2006
Brittany McComb, valedictorian of Foothill High School in Clark County, Nevada, stood up at her graduation and began to speak. A few paragraphs into her speech, school administrators cut off McComb’s microphone. She didn’t tell a dirty joke. She didn’t curse. She didn’t insult her classmates or her teachers. Brittany McComb committed the egregious sin of attempting to thank God and Jesus. “I went through four years of school at Foothill and they taught me logic and they taught me freedom of speech,” McComb stated. “God’s the biggest part of my life. Just like other valedictorians thank their parents, I wanted to thank my lord and savior.”
The American Civil Liberties Union, which seems more intent on curtailing important liberties than protecting them, praised the school’s decision. Nevada ACLU general counsel Allan Lichtenstein explained, “There should be no controversy here … It’s important for people to understand that a student was given a school-sponsored forum by a school, and therefore, in essence, it was a school-sponsored speech.” The school district stood by the school’s decision, suggesting that McComb’s speech entered into the realm of “preaching.” “We review the speeches and tell them they may not proselytize,” said district legal counsel Bill Hoffman. “We encourage people to talk about religion and the impact on their lives. But when that discussion crosses over to become proselytizing, then we tell students they can’t do that.”
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Senator Barack Obama agrees:
Obama: Democrats Must Court Evangelicals
Note 2 Whom doth Senator Obama think he doth fool?
Senator Obama is the pet of a party the platform of which fully supports abortion. Abortion activists are entrenched in the party structure from top to bottom.
Now, Senator Obama wants to court evangelicals. Please note “the catch.” Obama manages to lecture his pet target audience about “accepting the separation of church and state.” This means that evangelicals must be taught that morality based on the Judeo-Christian religion may not be used as a basis for supporting or opposing policies or legislative initiatives.
This whole graduation speech thing is strange. It’s a school event, governed by policies that are known by all parties up front. At high school graduations certain speech topics are appropriate; others are not. It is the job of the school officials to decide what is appropriate.
The author of this article seems to think that the valedictorian should have absolute right to freedom of speech, merely in virtue of being valedictorian. So presumably the valedictorian could give a speech praising Hitler, or celebrating abortion, or recommending drug use, or advertising her father’s insurance business, and the school officials should be powerless to edit the content of that speech.
The author of the article also seems to be incapable of distinguishing between speech that occurs as part of a publicly-funded ceremony, and other kinds of speech in non-public contexts.
This whole “religion in public” deal strikes me as nothing more than the religious version of a gang tag, or a dog pissing in order to mark territory. It’s the right-wing religious way of marking turf. So may be a public building, paid for with everyone’s money, but the Ten Commandments glued to the front door make it clear that it’s right-wing Christian turf. It may be a public school, but religious prayers and evangelistic graduation speeches show that it’s right-wing Christian turf.
I hear that recently one of these “ten commandments” politicians showed up on Steven Colbert’s show. Colbert asked him a simple question — what are the Ten Commandments. The dude didn’t even know what they all are. He’s wants to put up the Ten Commandments all over the place, but he can’t even list them. . . .
Jim: Consider these comments by Barack Obama in the speech I referenced above:
http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2006/06/obama_on_faith_and_politics_an.html
Dean, quoting Obama: “Some of the problem here is rhetorical – if we scrub language of all religious content, we forfeit the imagery and terminology through which millions of Americans understand both their personal morality and social justice.”
I understand his (your) concern, but I have a hard time understanding how that is supposed to play out in the public discourse.
In my view, a lot of the religious discourse is something that has been foisted on the country for political advantage. Yes, it is true that in the past people have made religious references — Lincoln, civil rights, and so on. But when, for example, you listen to a Martin Luther King speech, he is not trying to divide the country along religious lines. Rather, he is trying to draw people together through an appeal to values that are widely shared.
I don’t see that in right-wing religion. The whole purpose is to separate sheep from goats, righteous from evil. Right-wing religion typically involves an attack, often a scorched-earth attack on those who disagree with them. It’s not “come, let us reason together, here is a better way,” but “you suck, and people like you suck.”
Dean/Obama: “Our failure as progressives to tap into the moral underpinnings of the nation is not just rhetorical. Our fear of getting preachy may also lead us to discount the role that values and culture play in some of our most urgent social problems.”
