Sunday, May 02, 2004
the war of the mice.
this is a placeholder for an abortion rant. topic is being discussed at ampersand's alas a blog.
[early version of rant]
discussion starts with whether men should have input to abortion policy choices.
Sam the boy argues as i would, starting with personhood, moving logically to consequences.
he wrote stuff i'm glad to see written. big hugs.
but he writes like a guy, and this is part of why i stay away from this discussion most of the time.
he uses logic, not empathy, principles, not experience. others (amp) interpret his differing world view as rudeness, and he does little to mend fences. the discussion gets personal, he'll get (or feel) attacked, and respond defensively, and soon the discussion is about him, not the topic.
maybe i'm overgeneralizing - the male model of argumentation is familiar to me; it's how i would tend to respond.
abortion - babykilling - is a personal issue with me, but it's at one step removed.
it's not me having morning sickness. i mean, puking is a powerful deterrent. i don't drink 5 gin and tonics, i stop at 3, because i don't like puking. so it's problematic for me to insist someome go thru morning sickness just because the alternative is baby-killing.
if i were going to try to make sam the boy's arguments, i might start by talking about how i felt at the death of my only child, unborn. and go on to show that there are pro-feminist objections to baby-killing, as well as anti-feminist support for abortion.
women can work this out themselves, in a way that honors the male role. i have other issues to work on.
on the other hand, males do have a role here - to speak for the unborn, who can't speak for themselves. the white man's burden so to speak.
that was the intro here come the mice.
well, more pontificating first.
social rules about baby-killing can be analyzed using the kantian imperitive.
usually stated, act so that the universalization of your action would.. uh.. be a good thing. let's try this one "do unto others as you would have them do unto you"
now, i don't want to be killed. i can't stress that enough. i don't want to be killed. i want that to be a rule: don't kill the arbitrary aardvark. i want it to be more than a social norm; i want the rule to be so strong i can refer to a right not to be killed. as a special interest, i may not be able to convince others of this rule. so i look to generalize it more widely. "don't kill any aardvark, ever" [except self-defense, very limited exception.] still, the aardvark lobby lacks social power, so we'll generalize further: 'thou shalt not kill"
the question becomes, is an unborn baby an other. which is closely related to, is an aardvark an other. [we should always be respectful of otters.]
i'm an itinerant philosopher. i've been using this "i don't want to be killed, and it follows that i shouldn't kill others" for many years. recently, it's become more personal.
last winter people were trying to kill me. overtly, knives and guns and such. so i used my martial arts skills, which consist mostly of running and hiding, and i was a way from home for a few months, during which mice moved in.
this lead to the war with the mice. when i first came out as an activist (4/22/1970) i was a pacifist, not fighting back when my dad would hit me, never getting in fights at school, knowing i would grow up to go to jail for resisting the draft.
i evolved into a libertarian, then an anarchist, then a lawyer, then a basket case blogging addict.
as a young man, the first time i saw a mouse stuck to a glue trap, i killed it, and went home and cried, really upset. now i [cynically] kill mice when i can. Although i would never use a glue trap, I use poison, and by now the mice are dying off and i'm winning this round, i have my house back, for now. It was me or them. The bad karma may well come back and bite me in the ass.
I remain otherwise mostly vegan [subject to some exceptions such as termites]
Now the reason i'm writing about mice, is to show that i had a personal experience
that gave me some new insight as to how a woman might feel with an unwanted pregnancy.
This doesn't mean that i'm suddenly pro-baby-killing. But it gave me some validation for my position that, as a male, maybe i'll sit this one out, and concentrate my limited resources on other issues.
this is a placeholder for an abortion rant. topic is being discussed at ampersand's alas a blog.
[early version of rant]
discussion starts with whether men should have input to abortion policy choices.
Sam the boy argues as i would, starting with personhood, moving logically to consequences.
he wrote stuff i'm glad to see written. big hugs.
but he writes like a guy, and this is part of why i stay away from this discussion most of the time.
he uses logic, not empathy, principles, not experience. others (amp) interpret his differing world view as rudeness, and he does little to mend fences. the discussion gets personal, he'll get (or feel) attacked, and respond defensively, and soon the discussion is about him, not the topic.
maybe i'm overgeneralizing - the male model of argumentation is familiar to me; it's how i would tend to respond.
abortion - babykilling - is a personal issue with me, but it's at one step removed.
it's not me having morning sickness. i mean, puking is a powerful deterrent. i don't drink 5 gin and tonics, i stop at 3, because i don't like puking. so it's problematic for me to insist someome go thru morning sickness just because the alternative is baby-killing.
if i were going to try to make sam the boy's arguments, i might start by talking about how i felt at the death of my only child, unborn. and go on to show that there are pro-feminist objections to baby-killing, as well as anti-feminist support for abortion.
women can work this out themselves, in a way that honors the male role. i have other issues to work on.
on the other hand, males do have a role here - to speak for the unborn, who can't speak for themselves. the white man's burden so to speak.
that was the intro here come the mice.
well, more pontificating first.
social rules about baby-killing can be analyzed using the kantian imperitive.
usually stated, act so that the universalization of your action would.. uh.. be a good thing. let's try this one "do unto others as you would have them do unto you"
now, i don't want to be killed. i can't stress that enough. i don't want to be killed. i want that to be a rule: don't kill the arbitrary aardvark. i want it to be more than a social norm; i want the rule to be so strong i can refer to a right not to be killed. as a special interest, i may not be able to convince others of this rule. so i look to generalize it more widely. "don't kill any aardvark, ever" [except self-defense, very limited exception.] still, the aardvark lobby lacks social power, so we'll generalize further: 'thou shalt not kill"
the question becomes, is an unborn baby an other. which is closely related to, is an aardvark an other. [we should always be respectful of otters.]
i'm an itinerant philosopher. i've been using this "i don't want to be killed, and it follows that i shouldn't kill others" for many years. recently, it's become more personal.
last winter people were trying to kill me. overtly, knives and guns and such. so i used my martial arts skills, which consist mostly of running and hiding, and i was a way from home for a few months, during which mice moved in.
this lead to the war with the mice. when i first came out as an activist (4/22/1970) i was a pacifist, not fighting back when my dad would hit me, never getting in fights at school, knowing i would grow up to go to jail for resisting the draft.
i evolved into a libertarian, then an anarchist, then a lawyer, then a basket case blogging addict.
as a young man, the first time i saw a mouse stuck to a glue trap, i killed it, and went home and cried, really upset. now i [cynically] kill mice when i can. Although i would never use a glue trap, I use poison, and by now the mice are dying off and i'm winning this round, i have my house back, for now. It was me or them. The bad karma may well come back and bite me in the ass.
I remain otherwise mostly vegan [subject to some exceptions such as termites]
Now the reason i'm writing about mice, is to show that i had a personal experience
that gave me some new insight as to how a woman might feel with an unwanted pregnancy.
This doesn't mean that i'm suddenly pro-baby-killing. But it gave me some validation for my position that, as a male, maybe i'll sit this one out, and concentrate my limited resources on other issues.
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