The Right Scoop
Obama needs Jesus, just like any other person in this country that favors this Bull**** I have never seen any other president as anti-Christian as this dude, Osama bin laden, Obama bin laden, somedays I cant tell the difference.
I'm going to give some personal context to my opinions on this thread.
At this moment, a young woman I know and I are chatting on Yahoo Messenger.
She is a new mom and is marrying the father on the 17th. She loves being a mother and is one of the sweetest and kindest women I know. She's fun to hang out with, but she REALLY loves being a mom.
You know what I am not doing? Expressing my antinatalist opinion to her, or pointing out the downside of bringing a new being into the world. Instead I'm telling her I think she'll be a better than average mother and also a great wife.
Both of which I absolutely believe are true.
A part of me would love to be the father of her child, with her as my wife (I don't want to break them up; I'm just saying she's an above average woman), or another fine woman as my wife with another child being mine. I love children. I even have a strong desire to have children.
Here are the reasons I'm not telling her my opinion on the downsides (and eventual futility) of creating children:
1. It wouldn't make any difference. Having children is at the (perfectly understandable, it's natural) core of her being.
2. Her child is going to be well loved and has a good a chance as a kid is likely to have. So yes, there will be harms to the child in their life and death, but it's spilled milk. The best thing to do is love the child and do the best for her, which I am sure her mother and father will do. I will too to the very small degree I have a role.
But 3. And this is the big one. She didn't pro-actively choose to go on a blog where serious and often disturbing issues are discussed. And not only be on that blog, but choose to address one of the most disturbing topics imaginable, and to engage in debate on it.
So what I'm saying is, when you comment on something you find vile (and I really do understand; I cannot overstate how much I felt the same way for so long and how much the actual process of abortion I still find sickening), you take the risk upon yourself that someone who is on the other side of that particular issue might express their views, and their reason for their views, and it might be emotionally upsetting to you.
Which I regret. I knew my words could upset some, but I strongly feel the points I was making have merit and were worth making.
I am not as extreme in antinatalism as is University of Cape Town Philosophy Professor and Dept of Philosophy Head David Benatar.
He believes life is always a net harm. The main reason he thinks this seems to be that humans have a well-studied bias toward optimism, and if you strip away that bias, life is on balance bad. He makes many other points, some of which I've raised, but that's a big part of his argument.
I think his argument is facile and silly.
Why?
He's right that most humans have a bias toward optimism (which makes sense; it is a tendency which natural selection would have rewarded since it keeps us striving to survive and reproduce). I agree with that.
But since that bias toward optimism actually makes people FEEL better, then that really does add to the quality of their lives in the way that matters in my opinion, which is subjective experience.
So I think his antinatalist argument fails there.
My argument is based on the fact that life is very risky. That some, even most, people may enjoy their lives more than not, but that the degree of harm and horror and sadness suffered by those who don't are so great that it's wrong to impose that risk on non-consenting people, and children can't consent to be born into the world obviously.
That's my position. It's based on love and empathy, not on hatred.
You may disagree with my evaluation, and find it abhorrent, but nonetheless that is my position and my reason for it. It's in part formed by my own personal pains at times in my life.
Which, for some reason, a lot of people seem to think is a good idea to start mocking, rather than expressing some understanding that I and others could feel that way.
That said, there are also some really kind people, who disagree with me (and maybe see my points also), who express compassion as their first reflex. So I definitely don't mean to slag you all.
Further, I'm having a good day and feel fine. I enjoy much of life and the parts I enjoy, I enjoy a lot.
I want to say a word about this host of this site, who I don't know personally.
He clearly disagrees with my position. He has to, because his commentary on this video itself in the front page picture link to it is clearly a pro-life position (which I can respect and understand since I used to hold it, and am still emotionally although not intellectually drawn to).
Yet he's seen that I made my comments sincerely, with both an attempt at intellectual honesty and speaking in a calm tone if not calm words.
