Fetal Life and Abortion: Human Personhood at Conception
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Displayed Responses 2008
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2008
May 7th: The European Council of Europe's resolution is going too far!
April 25th: Some international organizations are counter-productive with respect to abortion
April 15th: Government of Finland Pressures Nicaragua to Legalize Abortion
April 2nd: Malta protests European Council of the E.U.
March 17th: Thoughts on Abortion
February 27th: Stop the abortion epidemic!
February 13th: The U.N., E.U. and World Bank's unethical influence in the affairs of small countries
January 28th: What remains of Roe v. Wade after 35 years?
Editor's Note: Again, is the European Union "playing fair?" Following are two articles from recent press releases:
New Paper Warns Against European Union “Moral Regulation” of Abortion
by Samantha Singson of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute
New York, NY -- In a recently released research paper on the European Union (EU) social agenda, scholar Maciej Golubiewski argues that the EU has overstepped its mandate by pursing a regime of “moral regulation” by funding controversial social policy initiatives on the family and the beginning and end-of-life issues. The European Institutions are doing this despite the frequent objections of individual EU member states. In “Europe’s Social Agenda: Why is the European Union Regulating Morality?,” Golubiewski uses the term “moral regulation” to encompass all EU social and human rights policies and initiatives that intrude or potentially intrude on democratic national jurisdiction over moral matters. The paper catalogues controversial programs and policies that are sponsored by the EU such as: competitions and publicity campaigns aimed at ... bureaucratic promotion of reproductive rights encompassing abortion, criticism of pro-life views, anti-religious educational programs aimed at youth, and funding of NGOs that explicitly advocate the legalization of abortion. The author concludes that “Only timely and effective action by national capitals to assert their rights can protect and preserve national traditions of marriage, family, and human life – arguably the most important issues of our time.” Golubiewski is a Polish national working on a doctorate in international relations at Johns Hopkins University and serves as C-FAM's analyst of European affairs.
The Council of Europe Presses Member States to Lift All Restrictions on Abortion
by Carlos Beltramo
A resolution approved by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe is demanding that its 47 member states "legalize abortion if they have not done so." Although legally non-binding, the resolution not only effectively endorses the "right" to kill the unborn, it puts pressure on nations to lift any and all restrictions on abortion throughout the whole continent. The resolution, named "Access to Safe and Legal Abortion in Europe," was approved by a vote of 102-69, with 69 abstentions. (See http://assembly.coe.int/ASP/Votes/DBVotesResults_EN.asp?VoteID=793&DocRef=11537&SessionID=317). The full text of the resolution is available at the official website of the Council of Europe. (See http://assembly.coe.int/Main.asp?link=/Documents/AdoptedText/ta08/ERES1607.htm )
The first section of the resolution states: "The Parliamentary Assembly reaffirms that abortion can in no circumstances be regarded as a family planning method." (Resolution, n. 1). While this statement sounds pro-life, in fact it has the opposite intent. What the Council of Europe is actually demanding is that the countries in which abortion is permitted, but carefully restricted, make the procedure readily available to all women who ask for it. Abortion on demand, in other words.
Although the Parliamentary Assembly's decision is non-binding on member states, it puts pressure on the Council of Europe to make abortion an unconditional "right." Even without a formal and binding decision from the Council of Europe, the resolution has a certain moral force, and can be used to intimidate countries such as Poland into establishing a "right to abortion."
Gisela Wurm, an Austrian Socialist parliamentarian, was the chief promoter of the resolution. She was at pains to explain that the resolution is intended to ensure that "society can protect women who don't want to continue with their pregnancies." She made no mention of particular countries. In fact, however, the resolution is clearly targeted at three countries which forbid all abortions: Ireland, Poland, and Malta.
Much of the resolution simply details the current European status quo. It reads: "In most of the Council of Europe member states the law permits abortion in order to save the woman's life for a number of reasons including to preserve physical and mental health, rape and incest, fetal impairment, economic and social reasons and in some countries on request.". The only three European countries that do not conform to this standard are, once again, Ireland, Poland, and Malta.
The seventh paragraph of the resolution--although it doesn't name names--is clearly directed at these holdouts. It states, "The Assembly invites the member states of the Council of Europe to ... decriminalize abortion within reasonable gestational limits, if they have not already done so."
