[Dialogue] Emailing: Abortion A Matter of Power, Not God - CommonDreams.org.htm

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Published on Monday, August 11, 2008 by the
<http://www.recordpub.com/news/article/4220662> Kent-Ravenna Record
Publisher (Ohio) 

Abortion: A Matter of Power, Not God

by Caroline Arnold

The moribund Bush administration has proposed new Health & Human Services
regulations that would cut off funds to health care providers who fired or
refused to hire people who object to abortion or contraception for religious
or moral beliefs.

Never mind that workers are already protected against such discrimination -
though it is not reciprocal: Catholic hospitals have no obligation to hire
pro-choice workers or respect moral convictions about contraception or HIV.

Recently I've received comments about my views on abortion. I am always
gratified when readers respond to the issues I raise, and often find their
criticisms helpful in shaping my thinking. But I find myself unpersuaded by
arguments that human life begins at conception and that abortion is
therefore murder.

I can't accept, either as a matter of personal conscience, or of my
commitment to my neighbors and the planet we live on, that we should invest
scarce resources, argue endlessly and fruitlessly, and punish women, neglect
children and forestall medical research in order to keep every fertilized
ovum alive.

I believe we have more important things to do - making sure children already
born have enough to eat, medical care and education, and learning to live
together without killing each other and consuming the planet we live on.

I don't think the abortion question is about religion, except insofar as
most religious people think that God doesn't like it because it destroys a
human life. What kind of a god worries about the destruction of some
unviable human tissue but designs human reproductive systems with a 50
percent attrition rate? What kind of god gives males the choice to conceive
a baby but doesn't give females the choice to reject it? What kind of god
allows older children to starve so that younger ones may be born, or permits
babies to be born to a life of want, violence and fear? Not one I want to
have anything to do with. And I won't accept the "It was ever thus" argument
about human frailty. Just because we humans have always done badly doesn't
excuse us from trying to do better, for ourselves, because we are all one
family.

That said, however, I have to retreat a step. I do have a kind of religious
faith, pretty much defined by what it is not. The Skeptic in me demands that
the utilitarian condition must be satisfied - God cannot be less than as
source of Goodness - love, grace, fulfillment - that is available to all
creatures and living systems. But my Resident Mystic keeps insisting that a
God worthy of human experience must be more than a bearded old man obsessed
with sex and virgins, strewing goodness about while withholding it from
sinners and showering wealth on entrepreneurial men, handing down Ten
Immutable Rules for human behavior, torturing the wicked, and advising
George W. Bush on how to conduct his war on terror. I believe we are called
to imagine a God of Truth and Uncertainty, Beauty and Disorder, Joy and
Loss, while we are challenged to love our neighbors and seek to live with
them in peace.

But neither the Skeptic's God nor the Mystic's God speaks to me about
abortion. Abortion isn't about God, it's about power. And it's not even
about male power vs. female rights - only whether a person is to be allowed
to make decisions about her or his body independent of the rules of
religion, society or the civic order. The prevailing mythology today is that
women cannot be trusted to make the right decision or take responsibility
for their bodies and must be forced to do so by law. Men are excused from
responsibility because sex is "natural" for them. And Viagra, Cialis, and
other male sex-enhancing materials are big sellers in our society.

What I don't understand - but find infinitely galling - is why
anti-abortionists feel it is their right to despise my conscience, control
my thinking, dictate my behavior, and criminalize a private medical
procedure. I don't tell them what they can and can't do, or try to make laws
or constitutional amendments to force their compliance with my beliefs.

The late John Seiberling was threatened in 1972 by Right-to-Lifers who
claimed they would defeat him if he didn't vote to restrict abortion.

"Well, that's all right," he replied, "because if I can't vote my conscience
in Congress, I don't want the job." He won (75% - 25%), he believed, because
he stood up for his conscience.

Once again we are looking into a deep chasm between those who believe that
human governance is a matter of blind obedience/uncritical acceptance of
sacred or secular laws and authority, and those who believe that we must
govern ourselves from individual conscience and shared values.

I don't know if the latter is even possible on a planet now largely owned by
private corporations, bristling with nuclear weapons, overpopulated with
hungry, hopeful masses, and overheating by the desires and habits of men.

I do believe that if it is to be done at all, we humans - male and female,
all ages, colors and beliefs - will have to do it ourselves. We can't expect
a deus ex machina, Grand Plan, or U.S. president to save us.