He's allowed my comments to stand, and even edited the angriest comments made by a commenter who was very understandably emotional over my words, and who has my empathy for the pains he felt in life and as a result of reading my words also. That commenter won't feel better reading that from me, but I can't help that. It's still true that I understand his reaction.
But the host's actions are exactly what I would have done even if a commenter on an imaginary blog I ran had opinions contra mine and someone who agreed with me went a little over the top, understandably.
So I my respect for the host has grown.
Before now, I just considered this a great video blog on politics with an editorial stance similar to most (obviously not all) of my positions.
Finally, it's election day and believe it or not, I strongly support the Romney-Ryan ticket, and despise Obama. I suppose life contains a lot of ambiguities, paradoxes, and even compromises, because Romney's still my first choice (because I believe he'll make life better for the living than Obama would) ... and yet, the Mormon position on creating children is clearly the opposite of mine. At least they strongly believe in loving and raising them after they're born.
Good luck to the GOP up and down the ticket.
This is child abuse pure and simple. Indoctrination of this kind is right out of Nazi Germany.
Everyone experiences heartbreak, it is part of our lives. No one escapes it. I am sorry that this "grandma" had to experience it, however to use a child like this is repulsive
Rarely have I ever been repulsed by and ad or even worse, the piece of S%&# explaination below it. "Don't have babies because the aunt that I play with might die of cancer...I blame Republicans !!!!".............I hope she ties her own tubes and saves everyone the burden of corrupting her own child!
After thinking about this commercial, I've come to the conclusions that it means the Liberals still don't have their base locked up. This is a pure left-wing issue, and the appeal is therefore to the left. Usually by this time in the election, you'd appeal to the middle by offering to reach across the aisle and work with the other party. That is not happening in this campaign. This is further proof that this is going to be a landslide.
I can understand his reason for his beliefs, but WTF is up with them using children to send their messages for them? These kids do not understand that if their mother had aborted them they wouldn't exist. It's appalling to use kids in this way.
"These kids do not understand that if their mother had aborted them they wouldn't exist."
I don't know how you can be certain of this.
However, maybe this girl doesn't, but I was very much interested in, and had well-formed beliefs and reasons for said beliefs, on abortion when I was quite young.
So you could be right in this case, but I would not apply it to children in general.
Ha!! No way are you telling me that it is appropriate to teach 7 to 10 year old girls about abortion. They don't even understand what death means. They don't know what conception is. Yet you say children at that age in general know about this stuff and understand it? Right (sarcasm).
As I said, I was part of a small group of students at my elementary school and we talked about that and other issues (even often nuclear war) at that age.
Once even on TV.
Ok, that's a little different. You said earlier that it was "in general".
Well, they aren't learning about it at school at that age, so the only people teaching them would be the parents. That's wrong.
I'm saying if the 7 to 10 year olds are ESPECIALLY bright, you may not be able to stop them from learning about it.
Some children, especially those with a high IQ, are just exceptionally curious about grown-up adult topics, and are way above their age group in thinking about them.
They may well be far above a typical adult with an average IQ in thinking about them.
I notice people like famouswolf care a lot about their own pain, which I acknowledge was real and important and extremely large, and feel it should receive special consideration, but other people's pain not.
For example, I said that I came to the conclusion it would have been better if I had never been born.
This conclusion -- like the same conclusion of the 30% of children surveyed in the study I referenced earlier -- is not arrived at because of a lack of pain. It's arrived at because of great pain.
But to famouswolf, my feelings don't count.
OK, I can accept that he feels that way because of the pain he is feeling. I really can. I hope he puts this thread behind him and remembers the good of those he lost, and the pain is lessened, even though I know he doesn't want to hear that from me.
But I cannot accept that as a valid reason that I cannot express my own opinions and feelings on this, or any, controversial topic.
Express your feelings all you want, but you are very controversial with the comments you make. I'll read them, but you have to expect that there are going to be people that get disgusted with what you say. Should we not be honest about that when it happens?
Of course you do.