Abortion in Ireland has been illegal since the founding of the Republic. The operant law, the "Offences Against the Person Act," was inherited from the United Kingdom. Under this Act, procuring or performing an abortion is an "unlawful" act, with both the person performing the abortion and the pregnant woman subject to imprisonment. While Great Britain later changed its laws to allow abortion up to 20 weeks gestation, Ireland moved in the opposite direction. The 1983 abortion referendum added even stronger anti-abortion language to the Irish Constitution. A 1992 decision by the Supreme Court of Ireland weakened the Offences Against the Person Act by ruling that an abortion could be lawfully performed if the continuation of the pregnancy would cause substantial risk to the woman's life. This decision aside, Ireland today has one of the most restrictive abortion laws in Europe. The legal situation in Malta is even more straightforward, and thus poses even more of an irritant to the pro-abortion lobby. The Criminal Code of Malta simply prohibits abortion under all circumstances. Moreover, when Malta joined the Council of Europe, it insisted on the following condition: It would not change its laws concerning human life.
The resolution passed by the Parliamentary Assembly essentially targets three pro-life nations: Ireland, Malta, and Poland.
Abortion resolution or no, Malta is not about to back down. In the words of Maltese lawmaker Leo Brincat: "It is impossible to legalize abortion" in Malta. Even the country's socialists oppose the practice. In Poland, abortion is illegal except for certain narrow exceptions. Moreover, it is as a practical matter, almost impossible to obtain. The Population Policy Data Bank of the U.N. Population Division notes that "the pregnant [Polish] woman would be required to undergo counseling, give written consent to the operation, and wait three days after the counseling until the abortion took place. . . At the same time, growing numbers of physicians and hospitals refused to perform abortions, as they were allowed to do under a conscience clause contained in the law. In some cities, there were no public institutions willing to perform abortions, leaving private clinics with much higher fees as the only resort for women seeking abortions. Some estimates were that almost half of all public hospitals in Poland had adopted this approach to the issue."
The resolution itself recounts in detail the various roadblocks that the country of Pope John Paul II has placed in the way of abortion: "The Assembly also notes that, in member states where abortion is permitted for a number of reasons, conditions are not always such as to guarantee women effective access to this right: the lack of local health care facilities, the lack of doctors willing to carry out abortions, the repeated medical consultations required, the time allowed for changing one's mind and the waiting time for the abortion all have the potential to make access to safe, affordable, acceptable and appropriate abortion services more difficult, or even impossible in practice."
Pope John Paul II would be proud of his nation, as well as of the other two. They constitute three small holdouts of Christian decency against a continent that has accepted the barbarism of abortion.
The Council of Europe is not happy with this deviation from the prevailing cultural line. It is attempting to use its diplomatic clout to bludgeon these three countries into line. Let us hope that it does not succeed.
Carlos Beltramo is a PRI correspondent, European Union.
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Editor's Note: We appreciate this viewer's wider ethical evaluation of the problem of permitting international organizations to dictate their agenda upon member nations which, in their own right, are sovereign nations.
Comment: Good. I'm glad you're presenting one of the most interesting paradoxes of the so-called liberal mindset. Almost nothing is more apparent to those who are familiar with a liberal mind than their tyrannical character.
The reason for this is simple: they're not liberals at all. A liberal is someone who believes that free choice operating in a rational context is the best mode of self-control for economic systems (18th c. Free enterprise), religion (Protestantism), and politics.
But the modern 'liberal' has no use for any of the above. Indeed, the above might be a fairly good characterization of a conservative. The reason for all this confusion is that the original use of the term 'liberal' had a definite meaning. The modern Liberal is simply someone who is opposed to its correlative, the conservative.
So, now a liberal is merely some form of a socialist, since socialism is the post-liberal(in the original sense) system of thought. And socialists are as doctrinaire as they come.
The old story that the nuns told us comes in pat here. They used to say that whenever someone points an accusing finger at someone else, there are three fingers pointing back at them.
Now the liberals I used to know would say that the anti-abortion laws were an imposition on people, as if any command or allowance, whether law and/or right or not, doesn't have some value at its foundation. Actually, a negative law deposes a disvalue. The affirmative commands impose a value.
