One of the intellectual disconnects I notice most frequently in liberals is the one surrounding freedom of speech.
Liberals usually spend a great deal of time talking about free speech and demanding their right to speech, but they also want to stifle speech with which they disagree (such as religious speech in schools, for instance). An elementary school girl is barred from singing Awesome God because a principal thinks it is "proselytizing," for instance, but gay pride T-shirts are ok. (Aside: judges determined that student rights to free speech were violated in both instances).
But one of the oddest disconnects for liberals is between speech and action. They seem to have a very hard time noting the difference between them. That's why they try to use anti-racketeering laws against abortion protesters. It's why you will frequently hear arguments that boil down to the idea that a woman's right to abortion is sacrosanct, whereas a protester's right to free speech should be limited.
I bring this up in connection with this post from Pandagon that I linked to yesterday.
Once you get past the pro-life- and Catholic-bashing, there was a quote from the Center for Reproductive Rights which concerned attempts to add forced pregnancy to the International Criminal Court's definition of a crime against humanity.
The part that caught my attention was this:
If such a general formulation had been accepted, the spouse’s objection to terminate a pregnancy could have been a punishable act - crime against humanity.
And Amanda's comment after it:
God forbid that a man forcing his wife to bear a child against her will be considered a crime against humanity.
This transformation of objection to force made me ask this question:
How is objecting to an abortion the same thing as forcing someone not to have one?
There were a few of the typical responses to this. One person discussed how, in poor countries, men will control all the finances and so by "objecting" to the abortion by not paying for it, he is effectively forcing her to have the baby. I understand this practical approach to the situation. But is a person objecting to an abortion really a crime against humanity? And should a man be forced to pay for an abortion he doesn't approve of under penalty of law?
I next posted this:
So, now you expect him to pay for her to kill the child he objects to her killing? How does that make sense?
I'll admit that I knew at this point that I was poking the cranky tiger with a stick. But the responses became more predictable:
bluefish A: what do you think, sharon? that the husband should have the ultimate say over whether or not a woman terminates a pregnancy? (notice i didn’t say killing a baby or child because that’s not what abortion is, in my mind)
regardless of her thoughts, concerns, doubts, fears, health, etc. should the husband should decide when, where and how his wife/property will reproduce?
Dorothy: Does it make sense for him to be able to force her to continue a pregnancy she objects to continuing?
Inky: Sharon: the point of it is that the entire society is set up so that him objecting does prevent her from getting the abortion, because he controls her financial resources.
aimai: This makes Sharon’s annoying “how is it fair to ask/force a man to pay for an abortion he doesn’t want” so stupid–women work, and work hard, from dawn to dusk at labor that is either unpaid, or whose payment is handed over to their husbands.
I tried repeatedly to separate the money issue from the speech issue by explaining that of course the woman should have her own money to do with as she wanted. And I wasn't even trying to debate abortion per se. I wanted people to recognize that a person objecting to their spouse having an abortion shouldn't be a crime against humanity (although, frankly, I do think abortion could be categorized as a crime against humanity).
Unfortunately, the Pandagonistas aren't really interested in free speech, at least where abortion is concerned. That much is obvious.
It isn't that the financial independence of women is insignificant. Obviously, if women have more control of their resources and become more empowered that way, then that is better for everyone. But it seems illogical to me that they cannot admit that a man objecting to his spouse's abortion doesn't rise to the level of a crime against humanity, a distinction usually reserved for slavery, genocide, and extermination of a population.
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