Death control and birth control: a foolish consistency
Is there consistency in the standard liberal position on the death penalty and abortion? They oppose the death penalty and favor abortion (as opposed to conservatives who favor the death penalty and oppose abortion).
Conservatives side with punishing guilty life (a murderer who takes innocent life) with death and giving innocent life the benefit of the doubt. Liberals give guilty life the benefit of the doubt ("juries are fallible") and side with slaughtering innocents (over 46,000,000 "safe and legal" abortions since Roe v. Wade in 1973).
The liberal consistency: murderers should not have to face the ultimate penalty (forfeiting their lives) for taking another's innocent life; irresponsible and promiscuous women who fail to use birth control should not be prevented from taking innocent life.
Not the Great Society. Call it the "Irresponsibility Society."
Those who still read the Bible likely find infant sacrifice to pagan gods unbelievably primitive and perverse. We recoil at the Aztecs offering human sacrifice to their gods. Yet, Americans sacrifice more than a million unborn on the altar of appetite every year. The central tenet of the new moral orthodoxy is sex without consequence. The old moral orthodoxy is "outmoded" and "unsophisticated." But in what way are modern abortionists more sophisticated than primitive Baal-worshippers and the perverse Aztec blood cult?
My church teaches that "the sacred powers of procreation are to be employed only between man and woman, lawfully wedded as husband and wife." Amazing in its simplicity and very pro-choice: abstinence is possible, and married love is the ideal. In contrast, modern moral determinism seems to deny freedom in human procreation. It says, "We are merely advanced animals without control over our urges." When sex is the ultimate value, anything goes: adultery, homosexuality, pedophila, bestiality. That is false and dehumanizing and poisons human relationships. It also denies that we are children of a heavenly Father. Being children means we're part of a family, and that family is important.
Modern popular culture's siren song -- "I can't get no satisfaction" -- ironically affirms that human intimacy, the bond between a married man and woman, is more fulfilling than all the selfish one-night-stand substitutes.
I personally believe that capital punishment emphasizes, not minimizes, the value society places on human life. I also personally believe abortion should be exceptional not routine: only in cases of incest or rape, or to save the life of the mother. Even then, it should be a carefully considered alternative, not a default (or "de-fault").
Conservatives side with punishing guilty life (a murderer who takes innocent life) with death and giving innocent life the benefit of the doubt. Liberals give guilty life the benefit of the doubt ("juries are fallible") and side with slaughtering innocents (over 46,000,000 "safe and legal" abortions since Roe v. Wade in 1973).
The liberal consistency: murderers should not have to face the ultimate penalty (forfeiting their lives) for taking another's innocent life; irresponsible and promiscuous women who fail to use birth control should not be prevented from taking innocent life.
Not the Great Society. Call it the "Irresponsibility Society."
Those who still read the Bible likely find infant sacrifice to pagan gods unbelievably primitive and perverse. We recoil at the Aztecs offering human sacrifice to their gods. Yet, Americans sacrifice more than a million unborn on the altar of appetite every year. The central tenet of the new moral orthodoxy is sex without consequence. The old moral orthodoxy is "outmoded" and "unsophisticated." But in what way are modern abortionists more sophisticated than primitive Baal-worshippers and the perverse Aztec blood cult?
My church teaches that "the sacred powers of procreation are to be employed only between man and woman, lawfully wedded as husband and wife." Amazing in its simplicity and very pro-choice: abstinence is possible, and married love is the ideal. In contrast, modern moral determinism seems to deny freedom in human procreation. It says, "We are merely advanced animals without control over our urges." When sex is the ultimate value, anything goes: adultery, homosexuality, pedophila, bestiality. That is false and dehumanizing and poisons human relationships. It also denies that we are children of a heavenly Father. Being children means we're part of a family, and that family is important.
Modern popular culture's siren song -- "I can't get no satisfaction" -- ironically affirms that human intimacy, the bond between a married man and woman, is more fulfilling than all the selfish one-night-stand substitutes.
I personally believe that capital punishment emphasizes, not minimizes, the value society places on human life. I also personally believe abortion should be exceptional not routine: only in cases of incest or rape, or to save the life of the mother. Even then, it should be a carefully considered alternative, not a default (or "de-fault").
posted by Barney at 8:22 AM
1 Comments:
Good post. I have always supported capital punishment, and have never had the slightest problem supporting the Church's position on abortion. (In fact, I consider Roe v. Wade to be an abomination, and the worst decision ever handed down by the United States Supreme Court -- worse, even, than the Dred Scott case, in which the disputed slave was at least allowed to live.) My own view on the death penalty squares pretty closely with yours, as I have always maintained that the execution of a murderer -- or even of people like the Rosenbergs -- actually affirms the sanctity of life, by imposing the supreme penalty on those who, without justification, mitigation, or excuse, would deprive others of it. Moreover, this is the only situation in which the punishment can truly be said to fit the crime, although that is not true in all cases (such as the Nuremberg defendants and Adolf Eichmann, who were responsible for the murder of millions, but could only be hanged once apiece.)
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