I can’t disagree with him here. But remember, the right has been at this for four decades. They have been funded by hundreds of millions of dollars, and have refined their message. In this the other side has been negligent. It doesn’t mean that the other side is wrong, but that they have failed to develop the message.
Dean/Obama: “After all, the problems of poverty and racism, the uninsured and the unemployed, are not simply technical problems in search of the perfect ten point plan. They are rooted in both societal indifference and individual callousness – in the imperfections of man.”
I think the problem is that the other side has articulated the technical solution, but has failed to articulate the moral foundation behind the solution.
Dean/Obama: “Solving these problems will require changes in government policy; it will also require changes in hearts and minds.”
Those changes also involve a change in the hearts and minds even of the religious right. If the gospels teach us anything, it is that the establishment or majority religious worldview has to be critiqued from a point of view based on the compassion and love of God — a point of view that often is not very popular. In the gospels we read ” . . . and in prison, and ye visited me not” — we read “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you” — even as we abuse and refuse visitation to those imprisoned at Guantanamo. From a Christian perspective, what’s wrong with this picture?
Father: I’m interested in your response to Senator Obama’s Call to Renewal speech since it affirms a lot of what you have been talking about these last several years, “the role that values and culture play in some of our most urgent social problems”.
Note 6. I think that Obama is on the right track. I don’t think he addresses the implications of his ideas (which would be an overthrow of current Democratic leadership on the national level) but he certainly seems to understand the nature of the problem. You’ve heard me argue for years that the Democratic captivity to the hard left is a huge problem for them, and Obama seems to confirm this.
I just posted a piece by Wesley Smith who reviewed a new book by Ramesh Ponnuru, “The Party of Death: The Democrats, the Media, the Courts, and the Disregard for Human Life” that addresses these questions. I haven’t read it yet.
If Obama authentically believes the things he wrote, and I will give him the benefit of the doubt here, I think it may portend good things for the country. Personally, I believe a culture shift may be occuring. I was quoted in the Washington Post last January saying the same thing, so this is not new on my part. Protesters See Mood Shift Against ‘Roe’
Jim, I’d like to know what you really think. Do you want Christians to be more or less Christian. When it comes to abortion and euthanasia, you consistently argue that we should be less Christian by abandoning sacred principals to accept the secular, materialist drive for a theology of sex and death.
However, when we approach other issues like war–you call us to some higher view of Christianity that often ignores the existential reality of living in a fallen world.
What you seem to miss, not surprisingly, is that genuine Christianity, since it is Incarnational, is fully in the world while always attempting to not be of it. You have a straw man labeled Christianity that you batter with your nerf bats at every opportunity no matter what.
Our Lord told St. Peter, and by extension the rest of us, that it was not important what others did or did not do. St. Peter’s job was to do what Jesus gave Peter to do. Perhaps if you allowed your straw man, so lovingly constructed and maintained, to blow away in the wind, you might see what Jesus is asking of you.
In one sense, the Protestants have it right. All that really matters in our salvation is if we open our hearts to an encounter with the living God, our Savior, Jesus Christ and then are obedient to what He asks of us. If one has not had the encounter, one cannot begin to comprehend what it means to be Christian. It is arrogant and a block to real understanding to criticize us by attempting to use elements of our faith when there is no acceptance of the very foundation of our faith.
When the angel told Zechariah that he would have a son, Zechariah questioned the angel with scepticism. Zechariah was blessed with silence so that he could gain faith and wisdom. When Mary asked much the same type of question, in faith, she was blessed with joy and the spirit of prophecy to proclaim her own blessedness because of what God had done in her.
A further comment on my opening paragraph in comment #8: Recently there was a quote posted somewhere on this blog attributed to Malcom Muggeridge that “Sex is the sacrament of the materialist” I have been reflecting on that thought off and on ever since and find it to be quite true especially for the materialist temptations within my own heart. It makes really good sense. Without God, the only way one can even imagine life continuing is through sexual reproduction, at the same time the phsyical and emotional pleasure of sex is about the only substitute for the joy of God.
