Michael J. Kane wrote:
> **Paul, I'm not religious, and I happen to favor "choice" when
> **it comes to the abortion issue. However, I don't think it's fair
> **to lump all right-to-lifers in with the same pool as those with
> **contradictory (hypocritical, dishonest) behaviors such as child
> **beaters and (some) homophobes. If someone's religious
> **doctrine forbids the taking of any "life" (whether born,
> **zygotic, or what have your) then there is nothing inherently
> **evil or dishonest or wrong with them opposing abortion and
> **working to rid the world of it.
>
> **There IS scientific evidence for evolution that can be
> willfully **and dishonestly ignored. There is no such evidence that
> **abortion is to be supported OR vilified.
You're completely correct about this, of course. I apologize for excess
"lumping together". In fact I believe that it is _not_ true that the
majority of people opposed to abortion are being dishonest (my mother, and a
beloved colleague whose recommendation for promotion I should be writing
this afternoon come to mind).
However, I do believe that my original comments would apply if I wrote them
about (for example) members of a _organized_ "Right to Life" group (e.g.,
"Wisconsin Right to Life"). Your second paragraph is a piece of the support
for this claim - despite the clear fact that there is no empirical evidence
that abortion is to be supported or vilified (nor can there be such support
for an ethical claim), organized right-to-life groups (at least ours)
repeatedly claim that there _is_ such evidence (of course using the word
"proof" instead of evidence). In short, they are lying to people like my
mother. The fact is (as you pointed out), science doesn't define "human".
In fact, had organized opposition to abortion begun with and limited itself
to the clear cases, I might now be a member of such an organization. I'd
sure hate to have to make the case for legal third trimester abortion, based
on my feelings about the importance of "having a phenomenology". But the
same organized groups making hay with the "partial-birth abortion" campaign
are simultaneously trying to prevent health insurance companies from
covering _birth control_ (that was a story in the Wisconsin news today) -
putatively for the same reasons! I hear the cry, "Wolf", but I smell a rat.
Paul Smith
Alverno College
Milwaukee
