Anti-Abortion Bullshit Bingo
Eyes down, ladies and gentlemen, eyes down. It’s time for Anti-Abortion Bullshit Bingo!
Nadine Dorries has been granted a 90-minute debate in the House of Commons on reducing the abortion time limit, and that means we should be in for some high-quality bullshit.
Print off your card and get ready to cross off each dodgy statement as you hear it. The winner is… who am I kidding – the only person who wins in this game is Nadine Dorries.
Your first comment begs the question: why – from a distinctively Green perspective – is “opposing forced pregnancy for others … certainly the only ethical option”?
Because it is never ethical to force girls or women through pregnancy and childbirth against her will.
That’s not from a “distinctively Green perspective”: that’s from the human rights perspective. To be pro-forced pregnancy is to oppose human rights for half the human race.
(And to suggest that non-Greens aren’t bothered about behaving ethically is absurd, if that’s what you are suggesting.)
You are wrong to infer that this is what I was trying to imply. To note that a group of people attempt to behave ethically, does not in any way imply that people not in that group do not behave ethically.
You need to expand on the point about long-term consequences, as I don’t think you mentioned any. You mentioned some side-effects of making abortions illegal, but nothing long-term.
That’s odd, because I’d say that death is the ultimate long-term consequence. You disagree?
EyeEdinburgh – thanks for that, though I’m still not seeing any distinctively Green reasons to favour abortion.
Your first comment begs the question: why – from a distinctively Green perspective – is “opposing forced pregnancy for others … certainly the only ethical option”? (And to suggest that non-Greens aren’t bothered about behaving ethically is absurd, if that’s what you are suggesting.)
You need to expand on the point about long-term consequences, as I don’t think you mentioned any. You mentioned some side-effects of making abortions illegal, but nothing long-term.
I don’t see anything distinctively Green about the other arguments.
So I’m still puzzled about why Greens tend to be more strongly in favour of abortion than other groups. Again, I’d have expected it to be the other way round, since Greens don’t place as much value on the absolute autonomy of the individual as others do.
I’m still trying to understand why Greens tend to be strongly pro-abortion though, as I don’t see much that is distinctively Green in your arguments.
I suspect because the Greens tend towards ethical choices, and opposing forced pregnancy for others is certainly the only ethical option.
You yourself, Anthony, when you get pregnant, will certainly have the right to decide whether you will carry the pregnancy to term regardless of the damage this may do to your health, your wellbeing, or your life: this is your ethical choice about abortion.
(Not a Green party member myself, though definitely inclined towards Green politics.)
A further reason is that Greens tend to look at long-term consequences rather than pretty front-page propaganda.
It is known and proved that the only sure consequence of making abortion is illegal is that women who need abortions will either travel to where they can have an abortion legally, if they can afford to do so, or they will have an illegal abortion, often – in stringently prolife countries – from an unqualified practitioner. In consequence of this, illegal abortion is one of the top four killers of pregnant women worldwide.
It is also known and proved that the only effective way of diminishing the number and rate of abortions is by ensuring all children have comprehensive sex education, including strong encouragement to use contraception, and, of course, to ensure that everyone has free access to free/cheap contraception.
So a Green who was against abortions would more likely than not do the Green thing: look at the evidence, think things through, and conclude that supporting sex education and contraceptives was the way forward to reduce abortions: while caring about whether women live would naturally lead to supporting safe legal abortion available at need.
Adam – thanks for that. I think your position makes sense. You’re doing what needs to be done in any ethically difficult situation – weighing up the different outcomes, along with the amount of certainty we have, to decide the best course of action. Even though, as a Green, you are not so offended by the woman’s loss of individual autonomy as others might be, you still see that being forced to endure pregnancy is a very hard thing (and I agree with you), so that counts strongly in favour of abortion. On the other side, you don’t see negatives as outweighing that – the possibility that an abortion might actually end the life of another human being – mainly (I presume) because you think there is very little reason to believe that the bundle of cells is a human being, and not because you don’t place immense value on the life of every human being. Is that a fair summary?
I’m still trying to understand why Greens tend to be strongly pro-abortion though, as I don’t see much that is distinctively Green in your arguments.
Anthony,
Like you, I don’t believe in individual autonomy, and I am not a huge fan of the prmacy of individual choice – so I don’t like the language of ‘right to choose’ much. We are all connected. I believe that we need to make decisions together based on what’s in the best interest of everyone.
I think that women ought to be allowed to have abortions because I think that no one should have to endure the suffering of a forced pregnancy. If there is a doubt to be had on one side (you say you give a smnear all bundle of cells the benefit of it) and a certainty on the other (that women do not enjoy enduring forced pregnancy) then I think we should consider the certainty as more important than the doubt.
In other words, women should be allowed to have abortions if they so wish. I hope that makes sense.
Adam
I’m curious to know how you link the issue of abortion with being green.
I can understand why a committed libertarian might be pro-abortion. If the core principle of politics and justice is that each individual has the right to their own autonomy, then I can see how it might seem offensive to suggest that the bundle of cells inside a woman’s body can somehow demand that she surrender her autonomy for nine months. How can a woman claim to be an autonomous individual if she’s forced against her will to endure pregnancy and to give birth?
But that’s not the central principle of green politics. We’re all connected together through the world we inhabit, so individual autonomy is not an absolute. The world is more than a collection of autonomous individuals. Yes, we do have rights as individuals, but the ecosystem also has rights (and lots of other things in between have rights too).
So, on the face of it, I would expect the libertarians to be pro-abortion, and the greens to be not so committed to the idea. But the reverse seems to be the case. I’m genuinely puzzled by that.
For what it’s worth, I’m a member of the Green Party (England and Wales), and also a Christian. So, as a Christian, I’m inclined to give the bundle of cells the benefit of the doubt, and treat it as if it is a valuable human being. I realise that’s a blow in the face of the absolute of individual autonomy, but as a green I don’t believe individual autonomy is an absolute, so that’s okay. But I find myself out of step with Green Party thinking on the issue of abortion, and I wonder if I’m missing something.
Interested to hear any thoughts!