However for some, who recognize the transient nature of sex, it is simply not enough. They must attempt to gain power over death: clonning, abortion, euthanasia, organ transplantation/stem cell research, world wide environmental engineering are all attempts at gaining control, if not victory, over death. For some who recognize the futility of such attempts, the final step into out right worship of death is taken.
Where sex is the sacrament, death is the god, evil and tryanny is the fruit even when the individuals professing such beliefs have not yet become evil themselves.
Michael writes: “Jim, I’d like to know what you really think. Do you want Christians to be more or less Christian. When it comes to abortion and euthanasia, you consistently argue that we should be less Christian by abandoning sacred principals to accept the secular, materialist drive for a theology of sex and death.”
As I see it, the primary issue with abortion is who makes the determination as to the moral status of the fetus or embryo, especially in the early stages of development when there is no clear moral concensus on the issue. So in the absence of a moral concensus, should the individual woman make that determination, or should the State make it for her?
Christians who believe that abortion is wrong shouldn’t have abortions. They should get the message out that abortion is wrong. They should work to change the moral concensus in the country. They should encourage adoption and work to prevent unwanted pregnancies in the first place. But it’s not clear to me that it is also their Christian duty to enlist the State as an enforcer of their beliefs in the absence of a moral concensus. I don’t see that NOT using the power of the State to that end makes anyone less Christian or constitutes an acceptance of secularism.
If Christians want to use the power of the State to enforce their view of abortion on people who may very well not agree with it, then where does that end? Should the Christian also pass anti-heresy laws forbidding any speech that is contrary to church teaching? Should Christians work for laws requiring all public schools to teach church doctrine? If Christians didn’t work for such laws, would they be abandoning sacred principles? I don’t believe so.
Michael: “However, when we approach other issues like war–you call us to some higher view of Christianity that often ignores the existential reality of living in a fallen world.”
That’s because the focus on the gospels is not on existential realities. They really are “other-worldly,” focusing on the Kingdom of God, on the eternal rather than the temporal. I remember years ago the first time I actually read the gospels. They were shocking, surprising, completely unlike anything I had ever read.
A few years ago, when I started looking into the views of the early church fathers on war, I honestly didn’t know what to expect. I was really quite surprised to see the uniformity of opposition, and not just that, but that Christian participation in war was typically unthinkable for them. This opposition originated in the teachings of Jesus himself, and in the what the fathers saw as the person of Jesus — the Prince of Peace, who would come “to guide our feet into the way of peace,” who said that “These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.”
We have come to a place today in which many Christians not only find war acceptable, but they are enthusiastic about it. Conservative Christians supported the war in Iraq by a greater margin than even the general population. War today is seen by many Christians not as a terrible thing of last resort, but as a handy way to pursue foreign policy goals. We live in a country that has countless military bases around the world, and that spends a huge amount of national treasure on bigger and better weapons systems. Military spending is so rampant and engrained in the economy that it is difficult even to close military bases that the military itself doesn’t want or need. The production of parts for many military systems is intentionally spread throughout a large number of states, making it difficult to eliminate those systems. (Someone recently told me that parts for the B-1 bomber come from all 50 states.)
Given all of this, and the large number of Christians in the country, and their enthusiasm for things military, is this the “way of peace” spoken of in the gospels? Is all of this inspired by the Prince of Peace, or the God or War, by Jesus, or by Mars?
Michael: “If one has not had the encounter, one cannot begin to comprehend what it means to be Christian.”
Remember, for around ten years I was a fundamentalist Christian. For six of those years I was with a Christian communal group that provided temporary food and housing and evangelism for hitchhikers and “crashers.” During that time I had no personal income except for very occasional pocket money. Two of those years in that organization were done as alternative service as a conscientious objector. During those years I read nothing but the Bible and an occasional newpaper. Much of my time in that organzation were spent doing hard manual labor, the income of which went to support the organization, since we received no public funds. Over the years there I picked apples in Washington, did reforestation in Oregon, worked in seafood canneries in Alaska, and did countless other manual jobs. All of the income from those jobs went to the organization. I did all of that after a sincere and profound conversion experience as a teenager. And my ten years as a fundamentalist had a tremendous effect on me, even though I no longer hold many of those beliefs.