Take, for example, abortion. When legalized and made into a right, instead of being called the legalization of murder, it is paraded as a progressive addition to the already-existing list of human rights, and the previous laws against it are characterized as barbaric, repressive, which merely imposed outdated values, etc, etc. The reason they can play the 'freedom card' is due to their having substituted a right for a negative law forbidding an evil. But this 'right' gives the woman an opportunity to become a tyrannical murder, acting on her own behalf with no regard for the other person. Every negative law forbids some evil. But because a law is a command and more clearly imposes a value or renounces a disvalue, it is easy for the anti-lifers to act as though they are not imposing any value, when as a matter of fact, the erection of a right which actually promotes murder doesn't impose a value, It promotes a disvalue, and teaches people that human life is less important than mere preference. To make a grave evil, which formerly was identified and forbidden, into the subject of a 'right' is a catastrophic legal and political error, is the wronging of righteousness, a destruction of that part of law which does not command good to be done, but an evil to be avoided.
To put the matter in terms of an example, by what stretch of the imagination would a alcoholic patient be liberated who was told not to get drunk by his doctor, but who fired that doctor for one who told him he had a perfect right to get drunk ? The first doctor has forbidden getting drunk for moral and health reasons. The second is teaching the doctrine that choice, based on pleasure, is more important than health or morality.
As everyone knows who has dealt with a drunk, a drunk is enslaved to their passion. You don't liberate them by encouraging them to do evil.
And this, or something like it, is what the pro-murderers have done when they made abortion a 'right'. They first substituted an allowance to do a serious evil for a negative command to avoid a that serious evil. What it really means is: The formerly 'serious' evil is not seriously evil.
I wonder if we 'put the shoe on the other foot' and removed the impositional law forbidding rape, and substituted for that repressive command a 'liberated' right for men or women to rape anyone they wanted if they so pleased; but, if they didn't want to, they didn't have to. The only thing worse would be to require rape.
So also with abortion. It would be worse to require abortions, but it is a step backwards, not a step forward to remove safeguards against serious evils. And that is what they have done in the name of choice, liberation, progress, and , of course, rationality.
We have a law on the books stating that robbing a bank is forbidden. If we use the same logic as was used in the case of abortion, we should allow people to have the right to rob banks, if they so choose. But if they didn't want to, well, that's ok, too.
But if its evil to throw away laws forbidding evil and substituting encouragements to do those evils, then its evil for international agencies to require nations to permit and encourage evils as a condition for economic membership.
Please. Remember that the modern nation which began encouraging abortions was the Soviet Union in the 1920's. What is one of Russia's greatest problems now? Population decline.
Why were/are so many Arab foreigners allowed in Western Europe – in Germany and France ? Because they don't have enough laborers from their own country. Abortion, in the long run, is economically disastrous. So, why make it a condition for economic membership?
If they are that stupid, then my own primitive suggestion is this:
Those nations that are not embracing and will not embrace the madness of murdering their young - why don't you form your own economic union, since you have a future and the others do not? Your populations will be growing. So will your economies. Why hitch your star to these other nations whose murderous policies are the death bell for those nations' futures? Their populations will continue to decline. They will have to continue to encourage foreign invasion with its predictable conflicts, and if the foreigners are fruitful and are finally enfranchised, those nations will have to look forward to the day when they are no longer in control of their own countries. Furthermore, if they are so short-sighted in these present circumstances, they will in the future want you to partake of all the costs and difficulties and pseudo-solutions that result from their former imprudence that they have forced upon you. You'll have the same problems they do. They'll want you to follow them again, like lemmings, in the future when they come up with equally absurd solutions. Please don't require me to enumerate them. I will just say that like Macbeth, they will be chasing tomorrow after tomorrow's petty solutions as their candle dwindles. What advantage is there to that?____________________
Editor's Note: We present this article to inform our viewers of what appears to be an unwarranted infringement by one Nation on the sovereignty of another.
http://www.lifesitenews.com:80/ldn/2008/apr/08040907.html
Government of Finland Pressures Nicaragua to Legalize Abortion
By Matthew Cullinan Hoffman
MANAGUA, April 9, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The Finnish government, following the practice of its Scandinavian neighbors, is pressuring Nicaragua to legalize abortion during a visit that will determine if Finland will continue its $16 million annual aid package to the country.
