Conservatives Argue Over Mary Ann Glendon:
Some interesting chatter over at National Review on Mary Ann Glendon's decision to rebuff Notre Dame.
Danielle Crittenden starts here and elaborates here. Responses by Maggie Gallagher, Kathryn Jean Lopez, and Ramesh Ponnuru.
I've given my two cents here but to summarize, I think there is a line to draw between giving someone a platform to speak as part of the academic enterprise and honoring someone with a honorary degree and giving that person a platform to speak at the university's most important collective event of the year.
Update:
And here is a really interesting and thoughtful post by Glendon's daughter.
How bravely would the media have portrayed her for refusing this honor if it had been intended to be presented to her alongside an honorary degree awarded to George W. Bush?
Obama supports the DP and is increasing the number of troops in Afghanistan.
True, I should have simply asked if prominent Catholics have ever protested the presentation of an honorary degree to a pro-war or pro-death penalty candidate on those grounds, and if those protesters would be criticized by anyone other than Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly for doing so.
What a dumb-ass, ridiculous comeback. By openly stiffing the university, and explaining why it deserves to be stiffed, she is speaking truth to power. What's the University going to do in rebuttal, force her to speak at their venue? Ha!
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Plus, there is the significant point that the occasion is a commencement, not a no-holds-barred debate.
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She's right, Obama and his supporters are wrong. They are squealing like stuck pigs because they know they are wrong. If I was a donor to ND, I'd dump 'em over this, freedom of speech/association and all that.
Catholic Church doctrine is not anti-war and holds the death penalty to be justified and moral in some extreme circumstances. In fact, its doctrine argues an obligation for governments to go to war in some circumstances.
Did Obama ask to speak or was he invited? How can he be "wrong" if he just accepted an invite?
But God forbid you use a CONDOM!!!!
Another dumb-ass remark by Danielle Crittenden. That's exactly the point - to repudiate the moral legitimacy of the president of the United States on the issue of abortion on demand. Behold, speaking truth to power.
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Point taken. I narrow my comments to those who have taken ND's side in this kerfuffle, and those who are critical of Mary Ann Glendon's decision to rebuff Notre Dame. I don't know if Obama is even aware of the ND kerfuffle.
I believe the Catholic response would be, "Yes, He does."
Thread win!
On the other hand, Notre Dame's mission statement also says,
How nice. They're all for open discussion. But how does that square with FIRE giving Notre Dame a red light rating?I guess one is free to have open discussion as long as one adheres to the speech code.
In light of Norte Dame's violation of it's own mission statement, why not honor Obama?
Religion can never be subject to democratic processes. Religion in this case codifies God's laws and we do not get to vote on whether we want to obey those laws or disobey them. The catholic Church is led by a man that was selected by God, that is the position of the Church.
I am no longer a Catholic but I am a member of a Church which takes these lines of authority much more seriously than the American Catholic Church does. If a president of one of our Church Universities disobeyed the authorities set over him he would be out of a job and out of the Church before the week was over.
I'm not a Catholic, but the honorary degree seems like a red herring to me. The commencement speech is given by an upstanding example for the graduates who has something valuable to say. Obama will probably have something valuable to say, but his actions will speak louder than his words.
Need a little coffee, Dan? Very few people, outside of dedicated Jains, feel that all human death is equal and equally repellent. Do you? Every death is equally abhorrent? Assisted suicide should earn the same penalty as child murder?
Catholic doctrine -- like most rational thought -- teaches that some death is regrettable but necessary, and under the right circumstances both battlefield killing and judicial executions fall into that category. In both cases one of the key questions is what the victim might have done to make his death necessary. In a just war, for example defense against an aggressor, the death of the enemy soldier is necessary to protect innocent life at home. In a similar way, it may be necessary to execute a man to protect his potential innocent victims.
The difficulty, as the Catholic Church sees it, is that abortion is the murder of a child in almost all cases only for the convenience of one or more adults. (Having to drop out of school, or being thrust into poverty, or having to make heroic efforts to manage your children, or having to raise a child of whose father you do not approve, do not count as sufficiently awful consequences to justify the taking of life to prevent it, by this doctrine.)
You can agree or not where these moral lines should be drawn, and even within the Catholic community people do so. But to equate abortion to execution and warfare is at best fatuous.
Conservative Catholics have two choices-- a Church that is somewhat tolerant of dissent and has a lot of power and influence, or a Church that is not tolerant of dissent and shrinks and has little power and influence. You can't have it both ways. Which do they prefer?
If you don't have principles, what is left?
They prefer to follow the Commandments of God and the teachings of St. Paul, as best as mere human understanding can grasp them.
The notion that mere considerations of political popularity should trump what is right and true would revolt any decent Catholic -- I might dare to say such a cynical philosophy would nauseate any truly moral person.
The Church has certainly survived being in disagreement with the secular fad o' the moment many times over its two thousand year history. Indeed, it has survived vicious persecution, from the Caesars to the Soviets, perhaps in part because it does not alter its moral message a hair's breadth in search of mere popularity.
I actually agree with this. That's why I support derecognition of the Holy See as a "nation", ignoring the Pope's teaching on moral issues (or any other issues), and treating the Church as any other youth group would be treated with respect to the sex abuse scandal.
Most conservative Catholics, though, don't support that sort of thing. They WANT the power and prestige that comes from being a huge religious organization. Well, if you want that, you can't be as exclusionary as conservative Catholics want the Church to be.
As for the matter of abortion, I'll only note that hundreds of people will be receiving a degree from Notre Dame whose views on abortion are at least as extreme as Obama's. I have heard no protest over that.
In short, the bloviating being done on this issue is an embarrassment for a conservative movement that desperately needs to be addressing the real issues facing our nation.
Again, I don't think conservative Catholics are honest about this. They certainly claim that worldly power doesn't matter, but they spend a heck of a lot of time supporting the Church's efforts to obtain and maintain it.
If you truly don't care about this, then there's no problem with the Glendons of the world. But these sorts of tactics certainly will render the Church into a smaller, less relevant entity, and as I said, I think in their hearts of hearts, conservative Catholics want power and wouldn't want this outcome.