Less so telling me I have to shut up and telling me you want to kill me.
Lol, I knew what you meant. I wouldn't say that to you. I had said a few nasty things to you, but I went back and edited to tone it down some. I'll try to disagree with you without getting out of control with my reactions. I apologize that I did say some things that were over the edge.
This ad is horrible on so many levels - the worst, IMHO, is the constant admonition by all those girls: "think of me-me-me-me-me-me" - dreadful, and showing further how disrespectful of girls and women the left really are. As if nothing matters in real life for females but having abortions: not education, not debt, not jobs.
After today, it is urgent that we all keep the left's feet in the fire for this blatant disrespect.
I think it's illogical and incoherent.
Well, there is a way you could make it somewhat logical, but you'd really have to thread the needle to do it.
this is the most disgusting ad I have ever seen
'mom' save me so I can have free pills and abortions???? seriously????? this is pathetic what is wrong with the women of America? Stop being victims no one is taking anything away from you....I just don't want to PAY for them
enjoy your pills and abortions
The incredible irony in a message like this is astounding. If this little girl's grandmother had an abortion or this little girl’s mother had an abortion then the issue of abortions for this little girl really would be mute now wouldn't it. An estimate of 54,559,615 murders of innocents since Roe Vs. Wade and the sick bastards who want more use the very same innocents to lobby for more. Oh what sweet irony. Truly sick...
Abortion, was always focused on limiting the birth of black people, and now we have this child propagating the murder of her own race. This is who Barry is, he will do anything to get reelected he will even watch the murder of 4 people in Benghazi. So I say if you want a murderer to stay in the White House then by all means give a vote to Barry!
COMMUNIST GOALS (From The Congressional Record, Jan. 10, 1963)
Hen. A.S. Herlong, Jr. of Florida in H.R., Congressional Record-Appendix, Jan. 10, 1963, pp. a34-35
18. Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them "censorship" and a violation of free speech and free press.
19. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio, and T.V.
20. Present homosexuality, degeneracy, and promiscuity, as "normal, natural, healthy."
28. Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.
Sounds more like the curriculum found in public schools that our tax money is funding. When oh when are we going to get a clue that school isn't what it was when we were in it?
Yes and they sure were not handing out Trojans. They were handing out paddle whippings!!
Exactly what I have taught my daughter. The government wants to make sin easy so that people are MORE dependent on the gov't. Then the people are SLAVES to their government. Our Founding Fathers did NOT intend this scenario.
Okay, I can understand your opinion.
The reason I can understand your opinion is, while most often secular, I was opposed to abortion most of my life for the same basic reasons that Christopher Hitchens expressed qualms about it.
The idea that it is wrong to take a person's life against their will, and that it's grotesque and unnatural.
Those are strong points.
As a child, I was strongly pro-life. It was always arguably my pinnacle moral principle, my acid test for judging others, including others I wished to date, until well into my adult life.
Also as a child, I was fairly bright and while in elementary school, I was part of a very small group of students from my school in a group that discussed the issues of the day, often removed from the regular class. I even went on TV once with this group.
A commenter here makes the argument that it should be illegal for this girl to appear in a political ad expressing a view on abortion.
It seems to me, that conflicts with the First Amendment.
Further, it would or could also have prevented me from publicly expressing my pro-life views as a child.
Further, I've seen compelling arguments from children that are pro-life in nature.
Granted, full disclosure, I am no longer pro-life.
But ... do you believe the other side, including children, should be allowed to legally express their opinion publicly, including in election advertising, under the First Amendment?
I am honestly curious what your view on that is.
Well, we all know these children didn't go public with their views on their own volition. This was pushed by liberals with a view they used the children to project. If I get angry enough about an issue I might find a way to go public with it and draw attention. That's not what happened here. The children did not have a burning desire to let us know how they feel about abortion. They were used, and I think that's appalling and wrong.
Oh, also, other than abortion, we talked about the Cold War.
A lot.
The fact the Russians could be lobbing ICBMs over our heads within half an hour was a big deal.
