5 ms·

First, curious to see that cited. Second, Anti-abortion people are ok with causing significant harm to women and see their lives as less valuable and not worth

First, curious to see that cited. Second, Anti-abortion people are ok with causing significant harm to women and see their lives as less valuable and not worth protecting.

verisimi 4y ago
Are latent baby lives not worth protecting?
- kennywinker 4y ago
  Why would you prioritize a “latent” life over an actual life? Anti-choice people only seem to care about others up until birth, at which point your poverty is your own problem and you shouldn’t have had so many kids.
  - wyager 4y ago
    Do you think anti-abortion activists would be OK with state-sanctioned intentional murder of babies who have been born? That would be the prediction of your model if it was applied consistently. Being against (what you believe to be) murder should be very easily distinguishable from being in favor of whatever flavor of welfare program you're thinking about.
    - kennywinker 4y ago
      That's how anti-choice people want to frame the argument, but that's not the only "applied consistently" frame available, and frankly it's not one that I'm interested in. The decision is to carry a child to term, or to not carry a child to term - the "murder" (as some see it) is a consequence of the decision, not the decision itself. Nobody is choosing to have an abortion in order to kill. So, applying that consistently, if you believe that fetuses are people, the question would be - are you ok with people being able to make legal ("state-sanctioned") choices that result in the death of other people? And of course we all are ok with that to some degree - driving is legal (40k/year dead in the USA), as is gun ownership (30k/year), as is deregulating the EPA (unknowable but large numbers of cancer deaths), and climate inaction (unknowable and growing numbers of climate related deaths).
      - verisimi 4y ago
        'My decision was whether I would pull the trigger or not to pull the trigger, not to commit a murder!'
        kennywinker 4y ago
        We're pretty happy to accept "I pulled the trigger because I thought my life was in danger" as a reason to not punish someone for killing... many are happy with "I pulled the trigger because I thought my property was in danger". Some are even happy with "I pulled the trigger because they were threatening me for pointing a gun at them". The reason for the trigger pull, it turns out, matters quite a bit to people.
      - wyager 4y ago
        You seem to be mistaking me for an anti-abortion person. I don't think you are engaging in this conversation at the right (non-object) level, and are engaging in a completely unrelated argument entirely, so I'm respectfully going to cut this off here.
        kennywinker 4y ago
        I did not mistake you for someone who believed that. I took you for someone relating an argument that requires adopting a framing that I don’t hold and does not interest me
      - aksss 4y ago
        > people being able to make legal choices that result in the death of other people? ... gun ownership (*30k/year*) As must be frequently pointed out, well over half the deaths by firearm in the US are not the killing of other people, but suicides. Of the killing of "other people", I'd wager a minority of those are associated with legal ownership - prior surveys of inmates in the US in prison for gun related offenses (not just homicide) show a great portion (40+%) obtained the gun used for the offense from an illegal source. I'm guessing this representation of illegal ownership goes up when you filter for just homicide offenses (the killing of other people) and when you consider whether the possession itself was legal, even if obtained from a legal source. Manslaughter or the killing of other people outside of homicides/suicides are in the low single percentage digits of the total figure.
wyager 4y ago
If it wasn't true, there would have to be a Simpson's paradox of epic proportions to account for the improved mental health outcomes of anti-abortion-aligned demographics. Pro-abortion republicans would have to be the happiest people in the world by a huge margin. This isn't an argument about whether abortion is moral. Please don't bring this down to an object-level argument about abortion - I have zero interest in that. This is about the psychological states of groups who believe in the presence of an urgent moral crisis.

First, curious to see that cited. Second, Anti-abortion people are ok with causing significant harm to women and see their lives as less valuable and not worth protecting.

verisimi 4y ago

Are latent baby lives not worth protecting?

kennywinker 4y ago
Why would you prioritize a “latent” life over an actual life? Anti-choice people only seem to care about others up until birth, at which point your poverty is your own problem and you shouldn’t have had so many kids.
- wyager 4y ago
  Do you think anti-abortion activists would be OK with state-sanctioned intentional murder of babies who have been born? That would be the prediction of your model if it was applied consistently. Being against (what you believe to be) murder should be very easily distinguishable from being in favor of whatever flavor of welfare program you're thinking about.
  - kennywinker 4y ago
    That's how anti-choice people want to frame the argument, but that's not the only "applied consistently" frame available, and frankly it's not one that I'm interested in. The decision is to carry a child to term, or to not carry a child to term - the "murder" (as some see it) is a consequence of the decision, not the decision itself. Nobody is choosing to have an abortion in order to kill. So, applying that consistently, if you believe that fetuses are people, the question would be - are you ok with people being able to make legal ("state-sanctioned") choices that result in the death of other people? And of course we all are ok with that to some degree - driving is legal (40k/year dead in the USA), as is gun ownership (30k/year), as is deregulating the EPA (unknowable but large numbers of cancer deaths), and climate inaction (unknowable and growing numbers of climate related deaths).
    - verisimi 4y ago
      'My decision was whether I would pull the trigger or not to pull the trigger, not to commit a murder!'
      - kennywinker 4y ago
        We're pretty happy to accept "I pulled the trigger because I thought my life was in danger" as a reason to not punish someone for killing... many are happy with "I pulled the trigger because I thought my property was in danger". Some are even happy with "I pulled the trigger because they were threatening me for pointing a gun at them". The reason for the trigger pull, it turns out, matters quite a bit to people.
    - wyager 4y ago
      You seem to be mistaking me for an anti-abortion person. I don't think you are engaging in this conversation at the right (non-object) level, and are engaging in a completely unrelated argument entirely, so I'm respectfully going to cut this off here.
      - kennywinker 4y ago
        I did not mistake you for someone who believed that. I took you for someone relating an argument that requires adopting a framing that I don’t hold and does not interest me
    - aksss 4y ago
      > people being able to make legal choices that result in the death of other people? ... gun ownership (*30k/year*) As must be frequently pointed out, well over half the deaths by firearm in the US are not the killing of other people, but suicides. Of the killing of "other people", I'd wager a minority of those are associated with legal ownership - prior surveys of inmates in the US in prison for gun related offenses (not just homicide) show a great portion (40+%) obtained the gun used for the offense from an illegal source. I'm guessing this representation of illegal ownership goes up when you filter for just homicide offenses (the killing of other people) and when you consider whether the possession itself was legal, even if obtained from a legal source. Manslaughter or the killing of other people outside of homicides/suicides are in the low single percentage digits of the total figure.

wyager 4y ago

If it wasn't true, there would have to be a Simpson's paradox of epic proportions to account for the improved mental health outcomes of anti-abortion-aligned demographics. Pro-abortion republicans would have to be the happiest people in the world by a huge margin. This isn't an argument about whether abortion is moral. Please don't bring this down to an object-level argument about abortion - I have zero interest in that. This is about the psychological states of groups who believe in the presence of an urgent moral crisis.