Your morality is in the way of my rights [Link]
This argument is fairly common. Some-one has a right, and no-one else has a right to interfere with that. Even worse, no-one can use "morality" as an excuse to interfere with the exercise of rights. So the rights of the unborn don't exist or are trumped by the right to terminate, and no moral argument should prevail. Although on what basis is this "right" asserted? Is there any relationship between rights and morality? Some rights are grounded in the legal, and others in the moral. But even legal rights are themselves derived from a belief system. So the phrasing of "get your morality away from my rights" can also be expressed as "get your morality away from my morality" and equally, "get your rights away from my rights", and perhaps even "Your defence of others rights gets in the way of my rights". It's a big discussion. The Hand Mirror used some cartoons to support their argument, so read the link perhaps. I reduced my comment to this:
The cartoons seem to be suggesting that two wrongs make a right.You care more for aliens than women - you must be have a fetus fetish
Which is exactly what you are suggesting too. On one hand you suggest you have rights, which are founded on some kind of moral position, and then getting annoyed if morality is considered in how far rights can go.
I think the pro-choice position is grounded in the supremacy of the individual, and I mean this in the sense that that belief system is so core to setting the world view, any perspective that moves away from this is hard to fathom.
It also requires that we do not consider that the unborn is in any way an individual with a right to life, no matter the feelings of others, because that would create a paradox over the supremacy of individual rights.
So to come at it from a rights perspective, as a mother, do they not have an obligation to make the best possible decisions for their child? Because don't rights come with obligations and duties? Certainly, if you wish to have certain rights, it will place duties on others to allow those rights. That could extend to the right to life of an unborn to place a duty on you to complete the pregnancy.
You do have a right to not get pregnant in the first place though, and complete autonomy over that decision - unless your rights are violated.
Meanwhile, Julie on the Hand Mirror thinks men empathise with an unthinking fetus and not with a thinking women. She describes this as a fetish. She fleshed out the argument a bit further than that perhaps, you can decide for yourself. Here was my response:
Some people also say "if I was a baby, I wouldn't ... "
and clearly, very very young babies probably are not quite up to the worldly awareness of older people.
I've seen several "Greens" empathising with trees too, for that matter.
I don't think this can be reduced to the "empathising with unthinking aliens vs empathising with real people" that seems to be the crux of your argument.
I also don't agree that the young man couldn't apparently put himself in the shoes of the potential mother. Perhaps that is more a product of your thinking that where supporting one thing means they are against another. I think most people realise every situation is complex and affects many people. People argue by jumping up into the clouds of principles and then down into the grounds of reality and complexity, and are just processing at different speeds.
Perhaps it is more like a communication style, like some people 'hear' what you say, whilst others will 'see' what you are getting at.
I think you are in danger of creating a strawman argument.
The trouble is ZenTiger, partly, is that morality and right and wrong were chucked out the window, long ago. The West's prevailing political correctness has allowed this position, where the so-called rights of the woman far outweigh the rights of the innocent and voicless.
ReplyDeleteA modern holocaust, that I'm sure one day will be recognised as such.
Shame.