My point is that, although my beliefs changed in subsequent years, I think I have a fairly good idea of what Christianity is about, and what is or is not Christian, and that six years of poverty, hard labor, evangelism, prayer, and Bible reading contributed to that. So perhaps we can dispense with the phrase “cannot begin to comprehend” when referring to my religious background.
Jim writes:
This atomistic approach is not morally coherent. Essentially you argue that because contention exists about the moral status of the unborn child, killing the child is morally insignificant. The consequences for the mother, the abortionist, and others involved don’t matter. It is the same reasoning you use to justify the killing of Terri Schiavo. There are no morally significant ramifications for the family, as well as those who killed her. The communal dimension of morality should be rendered irrelevant.
Morality, in this view, has no transcendent or communal authority. Further, when no consensus exists (we will put aside for a moment how we determine whether or not a consensus exists), the State is obligated to intervene. Yet the State is prohibited from any appeal to history, tradition, bodies of moral reasoning, even judicial precedent since those resources too have been stripped of authority given that no consensus exists that recognizes them as authoritative.
We have seen the results of this approach before. It justified slavery and then segregation in America for over two centuries. It led to horrors like the Tuskeegee experiments among other grave injustices that only God knows. (The consensus was the black man was not fully human.) We saw it in the eugenics craze earlier this century where Chief Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes* wrote the majority opinion for the forced sterilization of Carrie Buck. (The concensus was that poor white people polluted the gene pool.) We see it in the dismemberment of pre-born children ten seconds from a full-term birth. (Ideologues tell that because no consensus exists, such killing is of no moral significance.)
We saw it elsewhere such as the 6 million Jews slaughtered in concentration camps. (The consensus was that Jews were less than human.) We see it among Muslim extremists. (The consensus is that Christians and Jews are animals.)
You attack the State restrictions against abortion on one hand and encourage State enforced euthanasia (Terri Schiavo) on the other. Yet, you are not really arguing against the coercive power of the State here. Rather you are advancing the idea that the State should focus even more of its coercive power toward enforcing the private autonomy which morally sanctions such killing. (My article: Desecration as a Political Weapon explains in more detail how the State functions as the final court of right and wrong when materialism replaces transcendence.)
Atomism is the gateway to a Nietszchean will to power. It masks a naked nihilism that is contemptuous of culture and the order and values carried within it. It is driven by a militant materialism that will broach no appeal to things transcendent. Grasp this, and you will grasp why abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia foster a culture of death.
*Holmes wrote when justifying the forced sterilization of Carrie Buck (and let’s put a human face to his words):
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(Carrie Buck)
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Sound familiar? There’s a harmony here, a chime of ideas with the same timbre and quality that we hear from abortion and euthanasia activists today.
Note 11: “The State cannot appeal to history, tradition, bodies of moral reasoning, even judicial precedent since those resources too have been stripped of authority.”
In some cases, this is unfortunate, as the Church has become an outspoken advocate for universal human rights (although it has not always been so). People do not always refer to Church teaching when it comes to their own personal lives, let alone when they enter a voting booth.
It’s sometimes difficult to legislate the parameters of acceptable personal behavior, and it sometimes appears that these lines are drawn at arbitrary places. However, the line has to be drawn somewhere. (Thus, it’s safe to park 12.5 a half feet from a hydrant, but not 12. Just half a foot makes the difference between finding your car when you return and shelling out $150 for a tow fee.)
I would thus suggest that the Church’s approach be an incremental one in terms of legislation. It may insist that life begins at conception, but I don’t think most people see a moral equivalence between terminating a recently-fertilized egg and someone almost out of the womb (and I’m not sure I do). The issue must also be approached in the language of rights: most of us are aware that freedom in this country does not extend towards the unwarranted killing of others. Most people would be hard-pressed to not see the victim of a PBA as someone worthy of protection under the law. Desiring to criminalize the morning-after pill, however, is setting the bar too high at this point in time, so concessions and compromises may have to be made if the Church feels that PBA is something that should end. Set the cutoff point somewhere within the pregnancy, perhaps based on the complete development of the brain or some other physical manifestation of its being human, I don’t know.