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ROTFL. The fact the the president has some "bully pulpit" and control over the exercise of US foreign policy as it pertains to abortion on demand is precisely what provides the opportunity for protest actions.
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Your complaint is that abortion is discussed at all. "Incomprehensible fixation" you call it. Avert your gaze then.
Or is being pro choice a bannable offense only for Democrat politicians?
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Graduation speech wars: Rice in 2006, Obama now. Who's next? - USA Toady
Try again.
Abortion is no more tolerable than slavery, and political proponents of either should face overwhelming scorn. Both evils are premised upon the idea that certain living humans are not worthy of the dignity and protection the law affords other living humans. Slavery was predicated upon the idea that the black race was intrinsically inferior to whites. Abortion requires adherence to the delusion that the foetus deserves no protection until it emerges from the woman's body.
All attempts to distract by references to the death penalty and war are obtuse. They fail to distinguish between the deliberate ending of a life that brings no harm to others, and the ending of lives that either have harmed others, or are about to harm others.
I think that the doctrine of preventive war, without an imminent threat, is also profoundly immoral. I don't think the Church or a university dedicated to supporting the Church's mission should honor such a politician.
In general I think this is true. The Church's principled stand against the eugenics movement is but one example. But you have to admit, the Church has been known to soft-pedal moral outrage on occasion.
Was Mary Ann Glendon silent or outspoken when Notre Dame honored George W. Bush (no-count drunk until 40, mocking enthusiast with respect to the death penalty, architect of the invasion of Iraq)?
Without the answers to those questions, it is difficult to determine whether her loud opposition to Notre Dame's decision to honor Barack Obama is a heartfelt and principled act of conscience or a point of partisan convenience.
Even if by Catholic calculations abortion is more important than the deaths caused by immoral military attacks or a prosecution that hopes it has made the correct call, surely Notre Dame could have found someone who had all three issues correct, from the Catholic perspective, rather than stoop to honor Bush, Rice or Obama. For many Republicans, however, the line seems to be drawn at a level that excuses the Republicans and snares the Democrat.
I am not sure from a Catholic perspective, GWB being a "no-count drunk until 40" has any relevance at all. Redemption and change is a major component of Christian theology.
Remember, St. Paul was much, much worse until the middle of his life--chiefly being one the lead persecutors of the early Christians.
With respect to protests of Republicans of various kinds speaking at Notre Dame and other Catholic colleges and universities, I suspect there were protests. After all, college students will protest almost anything at the drop of a hat.
Whether someone declined a prestigious honor because he or she did not want to share a stage with the "offending" person seems to be what makes this particular incident unique.
Nicholas Sarkozy, the President of France, supports legal abortion. Yet he was made an honorary canon of the Lateran basilica in 2007, an honor approved at the highest levels of the Vatican and involving a special ceremony just for Sarko.
Similarly, in 2004, the Vatican Secretary of State, Cardinal Soldano, personally conferred a papal knighthood on Julian Hunte. Hunte, a member of the St. Lucia's upper legislative house, cast the deciding vote to legalize abortion in that country and stated that he was "a pro-choice man." Pro-life Catholics in St. Lucia tried to get the award canceled but were rebuffed.
So it is hard for me to take this very seriously absent an articulation of why Notre Dame must not do what the Vatican regularly does.
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Gosh, I didn't realize that Mary Ann Glendon was offered the Laetare Medal on those occasions, and/or was placed in direct juxtaposition with Rice, Bush or any other.
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The boneheads who invite lame comparisons to the Rice/Bush, etc. appearances at other universities also chronically overlook the letter that Mary Ann Glendon wrote, where she specifically cites the U.S. bishops’ express request of 2004.
I am disinclined to draw much lesson from it.
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Cripes, that's another no-brainer. Which major US party advocates abortion on demand? And so we are to conclude that her decision is just a matter of party identification? Baloney. The fact that the party being noticed is the Democratic party is a perfectly parallel issues consequence.
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"She only dissing the speaker because he's a Democrat." Give me a break.
She is entitled to do that. She also is entitled to refrain from criticizing Notre Dame for failing to select a more Catholic-congruent commencement speaker than a man who reportedly mocked a woman just before he had her put to death.
Everyone else, consequently, is entitled to recognize that her outrage appears to derive more from general political philosophy than from positions on abortion or the death penalty or congruence with Catholic teaching in general.
C'mon Arthur - I'm with you on the torture and unjust war thing, but "reportedly mocked?" One snide comment before the execution of a guilty murderer is somehow relevant to Glendon's moral consistency with respect to the wholesale ending of lives that have never harmed anyone?
Here's the other problem - every single time a pro-abortion person brings up war, the death penalty and such, and tries to point out the ostensible inconsistency of an anti-abortion person, the pro-abortion person is indirectly admitting that which they will never directly admit. Abortion is the end of a human life.
Even more importantly, what person that wants to be taken seriously is so single-issue oriented?
A cursory examination of history would suggest otherwise. All organized religions are power structures, and the Catholic Church is the grand-daddy off all power structures.
Drawing the line somewhere doesn't make you a single issue person.
No one who brought up the war, the death penalty and such in this thread has identified what their position on abortion is. What makes you assume they're pro-choice?
In other words, I can see saying that a politician isn't disqualified from receiving an honorary degree simply because the politician supports the death penalty and warmaking in some narrow circumstances; however, a politician who supports such policies in circumstances where the Church says that such policies are clearly immoral stands in exactly the same stead as one who supports abortion rights. And Bush Administration officials and many Republican politicians have clearly and extensively violated Catholic moral teachings on war and capital punishment, even though such teachings do not categorically prohibit war and capital punishment as they do abortions.
Clearly not true. Look at the Democratic Party, which is essentially a church:
- millions of members, most of whom belong out of some kind of ethnic solidarity or familial inertia
- an educated leadership who protest that membership is not just consistent with reason or morality, but in fact demanded by reason and morality
- and buttress their position with a host of arguments and an array of literature
- which nonbelievers find entirely unconvincing and/or silly
The Democratic Party is much less tolerant than the Catholic Church. Test it - go tell a priest you are starting to think there is no God, then tell someone with an Obama bumper sticker you're starting to think maybe the Republicans are right about [education vouchers, gay marriage, the cost-benefit ratio of a carbon cap and trade system, the deficit, or negotiating with Iran, pick one] and see which treats you better.
