Last post on Bristol Palin, I promise, but . . .
There's a subtext to the criticism here that I find very uncomfortable. Any number of commenters seem to be implying that what a GOOD parent would have done is encouraged her daughter to get an abortion.
I call myself pro-choice. Not pro-abortion. Pro-choice. A choice that I think should be made as rarely as possible. I applaud girls and women who are willing to do the difficult thing and carry the child to term at considerable personal cost.
I realize that many pro-choicers view abortion, as I do not, as a morally neutral act. But this is supposed to be about women doing what is right for them. What is right for you includes your moral beliefs about when a fetus becomes a full human life. There are a whole bunch of really bad beliefs bundled here: that you KNOW when life begins, and Bristol Palin does not; that you know that motherhood is wrong for her; that the most important thing in the entire world is having the same four years of carefree quasi-adulthood at a good college that I (and presumably you) did; that you, in short, are far better positioned to know what is right for Bristol Palin, whom you have never met and who lives several thousand miles from you, than do Bristol Palin and her family.
This is everything the pro-lifers tar us with: arrogant, elitist, anti-motherhood, pro-abortion rather than pro-choice. Liberal values are supposed to be about giving people space to make their own moral decisions, not forcing your own on them. I thought that's what we were supposed to hate about conservatives . . .
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She's not even fucking pregant now dimwit - she was earlier.
Give it two months and they will be a tragic miscarriage.
To get over the grief, she will adopt trig.
It's all a huge lie.
Oh - and stop it with the endless fucking strawmen.
i don't really care what the young girl does. but i do wonder how much, if any, choice she had in the matter. but her super pro-life ma line item vetoed funding for pregnant teens in need of last resort housing or something. megan, these people are pro-uterine control, not pro-life.
culture of life my ass!
Haven't been here in several days.
But the point is not about having an abortion.
Rather the point is about abstinence only policy,
The republicans are now saying a teenager having sex is OK.
With my daughter I did not want her to have sex when she was 17, but I understood human nature and had her a go on birth control pill.
It is like the old joke about what you call couples who practice the rhythm method? Parents.
Why is Megan having an argument with herself again?
And again, where are all these supposed anti-Bristol Palin comments?
Blogging against imaginary comments just seems silly.
No, a GOOD parent would have supervised her child properly and would have placed limits on how much time he/she could spend along with a member of the opposite sex, if he/she were allowed to do that at all.
Look, if you're a parent, and you sense that your kid is highly sexed (even more so than the normal teenager), and that's he/she is very impulsive (again even more so than an average teen), you should supervise your kid very carefully, lest you become a grandmother.
In my lifetime, a fetus will become viable outside the womb at any time, possibly with an artificial womb or something similar. A woman can have full control over her body, without having to kill her baby! It will be win-win! Oh, except that then the woman would have to take responsibility for her actions. Hm. (To attempt to head off "fathers have responsibility too"; yes, you'd think so, but since fathers have no say in abortion decisions today, it's irrelevant to the argument.)
It will be a great day when the "pro-choice" people have to admit that the "control my body" crap is not even remotely the point, and that what they really want is to be able to kill their children when they become an inconvenience.
Again, please point to someone actually making the argument you say they are.
What I find odd is that McCain and his people are praising her "choice" not to have an abortion, but, if they had their way, she would have had no choice to make.
Not being snarky here, I'd really like to know - could you please direct us to those "Any number of commenters"?
I don't read every comment on this blog, let alone (obviously) the entire blogosphere, so I may well have missed soem of those comments, but I haven't seen a single one.
Now there HAVE been "any number" of comments pointing out the incongruity of the Republicans applauding Bristol's "choice" while her mother would (if she could) legislatively deny here such a choice.
But that is far from suggesting that the mother should have advised an abortion.
You're no stranger to straw man arguments, but this one seems particularly egregious. i.e., typical straw man arguments are based upon at least some (fringe, atypical) person who really does make the argument, but in this case the argument appears to be made ENTIRELY of straw.
Okay, maybe I was being snarky. But if I've missed the comments that you are referring to, I honestly would like to bedirected to them.
I agree with comment above -- with whom is Megan arguing on this?
And while it should be her last post on Bristol Palin, I'd love for her to take on the issues raised by Sarah Palin's nomination. You know -- the policy stuff.
A good parent would have put her personal biases aside and encouraged her daughter to make her own choice. I don't know for sure, but I highly suspect that that's not what happened.
A good parent also would not have been quite so eager to push her teenage daughter's situation into the national spotlight like this.
Unlike everyone else, Megan, I think I'm in love with you. In a totally platonic, non-internet-stalker sort of way. I see exactly where you're coming from on this issue, which may not be an issue of "policy", but is clearly an issue of "politics", which is just reasonable for you to discuss as the heavier things.
Megan writes: "Liberal values are supposed to be about giving people space to make their own moral decisions, not forcing your own on them. "
Again, who exactly is in favor of "forcing" Bristol Palin to have an abortion?
Meanwhile the Repiglicans ACTUALLY DO want to force every pregnant woman to carry to term. This isn't some bullshit abstraction, it's THEIR ACTUAL PLATFORM POSITION.
" Any number of commenters seem to be implying that what a GOOD parent would have done is encouraged her daughter to get an abortion."
Care to name just one of these people?
I've heard it IRL.
Agreeing with MLaJ is not something I relish, but what I've been seeing in the Palin posts is one of journalism's worst habits--and one for which blogging really should be the cure. I refer to the "some say" dodge. Really? Some? How many? And who?