That was a pretty heavy issue, man, as much so as abortion.
So are other things we learned, such as about World War II, the fact there's crime in the world, and even mortality (not that we learned that necessarily in school as such, but these are all things a child will think about, especially a bright child).
To say that kids don't even have the right to TALK about what they're thinking, wherever they learned it, doesn't seem right to me.
It's up to the listener to consider the fact that the speaker is a child and weight the content accordingly.
For the record, I was 9 and 10 when I was in the school-led group I mentioned above, involving the brightest students in my public elementary school, talking about serious issues, and even abortion (there was no coercion to believe a particular thing: I was pro-life).
kong, the First Amendment doesn't protect sedition and doesn't even stop the FCC from banning 4-letter words during broadcasts. The saying one's opinion on important political topics that are distasteful does not equal that. That's exactly the type of speech the First Amendment was most designed to protect.
So it's fully in keeping with the spirit of the First Amendment for anyone, including a child, to express their view on something ... such view, of course, largely shaped by their parents' teachings.
People, by and large, are smart enough to realize a child may not have the same depth of understanding of an issue as they will in 20 years, and also to understand that the child is more often than not simply reflecting their parents' views.
Let them get the speech and make up their own minds.
"Grievous harm is guaranteed in life, and aside from death and various pains, it is dispassionate in that many people's lives are on balance horrors.
And I don't think that's fair to do to kids. Birth is the inevitable cause of these predictable outcomes." -- samwise
OMG! It's not fair to expose kids to the horrors and pains of life so you should just abort them? I don't know what satanic ritual you are indulging in, but if I read your statement right you are flat out disgusting.
Lol, where do you get this stuff? So now it's ok to put children on t.v. to express an adult's view (not their own) because they can recant it later? Geez. How about you don't spoon feed this crap into their heads to begin with? How about you don't use little girls to spread the opinions of others because they don't have a clue what the heck is coming out of their mouths? Stay away from kids.
The First Amendment does not give you the right to say whatever you want and wherever you want. If that were the case then why do television programs get fined for cussing over the public airwaves? You're saying these girls should be able to say whatever they want on t.v. because of the First Amendment, and that is flat out wrong.
I'd bet you $1,000 that none of these little girls were telling us their opinion. They were repeating the opinion of immoral liberals that don't care that they're feeding this crap into the girls' heads.
Continuing.
I reached a point in my life where I decided that, on balance, it would have been better if I hadn't been born.
This isn't an especially unusual conclusion, although it's something most people who have it hide. In fact, a study as far back as 1932 in American Journal of Sociology shows that 30% of children wish they had never been born.
Perhaps they should not have been.
Thanks for answering my questions.
I believe children should have the right to speak out on political topics, including in ads. If they reflect their parent's views, well that's natural on both sides of a topic. They can later recant their position if they wish.
I will say that CHILDREN are minors and mostly repeat what they have heard. My child, I believe and as life as revealed 19 years later, is that it is very rare in today's society that parents have the TIME and/or desire to teach the children everything that is NEEDED in order to be a good "productive" adult citizen. It is the parent who should be teaching the child religion, responsibilities, organization, and sex NOT the school system. After all, I produced a child so she can care and understand MY beliefs; but, hopefully I can instill enough for her to have a sound foundation to grow into her own belief system. It has been wonderful to see a beautiful flower BLOOM. Ok back on track, in today's society, I have found that even 14 year old girls have NOT been taught the truth or MUCH about sex and in this video, I really did not see the majority being 14. Girls hurl themselves at boys these days and little, if any, is taught about RESPECT. Therefore, lasting relationships are NOT. I use to laugh so I wouldn't be a MAD cow when my daughter would come home and say that a girl was dating a boy in fourth grade!! Really, where did he take her? Just talking, rather giggling, was a date...totally ludicrous!! Anyway, beings the girls in this video are minors and odds were they probably did not know the exact subject matter then the ad is a lie because they did not know what the REAL subject was. If they did know the ad was pertaining to abortion, then they were just repeating some story they heard or they have been totally misinformed. My belief is that however this ad came to light, minors should NOT be involved and it should be illegal based on them being minors. Now in your past, you may have been on local tv, not national, not POLITICAL ads for a grand election; but, I bet your parent had to sign a waiver form for you to be on tv or for your info to be released. This is the privacy issue. Again, I bet that the ad people made these parents sign a waiver as well so that the campaign did not find themselves in HOT water. At any rate, these are mere pups and know not what they say and should not be repeating it.
