comments on: Super Cool Dad Defends Daughter's ‘Keep Jesus Out of My Vagina’ Poster

Super Cool Dad Defends Daughter's ‘Keep Jesus Out of My Vagina’ Poster
http://jezebel.com/super-cool-dad-defends-daughters-keep-jesus-out-of-my-817807752

Well, on face value I'm happy with the sign. But there are some deeper issues at hand also. The crazies who called her vulgar names acted inappropriately. The people who advocate for *no abortions* are largely motivated by, what is essentially in my view, conservative religion warping otherwise normal built in human morality. Their religion forces them to take their moral views to the extreme.

Religion is a natural phenomenon, and so religious views can be "natural." So, if it's possible to take a middle view on abortion, can we state that, yes, before viability, women should have a right to choose? Can we also say that abortion should be discouraged, but nevertheless available? Can we also say that post-viability it's ok to have it banned?

Everyone draws the line somewhere. Peter Singer and Margaret Sanger may well dray the line at, or even shortly after birth. I think their views are/were wacky and immoral, speaking as an atheist/humanist/naturalist & Enlightenment-advocate myself.

The zero-tolerance for abortion people who view all abortion as murder are also wrong.

It's also wrong to assume that all anti-abortion views just come from religion, and therefore can be dismissed out of hand.

So, I'm just saying there is a more middle & moderate & reasonable ground here which really isn't addressed by the media all that often.

Yes, in my view, a view I advocate for, women do have a right to choose before viability. Yes, abortion should be discouraged but available. Yes, we should value life.

Related post:

atheist morality: response to Peter Singer, Moshe Averick: after birth abortions, infanticide, and human rights
http://jonathanshome.blogspot.com/2013/01/atheist-morality-response-to-peter.html

BBC is talking about it as well:
https://www.facebook.com/worldhaveyoursay

Margaret Sanger - as amoral as Peter Singer sadly

Ayaan Hirsi Ali has stated that everyone is a little bit racist & I agree. Maybe everyone is a little bit of a eugenicist also. Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood, apparently wrote a rather distasteful article on the issue. Check out page 107 of the following document:

http://www.toomanyaborted.com/1932-04%20April-PLAN%20FOR%20PEACE.pdf

And a more readable version:
http://hawaii.edu/religion/courses/sanger.htm

"The main objects of the Population Congress would be:
    a. to raise the level and increase the general intelligence of population.

    b. to increase the population slowly by keeping the birth rate at its present level of fifteen per thousand, decreasing the death rate below its present mark of 11 per thousand.

    c. to keep the doors of immigration closed to the entrance of certain aliens whose condition is known to be detrimental to the stamina of the race, such as feebleminded, idiots, morons, insane, syphilitic, epileptic, criminal, professional prostitutes, and others in this class barred by the immigration laws of 1924.

    d. to apply a stern and rigid policy of sterilization and segregation to that grade of population whose progeny is tainted, or whose inheritance is such that objectionable traits may be transmitted to offspring.

    e. to insure the country against future burdens of maintenance for numerous offspring as may be born of feebleminded parents, by pensioning all persons with transmissible disease who voluntarily consent to sterilization.

    f. to give certain dysgenic groups in our population their choice of segregation or sterilization.

    g. to apportion farm lands and homesteads for these segregated persons where they would be taught to work under competent instructors for the period of their entire lives..."

---end of quote

Well, isn't that nice. All the good old fashioned family values we've come to expect from rather famous eugenicists. I guess what pops into the brain of one totalitarian zealot who had only one testicle can easily somehow pop into the pretty brain & eyes of another - the second person having no testicles at all. What's up with that? Was advocacy for eugenics just a 1932 "thing," or was this all just a coincidence?

Further thoughts:

Hitchens on abortion: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcYv9hAkenI
and
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8HhTKzmvas

I am reminded of the crazed hysteria on the left revolving around overpopulation, a hysteria which has caused some people, sadly, to not have children of their own. "Those people in the third world have a lot of babies & so therefore I should have none." Crazy & stupid in my view.

More smart people and more atheists should have children. Yes, Planned Parenthood may do some good. But, Margaret Sanger was a eugenic authoritarian nutbag also - no better than parents who consider after-birth abortion today. Oh, who else thinks such a thing is ok? Peter Singer:
http://jonathanshome.blogspot.com/2013/01/atheist-morality-response-to-peter.html
and
http://jonathanshome.blogspot.com/2013/01/peter-singer-is-amoral-fuck-speaking-as.html

In looking at source documents by Margaret Sanger, it appears that she was an amoral fuck also.

Women raped, and all women up until the baby is viable, should be able to get abortions if they want them. But I also agree that the procedure should, in general, be highly discouraged.

Not everything is equal. Sanger & Singer are in rather the same boat - a boat I prefer not to be in.

atheist morality: response to Peter Singer, Moshe Averick: after birth abortions, infanticide, and human rights

As an atheist I whole heatedly disagree with Peter Singer’s positions on abortion, infanticide, and human rights.