We don't need more fascist regulations that override individual conscience
on abortion. As we choose a new president and administration we do need
honest elections, and candidates of conscience who will help us generate the
laws and processes needed to stop killing and torturing humans already born,
and start addressing the apocalyptic challenges of an endangered species on
a threatened planet.

Before joining Senator Glenn's Washington staff in 1985, Caroline Arnold
<mailto:csarnold at neo.rr.com>  founded a successful small business and served
three terms on the Kent (OH) Board of Education. In retirement she is active
with civic and environmental organizations in Kent.

Copyright Record Publishing Co, LLC. 1995-2008

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18 Comments so far 


1.	

	victoria August 11th, 2008 1:45 pm 

	Thanks for article-Articulate people needs to continue to let others
know there are people who share their views -

2.	

	JaneM August 11th, 2008 1:58 pm 

	No one will ever convince me it's in my best interest for someone
else to be able to determine whether or not I have a child. You're right, we
have much more difficult decisions facing us. This should be off-limits.

3.	

	Nietzsche August 11th, 2008 2:02 pm 

	Most communities reserve a place of honor for a retarded child. As
she grows up, everyone cooperates in making some sort of accommodation for
her to contribute, if only minimally to the general welfare.

	Everyone makes allowances for her, and tolerates her mistakes/social
gaffs that they would never allow anyone else to get away with.

	The most outrageous thing I have ever seen is the village idiot
being elected mayor, put on display, allowed to give foreign dignitaries
back rubs, talk with his mouth full, letting food fall out, given the
microphone to advertise his stupidity.

	Way back when the rich family in Texas held him up to public
ridicule by making him governor of Texas, Carl Rove is reputed to have said
"I can make (even) that guy president." And he did.

	What I find unbelievable is that the rich Bush family would allow
their retarded son to be a figurehead to be laughed at the world over while
the neocons used him as they pleased.

	It also says a little something about the American public that he
served two terms.

	I am old now and thought I had seen everything. Was I ever wrong.

4.	

	AdeleTheCzech August 11th, 2008 2:22 pm 

	I'm a staunch supporter of Roe v. Wade, but I do think that Catholic
hospitals have no obligation to hire pro-choice or pro-contraception
workers; that seems to me to be an important component of religious freedom.
So is the Catholic tenet (still in effect, I believe) that if during a
difficult delivery a choice to save the life of the mother or the baby must
be made, the baby is saved. This is why I went to a NON-CATHOLIC hospital to
have my baby, some years ago - one can respect people of many faiths without
subjecting oneself to beliefs profoundly disagreed with!

	That said, the proposed HHS regulations, which would cut off funds
to medical providers who "fired or refused to hire people who object to
abortion or contraception" on religious or moral grounds is a much more
murky area. Refusing to hire a qualified nurse because she's anti-abortion
seems rather draconian. Presumably that nurse could be hired for a unit
other than obstetrics, where it's not an issue. On the other hand, if
there's no opening other than in the obstetrics unit, one could argue that
her full participation in the O.R. could not be counted upon because she
would refuse to assist with an abortion. This is a moral dilemma, and to my
mind it won't do to approach it simplistically and/or ideologically.

	Caroline Arnold is a fine writer, but here she has so
over-emphasized the feminist perspective that all subtlety is lost.

5.	

	marc melchiori August 11th, 2008 2:23 pm 

	nietzshe - Don't ever think you know everything despite your age and
life experiences. I know plenty of older people that fit your description of
the president.

6.	

	Nietzsche August 11th, 2008 2:46 pm 

	Yes but they are not the president. I don't understand your point
marc.

7.	

	ZeroPointField August 11th, 2008 3:01 pm 

	Screw Religion
A Woman should have the same power over her own body that a many has. Nobody
has yet created a law that requires a man to do something to his body that
he does not want to do.

8.	

	fpie August 11th, 2008 3:02 pm 

	How far does the requirement to hire medical personel who have
objections of conscience to their duties? Would a hospital be required to
employ a Christian Scientist? As I understand, that religion forbids almost
all of what is thought of as modern medical intervention. There is a
difference between reigious discrimination and a person who disqualifies
him/herself by being unwilling to perform the duties stated in a job
description.

9.	

	lpenek August 11th, 2008 3:06 pm 

	I don't understand marc's point either. Nietzshe's point, well said,
was that we've been made a laughing stock by a fool and the people who put
him there. Ultimately, the joke really is on us I guess, since 50% of us
voted for him. I wish I could say "tricked into voting for him" but
unfortunately I don't think that's true.

10.	

	Cedar August 11th, 2008 4:58 pm 

	As I recall the Catholic Church said nothing about Family Planning -
until they were out bred by Italian Protestants and started losing
elections.