And yet the Democratic National Church is tremendously powerful. Its Pope is simultaneously President, CEO of Chrysler and Bank of America, an integral part of NBC's Wednesday night prime time lineup, and most importantly the only person who can prevent Joe Biden from becoming the leader of the free world.
If the Democrats can do it, why not the Catholics?
Nuts. They are pointing out the lack of moral seriousness on the other side by accepting their terms for the sake of argument. ("If you're so concerned about ending human lives, then...")
Not at all true. The Democrats (and the Republicans for that matter) tolerate lots of heterodoxy, in the form of candidates, volunteers, and voters who take different positions on important issues. The reason primary challenges like Joe Lieberman's make news is because they are so rare; in most cases, politicians are allowed to stray pretty far from the positions of the base of the party.
Indeed, parties that try to enforce orthodoxy turn into smaller parties, just like churches.
I actually think the Catholic hierarchy is very smart on these issues. The hierarchy gives conservatives a lot of rhetorical support, but they are careful NOT to go the whole nine yards and endorse measures like denying communion and refusing to confer honorary degrees and banning speakers and the like, because the hierarchy understands that there are a lot of pro-choice American Catholics and a serious attempt to drive them out of the Church would render the Church much less powerful and influential in the US, which would do great harm to its goals with respect to spreading Catholic moral teaching.
(On the other hand, much as I would like to see the Church adopt more liberal teachings on these issues, doing that would probably drive conservatives to split from the Church. So the Church has to thread the needle here.)
Over 70% of Notre Dame students and 97% of the senior class support the invitation and the honor for Obama.
Obama is being invited and honored for being a US President. If some prominent Catholics and, especially, the Vatican have a problem with Obama and want to use ND as a tool in their meddling in US politics, there is a bit of a constitutional conflict--it's not unconstitutional per se, but it is muddling affairs of Church and State. If ND would ever consider giving the honor to any other US President (not to mention leaders of foreign states), there is no excuse to attempt to prevent them from bestowing the same honor on Obama. If they pulled out now, ND would become the laughingstock in virtually every venue, save for rabidly conservative Catholic circles (Scalia and Alito come to mind) and the Republican Party.
IMHO, in a just world, all protesters in this case should be instantly castrated. OK, so this was a gratuitous comment. But the issue is quite clear. ND is an institution of higher learning first, a Catholic institution second. If they took advice from the lunatic fringe on all such issues, 99% of their research facilities would be languishing in moth balls and their student population would resemble the contestants in Monthy Python's Upperclass Twit of the Year sketch. So you can keep whining, but prepare to be ignored.
Whatever one's views on this, I think that most people who become aware of it will intuit that Glendon has held truck with many people who act against or outside of Catholic doctrine in most profund ways, ways that go to core moral values, but she chooses to snub Notre Dame here because Obama opposes the Catholic curch on a matter of sufficient importance to her.
Again, please. I agree with AJX. This comes off as the elevation of a particular issue, not the exercise of a broad principle.
"Rice said 'If you go back to 2000 when I helped the president in the campaign. I said that I was, in effect, kind of libertarian on this issue. And meaning by that, that I have been concerned about a government role in this issue. I am a strong proponent of parental choice -of parental notification. I am a strong proponent of a ban on late-term abortion. These are all things that I think unite people and I think that that's where we should be. I've called myself at times mildly pro-choice.' She would not want the federal government 'forcing its views on one side or the other.'
"Rice said she believes President Bush 'has been in exactly the right place' on abortion, 'which is we have to respect the culture of life and we have to try and bring people to have respect for it and make this as rare a circumstance as possible' However, she added that she has been 'concerned about a government role' but has 'tended to agree with those who do not favor federal funding for abortion, because I believe that those who hold a strong moral view on the other side should not be forced to fund' the procedure."
Though not up to the Pope's standards, this is a very long way from Obama's opposition to parental notification and informed consent, his support of late-term abortion, of partial-birth abortion, of subsidizing abortions overseas, of allowing babies who manage to survive botched abortions and are indubitably alive (breathing and crying) to be left to die (link), and his support of legislation that may very well shut every Catholic hospital in America (link). The simple fact is that Obama is as fanatically pro-abortion as any politician in America, and Rice is quite ambivalent.
Anyone can allege that the only possible reason to oppose an honorary Notre Dame degree for Obama and not for Rice is that she is a Republican and he a Democrat. However, such an allegation only demonstrates the allegator's gross argumentative incompetence or shameless dishonesty (or both).
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And at the same time, claiming to be morally serious by claiming their opponent is a hypocrite.
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The problem is that it's illogical to accept tolerance of baby-killing as morally serious. That is, those who claim their opponent lack moral seriousness (because of absence of anti-war or anti-death-penalty stances) have an even larger character flaw themselves. Claiming to possess "moral seriousness" is all fine and dandy, but the claim is false.
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That conclusion depends on what it takes to put an individual into the "pro-choice" bucket. I've just now looked at a variety of news stories and polls on the subject, and the DEMs take the position that voting for Obama make a person pro-choice. That's a transparent piece of intellectual dishonesty.
It does. It says "I disagree with someone on just one star in the whole constellation of disputed human ideas, and that alone is sufficient to merit shunning." -- it is the elevation of that single star to the center of the universe, to the exclusion of all others.
The obvious corollary comes up -- how much is MAG willing to compromise her other beliefs for this one? That is, how repellent (to her) must the other views of a pro-life candidate be before she abstains from voting or votes for his pro-choice opponent.
Tu quoque will only get you so far. If you're to be the ruling majority you claim with some relish and accuracy to be, that's not far enough.
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You could trouble yourself to read and comprehend Mary Ann Glendon's letter. It explains the answer to the rank hypocrisy that you posit is in place.
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If you don't understand it, well, wow back to you.