It's a layer of bogosity that goes even deeper than "an unnamed source close to the campaign" because you can't even have any confidence that the "some" people actually exist or have the slightest influence or importance. Random commenters right here have been serious assholes. But there's a big difference between random commenters and, say, players in Obama's campaign or on the Sunday talk shows.
Now, I've been a fan--and occasionally a critic--for the better part of a decade, and I'm asking you: please link and quote. Not because I think you're wrong, but because I can't tell if you're wrong or not.
The fact that the NYT does the same damn thing is not a defense.
The real issue is supporting ignorance-only education when it comes to biology and contraception. Whatever happened in Palin's own family is irrelevant.
I agree with vwrrt, however, that the "control my body" stuff is extremely overblown and misleading when it comes to debating abortion. It's just not the core issue.
honestly, megan, i don't know what you're talkign about. NOBODY is even discussing Bristol's situation in the corporate media.
And if you're commenters are commenting about it, it's only because you decided to write about it and make an issue of it.
If a kid's gonna, she's gonna. She'll find the time (it only takes a minute) and the place and she'll do what she wants.
What I don't get about blaming the parents is where is the child's agency in this? I've never understood that; I've raised two, and even a week after birth I couldn't make them do something they didn't want to do and it only got worse the older they got. My job was to make them want to do things; my success varied considerably, and the two kids were completely different about what worked and what they wanted and how easy it was to talk them out of one thing and into another. My older one basically started making his own decisions without consultation when he was 14; some of them turned out fine, some are easily fixed now he's an adult, and the rest have had at most minor consequences.
Judging parents by their children's decisions implies a worldview in which other people are completely under someone's control, an authoritarian worldview that I don't agree with.
I had to quit thinking about politics in 2007 because I got too bummed out over the negativity being put out by everyone involved. Now, it's worse than ever.
Yes, McCain was one of the crew that picked on Chelsea Clinton. He is an ass who will spend most of his first term seeking revenge on the religious right that spurned him for Dub in 2000. A lot of conservative commentators have become world-hating trolls that need a round of brain flossing to clean the dirt out of their heads.
Even so, I've been amazed at the "Trig should have died"/"Bristol's baby should die" vitriol that's being spewed. I think a lot of people are upset that the Palins weren't hypocrites and either aborted Trig or got Bristol a quiet abortion. I have to wonder how much of this is redirected guilt. The Palins were supposed to do the same thing the bitter person either did or would have done (i.e. get abortion(s)). Because the Palins made a different choice, they have to be EEEEVIL or the speaker is forced to allow the option that the Palins made a superior moral choice. Rather than allow the possibility of being wrong, the speaker breaks out the condemnations.
I just don't see how one can rationally argue with this kind of instinctual hatred being thrown around...
honestly, megan, i don't know what you're talkign about. NOBODY is even discussing Bristol's situation in the corporate media.
And if you're commenters are commenting about it, it's only because you decided to write about it and make an issue of it.
I must say that you people who regularly comment on this blog have to be the most viciously stupid human trash on the internet.
Moe and Lucia,
Maybe you should have read the first comment above from Fred. Do you care to defend that?
I can understand how for some families, carrying the baby to term would be the only option in a bad situation. It's the marriage that bothers me the most. She's 17. A bad marriage can ruin a person's life in a way that a kid (especially when money isn't an issue) just can't.
What a good mother would do is let Bristol make her own choice. I believe Palin did that (but she may not have given her that choice), but there is the catch, she let her make a CHOICE. Palin would like nothing more to remove that choice.
If she got her way, a mother couldn't give her daughter that choice, nor could a mother encourage one choice over the other. There would be no choice to make at all.
Taking away the option of choosing is much more drastic than simply "encouraging" one choice over the other.
The real kicker is that everyone knows that the rich will still have access to abortions no matter what the law says. Even if abortions were illegal, had Meghan McCain or either of the Bush twins gotten pregnant at 17 and decided not to have the paper, their parents are rich enough, and powerful enough to secure then a clean and safe abortion, even if it had to coincide with a overseas "vacation".
That is a big problem. We have a bunch of rich lawmakers, judges, etc. all trying to take away choices from the poor, knowing full well those options will always be available for them, their kids, and their mistresses.
And Palin has an especially extreme take on the debate having been quite outspoken that even rape victims should be forced to have the baby of their rapists. Like John McCain would ever force Meghan to do that. Yeah right.
The issue is not whether Bristol should have had an abortion. The issue is, whether all women should have the right to make that decision.
No one disputes Bristol (and the Palins) have the right to make a decision in accord with their personal beliefs. We dispute Sarah palin's right to make that decision for all women.
The Religious Right is supposed to be all about Family Values. Well, I don't know any more family value out there than the belief that sex should only be within the marriage between a husband and wife. Yet, Sarah Pallin, who was pregnant when she got married, gets a free ride because she is Pro Life. Her daughter is praised for having the child rather than have an abortion, which I heartily agree with, but gets a free ride on premarital sex. The only logical conclusion of all of this is that the Reverend Dobsoon's of the world are saying it is okay to have premarital sex- go for it, boys and girls- so long as you have the child and get married.
The only logical conclusion of all of this is that the Reverend Dobsoon's of the world are saying it is okay to have premarital sex- go for it, boys and girls- so long as you have the child and get married.