During his recent visit to Nicaragua to "evaluate" the state of the country, the Finnish minister of Exterior Cooperation and Trade, Paavo Väyrynen, made his desire clear: legalize abortion.
"We are aware of the legislation that you have in Nicaragua to restrict abortion," he told the Managuan daily El Nuevo Diario on April 2. "When your Minister of Exterior Relations visited us, we talked to him about the laws that are typical of all countries regarding therapeutic abortion, and how they are a basic human right of the woman, and important for the health of pregnant women and children."
"We think that the legislation in Nicaragua is very strict, and affects the human rights of the woman and the quality of life of children, and for that reason we think that we have a justification for discussing this topic with the government of Nicaragua," he added.
Väyrynen did not address the issue of the health of children who die as a result of the abortion procedure, nor did he cite any international treaty establishing abortion as a "right".
Väyrynen made it clear that he was not at all sure if the aid package would continue. "It's a controversial topic. It's positive for donating countries to hold a discussion with respect to it, to influence basic progress, but on the other side, there are some negative aspects that we need to discuss. And we are now deciding the levels of direct support in the budget for each country. The future is something that we are going to discuss. I still don't know if we will continue."
Finland's thinly veiled threat against Nicaragua follows on the heels of a recent decision by Sweden to cut off aid to the country, which followed months of tension over Nicaragua's decision to apply criminal penalties to all abortions in 2006 (except for medical procedures to save a woman's life), a measure that was overwhelmingly ratified in Nicaragua's new penal code in 2007. Although Sweden did not cite Nicaragua's abortion law in its decision, it was widely seen as a punishment for violating the pro-abortion standards of the European country.
Representatives from Scandinavia and other European countries have also expressed concern to Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega, who has consistently defended the law (see LifeSiteNews coverage at http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/jan/08010804.html).
Nicaragua's "Women's Network Against Violence" (RMCV), a pro-abortion feminist group, applauded Väyrynen's statements. "We feel that his declarations are a window of opportunity so that we can again put the topic on the national agenda," said Ruth Marina Matamoros, a Network spokesman, in a separate interview with El Nuevo Diario. She added that the statement was an "open call" by "international jurisdictions" to legalize abortion in the country.
Related LifeSiteNews.com Coverage:
Excerpts from "Democracy is Realized in a Parliamentary System": Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/jan/08012401.htmlNicaraguan President Denounces International Media for Campaign Against Country's Anti-Abortion Laws
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/jan/08010804.htmlSweden Cuts Aid to Countries that Oppose its Pro-Abortion Stance
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/aug/07083106.htmlEU Threatens to Withdraw Aid to Nicaragua if Pro-Life Law Remains
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2007/feb/07020902.html
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Editor's Note: We have recently spoken of what we see as an infringement of the sovereignty of nations by the United Nations and the European Union. We see this in their demand that member nations legalize abortion. We presume permission to present this article indicating that demand, and the protest of Malta against that attempted, unjust imposition.
The following article is from maltaStar.com
Decriminalization of abortion: "Council of Europe imposing values" - Pro-life activist
Tuesday 25 March 2008
Paul Vincenti, Gift of Life Malta coordinator and pro-life activist, harshly criticised the Council of Europe after its call for the decriminalization of abortion.
Vincenti told maltastar.com in an interview on Tuesday that he believes that the CoE’s (Council of Europe’s) agenda “is not to seek the truth here, but just to impose their values upon others. This is most alarming.”
The pro-life activist criticised the Council of Europe because it sought the opinion of pro-abortion groups without inviting pro-life organisations to contribute to the Council’s deliberation.Mr Vincenti once again stresses the Gift of Life’s stand to amend the Constitution of Malta because the “vast majority at 93% of Maltese, is absolutely against abortion and believe that the unborn child should have the clear right to life.”
When challenged with the CoE argument that legal abortions would reduce the chance of illegal and unsanitary abortions, Mr Vincenti said that as far as is known, there have never been any recorded instances of illegal back street abortions taking place in Malta.