1. Hundreds of people will receive degrees they earned by taking the appropriate classes and passing them. Isn't that a bit different from an honorary degree? It should be harder to honor someone whose views are utterly repugnant than to reward such a person for doing everything that was required of him or her.
2. How can any of the graduates have "views on abortion . . . more extreme than Obama's"? I doubt that any Notre Dame graduate supports China's forced abortions for those who already have one child, and I really can't think of any other position on abortion more extreme than Obama's. Care to name one?
The big deal is that there is a whole rest of the intellectual world outside the abortion debate.
Gonna drag out the UNFPA controversy again?
While you're at it, you (or AJK) could try naming a position on abortion more extreme than any of Obama's and likely to be held by a significant number of this year's graduates.
Hard to do if you insist that Obama supports One Child. The only part of that accusation which sticks is that he did, in fact, fund UNFPA (with the princely sum of $50M), which operates in China without preventing One Child.
Here is the report on the UNFPA involvement in China prepared by W's State Dept (not Clinton's, mind you):
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I read the contention in light of a spectrum ranging from more extreme than Obama (e.g., One child) to Obama to whatever; not that Obama holds a One Child position, but that the One Child position is more extreme.
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See the initial assertion, "hundreds of people will be receiving degrees whose views on abortion are identical to or more extreme than Obama's", followed by a focus on the second item in the disjunctive "I really can't think of any other position on abortion more extreme than Obama's."
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So yeah, your conclusion "why Obama supports One Child" does not follow from the discussion. It's something that you decided to bring in, perhaps as a straw man.
You're right about the contents of the thread, but the assumption came out of past discussions with pro-choice friends. Apologies for the imprecision, and for veering somewhat off-topic.
I still don't buy the "accepting their terms for the sake of argument" line. Every conversation I've ever had on this matter has led me to conclude that the pro-abortion person understood the inconsistency to be real, and not just a product of an accepting terms for the sake of argument. Do I know for sure? No. But I think that deep down, those who favor abortion understand that it often ends the life of an organism that has a beating heart, 10 fingers, and 10 toes. That understanding has been reflected in my conversations, though that is of little value in an online forum.
And even with respect to the "if you're so concerned" line of thinking, selective focus on a particularly egregious form of injustice, in a world of many injustices, hardly represents moral inconsistency. It's simply a strategic focus, though perhaps an incorrect one (see, e.g., Dubya).
As to Obama's views, in 2008 interview he said:
I wonder if this disconnect is another example of the effect of the major media covering for Obama. If your major source of news and information is network news, then you probably have never heard of the Born Alive Infant Protection Act and Obama's fanatical opposition to it. Obama is famously pro-abortion, at least among people who follow the issue. Myself, I tend to be libertarian about it, though not to the extent of Glenn Reynolds or Condi Rice. But I try to conscientiously apply the "slavery test" to assertions about abortion, as Easter Bunnee suggested. What would the libertarian view of slavery have been?
Most of the commenters here seem innocently ignorant of Catholic doctrine, too. I'm not Catholic, but I taught engineering at a Catholic University for twelve years. So I got to see close-up the gradations of tolerance that Catholics have for different issues. A vocal minority of professors opposed the Iraq war, but it was controversial and discussion was lively. I'd say a majority opposed the death penalty, and though I know there are criminals that deserve killing, I've come around to the view that I don't trust the government to decide which ones. Abortion was no doubt the most extremely enforced doctrine. We certainly weren't allowed to advocate abortion in the classroom. The biology department was compelled to allow the administration to screen guest lecturers. One prominent Civil Rights Activist was uninvited as a guest speaker at commencement because of his pro-abortion stance. People who accuse Catholics of hypocrisy for not equally enforcing sanctions against all non-conformance with doctrine really don't understand Catholicism, and they are trying to enforce their own Manichaean weltanschauung on others.
Because just as they're free to have an opinion on the matter, we're free to have an opinion about the reasoning behind their opinion. We're also free to have an opinion about your attempted well-poisoning.
See my earlier comment. No doubt that Catholic doctrine permits war and capital punishment in certain circumstances, but never permits abortion.
But the bait and switch that dishonest conservatives are making is pretending that this means that a politician that VIOLATES the narrow restrictions that the Church places on the use of war and capital punishment is somehow less "offensive" to Catholic values than a politician that supports abortion rights.
The exceptions for war and capital punishment only matter in this analysis if the politician obeys them.
Why? I haven't heard anyone argue that Obama's achievements don't meet the threshold required for the recipient of an honorary degree, just that he isn't morally worthy. So why should the school not apply a similar moral requirement on the other degree recipients?
I find no such explanation. Perhaps you can point me to it?
I do find Glendon referring to the proclamation that "The Catholic community and Catholic institutions should not honor those who act in defiance of our fundamental moral principles. They should not be given awards, honors or platforms which would suggest support for their actions." Again, why should a student with views identical to Obama's not be exempted? Maybe you don't consider a college diploma to be an award or honor -- but should Notre Dame allow such students onto the Dean's List, or let them be the valedictorian?
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I believe you.
Indeed. For all its faults, Catholicism is pretty consistent in it's distaste for contrary authority. I disagree very strenuously with the very concept of such an authority (which seem wholly contrary to the purpose of a university as a center for rational discussion) but I do respect it as their preference.
Because honoring a politician, who is defined by his politics, and honoring a student for academic achievement just aren't the same and never will be.
Obama opposed the BAIPA because he felt that it did not add any obligation that did not already exist in IL law.
I've yet to see any evidence he's more pro-choice than Clinton (either one), Kerry or any other major Dems. If wanting the legality of abortion-on-demand before 20 weeks gestation is "extreme", then a fair percentage of the country is extreme (tautologically impossible, of course).
Without rehashing the 15 centuries of politics which have presaged this, there is a strong impulse currently in the US (and elsewhere but the US is at the forefront) to ignore episcopal authority. The US Council of Catholic Bishops, which Glendon allies herself with, chose abortion as the issue to assert episcopal authority. This is complicated by the confusion of the role of religion in public life but that is a non-issue to the Glendon matter, the rejection of the medal is not a move against pro-abortion politics but using the tool of abortion against Catholics who reject the authority of Bishops.