That would be of a piece with their belief in repentance and forgiveness of sin, would it not?
"we were supposed to hate about conservatives . . ."
While I agree with you on most of this discussion, the way you phrase that "we" and "conservatives" definitely sounds like you are declaring yourself officially liberal and opposed to conservative.
Maybe you meant "pro-lifers" there? Or are all conservatives automatically pro-choice?
I totally agree with Megan that prochoice is not proabortion. Also, when will the MSM realize that when they talk about how innapropriate it is to talk about Bristol, that that is exactly what they are doing? It makes it so easy for the GOP to use this issue to distract voters and make them sympathize with Sarah Palin when actual policy issues are raised (if they ever get to it - only about 60 days left). I hope this really will be the last post on the Palin children.
Slate and its commenters have been pushing the idea that Bristol Palin's choice to keep the baby must have been coerced.
It has to be pointed out that, having initially argued that nobody should be talking about Bristol Palin, you've now spent 2 days posting about Bristol Palin. I'm not saying you shouldn't be posting about her, but it does prove the point: this narrative is irresistible as discussion fodder for the body politic, it touches on a series of significant cultural and social issues, and given that everyone's talking about it, each person with views on the subjects touched upon feels they have to jump in. And, again, this re-emphasizes the point that the person fundamentally responsible for thrusting Bristol Palin's pregnancy into the spotlight is Sarah Palin.
On the particular issue you're raising, I happen to also feel that the moral thing to do if your 17-year-old daughter gets pregnant is to encourage her to have an abortion as early as possible. Those are my values. Sarah Palin is entitled to hers, and I am entitled to mine. I don't view abortion as a morally neutral event, but I also don't view giving birth at age 17 as a morally neutral event, and the negative practical consequences of giving birth are vastly more serious than are those of having an abortion.
Kai Jones says:
Kai, if it only takes a minute you're doing it TOTALLY wrong.Previously vwrrt noted that abortion is really about the inconvenience of raising a baby.
This bears on one of my pet peeves. Under current law in most states [admittedly not in Alaska -- yet], a new mother can drop her baby off at a hospital or fire station within [usually] 72 hours and she is completely free of future obligations. These are called "safe haven" laws. The father can theoretically obtain the baby but he has to somehow find out about the situation in time [usually a month]. Like most modern laws it's written gender neutrally, but c'mon, how many fathers gain sole physical possession in time to do this.
I believe that a father should be able to disclaim a child within 72 hours of official notification of the pregnancy. The mother could elect to deliver such notice well before delivery, in time to have an abortion if he disclaims. She could deliver such notice at birth, so she can use the safe haven laws if he refuses to support the child and help bring it up. Or, she can wait, but there's no incentive to.
To explain how that works, let me explain a bit about how child support works in most states. The court looks at the incomes of the parents and the custodial shares and cranks them to derive a number. You get more support if your custody percentage increases [and the other parent's decreases] or if you make less money or he makes more money. Therefore, if you are a mother and you don't really care about having a father in the child's life but you want maximum child support, you can notify the other parent at birth, but the judge is likely to insist on co-parenting. You can instead wait for a few years. No judge is going to impose a stranger-parent on a toddler. Also, his career might have matured and you not only get the maximum by writing him out of the child's life, but that maximum is larger.
If we let fathers opt out of parenthood within 72 hours of notification, mothers will no longer have incentive to hide children from the fathers by one-night stands. Many fathers would bail when they receive such a notice after, say, five years, and the mothers certainly have to think twice before they adopt the lurking strategy. Since in the real world their "relationship" to the child would be no joys and all obligations, why not opt out? The elimination of this lurking, plus the elimination of the unfairness of having safe haven laws but no similar thing for fathers, is why I advocate this 72 hour provision for father opt out. Again, this notice can be delivered while an abortion is still possible if the mother chooses to, which she might if her decision as to whether to have an abortion depends on whether she will get co-parenting from the father.
In the case of married couples some adjustment might be made; some assumption of notice in the second month or some such.
-dk
Two great tastes that taste great as one...
If you have national health care and legal abortion, should a woman pregnant with a Down's Syndrome child be forced to have an abortion? Why or why not?
Rob Lyman writes: "Agreeing with MLaJ is not something I relish, but what I've been seeing in the Palin posts is one of journalism's worst habits--and one for which blogging really should be the cure. I refer to the "some say" dodge. Really? Some? How many? And who?"
How about the "I hate agreeing with Moe" dodge? I get that a lot.
One of the reasons (and they are legion) that I despise Dumbya Bush is that the "some say" dodge has been his go-to rhetorical device all along. He's not called on it nearly often enough.
SG: no, because the logic of Roe v. Wade is that the right to privacy means the government can't step in and tell a woman what to do with her body, one way or the other.
Now, was that so hard? Sheesh.
the negative practical consequences of giving birth are vastly more serious than are those of having an abortion.
Unless you're being aborted. Tough to exercise autonomous control over your body when mom has you preemptively dismembered in utero.
DBL asks: "Maybe you should have read the first comment above from Fred. Do you care to defend that?"
Why would I want to defend a wingnut wackaloon like Fred?
brooksfoe:
I asked "should", not "could". As a matter of public policy, should we the people be forced to pay for an expensive and legally avoidable condition?
How about the "I hate agreeing with Moe" dodge? I get that a lot.
What, no links to back that up?
Anyway, I've exceeded my quota for agreeing with you this month, so you're on your own from now on.
