by Bluegoat » February 11th, 2009, 5:27 pm
Hmm, at the risk of getting into something messy..
It seems to me that part of the problem in all public regulation is finding the line between individual liberties and soical norms, or values. In some things it is pretty easy, in others, even when the facts are agreed upon, values and interpretations vary widely. In other cases, people can't even agree on the facts.
I'd be interested to know, Mitch, how you think we should decide what is fascism, and what is a place where we have to accept compromise? How do we begin to tell the difference?
Abortion is particularly sticky because depending upon which facts you accept as true or most likely, the consequences are quite different, and serious. But I am not sure that this is primarily the result of postmodernism, as the article suggests. There is a kind of postmodern attitude that suggests that ideas or principles are totally internal things, and that our ideas do not have to translate to our actions. It is the same attitude that says that religion is private, so we must never never show it in public life, but extended to all of our personal convictions/beliefs/understndings.
But abortion seems to me to be more complicated than this, it is not just a matter of saying that our beliefs or conclusions about abortion are "private" ideas. I think that we (as a population) are not even sure of the facts of our beginnings, much less how to interpret them. Our population is really quite divided on these questions, which makes it very difficult to even begin to talk about how to legislate about them. I am in Canada, though, so Roe vs. Wade is not perhaps so much influencing my thought.
As far as what people actually think about abortion, I'd say there are roughly three approaches.
One says all potential human life is sacred, so no abortion. Even a zygote is potential human life, even if it is not a "person" with a soul. Typically this view also doesn't allow most forms of birth control, which is perfectly logical.
The second says that it is the soul that is sacred, and makes us a person, so no abortion of anyone who has a soul. When the soul is there then becomes the issue. People tend to take one of two approaches to this problem; they try to pinpoint when the fetus has a soul (rather difficult) or they say it is impossible to know, so we must assume that it is there from the beginning.
The third says that all of this is irrelevant, the mother's rights are what counts, even if there is a person with a soul involved.
All of this is further complicated by the fact that there can be many sticky situations, such as when there are medical problems or rape. What can we possibly impose on a pregnant woman who needs chemotherapy, right now?
I think these difficulties are why some people feel that it is best to let each person navigate the issues, more that a feeling that each person's ideas are equally "right." Certainly, I haven't seen much useful public discourse on the issue.