Exactly right. Their honoring President Obama in the face of the bishops' directive is evidence that the current ND administration has their priorities in precisely that order.
You could say that the argument, then, is between those who think that's the right order of priorities, and those who think that's the wrong order of priorities.
Interesting piece of writing, cboldt. That you found some piece of trash suggesting that someone draws a connection between being pro-choice and voting for Obama in no way contradicts what I am saying--Catholics consistently poll as majority pro-choice. I also said that majority of Catholics in the US voted for Obama--in fact, I was more specific, saying that majority of Catholic voters supported Obama. I did not make a connection between these two statements, except that both of them support ND's position.
There are at least three levels of decision making on abortion:
1) a decision for oneself
2) a decision for one's family members, e.g., daughter or wife
3) a decision on the national level, i.e. legalization or illegitimizing all abortion.
It is interesting that a number of Republicans and conservatives (Dan Quayle, Dick Cheney and John McCain, among others) support non-interference at level (2), but interference at level (3). The "pro-choice" position, as defined by those who support it, is strictly at level (3). The anti-choicers consistently want to paint the pro-choice position as being at level (1). There absolutely no legitimate reason for the Catholic Church to sanction anyone who is pro-choice at level (3)--this is not a moral position and it does not contradict the Church doctrine. On the other hand, taking a position on levels (1) and (2) is a moral choice. It is perfectly reasonable for anti-abortion advocates to express their opinion to each individual who is trying to make a decision at levels (1) and (2)and to suggest that the choices they make may or may not be immoral. Micromanaging moral decisions, especially for those outside the Church is totally contrary to the long-running Church doctrine, irrespectively of the position of the latest crop of leaders. (And we can always get into the question as to why decisions on abortion are of high moral value, but decisions to join the Nazi movement are not.)
One may raise the question of religious morality in politics in a country that is either relatively monolithic in terms of religion or where there is a single official religion (that would be, a single denomination, for those scoring at home) or in a theocracy. But in a nation religious pluralism and where religion and affairs of state are separated by law, moral absolutism in politics should be unacceptable. This is not to say that an individual politician may not be a moral absolutist. But he also has to recognize that others may not and do not share his opinions--and, even though, he may not consider his positions opinions, others certainly do, and there is nothing wrong with that.
So opposition to child molestation on moral grounds is not OK, but if you come up with a secular reason it's OK?
What about all the atheists against legalized abortion?
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You juxtaposed the two statements (one of them -- how the person voted -- you now contend being utterly irrelevant); and now you say that suggesting (e.g., perhaps by juxtaposition of unrelated observations) that support for Obama correlates with support for pro-choice amounts to trash. Well, here is your own trash:
The assertion, Catholics consistently poll as majority pro-choice, appears and disappears depending on the poll, and how the poll defines "pro-choice." You choose to define it so as to sweep in a majority of Catholics, and the only evidence you offered was the recent election. You can disclaim making a direct connection, I'll concede that much but no more. You invited the reader to make the connection between "voted for Obama" and "holds a pro-choice point of view" on their own.
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The rest of your post is the product of an active imagination. It's a free country, and the Church and individuals are free to speak against and shun politicians as they see fit. Voters (and some churches) will hold politicians accountable for their opinions, as well as their actions.
It's just silly to say that someone who is 'pro-choice' because they would not punish someone for having an abortion is equivalent to someone who advocates for more abortion.
He supported FoCA while in the Senate but now that he's President, he's said it's "not a high priority" (In an interview just a few days ago). Consequently, the bill is languishing in committee in both Houses of Congress. Apparently he sees the wisdom in not fighting the abortion war -- a move I very much agree with.
As to Federally funded abortions, Obama's budget does not repeal the Hyde Amendment (as far as I can see, please correct me if I'm wrong), so that's a non-starter.
Finally, stem-cell research is supported across the political board. I don't see how interjecting it here is useful.
[ Of course, none of this has anything to do with Notre Dame or Glendon, but I've said my peace on them.]
White Catholics:
modernist (7% of electorate): 66% Obama
centrist (6% of electorate): 34% Obama
traditionalist (6% of electorate): 39% Obama
Doing the arithmetic, I come out with 10% of the electorate being white Catholics who voted for McCain, 9% white Catholics who voted for Obama.
What about non-white Catholics? Unfortunately, the article gives no specific numbers, but it does list "Minorities: ethnic Catholics / other Christians" as 6% of the electorate, 74% Obama.
This would include quite a few Protestants, especially among the non-Filipino Asians, but is probably mostly Catholic, given the number of Hispanics in the U.S. So the total Catholic vote undoubtedly did go narrowly to Obama. If we guess that the 6% of the electorate in this category is something like 4 parts Catholic, 2 parts Protestant, and that both parts voted 74% for Obama, that would make 3% of the electorate non-white Catholics who voted for Obama, 1% non-white Catholics who voted for McCain.
Adding up the subtotals, that makes (as a very rough guess) for a Catholic vote that went to Obama by something like a 12-11 ratio. You can diddle with the numbers in the previous paragraph (which are just guesses) and try for 13-10, but that's still a long long way from the alleged 2-1 ratio. Anyone who says that Catholics went two-thirds for Obama last fall seems to be just making stuff up.
And Catholics who actually practice their faith in a more than just social way went heavily for McCain (by nearly 2-1, as it happens, at least for the white ones), though not nearly as heavily as they went for Bush over Kerry (78-22 among white traditionalist Catholics, according to this article).
I don't know that he's tried to repeal the Hyde Amendment, but I'm sure he opposes it, and he rescinded the Mexico City Policy.
You're right, I shouldn't have characterized support for federally funded embryonic stem cell research as extreme, even though many who support embryonic stem cell research have been told for years that there was an actual ban on the research and not simply on federal funding.
I think the point stands, though, that simply being pro-choice in not wanting government to interfere with abortion is a far cry from the NARAL and ACLU agenda, which Barack Obama wholeheartedly supports in his voting record despite rhetoric that makes him appear sympathetic to pro-lifers.