Rob Lyman writes: "I've exceeded my quota for agreeing with you this month, so you're on your own from now on."
Rob Lyman does not beat his wife.
DBL,
It was a parody post you dumb fucknut.
Here's why I find Sarah Palin irresponsible: 1) accepting the VP offer when she: 1) has such little experience or knowledge about the role of VP, 2) has such little knowledge about international, historical and country-wide issues 3) when she has four children at home (one an infant with Down Syndrome, another a pregnant 17 year-old) and a working husband.
I agree with many commenters that you are making straw-man arguments while ignoring the very real problem with Sarah Palin as Vice President of the United States.
Kai Jones hit the nail on the head and made every other comment here superfluous. Children are people too.
The issue is not Bristol Palin's blessing from Jesus, the issue is that Sarah Palin has more executive experience than Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Abraham Lincoln and Augustus Caesar combined and she personally shot down 53 Soviet MiGs with a rusty blunderbuss and she carried 70 billion barrels of grade-A Alaskan crude to market in her womb and duelled Ted Stevens with pistols and swords under the midnight sun and fed the entire country of Botswana with a single moose and anonymously changed the diapers of a jillion Eskimo babies just to be nice and snuck into your house and taught your dog to sit and roll over when you weren't looking.
Unless you're being aborted. - Rob
I don't recognize the "you" form to legitimately refer to either me, a clump of cells, or a fingernail-sized boneless preconscious fetus. Similarly, I don't recognize "you" to refer to either me or a chicken, except facetiously. Clearly allowing people to legally slaughter chickens is a terrible thing if "you" are the chicken. And I don't consider killing chickens to be a morally neutral event. But I'm willing to countenance it because I don't think chickens are conscious beings deserving of full moral status, and I likes me some fried chicken. And the disruption and unfreedom occasioned in the life of a teenager by becoming a mother before she's ready is of vastly graver concern than my appetite for chicken. So I am that much more convinced that they outweigh the moral consequences of that teenager aborting her fetus.
You may consider that clump of cells to be human; apparently you have a different definition of humanity than I do. But this is a difficult calculus because of lots of contingent factors. As I said, I'm entitled to my value system, you're entitled to yours, and I disapprove of and tolerate yours just as strongly as you may disapprove of and tolerate mine.
The issue is not Bristol Palin's blessing from Jesus, the issue is that Sarah Palin has more executive experience than Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Abraham Lincoln and Augustus Caesar combined and she personally shot down 53 Soviet MiGs with a rusty blunderbuss and she carried 70 billion barrels of grade-A Alaskan crude to market in her womb and duelled Ted Stevens with pistols and swords under the midnight sun and fed the entire country of Botswana with a single moose and anonymously changed the diapers of a jillion Eskimo babies just to be nice and snuck into your house and taught your dog to sit and roll over when you weren't looking.
The contemporary American Left… not actually embracing values such as individual choice and tolerance for alternative viewpoints… who knew?
Rob Lyman does not suck random cock on Tuesdays.
Nor does he put a lipstick target sign on his ass and hang around biker bars on Wednesdays.
Slate and its commenters have been pushing the idea that Bristol Palin's choice to keep the baby must have been coerced.
Slate and its commenters have been pushing the idea that Bristol Palin's choice to keep the baby must have been coerced.
I don't know about Augustus Caeser, but Sarah Palin does have more executive experience than Obama, Biden and Abraham Lincoln (at the time of his election) combined, doesn't she?
Rob Lyman:
Can a zygote be "dismembered" if it has yet to develop limbs? As an aside, is it your contention that every abortion necessarily involves dismemberment? I'm not a pro-abortion activist, but when you throw inflammatory language around, the conversation devolves quickly.
Bristol is NOT having an abortion. She has a family that has expressed its support for her and her unborn child. There appears to be a network in place that will provide the child a loving and nurturing environment. Sadly, that is not the case in all instances of unwanted pregnancy.
I can't imagine life without my three kids and my wife and I have never had to face that agonizing choice. As a man, I never will. However, I think that there are circumstances where a woman must reconcile her situation with herself and the moral barometer that guides her to make that CHOICE.
My heart weeps for any child (born or unborn) who faces life in this world without the blessing of two loving and committed parents. But I am comforted with the knowledge that God welcomes all his children regardless of the circumstances of their death.
I find it hard to believe the illogic of Brooksfoe that he/she that you do not believe that a fetus is not human. If not, what do women birth, monsters?
A fetus at a certain stage can be viable so the morality of killing it is debatable. Twenty-week fetus is often viable. A four-week fetus is not.
A blatocyst may be considered a clump of cells since it has not yet differentiated.
Yet a full grown adult could be described as a " clump of cell" Are adults or children not human?
This cognitive dissonance is jarring. Abortion is the destruction of a fetus, a developing human child. That is truth. Now it may be better to destroy that fetus for reasons of the parents and that is their choice.
But to suggest that it is better for a 17 yr old to abort her child than carry to term for convenience is ridiculous. Many 17 year olds become good parents and currently have societal support to finish school and get jobs and get subsidized health and food stamps.
It may be difficult for a young person but with good family support it is done every day.
Abortion should not be substitute birth control. That is what I hear when suggestions such as brooksfoe gave in an earlier comment.
“On the particular issue you're raising, I happen to also feel that the moral thing to do if your 17-year-old daughter gets pregnant is to encourage her to have an abortion as early as possible. Those are my values. Sarah Palin is entitled to hers, and I am entitled to mine.”