Also a local mother who went to jail because she gave her minor child (10 yrs old) a tattoo at a local parlor. She should be in jail because that should be an adult decision that the child makes for herself one day. I mean would you have like it if ur dad would have drawn something awful on your arm as a child? His beauty could be your ugly. Children should be children for there is ENOUGH life ahead. Personally I feel a mother is a bit cracked up to take her kid to the tattoo parlor!! Also to let her kid be in the political ad for Obama or Romney. It's just not the place or time.
I'd have to know how you define fatalism before answering that.
As I said, I believe life can, on balance, be good. This is contra the David Benatar antinatalist position.
However, it's a tremendous risk to take with another person, and there's no way it ends in anything but their death anyway.
Ethically, I don't have an obligation to do good things for people, although that's nice when I do.
But I do have an imperative not to actively and grievously harm them.
Grievous harm is guaranteed in life, and aside from death and various pains, it is dispassionate in that many people's lives are on balance horrors.
And I don't think that's fair to do to kids. Birth is the inevitable cause of these predictable outcomes.
I'll say more and answer your question specifically, but I have to change locations.
My niece and her husband just lost their 2nd child at 4 months of pregnancy. They learned early on that the child had serious malformations and that he/she probably wouldn't make the 9 month journey and even if they did they would be stillborn or would never make it out of the hospital. They chose as Christians to leave it all in God's hands. My niece just delivered a stillborn baby boy one week ago. I am positive this little one's short life has taught these two people and perhaps others as well many things about God and His care and love in all situations. All life is precious and has a purpose no matter how long or short one lives!
So true!! My best girlfriend had the same situation happen to her. We were in the Navy overseas and this would have been her second child. The doctor NEVER told her that anything was wrong and it really did not matter because the military does not or rather did not perform abortions. When the baby girl was born, she cried and passed away. That was ONE of the hardest days of my life. Some 8 years later, I had my own daughter and I have always asked myself how my gf managed her grief and there is only ONE answer.... God held her hand. Life is very precious!! Every day of my life I thank God that He Blessed me with a daughter.
Wow! Especially disgusting and ironic using little girls who are not too far removed from their own birth. Asking their mother to give them the choice that their mothers could have used to end their lives before birth.
Having an abortion isn't something you plan to do, and it's not something you take pride in doing: It's something you do if you made a mistake and are in bad circumstances.
Not so much if you understand life is in God's hands and just because you "made a mistake" doesn't mean you go and make another by taking an innocent life. I promise you as the parent of an adopted child I know for a fact that there are many families out there that would love to adopt. Even if you don't view life as sacred God does and many others do as well...there is always a positive solution to problems when we involve God in the answer!!! Besides, you don't know the child that was created but God does-He has a purpose and a plan for every life!
What's done is done.
Sam is EXTREMELY offensive, just not quite as much as the video. Almost. These things are tragedies, not mercies.
My comment on what I would do to a certain individual was directed at the maker of the film, however. I-meant-every-word.
If I had not been so angry last night I would have edited it approx. as you did. There was no intent to break your posting rules.
I am SO sorry for your loss famouswolf. I can't imagine it. I can't stand these kinds of thoughts and opinions either, but unless folks are threatening or attacking, they have as much right to voice their opinons as we do. Believe me friend, I find such arguments sick and disturbing, and downright pitiful. God Bless you famouswolf.
I'm sorry for the pain you underwent.