Even if he says that he believes that the state "can" prevent late-term abortions, it doesn't mean that he would ever actually vote for a bill that does so, and in fact he has not.
That's patently untrue. Wherever you want to set the threshold for moral worthiness, the vast majority of those individuals will never receive an honorary degree from Notre Dame or any other Catholic institution.
No. I made two statements in support of ND's invitation and honor for Obama and in opposition to any demands for withdrawal of said invitation and honor. At no point did I 1) juxtapose them or 2) correlate them. They were two unrelated statements that served a similar purpose.
You--and only you--had claimed that someone that you found elsewhere suggested that there was a relation between two. I responded that any attempt to relate the two together was nonsensical and, yes, made a condescending comment about your source, referring to it as "trash".
You choose to define it so as to sweep in a majority of Catholics, and the only evidence you offered was the recent election. You can disclaim making a direct connection, I'll concede that much but no more.
I made no such contention of any kind--direct or indirect. As I said, the statements--clearly separated by periods (.) were made in support of an entirely different point and not of each other. If your reading comprehension is at 3rd grade level, why are you trying to argue with adults?
It's a free country, and the Church and individuals are free to speak against and shun politicians as they see fit.
Precisely. And congregations and organizations affiliated with the Church may agree or disagree with the proclamations. But, in fact, "the Church" made no specific proclamation for shunning Obama. And granting of an honorary degree--let alone inviting one to be a commencement speaker--is not a Church activity or a religious activity, by any stretch of imagination. So even if the Church proclaimed a self-professed Catholic a persona non grata at religious services--effectively, excommunicating them, although possibly without that specific language--this would not affect social events that are held separately from religious services.
As an American citizen, I am far more concerned about adults buggering children and adolescents--something that they know to be immoral and irresponsible--than I am concerned about others making their own choices according to their own moral precepts. Therefore, I am supportive of politicians who are not interested in poking their heads or hands into private bedrooms and are not interested in making medical decisions for the rest of us.
If you want to defer your own decisions to another entity--one, in fact, in another State--it is your prerogative. Some other people may choose to do the same--and I don't begrudge them that choice. But don't go around telling others that they should do likewise if they don't share your religion or your moral codex. In fact, those deferring their own decisions to the Church suggest that they are incapable of thinking for the themselves. Why should the rest of us let them speak for us when they can't even speak for themselves?
Oren wrote:
So opposition to child molestation on moral grounds is not OK, but if you come up with a secular reason it's OK?
What about all the atheists against legalized abortion?
Interesting--are you suggesting that atheists cannot make moral choices? Is there no secular morality? Are there no moral norms we can agree (most of the time) without having to resort to religion?
One need not go very far to verify this--compare, for example, the Code of Hammurabi with Biblical ethics. Last I checked, Hammurabi was not a Christian. Nor was he a member of any "Abrahamic" cult or even a monotheist. And the codex appears to be purely secular--with no references to religion of any kind.
In a secular state, laws are passed on pragmatic grounds. Where they are not, you have a theocracy. Do you live in a theocracy, Oren?
I am just curious, how many "atheists" will you find that oppose legal abortions without reservation? Unlike religious fanatics, atheists usually also know limitations of their beliefs, although, I am sure, there are plenty of self-proclaimed atheists who are fanatics too--a number of East European and East Asian graves will attest to that.
— Catholics consistently poll as majority pro-choice. —
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Zogby/Lemoyne Poll - October 2008. As to when should abortion be allowed, 21.7% responded "never," and another 42.5% (cum 64.1%) "only in the case of rape/incest." 18.3% of the Catholics polled support abortion on demand. Other polls produce differing results, and illuminate the ease with which dishonest advocates can paint a false impression by not disclosing their definitions.
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If your reading comprehension is at 3rd grade level --
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Look up the definition of "juxtapose." It's no surprise that you didn't comprehend my criticism.
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I found (and conceded) that the two sentences (one immediately after the other) were logically disconnected; and went on to say that placing them one after the other invited the reader to make an assertion/evidence connection. "A majority of Catholics are pro-choice. Two thirds of the Catholic vote in 2008 went to Obama." The other choice a reader has is to take the first sentence as a naked claim that a majority of Catholics are pro-choice.
Because just as they're free to have an opinion on the matter, we're free to have an opinion about the reasoning behind their opinion. We're also free to have an opinion about your attempted well-poisoning.
Well, duh, of course you're free to have an opinion. Has anyone suggested anything else? The question is whether there's any point to having one about somebody else's dispute?
And what could you possibly mean by "well poisoning?" The water looked pretty dodgy long before I got here.
Actually, the US conference, like the Vatican, has been very careful in rhetorically supporting conservative Catholics while not imposing ultimate sanctions on dissenters.
Further, the Holy See has been quite firm in its opposition to capital punishment and war in the circumstances where it has been advocated by US Republicans. So in order to maintain the position conservative Catholics maintain, they have to declare that what the Vatican says on these matters doesn't actually matter, which is a strange position for someone claiming to be a "devout" Catholic to take.
And Catholics who actually practice their faith in a more than just social way went heavily for McCain (by nearly 2-1, as it happens, at least for the white ones), though not nearly as heavily as they went for Bush over Kerry (78-22 among white traditionalist Catholics, according to this article).
Weekly (or more frequent) churchgoers are Republican voters at about a 65-66% clip--and this is fairly consistent through the last four or five election cycles (including the last three presidential elections). This is the same for Catholics as it is for other Christians--and, yes, "churchgoers" above does imply Christians. So, yes, it is quite reasonable to conclude that the more conservative Catholics voted for McCain at a 2-to-1 rate.
Now, for the total numbers. It seemed reasonable to try to verify the 9% margin figure. Indeed, some early estimates suggested the 54%-45% spread, which would put the difference at 9%. Here is one early report.
However, later reports put the margin much higher, listing Obama's "take" at "over 55%". So, while the final spread was not 2:1, it was substantial.
