Getting the rest of my thoughts in

It began with agreement, it really did...

A fellow blogger I follow went off on the meatheaded would be congressman Todd Akin, who thinks that woman can shut off incoming sperm at will.  Apparently he never bothered to look into things past what he heard in some 6th grade locker room.  In the course of many posts, though, this blogger said something that made me decide I had to speak up- basically, she'd never vote for any man who told her what she HAD to do with her body.

In a way of getting the other side out, I sent in an unfortunately long winded comment.  Among the the things I brought up:

- That BOTH times my ex and I made a child, we knew it immediately.  I won't pretend it happens to everyone, but I know for a fact that we weren't alone in this.  She said "That is insane" but admitted she neither had children nor wanted any.  Which is a better response than the ones I get from atheists about what I believe, but would have been nice to not have been looked at as nuts for an experience I had and she did not.

-That, given that I personally believe that life comes at conception, I find it a bit selfish for this to be all about the woman and nothing about the child.  She has a different mindset and disagrees, no harm no foul.

-That I don't think the fight over it would be near the proportion it is except that Planned Parenthood is not an honest broker in this, nor are any other clinics.  They make a profit on the procedure- a bigger one than they get from counseling- and thus have been exposed many times in pushing abortions without recourse, counselling, or parental notification.  I suggested that all abortions should be government paid- but paid only to the break-even-point on the procedure, so that money leaves the equation and counselling, other options, education based on responsibility and ramifications, and birth control could be equal partners in their work.  I think we "basically" can see agreement there, but from her response I think she believes that any control of abortion leads to unwanted kids, handicapped kids with no one to support them, and other such cases by the ton.  Which pretty much makes my point, which is that as long as money is in the equation, both sides will take extreme positions and refuse to compromise.

- None of which was but a set up to my real problem with the post- that I do not believe that ANYONE who has one, make-or-break issue is a fit voter.  Voting should be done with the best interests of the nation as a whole, or not done at all.  If you can say, for example," It doesn't matter how bad the economy sucks, I'm voting for Obama because he'll let me have an abortion"- OR "I don't care if he is a heartless corporate monster, I'm voting for Mitt because he'll let my church's hospital run things according to conscience", it's one easy step to," I'm voting for Hitler, because he's giving us everything we want- who cares what he does with the Jews?"  To her credit, she explained that the statement was just made over the issue being discussed, and didn't mean she was actually a one-trick-pony voter.  But if it's in your mind, perhaps it needs to be examined.  It doesn't do much good to vote for the guy standing up for woman's reproductive rights if his economic plans put all the women you are defending out of work.

Okay, all of that is what has gone before.  But there are a couple of things I wanted to hit and didn't particularly want to turn it into a whole thing on her site.  I know she doesn't read here, but some of her other readers do.  If you'd like to pass this on to her, your business, public forum.  I'm not doing this to berate her, or talk behind her back, and she is certainly entitled to her opinions.  Like I said, I agreed with 90% of the original post, for pete's sake.  So rather than trash her blog and her day, I thought I'd finish up here.

One thing, she states that she believes "a baby's rights begin at birth".  Okay, but what about its life?  Carry one for 10 months and see where you set that marker at.  Not trying to be snarky, but there is a fundamental difference between "rights" and "life", and you can't just rationalize that away.

Another thing, it was brought to my attention that I would feel differently if I was being forced to have a vasectomy at a certain age.  Actually, I wouldn't since I had one after Shenan, but anyway it's apples and oranges.  Maybe not if you take the baby in the womb as a living thing out of the equation, but you are comparing the prevention of the CREATION of future lives with the taking of one THAT IS ONGOING.  Not the same thing at any level.

And the sad thing is that the true, overarching issue is being ignored.  Perhaps it would be easier to see a fetus as a life rather than "A rice grain sized thing inside me" if we saw sex as the loving union of one man and one woman rather than a recreational pursuit.  Not judging anyone in particular, I think all of us get hit by that stone.  Lord, I know I do.

Finally, I was told I'd feel different if I had woman parts rather than man parts.  I really don't think that's true- the only change, sadly enough, would be the level of responsibility I would feel (sadly, because it's the level I should have felt all along).