He argues that those Maltese who opt for an abortion go to Sicily or the UK and have an abortion in private clinics there, “and not in someone’s dirty garage as the pro-abortion side would try to have the uninformed believe to solicit fear and support for abortion.”
Anja Schulze bounces questions and ideas with Paul Vincenti about the recent developments in the Council of Europe:AS: What is the Gift of Life's opinion about the Council of Europe's to decriminalise abortion?
PV: The Council of Europe is the guardian of human rights. Human life begins at conception and it is simply incomprehensible how the CoE can call for the legal destruction of human life in its most exposed and defenceless stage of development. If the CoE were so interested in abortion, why did they only take testimonies from pro-abortion groups? They did not invite the pro-life organizations to give their expert advice. Why is this? Clearly, their agenda is not to seek the truth here, but just to impose their values upon others. This is most alarming.
AS: Why do you want to fix the law which makes abortion illegal in the constitution? Will you be sustaining your stance even under the new legislature?
PV: We do not want to touch the law as it stands. We want to amend the Constitution of Malta. The unborn child does not have the clear right to life in Malta, even if the vast majority at 93% of Maltese, is absolutely against abortion and feel that the unborn child should have the clear right to life. We have already made contact with the key people to start a parliamentary debate on the matter. We will keep on working at this as the people want this.
AS: The Constitution of Malta guarantees the "freedom of choice" for everybody. But women do not have the right to decide for themselves for an abortion. Isn't it a contradiction? How do you justify this fact?
PV: I am not aware of any part in the Constitution which allows for free choice for murder, rape or theft. These are all free choices people may make also. Some things however are clearly wrong and that includes all the above and abortion to the Maltese. Laws are there to protect human life, which starts at conception. To elevate the ideal of choice to a state above that or moral rights and wrong and sensible reason is a very dangerous slippery slope to travel on. Yet some are prepared to walk it all the same.
AS: The report from the "Community on Equal Opportunities for Women and Men" that a ban doesn't cause fewer abortions and mainly leads to clandestine abortions which are more dangerous for women. Do you (GoL) still believe in a ban on abortion when mothers-to-be are taking such high risks to find a way out their situation, because of the law?
PV: Being pro-life means being in favour of the protection of all human life from the beginning to a natural end. Whether abortions are more common, legal or illegal does not make abortion any less fatal for the child that dies within his mother’s womb and any less traumatic for the mother either.
Abortion hurts the mother. Times are changing now with more and more women mustering the courage to come forward in ever increasing numbers, laden with harrowing stories of life long silent suffering following an abortion. This is now a psychologically accepted syndrome called Post Abortion Syndrom (PAS). Women have thoughts of suicide, some act on this; many fall into deep depression, become addicted to alcohol and drugs. They have flashbacks and cannot get over their grief.
Many support groups of pro-life volunteers, now even in Malta are reaching out to these victims of a male dominated society which tells women, abortion is good for them and will make them equal to men. There is nothing more anti-female than abortion and we must defend women from this male dominated business. The pro-aborts have turned pregnancy into a disease and abortion is the cure. They have robbed us of the wonder of pregnancy and the unique wonder and beauty of motherhood. They have indoctrinated people with the lie that for a women to be equal to men, they have to shed their motherhood, the very thing that makes them so much more special then us men.
As far as is known, there have never been any recorded instances of illegal back street abortions taking place in Malta. Those Maltese who opt for an abortion go to Sicily or the UK and have an abortion that is generally carried out by doctors in their private clinics and not in someone’s dirty garage as the pro-abortion side would try to have the uninformed believe to solicit fear and support for abortion.
Abortion whether legal or not, carries the same risks to the mother and these real risks are always conveniently ignored by the pro-abortion industry.
AS: Point 5 in the CoE report states: "In no case should abortion be promoted as a method of family planning. But in circumstances where abortion is not against the law, such abortion should be safe and accessible." When the pregnancy results from a rape, women should be given the choice of having an abortion."
Why should a mother who gets pregnant out of rape carry the burden of such a pregnancy?PV: What always amazes us is how the pro-abortion movement is so ready to admit that abortion is a necessary wrong. They will still however excuse it and refer to it as some kind of unavoidable evil.