In terms of PBA, I don’t think this is so much an imposition of personal morality so much as an infringement of civil liberties. While I’m still libertarian in most areas, there seems to be a sphere of influence regarding one’s actions that I think must be taken into account when legislating these things. The greater the influence on others’ life or property, the more need there may be for the government to step in in some manner.
James, my comment does not pertain only to the Church as such (although the Church bears a great responsibility for the health of a culture), but the entire body of moral tradition codified in law, enshrined in institutional practice, held quietly in the heart, etc. The problem with grounding a philosophy in social or political consensus rather than a moral tradition however, is that opinions shift. Hence my examples of historical periods where the consensus supported all types of the worst sorts of abuses.
Further, the answers to some questions are just not that clear at first. Our time is one like that. Technology has indeed pushed to the fore questions that past generations did not have to face (termination of life, artificial wombs, etc.). Jim argues that absent a consensus the authority to abort or euthanize defaults to the person who wants to abort or euthanize. The moral authority to kill another person rests solely in the hands of that individual. I argue that Jim’s atomism* removes the moral barriers against unjust killing and leads to the crimes I described. Moralilty is both individual and communal. Private acts have public ramifications. Jim either denies this communal dimension or renders it morally irrelevant (he has not indicated which one).
So, when issues are not clear, what do you do? You reach back into the tradition, into precedent, into the moral vision that informed society in the past. We discover precepts that shape the foundation of our deliberations. You won’t necessarily find the answer to a pressing question, but you will find the road that will lead you to the answer.
What’s an example of such a precept? Try this: You just can’t kill people because you want to — no matter how compelling the justification appears to be at this time. This applies to the unborn and infirm as well as the healthy and strong. This is the starting point of discussion. (Abortion and euthanasia activists know the moral power of these precepts, BTW. That’s why you hear things like “the fetus is not really human,” or “Terry Schiavo was as good as dead.” On both ends of life intrinsic humanity is denied in order to infer that the moral tradition does not apply. This propaganda has confused many people.)
Now, human life being what it is, moral standards are imperfectly applied. Yes, sometimes even rank hypocrisy abounds. But even hypocrisy tips its hat to virtue, for without virtue we would not know what hypocrisy is. I’ll defend virtue even when it is imperfectly applied and even when hypocrisy abounds. Jim, OTOH, seeks a different definition of virtue.
*Atomism. A theory according to which social institutions, values, and processes arise solely from the acts and interests of individuals, who thus constitute the only true subject of analysis. Dictionary.com.
Fr. Hans writes: “Essentially you argue that because contention exists about the moral status of the unborn child, killing the child is morally insignificant.”
No, not at all. What I have tried to explain is that in the early stages of pregnancy, there is no widespread moral concensus on the status of the fetus or embryo. That doesn’t mean that abortion is morally insignificant, but that there is honest disagreement over the moral status of that act. Frankly, if I thought the whole issue were insignificant, I wouldn’t bother posting, especially since I get torn a new orifice on a regular basis in this venue over that very issue. (e.g., Christopher’s comment that I support “the holocaust.” Apparently when he says that about me, that’s not considered a personal attack, but when I say that I don’t think he cares very much about people, that is considered a personal attack. Go figure.) It IS significant, which is why continued dialog on the issue is important.
Fr. Hans: “It is the same reasoning you use to justify the killing of Terri Schiavo.”
With all respect, I think the reasoning is totally different. The issue there is whether one thinks that the Shiavo case is remarkably different from other end of life cases, or whether it falls into the general class of end of life cases. I see it as the latter. In other words, I don’t see the Schiavo case as being significantly different from the case of Tom Delay’s father — with this exception — that in one case there is a family disagreement, and in the other case there is not. The other significant difference is that Schiavo was monumentally litigated, whereas in the other case “he wouldn’t want to live like that” ended the issue — and the life of Tom Delay’s father. R.I.P to both.
Fr. Hans: “Yet the State is prohibited from any appeal to history, tradition, bodies of moral reasoning, even judicial precedent since those resources too have been stripped of authority given that no consensus exists that recognizes them as authoritative.”
