I got into a 'discussion' on Friday about abortion. It was with a very religiously conservative woman. As I have written here previously, I believe abortion should be legal although I personally am uncomfortable with elective abortion. The main effect of legal abortion has been to prevent maternal injury and death. I also believe abortion should be legal for anomalies and rape and incest. This individual felt abortion should be illegal in all circumstances. I got a bit hot over that. I asked if she had seen a woman holding a Trisomy 18 fetus in her arms while it died from pulmonary edema, her child dying by drowning as she watched, and wept. Given that 100% of fetuses with Trisomy 18 die I see no benefit in carrying these fetuses to term, placing the mother's health in danger, and then having the mother watch the fetus die. She replied that suffering builds character, and I asked what part of character building occurred when holding a dying child. She could not answer that.
This is not a post on abortion. Rather, it is a post about conservatism. I consider myself a Republican and a conservative. But not like that. And that got me thinking about definitions and use of terms. Today both parties are heatedly trying to tell Americans what to do. One party wants to limit personal freedoms in the name of state responsibility and collectivism. The other party wants to limit personal freedoms by telling us what is and is not moral. I have a major problem with both of those positions. At least the statist party offers something in their moralizing. The morality party offers nothing except an assertion they are right. Both claim to offer freedom, but one offers freedom from worry while the other offers freedom from government. With these basic plot lines it is no surprise that the statist party wins elections.
But 'conservative' means to preserve or protect something. Conservative should not mean telling people what to do. I am a financial conservative, not a social one. Somehow financial responsibility has become conflated with being a prig and a judgmental moralist. Like the woman with whom I spoke about abortion. I am not a prig and, to paraphrase U2, the God in which I believe asks me not to judge others.
If you ask people today who started the EPA I bet they will say a democrat. Wrong. It was a republican, Richard Nixon. Preserving our environment ought to be a priority that crosses all party lines, and ought to be a conservative value, as I understand the term. Instead the statist party tells us to strangle growth in the name of the environment, and the moralist party spouts business propaganda in opposing environmental protection.
I feel conservatism is applied at the level of government and constitutional values, not at the level of the individual. Individual sexual and moral choices are best left to the individual. Conservatism is a broader concept involving finances, environment, defense and preservation of individual freedoms. I don't see how those freedoms are preserved by telling someone what to believe. As was said brutally about Nixon's concept of 'fighting for peace', fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity. Well, telling people what to believe in the name of conservatism is like that as well.
This makes me, in the main, a libertarian and a tea partier. A terrible word in the press, I know. Our budget should be balanced, and that happens not by outlawing abortion or requiring prayer in schools. It happens by a combination of increased taxes, decreased military spending and decreased social programs. Both the statists and the moralists are wrong. Government has no business doing large amounts of what it does with regard to personal subsidization, but has much to offer in health care. I don't like Obamacare much, but I have long supported single payor federalized health care.
Anyway, listening to a religiously conservative woman tell me that holding a dying baby builds character and that therefore all abortion should be outlawed was a great example of why I don't want moralists telling me what to do. But I don't want statists spending my money on governmental activities either. I want a balanced budget and freedom to understand God, sex and physical indulgence on my own.
Ted
This is not a post on abortion. Rather, it is a post about conservatism. I consider myself a Republican and a conservative. But not like that. And that got me thinking about definitions and use of terms. Today both parties are heatedly trying to tell Americans what to do. One party wants to limit personal freedoms in the name of state responsibility and collectivism. The other party wants to limit personal freedoms by telling us what is and is not moral. I have a major problem with both of those positions. At least the statist party offers something in their moralizing. The morality party offers nothing except an assertion they are right. Both claim to offer freedom, but one offers freedom from worry while the other offers freedom from government. With these basic plot lines it is no surprise that the statist party wins elections.
But 'conservative' means to preserve or protect something. Conservative should not mean telling people what to do. I am a financial conservative, not a social one. Somehow financial responsibility has become conflated with being a prig and a judgmental moralist. Like the woman with whom I spoke about abortion. I am not a prig and, to paraphrase U2, the God in which I believe asks me not to judge others.
If you ask people today who started the EPA I bet they will say a democrat. Wrong. It was a republican, Richard Nixon. Preserving our environment ought to be a priority that crosses all party lines, and ought to be a conservative value, as I understand the term. Instead the statist party tells us to strangle growth in the name of the environment, and the moralist party spouts business propaganda in opposing environmental protection.
I feel conservatism is applied at the level of government and constitutional values, not at the level of the individual. Individual sexual and moral choices are best left to the individual. Conservatism is a broader concept involving finances, environment, defense and preservation of individual freedoms. I don't see how those freedoms are preserved by telling someone what to believe. As was said brutally about Nixon's concept of 'fighting for peace', fighting for peace is like fucking for virginity. Well, telling people what to believe in the name of conservatism is like that as well.
This makes me, in the main, a libertarian and a tea partier. A terrible word in the press, I know. Our budget should be balanced, and that happens not by outlawing abortion or requiring prayer in schools. It happens by a combination of increased taxes, decreased military spending and decreased social programs. Both the statists and the moralists are wrong. Government has no business doing large amounts of what it does with regard to personal subsidization, but has much to offer in health care. I don't like Obamacare much, but I have long supported single payor federalized health care.
Anyway, listening to a religiously conservative woman tell me that holding a dying baby builds character and that therefore all abortion should be outlawed was a great example of why I don't want moralists telling me what to do. But I don't want statists spending my money on governmental activities either. I want a balanced budget and freedom to understand God, sex and physical indulgence on my own.
Ted
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