Abortion is medically never safe. Abortion always carries a risk for the mother because it is simply not natural. It is not natural to force open a woman’s cervix before the time, it is not natural to insert all manner of surgical instruments into her womb, it is simply not natural to cut away a human life from her womb. To give people the false impression that abortion is in any way safe is nothing less than absolute dishonesty. There have been numerous recorded instances of women who have died, been rushed into emergency treatment rooms with profuse bleeding and countless others who have become sterile because of legal, so called safe abortions.
Dr David C Reardon, who wrote about the only known study on abortion and rape victims available “Victims and Victors”, testified that the vast majority of women who had an abortion following rape, said that the experience of having an abortion after the rape was far worse than the actual rape itself which they tended to get over much sooner. Rape is a powerful word that evokes high emotions. The use of a pretence such as abortion in cases of rape is an unfair tactic that seeks to enrol a level of deep sympathy for abortion in restricted cases and to also attempt to get those who are in favour of life to seem heartless in the face of such a terrible ordeal. It is true that rape is a horrendous crime against women, but if abortion makes post- rape victims even worse, then we should all be helping that person keep her child and avoid an even greater trauma.
It is the women themselves who are telling us that abortion is not a solution in cases of rape and incest so why are the pro-abortion groups, including the CoE systematically ignoring these documented facts? This is a very important question that must be answered.
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Abortion (1973 - )
A red, red rosebud was unfolding
Within its bassinet of green,
In wonder, there I stood beholding,
As though the hand of God were seen.
The sunlight sparkled on its beauty,
Through a drop of dew upon its side,
But now it is the sadness of my duty
To tell you how the rosebud died.
A little boy came swinging,
With hockey stick in air,
And sent the rosebud flinging
Broken treasures everywhere!
The poor rosebud was a living flower,
About to share its blessings here,
Transplanted fresh from Heaven’s bower,
With shiny dewdrop! Perhaps a tear?
This sad, sad story is not saying
That all abortions show no care,
But I tell it as my way of praying
To save God’s creatures, anywhere.
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Abortion’s Destination
We’ve muddied the waters; we’ve soiled the skies.
What else to destroy before the planet dies?
We’ve tattered the fringes; now for the heart;
We’ll kill off the people; we’ve made the start.
We’ve sold our one future to sustain abortion;
We’ve cannibalized our unborn beyond distortion.
We’ll replace the blueprint with one of our own!
Then await the harvest of the seeds we have sown.
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Abortion
The cruelest part is not the pain.
Or that the blood is shed,
But that the measure of ones gain
Is that a man is dead
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Editor’s Note: In the hectic, world-wide push to legalize the abortion of unwanted, unborn babies, the morality of abortion has been given no place in the evaluation of this senseless “Crusade.” Women now have “rights” to destroy their young. Their male partners have no rights to defend their offspring. That part of the abortionists’ conquest seems to be an accomplished fact.
But there are consequences flowing from “choice.” Among these, I would place national shame. Yes, shame, even if not a factor in our present culture, shame will become an embarrassment for the centuries to come…. that is, if the society will not already have collapsed, because shame is the guardian of both personal and social integrity.
The “hubris” of a people, turning lethal weapons against defenseless members of their own constituency, will go down in history as the vilest betrayal of human decency!
But, “everyone is doing it.” No, there is still a bit of decency left in our society. Valiant countries, such as Nicaragua, Jamaica, Ireland, Poland, Malta, Uruguay, Mexico (nation) and Brazil, are a few examples of defiance against the pressures being placed on them by organizations such as UN and EU, who demand legalized abortion in exchange for economic advantages.
The writer of this Editorial is not unaware of suffering throughout the world, physical and emotional, individual and communal, curable and incurable. But this writer can see no circumstances that warrant the deliberate killing of unborn babies as a valid remedy for any of those problems. Our society is “off the track” in supposing that legalized abortion is a cure for anything. It only adds to the problems that it has already imposed upon our human society.
The basic, human, right to life is being disregarded and denied by the advocates of legalized abortion. And it is here that recovery to social sanity and justice must begin. Every baby, even those waiting to be born, from the time of his or her conception, has the right to continue living the life given by the Creator in conjunction with the baby’s parents. Remember that the co-relative of rights is obligation. Let us encourage one another to fulfill our obligation to defend our brothers and sister waiting to be born. Do not permit your nation to be consumed by the “social engineers,” who would desecrate your birthright by depriving others of your human family the birthright that is theirs! E.R.
