The problem I have with this particular comparison is my feeling that this is a comparison of apples and oranges. Are insane people with guns killing people? Yes. Does abortion occur? Yes. Here's the thing, though; according to the CDC, more than 91% of abortions occur at or before week 13 of pregnancy. In addition, of those performed before week 13, nearly 70% are before the 8th week (http://www.cdc.gov/reproductivehealth/data_stats/). Brain development doesn't occur into a usable (electrically active) form until nearly 20 weeks (when fetal movement begins). What's my point? At the stage where abortion occurs, the fetus is not alive, for all intents and purposes. NOT, ALIVE. By any definition of life. Potentially life? Yes, but not actually alive at the time.
Gun violence, on the other hand, clearly destroys living, breathing, loving LIVES. PEOPLE die, not what can only be described as more than a ball of cells. PEOPLE. CHILDREN. Who had lives, families, and friends. One cannot, in my opinion, compare these two, and it is sickening for people to do so. It's ludicrous and terrible to compare these statistics.
You can use all the standard arguments for both sides of both things in this argument: life begins at conception/no it doesn't. Guns don't kill, people do. Well why do you need such a big magazine? Then of course the issue of rape babies (with abortion) and the latest "is it mental health or gun control that needs help" issue. Blah blah blah. It doesn't matter. My problem is I feel that these two issues, while both are important, should NOT be compared. They have no bearing on one another and are not related in any real way. It sickens me to think that people are taking these issues to one another. It may be another sad comparison, but the tact of this comparison reminds me of PETA's comparison of farm animal treatment to holocaust victims. They are completely different and it is a sad fact that they are being grouped together.
Again, I support gun rights AND the right for a woman/couple to choose whether they have a child, but DO NOT say that the so-called 'deaths' from abortion are anywhere hear the same category as those of gun violence. If you don't like abortion, fine, say so. But don't say that the lives of 20 American CHILDREN matter less than aborted fetuses that may have been unwanted, forced upon a woman (in rape), or to parents unable to care for them properly. That is just plain sick. Again, in my opinion. But it's my blog, so it's my side of the argument. Thank you.
Danny, what an interesting post (you've been busy today!). I don't know much about cooking, video games, etc., so can't really comment very intelligently on your other cool posts very well but definitely could share my thoughts on this one. I could not agree with you more that those sorts of images are absolutely inappropriate and offensive and had a similar reaction when seeing this online, but I guess I approached it from a different perspective. I think the creators are this image are showing tremendous insensitivity to the families of the children who were killed at Sandy Hook, and I think it kind of comes across as "well it's not a big deal that 20 kids were killed because we kill 1.2 million kids through abortion", which is absolutely insane and reminiscent of "pro-life" advocates who claim is it better than an abortionist die than that X number of children die. So regardless of feelings on abortion, this image is inappropriate. AND (this is my own personal bias because I support much stricter gun control/bans)- I think that is is totally nonsensical to lump gun control and abortion issues in one package as typically seen in conservative politics. You can certainly make a case for them being separate issues, but for the sake of consistency I would think logically people who are "pro-freedom" would be for abortion access and for gun access, whereas I would think the pro-life position would be against abortion and against weapons that result in senseless death. Fortunately this is gaining a lot of traction in the younger pro-life movement but still a lot of inconsistencies.
ReplyDeleteI would, however, disagree about these being apples and oranges about life vs. potential life. I would argue that science has definitely proven that brain development is a continuous process, and that development/degeneration of the brain and myelination of neuronal axons is a process that continues to change throughout the lifespan. I think it's a philosophical and moral issue that reasonable people can disagree on as to at what point life becomes "meaningful" or "independent" based on developmental stage. But I think it's dangerous to mix these subjective moral decisions with our laws. But from a scientific standpoint, I don't know that there is ever a definitive point at which we change from being "potentially alive" to being "alive". The closest definitive scientific event I think would be at conception when there is a full set of human DNA. I do understand your sentiment though. I was very involved in the consistent pro-life movement in college, and one of my intelligent professors pointed out that if we can't get people to respect or show empathy about the lives of people that we can actually see and interact with (i.e., schoolchildren that are murdered), it's certainly a stretch to get them to care about life they cannot see (i.e., developing child).
Given that both these issues are sensitive and people will continue to disagree for a long time, I think a lot more helpful progress could be made if instead of images like this one people on both sides focused on things we can mutually agree on, like preventing abortion by providing better access to info about preventing pregnancy/affordable childcare/education support for parenting students, etc., and preventing gun violence by committing to better enforcement of laws we have and drastically revamping our mental health system. There's a lot of work to be done!