This suggestion is moral that is the wrong choice of words. I assume she thinks it may be wiser to terminate the pregnancy
Kunal:
Palin also has more executive experience than John McCain. Why not argue that managing the affairs of a town of 6,500 makes her a better choice to head the GOP ticket?
Incidentally, Palin was elected to the Governorship by 114,000 folks. She was placed as the 2nd in command of the GOP ticket by a single vote... McCain's.
spencer wrote:
"The republicans are now saying a teenager having sex is OK."
Distortion of the Day.
Johanna wrote:
"A good parent also would not have been quite so eager to push her teenage daughter's situation into the national spotlight like this."
Agreed: A good parent wouldn't be eager to do so. (Are you aware of some eagerness on Panlin's part that the rest of us aren't?)
blue wrote:
"No, a GOOD parent would have supervised her child properly and would have placed limits on how much time he/she could spend along with a member of the opposite sex, if he/she were allowed to do that at all."
--disbelief that anyone would take such an absurd position--
Sarah Palin does have more executive experience than Obama, Biden and Abraham Lincoln (at the time of his election) combined, doesn't she?
And Nixon, and LBJ, and Kennedy, and Eisenhower (who had no political experience of any kind), and Truman (I think), and FDR, and Hoover, and Wilson, and TR, and so forth.
Yet somehow arguing that Palin is more experienced than Nixon or LBJ were seems likely to occasion hilarious guffaws.
[quote]I realize that many pro-choicers view abortion, as I do not, as a morally neutral act. But this is supposed to be about women doing what is right for them. [/quote]
Now that is just a dumb comment. Morality is not a sliding scale, there is either an objective standard for right or wrong or there is no standard, and right and wrong do not exist. If we are just to say do what is right for you, what makes 9 weeks before any different than 9 weeks after birth???
O brave new world that has such people in it.
" ...I applaud girls and women who are willing to do the difficult thing and carry the child to term at considerable personal cost. ..."
What "considerable personal cost" ??? If she had been planning to become a brain surgeon or a nuclear physicist, then, yes, she messed up her life rather badly by getting pregnant at 17. On the other hand, if she was planning to become a housewife, then all she did was get a head start.
Your "considerable personal cost" description sounds suspiciously like B. Obama's previous characterization of babies as -- quote -- "a punishment."
Megan
No response from you to the requests that you pony up the name or citation to a commenter. No evidence? Thought so. Intellectually embarrassing yourself, again.
The main issue is that McCain made a rash and irresponsible choice by picking a running mate without serious vetting and picking one with so little experience, nearly no national reputation, and even less of a record of concern about national issues. This shows he is unfit to be President.
The secondary issue is that Palin is an extremist who injects extremist religion into her politics, which are extremist and seem to have a record for abusing power.
And the tertiary issue is that McCain and Palin would take away the elements of CHOICE and DECISION for which Palin and her daughter are being congratulated for making. That makes Palin a hypocrite and a danger to people's rights, especially women's rights.
The tertiary issue should be enough to keep McCain/Palin out of office, though the secondary and primary issues are worse.
P G
Brooksfoe, are there realistic circumstances under which you would argue that the "moral thing to do" is to kill a chicken? Not that it's morally acceptable, but actually morally preferable to alternatives? I like chicken--hell, I complain bitterly when I miss a hunting season--but I wouldn't go about encouraging the optional killing of anything as being the "moral" choice.
That's what bothered me. If some women have abortions, well, I can't stop them. But to argue that the right choice is to encourage them to do so, well, that bothers me more than a little. Babies are a huge imposition on one's life. But death--or, if you prefer, non-existence--is also a burden that most of us are glad not to face. If it has to happen, it has to happen, but to encourage it as morally preferable? Really?
If a kid's gonna, she's gonna. She'll find the time (it only takes a minute)
Poor kid.
I like chicken--hell, I complain bitterly when I miss a hunting season
Chicken-hunting season?
john w.: the considerable personal cost there would be the cost to her freedom to decide at, say, age 18 whether she wanted to be a brain surgeon or a nuclear physicist. We Americans tend to value our freedom.
If she had been planning to become a brain surgeon or a nuclear physicist, then, yes, she messed up her life rather badly by getting pregnant at 17. On the other hand, if she was planning to become a housewife, then all she did was get a head start.
Ah, to be 17 again, when the roadmap of one's life is linear, predictable and planned for down to the last detail.
We Americans tend to value our freedom.
But apparently without a corresponding value attached to duty. Which is no more than a recipe for dim-witted adolescence extending well into the 30's or even beyond.
As a pro-choice woman and a mother, I agree with you completely, Megan.
My daughter is now 28, but had she become pregnant as a teenager, I would not have 'told her what to do.' First, I wouldn't even know what she should do because I can't predict the future. This might be her only biological chance to have a child, for all I know. But there would be no shortage of either information or support.
Second, the burden of that choice should be hers because choice is what goes with freedom and growth is earned through choice.
Third, anyone who has raised children to adulthood knows that when you tell them what you think they should do, you may be indicted in some future court for causing them to make what now looks to be the wrong decision.
Hell, my younger sister is still holding my older sister responsible for an abortion she had twenty years ago, when both were employed adults, because of my sister's "advice." If she'd had that baby, then she wouldn't have had the child she did have, now 17, that is currently driving her mad, right?