It is also important to note how this came about. Bush gained roughly the same share of "weekly or more often" church-goer vote by roughly the same margin against both Gore and Kerry. It was essentially the same margin as McCain's. The "less than weekly" Catholics dropped somewhat from Gore to Kerry, but still were close to 2:1 margin for the Democrat. More importantly, the fraction of "less than weekly" voters dropped somewhat from 2000 to 2004, leaving Bush with a greater total Catholic vote against Kerry than against Gore. However, in 2008, both the share and the Dem spread of "less than weekly" Catholic voters increased, leaving Obama with substantially greater share of the Catholic vote than was initially predicted.
So I was wrong on the numbers in the initial estimate, but the point remains the same--majority of Catholics support choice, majority of Catholics support Obama, majority of Notre Dame students want Obama both as a speaker and an honoree, and it's hard to argue with 97% senior telling the critics to f@ off.
The broader point is hard to ignore as well. American Catholics are not one-issue voters. The frequent church-goers are already substantially more conservative--which is why the margin is similar irrespectively of the denomination. But the more casual Catholics are substantially more liberal than either Evangelical or mainline Protestant Christians, and this remained so historically despite changing demographics--both ethnic and socio-economic.
OK, I can play that game. Let's try... Encarta:
I neither suggested a link between them nor a contrast between them. I cited both as argument for a third proposition, as I mentioned several times now. The usual problem with conservative positions is that they don't allow for middle ground. Aristotle is long dead--live with it!
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You put them side by side. That makes them juxtaposed. Then you say they aren't juxtaposed. That just makes you look stupid.
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You make serious unsubstantiated false assertions too ... "the point remains the same--majority of Catholics support choice," but you dodge the definition of "choice." And how about that "97% of seniors" figure that you're so proud of -- what exactly does that represent?
I suggested no such thing, I believe no such thing.
You wrote that moral absolutism has no place in politics in the context of abortion and I ask why the motivation could possibly matter -- hence the hypothetical why I should care more about those seeking to end child molestation because they are motivated by a moral absolutism versus ones motivated by secular pragmatism. In either case, their proposition ought to be evaluated on the merits.
One need not go very far to verify this--compare, for example, the Code of Hammurabi with Biblical ethics. Last I checked, Hammurabi was not a Christian. Nor was he a member of any "Abrahamic" cult or even a monotheist. And the codex appears to be purely secular--with no references to religion of any kind.
I live in a republic (well, Commonwealth of MA) where the laws are passed on populist grounds. Sometimes the populace is pragmatic, sometimes religiously motivated, sometimes they just vote a particular way because they feel like it.
Most of them aren't "no reservation" types. I've actually never met anyone that was opposed to abortion in rape/incest/health cases (although, some will say "mental health" is not in the same category, a detail that isn't really relevant). The atheist logic usually used to justify the more restrictive position is one of basic choice -- we have contraceptive tools available to us now that make it virtually impossible to unintentionally get pregnant without essentially being negligent. With the wide availability of Plan B, even failure to use contraceptives ahead of time can be taken care of promptly. A few actually propose a one-abortion limit (RIH exceptions apply) on the theory that the first unwanted pregnancy should really be a wake-up call to get on birth control.
Of course, most of them would make allowances for the failure of properly-used birth control and severe uncurable birth defects that would result in certain painful death at a young age. To them, the availability of on-demand abortion is a crutch that is preventing women from taking forward control of their lives (combined with the normal human weakness at judging the consequences of rare events before they become "real").
Well-poisoning is a type logic fallacy where someone, rather than addressing arguments, attempts to forestall adebate entirely by preemptively declaring that only certain classes of people are even entitled to engage in the debate.
Surprise, surprise! We are in the same location, more or less. That means that it would be fair to ask you who makes the laws in the Commonwealth of MA. Is it the "sometimes pragmatic, sometimes religiously motivated" public, or is it someone else--say, elected officials? I did not question the motivations of the "public". I questioned the motivations of two quite distinct groups--religious leaders and public officials (elected or otherwise).
Most of them aren't "no reservation" types. I've actually never met anyone that was opposed to abortion in rape/incest/health cases (although, some will say "mental health" is not in the same category, a detail that isn't really relevant). The atheist logic usually used to justify the more restrictive position is one of basic choice -- we have contraceptive tools available to us now that make it virtually impossible to unintentionally get pregnant without essentially being negligent.
Apparently, your world is smaller than mine. I've met quite a few religiously motivated anti-choicers--some happen to be people I know, others are random protesters that I've been known to engage once in a while. Yet another group are activists and/or public officials whose views are exposed in print--either of their own volition, in an attempt to publicize their cause, or by reporters, when they give brief profiles of the movers and shakers. And a number of these people have an absolute position on abortion--not now, not ever, not for any reason. Perhaps you've heard of the scandal in Brazil just a couple of months ago when members of a certain Christian denomination very angrily protested (down to physical confrontations) a decision to allow an abortion procedure to be performed on an eight year-old girl victim of an incest rape (never mind the fact that a pregnancy, at her age, threatened her life in and of itself). If you think this kind of nonsense only happens in backwards countries like Brazil (no offense to Brazil--that's not my own view), you'd be mistaken. There are large groups of people in this country who hold the same views. There are also people in the Vatican who promote this approach. And this is why we are supposed to protest Notre Dame's decision to let Obama give a commencement address and to give him an honorary degree? So that we can let eight-year-old rape victims die?
You wrote that moral absolutism has no place in politics in the context of abortion ...
Actually, you should have stopped before getting to the context--at least, this way, you would have had a correct statement. Motivation matters for a very simple reason--I don't wish to live in a theocracy. Apparently, you don't care.
Oh, BTW, cboldt--thanks for making my argument for me.
In the transcript of the 30 March 2001 Illinois Senate hearings on the Illinois version of the law (the Induced Birth Infant Liability Act), Obama states (cf. p.85) two reasons for his opposition: first, that extending protection to children before they are viable crosses the line into unconstitutionality, in his view regardless of whether they are inside or outside the womb. Second, that requiring medical care for children before they are viable also crosses the line into unconstitutionality. He states that accepting the premises of the bill would necessarily outlaw abortions. I think this twisted logic speaks for itself, but I submit that further contortions would be necessary to turn this into an argument that Obama opposed the bill because "it did not add any obligation that did not already exist in IL law."