Rov V. Wade looked at the tradition. The problem is that there really has been a variety of opinions, even in the Christian tradition. If you go back to Greek and Roman law abortion was permitted, within the restriction that the fetus was considered the father’s “property.” The last thousand years have seen various positions, both Christian and governmental. I agree that the Orthodox position, as I understand it, has been consistently against abortion. But most people are not Orthodox. I have looked for evidence that, post-Constantine, abortion was prohibited in the Roman empire, but have found no such evidence. If there is, I’m willing to be educated.
Fr. Hans: “It led to horrors like the Tuskeegee experiments among other grave injustices that only God knows. (The consensus was the black man was not fully human.)”
Yes, there is no guarantee that the moral concensus is right. But the moral concensus for many Christians used to be that heretics could be burned at the stake. The moral concensus of Christians in Europe led to terrible religious wars. The moral concensus for many Christians was that slavery was part of the natural order of things. Just because a lot of Christians agree on something doesn’t mean that it’s right either.
Fr. Hans: “We saw it in the eugenics craze earlier this century where Chief Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes* wrote the majority opinion for the forced sterilization of Carrie Buck. (The concensus was that poor white people polluted the gene pool.)”
Well, you’ve read the book. So have I. There weren’t a bunch of “liberals” clamoring for sterilization. Many of the proponents of sterilization would be considered conservatives today, and a lot of the funding that developed the philosophy of sterilization came from the wealthy — well-meaning, but profoundly wrong. I don’t blame them over and above anyone else, but my point is that at any point in time neither secular nor Christian thinking necessary generates a moral policy.
Fr. Hans: “Rather you are advancing the idea that the State should focus even more of its coercive power toward enforcing the private autonomy which morally sanctions such killing.”
I don’t know how many times I’ve said this, but maybe this time it will “take.” Had Judge Greer found that Terri Schiavo wanted to be kept alive in a PVS state, that would have been fine with me. In fact, I would have said that that was the only moral thing to do, and I would have protested against any other outcome. Again, you looked for a particular outcome, and I looked for a process consistent with the laws of the State of Florida — YOUR state, YOUR laws, enacted with due deliberation by YOUR elected representatives, and enforced by YOUR judges.
Fr. Hans: “Grasp this, and you will grasp why abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia foster a culture of death.”
Having just come off of a discussion in which various contributors to this venue approved of the incineration of over a million Japanese non-combatants, and the hideous injury of countless other non-combatants through industrial-scale incendiary and atomic bombing, it may take me a little while to grasp why all of that is not included in the culture of death as well.
Jim, the attitude that allows, encourages and celebrates abortion, euthanasia and infanticide is the same as that which allows, encourages, and celebrates weapons of mass destruction, i.e., the de-humanization of other people. The criteria differs, but not the attitude. I’m perfectly willing to admit that as I’m sure most of the folks who post on this board are.
The de-humanization occurs in part because of the ability of a culture to define humanity without reference to transcendent values, precedent and norms.
Nevertheless, war is a different case. The Church, to my knowledge, has never dealt with it in council. She has dealt with abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia in council. For we Orthodox, at least, that is significant. Abortion, infanticide, and euthanasia are acts by people against helpless and defenseless individuals with the intent to kill.
Fire bombing, land mines, thermo-nuclear and nuclear devices are weapons and tactics of war that we are better off without and should not be used–they are excessive. Always Christians should act and demand others act in a way that is not excessive. Warfare can be conducted in a righteous way. Let me reiterate: Despite the overwhelming witness in the early church to a preference for not serving in the military, thousands of Christians did serve and distinguished themselves in battle. Of the many military marytrs during the first 300 years, the only ones martyred for refusing to fight refused to kill fellow Christians. The rest were marytred for refusing to sacrifice to Caesar, frequently when they were to receive honors for their performance in battle.
Christians can and ALWAYS have engaged in battle without forfeiting their Christianity (their communion with our Lord God and Savior).
To support or engage in the systematic slaugther of human beings simply because those human beings have been defined as less than or non-human, IMO, excommunicates those so engaged. Abortion, euthanasia, and infanticide as a matter of public policy cannot be righteous in part, because they are always excessive. They are the civil analog of wartime atrocities.
Killing in battle is simply not the same as the killing of people because they are inconvenient. Your constant attempt to make it so destroys your whole argument. An argument that has no logical or moral consistency to it anyway. I, for one, have grown weary of such an illogical, unsupportable, offensive attempt to justify gross materialism by appealing to Christianity–a Christianity that exists only in your mind as some sort of philosophy.