If my daughter insisted, with appropriate caveats I might tell her what I would do in her place--which for a 17 year old would be to end the pregnancy as early as possible--but that I can't really be in her place.
Knowing the profound truth of that is important.
Just think.....if Obama's young, single mom had done what so many pro-choicers say the young Palin should've done, we wouldn't even be having this discussion......
Just think.....if Obama's young, single mom had done what so many pro-choicers say the young Palin should've done, we wouldn't even be having this discussion......
Just think ... if Godwin's mom had done what so many pro-choicers say the young Palin should've done, we could invoke Hitler on this thread to our heart's content......
"We Americans tend to value our freedom." - brooksfoe
"When the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again." - Sir Edward Gibbon discussing ancient Athens.
I haven't heard this anywhere except from you, Megan. Hmm. And it's not helping your case that you aren't giving any sources.
Rob: Abortion is obviously not easily analogized to anything else. That's why it's a difficult moral issue. But there are circumstances in which one would say that, yes, the moral thing to do is to kill the animal. If you are the zookeeper of a city under siege, and the human population is no longer willing to provide the food to feed your animals, the moral thing to do is to kill them quickly and painlessly.
What's unique about babies is that while they're fetuses they make relatively few demands, but it's certain that once born they will start to make immense demands. Similarly, while they're fetuses, in the early stages, they're not conscious and not fully human, but the longer you wait the more human they become and the more they become moral agents in their own right. By the time they start to make great demands on you, you'll no longer have the right to do anything but care for them to the fullest of your ability. So it's in this sense that I feel the decision to have an early abortion if you're 17 is generally the responsible, moral decision, and should be viewed with a sense of regrettable necessity.
But it's different for every person, and there are I'm sure plenty of 17-year-olds who would thrive with a baby, which is why it's ultimately the mother's choice. I said I think the moral thing to do is to encourage the girl to have an abortion. What she decides is up to her.
John w quotes and cites: ""We Americans tend to value our freedom." - brooksfoe
"When the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again." - Sir Edward Gibbon discussing ancient Athens."
"Arbeit macht frei." - Anonymous Nazi
"They hate us for our freedoms. So I'm taking some of yours away." - Dumbya Bush, Incompetent Douchebag
So it's in this sense that I feel the decision to have an early abortion if you're 17 is generally the responsible, moral decision, and should be viewed with a sense of regrettable necessity.
If you think a teenager is more or less guaranteed to abuse or malnourish a child, then maybe it's a "regrettable necessity" but, 1) there's always adoption, which I certainly would encourage as the moral choice for someone I thought would be a neglectful parent and 2) why would you think that abuse or neglect were guaranteed?
What you're arguing is that it's morally correct or preferable to preserve the teenager's ability to more easily make various life choices at the expense of the fetus/baby. I guess I'm finding it hard to put a ton of moral weight on the whole life choice thing. Many--perhaps most--adults do things they would prefer not to to discharge their responsibilities. We sacrifice the ability to make life choices all the time, for good reasons and bad. I don't see the constraints which bind adult behavior as somehow immoral, or freedom from constraints as morally preferable. Rather, I think the moral value attaches to decision to accept the constraints and discharge one's responsibilities, or to refuse to do so.
Why do people want to discuss things of which they have no knowledge such as:
1) whether Palin's daughter was pressured to carry the baby or to marry the father;
2) whether getting married is a good decision for her or not;
3) whether any shortcoming on Governor Palin's part as a mother contributed to her daughter's situation.
D. Aristophanes:
Except that the Obama's were together through his birth... Apple to apple comparisons make better talking points.
If A > B
If B > a load of crap.
Say then that Bristol having a baby at 17 and Mrs. Palin having a Down's syndrome baby (is B) leads to the hideous aforementioned enumerated problems. Then if A (their pregnancies) leads to B then, I don't know Sherlock, what would be logical? It would be incorrect that anyone is arguing against A; did you hear that Moe? I didn't hear that Larry.
Well put, Megan. I'm pro-choice but it's a terrible decision to have to make...if she wants to have the baby, bravo. If she's not ready, then she should give it up for adoption. I know a lot of people who would love to take care of it.
I think she and her boyfriend were stupid not to use a condom, or her boyfriend was stupid if he pressured her to allow him to go in bareback.
- A liberal who actually agreed with everything you posted.
JB-
"honestly, megan, i don't know what you're talkign about. NOBODY is even discussing Bristol's situation in the corporate media."
If only this were true.
Check out the front page of Tuesday's New York Times. Three articles. To their credit, Hurricane Gustav got the bulk of the space. The second is about whether Governor Palin is a bad mother for running when she should be staying home to take care of the kids. The third is about whether the fact that Governor Palin's daughter is pregnant proves that Senator McCain lacks judgement. Bristol's pregnancy gets a mention in the large-font secondary headline above the article as "Daughter's Pregnancy One of Several Revelations".
"i don't really care what the young girl does. but i do wonder how much, if any, choice she had in the matter. but her super pro-life ma line item vetoed funding for pregnant teens in need of last resort housing or something."
Um, NO. She cut, not even eliminated, money for expansion of the programs. She did not even come remotely close to cutting the programs themselves.
"SG: no, because the logic of Roe v. Wade is that the right to privacy means the government can't step in and tell a woman what to do with her body, one way or the other.
Now, was that so hard? Sheesh."
You just used logic and RoeVWade in the same sentence. Regardless of one's position on abortion, Roe's logic was so fucking tortuous and horrible it should have been taken out back and shot. You aren't helping your case any.