In re this view being mainstream, clearly "wanting the legality of abortion-on-demand before 20 weeks gestation" is not the issue at stake here. What is at stake is the difference betweeen abortion and infanticide. Obama supports infanticide, at least for infants born before full term. I doubt you will find many Americans that support that position, and yes, he is more radical than either Kerry or Hillary Clinton, neither of whom can fairly be described as supporting infanticide, and both of whom supported BAIPA. Even NARAL supported BAIPA.
In interviews and speeches, Obama has repeatedly described children as "burdens" and "punishment". I think you're being obtuse about his anti-life views.
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That you're engaging in intellectually dishonesty by making false unsubstantiated assertions and you look stupid because you misconstrue the word "juxtapose?" My pleasure.
I hope the elected officials have no ulterior motivation other that to implement the preferences of the voters. Sometimes, they take up bills (proposals to amend the MA Constitution to ban gay marriage, for instance) that are explicitly religiously motivated.
Last November, The People got to make law directly (legalizing marijuana and criminalizing dog racing) because our legislators were not in tune. Their motivation in those two initiative votes is also beyond my ability to discern.
"We" aren't supposed to protest anything. Those people (Glendon) that believe that ND must follow the teachings of the Catholic Church are supposed to protest.
Your inability to see middle ground, of course, is no one's fault but your own.
I don't want to live in a theocracy, but I believe in Public Choice and, where The People are motivated by religion to pass a law (say, feeding the poor), I am in no position to object. The People are entitled to feed the poor (criminalize the molesters) for religious motivations or for secular motivations -- it doesn't matter.
"Last November, The People got to make law directly (legalizing marijuana and criminalizing dog racing) because our legislators were not in tune. Their motivation in those two initiative votes is also beyond my ability to discern."
Enemies of the people like to dog race. Friends of the people get high. Is it really that complicated?
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I left the hard evidence of your rank intellectual dishonesty, with links, upthread. It's not a matter of sounding or appearing convincing, it's a question of actually producing evidence. Which you haven't. Which you can't, because you are promoting complete and utterly false fabrications as truths.
Ah yes, but do they get high to seek Godliness or just to enhance their premarital homosexual relations?
Of course there is, Oren, but this woman's life has been spent on specific causes, and she was here to be awarded for those efforts, which award she's declining because of its association with a guy who tirelessly works against her causes. Again, what's the big deal here? Her's is a principled action.
It's a free country -- you can define your entire intellectual life with respect to your position on one issue -- but that doesn't mean anyone has to take you seriously unless you engage the world more broadly.
Not that she's making any statement about her entire intellectual life, or excluding all others, as you mention. This award was for specific work, not her gardening, competitive archery, antique sewing machines or whatever else she might be involved in. Obama works passionately against her work, and she's responding, and you don't take her seriously. That all works for me.
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He's free to use and advocate that test, but on it's face, it amounts to an unprincipled discounting of probably the better advocates for any position.
It discounts the most extreme and myopic. Politics is the art of the possible compromise. Given even a small sample of a few hundred US citizens, it is impossible to find even a small subset that agrees completely on any subset of the issues. Instead, if you tell that sample they can make rules by majority-rule, they naturally form coalitions in which the members compromise their least-important positions in order to further their most-important ones.
The question for each individual when evaluating under what terms to join a coalition is then how to properly weight those positions. Is it better to join a coalition where you agree tepidly to most of the policies versus a competing coalition with which you agree strongly in a few important positions but don't really support the rest.
That is to say, is the best politics about finding the policies with the most fervent public support or, conversely, about finding the policies with the fewest detractors. This is another species of the perennial debate about the Condorcet method, which posits that policies with broad but shallow support from a large supermajority ought to win against politics with narrow majorities but deep support (contrary to plurality methods).
Every individual must judge that for herself, but it seems to me evident that the former strategy maximizes the total net utility of the group.
Incidentally, I don't discount the arguments, I just discount the idea that it makes any sense to accept a leader who agrees with them on $ISSUE but whose rest of the "policy package" is objectionable or just apathy-inspiring. We are not a direct democracy and, like it or not, policy choices are bundled -- for someone like me that supports both the RKBA and broad social freedoms, the trip to the ballot box each November is a wrenching compromise.
-- I don't discount the arguments ... --
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In the context of this thread, your position seems to one that discounts (in the sense of "diminishes" (i.e. this person is not to be taken seriously), not in the sense of "ignores" or "utterly repudiates") Mary Ann Glendon's statement and action because you cast her (perhaps properly, but no matter) as being fixated on a single issue.
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Your mileage varies, but I tend to find those who focus on certain issues to have developed a superior repertoire of fact and argument on the subject. Agreed that many fixated people are kooks, and their "facts" and arguments quickly show this.
Heck, yes. Defeat 'em in detail. Demonize 'em. Club 'em over the head, take their scalps and put 'em on your belt, then turn 'em in for bounty at the territorial campaign cash office.
Your inability to see middle ground, of course, is no one's fault but your own.
I see "middle ground" quite clearly: "they" protest, "we" laugh at them. Taking "them" seriously on an absurd issue is not middle ground.
Of course, this kind of decision involves moral judgment, at some point. Consider, for example: "they" want a right to vote, "we" laugh at them.
The point in the latter case is that if enough people see "their" right to vote as a clear moral choice, pretty soon laughing at "them" is no longer an option.
The difference in these two cases is clear--in ND case, the chances of popular support on moral grounds are nil. "They" are not interested in changing people's minds--"they" only want to change the minds of decision makers. If "they" can't change their minds, "they" want to twist their arms. This is what happens with a disgruntled minority that has disproportionate power. Of course, some people think that the volume of their whining represents the true strength of their arguments.
Well-poisoning is a type logic fallacy where someone, rather than addressing arguments, attempts to forestall adebate entirely by preemptively declaring that only certain classes of people are even entitled to engage in the debate.
Never heard of that one. Do you have a source? And how does "a lot of people are getting awfully worked up over something that is not their business" amount to forestalling debate or telling people they are not "entitled" to waste their mental and emotional energy any way they please?
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