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Editor’s Note: We reprint this previous posting to reinforce our contention that much of the present conflict about legalizing abortion is being forced upon smaller nations by international organizations, such as the U.N., E.U. and the World Bank. We still ask why there is no protection against their incursions into smaller, though sovereign nations.
Response (August 23rd): The road we are headed down, at the very least, is the well-beaten path that has characteristically destroyed republics in the past: liberty gradually turning into license. The ridiculous idea that by instituting changes into a common law legal system, operating by precedent, which allow and encourage larger, more powerful, more experienced humans to destroy smaller, weaker, and less experienced humans is a tyranny in the case of the individual. Wide scale use of such a ‘right’ (I can’t think of a clearer case of a ‘wrong’) can only encourage tyranny on a wider scale. Such changes are not ‘enlightened and progressive refreshments and renewals of the traditional American love of freedom’. They are cancerous implants in the body politic which encourage lust, murder, and greed.
Reply: Your observation expresses our concern about self-established, international organizations that would dictate their social agenda to the world. Under the enticement of economic aid, these organizations, such as the United Nations and the European Union, demand that prospective member nations “modernize” their laws pertinent to “reproductive rights, ” to include legalized abortion. The enticement, of course, is subtly hidden under the claim that great numbers of women are dying from the consequences of illegal abortion.
Even assuming the claim to be correct, we question whether abortion is the proper solution to this problem. Would it not be better for the underprivileged country to save their man power and build up an economic sufficiency? The international organization could provide a “jump-start” to that economy, such as offering the poorer nation maternal health care and by discouraging abortion. Educational and nutritional assistance should be added to build the small nation into an economic partnership with the rest of the world. Then, the international organization will be able to reap its profit, the well being of our human society.
The international organization cannot vote, directly, in any national election, but it can, and does, prejudice the process, from within the country, by a well-planned strategy of economic persuasion. Pressures on Third World countries, in South and Central America and in Africa, are especially evident to a reader of current events. In the European arena, one may well question the “surprise attack” and consequent pro-life defeat in Portugal, and the current pressure play against Ireland, Poland and Malta.
While writing these lines, I ponder the events of six years ago today, September 11th, when terrorists portrayed their social agenda in bloody violence against innocent and defenseless human beings, in the United States of America. Without doubt, the international organizations do not intend to become partner to such violence but, in reality, their “stealth approach” to eliminating the offspring of human parentage, has the same end effect, the violation of human rights and the refusal to honor the dignity of human individuals.
We ask the obvious question: Where is the overview of the self-appointed, international organization? And, a more telling question: Why does the rest of the world stand by and allow the depredation of our smaller, less affluent nations, the destruction of their moral culture and their rightful self respect? E.R.
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Editor’s Note: Thirty-five years have passed since the shock of Roe v. Wade paralyzed our nation. This is longer than one-third of an average lifetime! I use the term “paralyzed” because we, of the United States, are still “in shock” with reference to a united response to that deeply divisive decision. Paralysis of thought and action! How, otherwise, could we go on killing our offspring during these thirty-five years? Unreasonable and irresponsible conduct can be explained only by a lack of clear thinking and an unwillingness to conform to ethical standards of behavior.
What could arouse us from our current culture-slumber? The logical answer to this logical question is: justice and truth. As a first application of justice, we should ask whether legalized abortion is fair treatment toward the unborn victim, toward the society of which he or she is a member, and toward the Creator of all living things.
Truth is the knowledge of things as they are. Truth would affirm that the offspring of human parents is a human being. As a basic principle of Biology, the offspring inherits his or her species-status, at the moment of conception (fertilization.) The truth of Ethics tells us that all human beings have a right to life. Truth, rooted in nature, would tell us that nurture is an obligation of parenting, and that abortion is a violation of that responsibility.
Put in these simple terms, it should be evident that Roe v. Wade is an unjust decision, and that its message is untruthful. Will it take us another thirty-five years to discover that! E.R.
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