"Here's why I find Sarah Palin irresponsible: 1) accepting the VP offer when she: 1) has such little experience or knowledge about the role of VP" Historically speaking, the VP did very very little. It is only pretty recently that the VP's powers have been expanded, with the most expansion being Cheney's doing. So unless you're really asking her to act as another Cheney this point has little contact with reality. Of course, if she did shoot anybody they'd stay down because she wouldn't use a sissy fowling piece.
"Palin also has more executive experience than John McCain. Why not argue that managing the affairs of a town of 6,500 makes her a better choice to head the GOP ticket?"
Managing a fighter squadron most definitely qualifies as executive experience. So McCain still has the edge. This also puts Eisenhower aboveboard.
trrwv - re: "but her super pro-life ma line item vetoed funding for pregnant teens in need of last resort housing or something."
She had the state funding for Covenant House Alaska increase from $1.34 million in 2006 to $3,900,000 in 2007. Thats a large increase in funding, not "vetoing funding".
I'd link to more data about it, but I don't want to get my comment blocked as spam.
re: "megan, these people are pro-uterine control, not pro-life."
Even if she really had vetoed funding, or changed it from some very high level to $0. That would not imply being "pro-uterine control". Not funding things, isn't imposing control on people. Funding things might be, but inaction/not-funding is not.
"Any number of commenters seem to be implying that what a GOOD parent would have done is encouraged her daughter to get an abortion."
As opposed to the McCain campaign not telling parents what their daughters should do?
That the story line that McCain put front and center about Palin - that her fitness for office is somehow enhanced because she chose not to abort a Down's Syndrome baby - is now getting stepped on by the behavior of another Palin child is simply anecdotal evidence of the existence of karma.
"What I find odd is that McCain and his people are praising her "choice" not to have an abortion, but, if they had their way, she would have had no choice to make."
The fact of the matter is the law does give her the choice of abortion, without even telling her mother or boyfriend about the pregnancy. People who are pro-life believe she made the right choice.
What is so hard about that?
I thought that's what we were supposed to hate about conservatives . . .
It's only the social conservatives (probably a little more than 1/3 of the party) that waste their time telling the populace how to live. Self-described progressives want to tell everybody how to live. Don't you read Ezra Klein?
Please stop posting about Bristol Palin.
Kudos for figuring this out at along last:
" Liberal values are supposed to be about giving people space to make their own moral decisions, not forcing your own on them. I thought that's what we were supposed to hate about conservatives . . . "
Liberalism in practice is 180 degrees different than what it is supposed to be... I suspect that you knew this all along.
I wonder if you will apply this lesson to any of Obama's other positions (healthcare, etc.)
Megan,
Can you identify the "commenters [who] seem to be implying that what a GOOD parent would have done is encouraged her daughter to get an abortion"?
Can you identify who are the "many pro-choicers view abortion ... as a morally neutral act"? Should be easy to identify a bunch if there are so many.
Here's what I think is happening: the elites who run political parties and are TV pundits have money and nannies and see no issue with the broad concept of work plus family for women.
BUT, they think they can use her to appeal to middle American women. And many of these women are likely to not like to see a woman essentially leaving her family of 5 for work.
Shinyk writes: "It's only the social conservatives (probably a little more than 1/3 of the party) that waste their time telling the populace how to live."
If the social conservatives are only 1/3 of the GOP why are they at least 80% of their elected representatives? Name ten prominent currently-elected Republicans, fast.
Oops, should have been "ten moderate currently-elected Republicans."
They're few and far between.
Most of you guys miss the point on the abortion issue. Abortion is only a women's rights issue IF life does not begin before birth. If it does (and the evidence that premature babies do survive could be used to defend that), then this is not a women's rights issue, it is a human right's issue.
If life begins before birth, abortion represents a huge violation of a libertarian principle that "Criminal laws should be limited to violation of the rights of others through force or fraud, or deliberate actions that place others involuntarily at significant risk of harm."
Aaron writes: "Most of you guys miss the point on the abortion issue. Abortion is only a women's rights issue IF life does not begin before birth. If it does (and the evidence that premature babies do survive could be used to defend that), then this is not a women's rights issue, it is a human right's issue."
Well over 90% off abortions take place in the 1st trimester, chuckles. Tell me how many of them survive miscarriages.
The answer is ZERO, which is also your grade for your silly-ass comment.
Hey Rob, the f***ing filter keeps catching my response. But here it is basically: you keep dropping parts of my argument instead of looking at the whole thing. I don't think an early-stage fetus has any more moral agency than a duck's egg. The fact that in the future at some point it could be a human being doesn't seem to me to be relevant. Around week 9-10 you start getting to the point where it's more like some tiny animal with almost no brain, a frog or something, but again while I don't think killing a frog is a morally neutral act, I run over them periodically by accident (Vietnam has a lot of frogs) and it doesn't keep me awake at night.
A girl who has a baby at age 17 will almost certainly have lower educational attainment and lower earning power than one who has a baby at 25. A girl who marries at 17-18 has a 48% chance of being divorced 10 years later -- double that of a woman who marries at 25. Having a "non-intact family" is itself the single greatest risk factor for teen pregnancies in the next generation, so by having the baby and getting married you're raising the risk of entering a multi-generational cycle of teen pregnancy, broken families, lower education and income. In general, I would counsel a pregnant 17-year-old to get an early abortion, and I would do so out of a sense of moral duty to her interests.