11.	

	charliej August 11th, 2008 5:01 pm 

	My thoughts. 

	One might suggest, from reading religious literature around the
world that:

	1. Life, in all its forms, is a sacred treasure.

	2. Self-determination (including bodily) is the essence of
individual freedom and dignity. 

	Both of these are entered into fully in the public debate regarding
abortion and family planning. However there are differences between personal
(and private) decisions and polity.

12.	

	GKL August 11th, 2008 5:58 pm 

	Does any other human being, especially a man, have the right to
judge a woman for having an abortion? Sometimes an abortion is the only
merciful option.

13.	

	tetti_tatti August 11th, 2008 6:38 pm 

	Catholics love life before one's born, but after birth Catholics
have little respect for human life, as their bloody history of
mass-murdering scores of heretics, muslins and jews proves it.

	A woman's body belongs to her alone.

14.	

	Truth_Forward August 11th, 2008 7:10 pm 

	The Catholic Church has much more pressing issues to deal with than
abortion. They should expend just as much engery trying weed out pedophile
priests.

15.	

	Nietzsche August 11th, 2008 7:13 pm 

	It is outrageous that men have been telling women what to do for so
long.

	"If men had periods Percodan would be an over-the-counter drug"

16.	

	victoria August 11th, 2008 7:41 pm 

	The problem with this new regulation is-- when you go to a pharmacy
to get any form of birth control and the pharmacy has hired people that
don't believe in birth control -they won't fill your prescription or sell
the birth control to you.

	Just go to another pharmacy you say-What if it is the only one
around? Just come back on another shift you say? What if you have just been
raped and just barely have made it out to do this pick up? A woman should
not be denied birth control when she needs help --and that is what those
opposed to birth control want to see happen because to them any kind of
birth control is abortion.

17.	

	poopdeck August 11th, 2008 7:41 pm 

	The American icon Benjamin Franklin would instantly recognize the
planned redefinition of abortion by the Bush Administration as a relapse to
"Proprietorship Rule", one form of British colonial government of the 18-th
Century by which "Proprietors" such as the Penn family of Pennsylvania were
given their "property" as a sort of medieval fiefdom by the British Crown,
the only power to which they were accountable. Yes, the "Proprietorship
Pennsylvania" had an Assembly but it could not make laws and the
"Proprietor" might but did not have to consult it.
The huge difference between the Penn family and the Bush family is that the
former were accountable to a higher power, namely the British Crown which
occasionally though rarely ruled against them. To whom does our President
believe that he is accountable when he promulgates what is in essence a new
law? Not his own father according to his testimony.
Benjamin Franklin fought the Penn's tooth and nail but really succeeded only
when the colonies broke away from England. Today we need our own Benjamin
Franklin's to fight such destructive power grabs by U.S. Presidents and our
own Washington's, Adams's, and Jefferson's to break away from the
"Proprietor Presidency." Mr. President you do not own our country!

18.	

	RuthK August 11th, 2008 7:49 pm 

	I believe in a God. I believe in the continuation of the spirit and
that, at some point, all of us will have to account for ourselves. The
church that I attended as a child emphasized the individual's responsibility
to seek a moral way of life. The only politics I ever heard were prayers
that our leaders would be guided. We were never told how to vote. We were
not taught that everyone who disagreed with us was wrong. Rather, we were to
look for the beam in our one eye before complaining about the mote in our
brother's eye.

	Religion has changed dramatically. It has now become incorporated
and infused with politics. It has deserted God in favor of attaining
political power and domination over all of us. It viciously attacks anyone
who does not agree with all of its ideas.

	Morality, according to some religious people, consists of being
against abortion and homosexuality. It is as if these were the only topics.
There are many other issues; poverty, child abuse, the destruction of our
planet, hypocrisy, and so on.

	When I quite going to church, I still had respect for religion. I
simply believed that it had changed to much to be the religion that I was
taught. As time passes, I have become afraid of it. "Religious" people seem
to be increasingly nasty. The only way I can preserve my own faith is to
avoid them.

	I am also old enough (72) to remember when abortion was supposed to
be illegal. It never was. The rich did as they pleased (as always). The
middle class had the medical care and information to help them plan their
families. If not, they could afford to have a safe, albeit illegal,
abortion. The poor had little information, medical care, or access to safe
abortions.

	Regardless of arguments about the morality of abortion, the fact
that anti-abortion laws were and could again be enforced on the basis of
economic class really angers me. That is the real issue.


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