Michael writes: “Killing in battle is simply not the same as the killing of people because they are inconvenient. Your constant attempt to make it so destroys your whole argument.”
My point is that the whole “culture of death” thing is very selective, and typically is used by the right to beat up on the left.
But let’s clear up a couple of things. Euthanasia is illegal. Nurses who intentionally inject patients with lethal doses of drugs end up in prison. Oregon has physician-assisted suicide — something completely different from euthanasia, under strict regulation, and rare. I am unaware of any state that permits infanticde, although, given that whatever can happen will happen, I’m sure it has happened — and whenever it has happened it is no doubt blamed on “liberals.”
No doubt there people who advocate for euthanasia and infanticide, just as there are people who will advocate for anything. The typical strategy on the right is to throw out a few disconnected anecdotes and a Peter Singer book, and then on that basis claim that “the left” supports euthanasia and infanticide.
As Fr. Hans recently pointed out, for many years forced sterilization was also a common practice in the U.S., although there is no evidence that “liberals” supported it more than anyone else. In fact, the early financiers were wealthy individuals who saw forced sterilization as a way to improve society.
And then we have the Terri Schiavo situation. The laws under which the Shiavo cases was decided — the same laws on the books today — were passed by a red-state legislature that was elected by red-state voters. The main judge in the case is a conservative Southern Baptist Christian, who was also elected by red-state voters. But none of that matters, you see, because “the liberals” were behind it all. The fact that a majority of the people in the country agreed with the outcome, by around a 2 to 1 margin, is also irrelevant, because the evil liberals were at the heart of it.
This bring us to the next “culture of death” issue, abortion, which as I see as more of a metaphysical and theological issue than a moral issue. In the abortion issue we are asked to believe that fertilized eggs, blastocysts consisting of undifferentiated cells, and embryos at all stages of development are persons, just like . . . well, just like real persons. And that any attempt to interfere with the development of one of these forms is murder, just as if you’d gone out and shot someone.
To fail to believe in this extraordinary metaphysical view is to support the abortion “holocaust,” AND to be a person whose moral decisions on any other issue cannot be trusted, AND to be someone unfit for public office, AND to be someone whose spiritual life must be terminally defective.
Michael writes: “Jim, the attitude that allows, encourages and celebrates abortion, euthanasia and infanticide is the same as that which allows, encourages, and celebrates weapons of mass destruction, i.e., the de-humanization of other people.”
First of all, I don’t know anyone who “celebrates” abortion, euthanasia, or infanticide. Again, I suppose it’s possible since anything is possible, but I’m not aware of it.
But let’s talk about what is frequently celebrated — warfare itself. Every year we pay hundreds of billions of dollars a year in the acquisition of bigger and better weapons, even weapons systems that the Pentagon does not want or need. We have military bases that the Pentagon doesn’t want or need but that are kept open anyway. We have military parades to show off the latest hardware and weapons. We have military recruiters going into high schools. Indeed the “No Chilld Left Behind” act had an interesting provision in which schools are required to turn over contact information on their students to military recruiters or face the possible loss of federal aid. We have an entire culture in which violence is a form of entertainment. For us Americans, there’s just nothing as good as seeing the “bad guy” get riddled with machine gun bullets, while the hero makes a witty remark. In recent years three of the most popular movies, the Lord of the Rings series, were also three of the most violent. In the LOTR series, the enemy is literally dehumanized, consisting of orcs and goblins, who can be hacked or stabbed with no moral qualms at all.
But neither warfare itself, nor any particular war, nor any particular battle, nor even any particular weapon system, nor even violence as entertainment ever makes it on the “culture of death” list.
Jim writes:
You’ve got it backwards Jim. It’s not that culture of death ideology is “liberal.” It’s that liberals have adopted the culture of death ideology. (Many liberals occupy the same ideological bed of the earlier elites who championed eugenics.)
Also, be careful with the implicit assertion that because abortion, assisted suicide, euthanasia, etc. might be practiced more selectively in some places than others, the ideology informing the practices is of no consequence. Sometimes the virus incubates.