What she does, of course, is up to her, and every 17-year-old is different. There are some who thrive. I have a good friend who became a father at 18, married the girl, became a music producer, raised the kids, the wife turned lesbian, he became successful, they divorced and he's now a happy 40-year-old with two reasonably well-adjusted college-age sons. And he didn't even have much support from his parents. All sorts of things can happen. But in general a shotgun wedding and a baby at 18 is not a plan for success and happiness, and I think it's a moral duty to tell girls they don't have to do this, they can call it a youthful error, go to college and grow up and then start a family when they're prepared for it. (And start using some goddamn contraception. Really, someone who isn't responsible enough to use contraceptives seems unlikely to me to be responsible enough to raise the kid well.)
The true irony of Bristol's story is that the Palin family epitomizes the Pro-Choice position. They had choices available to them and exercised those that were right for their family. The vast majority of pregnancies in this country are carried to term whether their mothers are pro-choice or pro-life. Most pro-choice moms would have made the same choice as the Palins if they had access to good health care, economic resources, and a supportive family.
I've outlined a detailed case that the pro-life pundits should not be so quick to claim the Palins as their poster family in this blog posting.
Excellent post Megan. I knew you'd come through. Thanks for the sanity.
More like it, please.
Haven't read all 94 other comments.. but I would only add a few things..
1. I agree with Megan that there should not be some perceived onus that Bristol should have an abortion.. Choice doesn't mean kill.. it means choice.
2. However, the bigger point is about Palin pushing abstinence only policies and cutting funding to teen mothers programs at the same time as she herself is using her daughter's pregnancy to show what an accepting family they are. Pure hypocrisy there.
3. What is perhaps, the most galling, is that the McCain campaign seems to be instrumentalizing this pregnancy itself and in a very hypocritical fashion. While telling everyone not to pay attention, it's a family matter, etc etc, they then also make positive statements about "how cool it is that Bristol made the right decision."
So, the Republicans are talking about how Bristol made the "right" decision, even though their specified campaign planks argue for a policy where SHE WOULDN'T HAVE A DECISION AT ALL.. or that they see her as making the right decision on whether to commit murder or not. That's the really galling thing..
Oh.. and one PS-from an earlier post of Megan's about abstinence only vs. birth control education. Yes, there is this one study that says that both work equally horribly--and other people have noted other studies that disagree.. but my first thought about all this was: What about other countries? The United States has the highest rate of teen pregnancies of any industrialized country from what I can read.. So how come American teens are just so bad at not getting pregnant. It seems to me that the "well, teens are just stupid and don't listen" argument doesn't hold up if it only seems to apply to American teens, and other countries, with easier contraception access and more education do show a much lower teen pregnancy rates.. (of course, maybe there are other cultural factors.. but I would wonder what they are.. )
Managing a fighter squadron most definitely qualifies as executive experience. So McCain still has the edge.
McCain was a bomber pilot. That may seem like a small detail not worth quibbling over, but if you can't get the easy facts right, why should anyone have confidence that you'll do better with the tougher ones?
tricstmr - Palin didn't cut funding to teen mother's programs, see my earlier comment.
MAYBE ONE OF THE OTHER READERS KNOWS THE ANSWER TO THIS:
Megan,
Can you identify the "commenters [who] seem to be implying that what a GOOD parent would have done is encouraged her daughter to get an abortion"?
Can you identify who are the "many pro-choicers view abortion ... as a morally neutral act"? Should be easy to identify a bunch if there are so many.
Here's what I think is happening: the elites who run political parties and are TV pundits have money and nannies and see no issue with the broad concept of work plus family for women.
BUT, they think they can use her to appeal to middle American women. And many of these women are likely to not like to see a woman essentially leaving her family of 5 for work.
Posted by mike | September 3, 2008 7:58 PM
mike:
Can you identify the "commenters [who] seem to be implying that what a GOOD parent would have done is encouraged her daughter to get an abortion"?
Go back in one of these Palin threads and you can find a comments from brooksfoe stating that were it his daughter, he would have encouraged her to get an abortion. Presumably he considers himself a good parent. Also, see Obama's comment that were his daughters to be come pregnant, he would not want to see them punished with a child. Likewise, I believe he would consider himself to be a good parent.
Can you identify who are the "many pro-choicers view abortion ... as a morally neutral act"? Should be easy to identify a bunch if there are so many.
Also, if you looking through the archives, there were a number of commenters in the various abortion threads asserting that a embryo had no moral worth. Now, perhaps their volume overstates the number, but they're not strawman. They certainly do exist, and they've posted here.
Oops, should have been "ten moderate currently-elected Republicans."
Social moderates?
Paul, Gary Johnson, Jeff Flake, Spector, Cheney, Schwartzenegger, Paul Braun, Liddy Dole, Jim Douglas, Mark Sanford.
It should be noted that a lot of these politicians are anything but moderate in other respects (particularly Paul and Cheney).
I could probably just as soon have saved myself a few minutes and named the top dog, since McCain only gives a damn about the few things McCain gives a damn about: immigration, blowing things up, Pork, Baseball, national parks, the UFC and corruption. Gays, divorces and abortions aren't on that list. I imagine the only thing that would be needed to get McCain to sign a bill greatly relaxing every existing restriction on abortion is a tacked-on provision that made more immigrants legal (or declared war on, say, Spain).
Which is, of course, why the aforementioned 1/3 voted for Huckabee.