Science and much of people’s beliefs appear to be at war. The war, however, is mostly one-sided. Science just does its thing and people’s beliefs seem to be attacking science’s ‘thing.’
Congressman’s Akin was actually being honest the other day. What he said was, in fact, his opinion. It is often said that when politicians have this kind of ‘slip of the tongue’ it occurs when they are actually telling the truth----or their opinion of the truth. He was simply guilty of listening to, as S. E. Cupp so aptly pronounced, junk science. He was not the first and he will not be the last. His statement was simply being honest at the wrong place in the wrong time.
The National Right to Life organization has been around for years. They have been historically opposed to abortion and euthanasia. Personally, I will never call anyone pro-life unless they also include capital punishment. To me, if one takes the life issue seriously, one need to include this as well. But that’s my opinion. Having said that, if a people tell me they are ‘pro-life’ the first question I will ask will be about capital punishment. If they do not want to include it, I won’t call them pro-life. I’m rather obstinate about that.
Abortion is an ugly subject. I wrestle with the subject of when life begins; I also wrestle with the subject of when human life begins. There is the very real question of determining if this is, in fact, a separate life if it cannot exist outside the mother’s womb. Science doesn’t really make ethical judgments on this at all. It merely tells us what is there. What we do with that information is very much up to us to determine philosophically and theologically.
I would, in a perfect world, like to be totally opposed to abortion. It is not, however, a perfect world. I am also not a woman and I cannot, in good conscience, ever tell a woman what she can and cannot do or have done to her own body. It would be simply inappropriate. Frankly, I really do not believe anyone can tell any other person what they can and cannot do in this regard. Additionally, rape, incest, molestation, health and well-being of the mother all come into play. Abortion is an ugly subject and it often gets even uglier when there are circumstances behind it.
In the 1970’s I did join the Right to Life organization. I was in the seminary and I read the literature RTL put out and I believed it. One piece of that literature was the scientific ‘fact’ that women did not get pregnant from rape. I did more research and learned that was not true. In a rape, when the rapist is wearing no protection, and the sexual act is completed inside the woman, the woman has a 5% chance of becoming pregnant. It is exactly the same percentage as any other kind of unprotected sex. That is the factual science. Saying that the woman’s body ‘protects’ her from becoming pregnant is junk science.
Interestingly enough, S. E. Cupp, who is very conservative and states she is very pro-life (I don’t know if she really is in terms of capital punishment), said that this kind of junk science is inexcusable and does more harm than good in terms of discussions about abortion.
She is correct. When junk science gets exposed and people begin bringing this nonsense to the public forum, they get discredited. Serious discussions on abortion are short-changed into saying that people are lying or are uninformed fools.
It’s an unnecessary war and it’s a foolish war to be having. Abortion is a painful and ugly subject; at least give the topic the dignity of dealing with real science and not junk science. And, please politicians, before you speak on such topics, learn the subject and the difference between real and junk science.
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