But you misunderstand my position.
I feel it's an ethical error -- albeit a very understandable one in light of biological motivations as influenced by natural selection for over a billion years -- not because children cause pain.
Children are wonderful and bring joy.
It's because children feel pain.
And because this pain is so widely and unfairly distributed and because it continues over a lifetime, and because the best case scenario is a person mostly enjoys their life, but it ends anyway, as do the lives of everyone they love.
It's the pain, and the risk, that lead me to this position, but I am not saying children are the cause.
It sounds harsh (and it is harsh) but the only intellectually fair characterization you could make of my argument on or about this point is I'm saying parents cause pain.
That is a logical inference. It's an unavoidable one, actually.
Yes, I'm aware parents cause joy as well.
Not just that, but he is really beginning to annoy me.
'The better choice would be nonexistance', he spouts. Just so happens I lost my mother and little sister because she chose to carry the little one to term, and I don't want to hear stuff like that here. It's not what I expect, even in threads with such disgusting subject matter. It sounds like he's saying there isn't any point to having children since they cause pain.
His posts are disturbing, and in this thread, inappropriate.
It's heart breaking that children are used, abused and thrown out as trash, but Sam,how,if you don't believe in God, can you believe that evil does not exist when you see things like this? God did not create evil, but evil came into the world none the less and this is the result. God says in His Word that He knows us before we are known, and that He has plans for each of us. It is not His will for these things to happen to children, but what,should we compound that by torturing them in the womb? Have you ever seen what a saline solution does to a baby? What about partial birth abortion- do you not think the baby feels pain when sissors are stabbed into the back of it's head and it's brains sucked out? Are you aware that those babies who survive abortions are often either thrown in a garbage, or left alone in a dark empty room, cold, untouched, in pain... until it is dead?
Is that how we should be if the world is so tough on children?
I know from your posts you don't believe in God, but I don't know how you can justify murder, painful murder, to save a child from being maybe having a painful life later on.
Suffering happens. All sorts of crap happens in life. Doesn't have any culture/race or income barriers. Crap happens, and a lot of it is horrible, painful and senseless. But a lot of good happens too. You can go through life looking at all the bad, but you'll miss out on so much good if you do. I shudder to think of what this world would have been like if people like Jesus, Beethoven, Michaelangelo, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Winston Churchill, the thousands of doctors and scientists, engineers, dreamers, inventors, had not been born. It'd be a darker place than it is now.
Ask a parent who is raising a severely handicapped child if they think their child has a purpose. Those I know who do, would give a resounding YES! Everyone has a purpose, but it's up to each of us whether we're going to bless or curse another.
What happens to children daily is heart breaking. I agree with you on that, but they also give joy, melt the coldest hearts and give more wisdom than many adults give them credit for. And each has a right to live.
And fortunately for you, you don't buy your own arguments so you are stuck in a very sticky quagmire.
And specifically, in the last comment of mine you replied to, I asked her a question.
She said: "He has a purpose and a plan for every life!"
I asked her how she knows this. It's a fair question.
The last two words of my question linked to a google search for the term "children tortured to death".
There are > 0 search results for that term. There ought to be 0 search results. The fact that that is not so, is a valid argument -- perhaps not a conclusive one, but an eminently fair one -- against bringing children into the world.
It raises the additional, entirely valid, question about the propriety of God's plans for children, assuming her premise is correct.
I've given stuff to back up my arguments. A great deal, actually. You're just discounting it.
You haven't addressed any of it.
I don't care if this discussion continues. Either yes or no, but I won't shy from it. I can talk about this here, or something elsewhere, as can we all.
But I've already made my argument -- it was pretty clear. Anything else is just additional details, of which there are many, and they aren't especially pleasant.
Samwise, you're getting a little too much like a troll with these comments. Give something to back up your argument or don't keep commenting against people's beliefs. Thanks.
The WORD of God...The Bible tells me so...Psalm 139...You might want to check it out, it's beautiful!
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