Notes from video commentary, with additional thoughts:

Religion is a natural phenomenon. So the good that comes from religion is natural. There are atheists who are concerned about abortion, and who absolutely do not agree with Singer.

Without god everything is permitted? No. There is no god, and not everything is permitted. So the answer is no to that proposition.

In Averick's article on Singer he doesn't need to paint all atheists as immoral. We aren’t - we’re human just like him, and humans have human morals.

And as for Singer, I recommend you read this post and an earlier post, which includes notes on Sam Harris & Christopher Hitchens, on the problems with moral & cultural relativism, and an advocacy for discouraging abortion.

Can a middle road be taken on abortion? How about: First & second trimester: legal but highly discouraged. Third trimester: illegal. After birth abortion: equivalent to murder. How's that?

Morality comes from a combination of socialization and genetics. Check out Steven Pinker, Sam Harris, & Daniel Dennet on the subject of morality, religion, and the thankfully evolving & improving moral zeitgeist.

I admit that I have built in morals, as do most people except for sociopaths, and except (in part) for people currently tied down by meme sets that are infecting their brains & making them less moral than they would otherwise be.

Religion can make people less moral than they would otherwise be (eg: suicide bombers as one example). The ivory tower of academics can do the same, for example where students learn the "value" of moral & cultural relativism, and the lie of the blank slate.

Did your god have sex with Mary the mother of Jesus? Does your god live on Kolob? Is Mohamed god's messenger? If you don't believe any one, two, or three of these three points, then maybe it's not illusory to be a so-called atheist.

Stop mutilating the genitals of kids. There's plenty of people who're atheist with regard to many gods including yours, and yet they have just as much "family values" as you have.

Nihilism is not an appropriate response, not from atheists or theists or anyone.

A set of memes can put you off the rails of natural built in morality. So watch out & don't be sucked in by anyone.

Additional blog post on these issues:

Peter Singer is an amoral fuck -- speaking as an atheist. On morality, children, infanticide, and abortions.
http://jonathanshome.blogspot.com/2013/01/peter-singer-is-amoral-fuck-speaking-as.html

My additional writings:

http://jonathanshome.blogspot.com
http://corvus.freeshell.org

And from people I generally admire:
http://www.samharris.org/media/video
Hitchens:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=hitchens&oq=hitchens&gs_l=youtube
Pinker:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=steven+pinker&oq=steven+pinker&gs_l=youtube
Dennett:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=daniel+dennett&oq=daniel+dennett&gs_l=youtube

We aren't required to choose between the ass hole tea baggers of Fox News & the current Republican Party, and the similarly anally retentive feminazi zero population growth ultra lefties who love PETA and similar groups, and who believe that women who're homemakers are selling themselves short. A pox on both of their houses. We're moving forward, as natural humans who're interested in truth and what science reveals about everything. And when your preconceived or inculcated notions are debunked, then drop them. I'll try to do the same.

Peter Singer is an amoral fuck -- speaking as an atheist. On morality, children, infanticide, and abortions.

Peter Singer is an amoral fuck -- speaking as an atheist. On morality, children, infanticide, and abortions...

Today I started watching a debate between David Silverman and Dinesh D'Souza:

Peter Singer:

 "...human babies are not born self-aware ... they are not persons ... the life of a newborn is of less value than the life of a pig, a dog, or a chimpanzee."

Silverman doesn't speak for all atheists. Atheism is not a religion per se, and we aren't required to join hands with everyone who may be classified as an atheist.

Merry Christmas. Happy Solstice. Merry Festivus. Whatever. I don't have a problem with any of these unlike Silverman. 

And Singer's past comments are disturbing, wrong, and amoral. Religion is a natural phenomenon. Whatever good comes from religion still is natural, not supernatural. So Dinesh should make note of that, if he can. And at the same time, being an atheist doesn't have to mean being a zero population growth ultra-leftie.

Singer is a fucking nut, speaking frankly...

More info:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Singer
http://www.equip.org/articles/peter-singers-bold-defense-of-infanticide/

I don't have a problem with American Atheists as a group per se, but I'm not into leader-worship though. So Silverman is just plain wrong on the specific point of Singer's morality or lack thereof. Since atheism is not a religion per se we're not obliged to kowtow to arguments from authority.

There is a theme of relativistic amorality in the ivory tower. I agree with the assessment of Steven Pinker and Sam Harris about the state of higher education in America, with their belief in the blank slate, and advocacy for cultural & moral relativism so anally retentive that it's no problem for these people if religions oppress their own people. Who are we to say what's moral? We are. And not everything is relative...

Related links:

After-birth abortion: why should the baby live?

''...the authors argue that what we call ‘after-birth abortion’ (killing a newborn) should be permissible in all the cases where abortion is, including cases where the newborn is not disabled..."

http://jme.bmj.com/content/early/2012/03/01/medethics-2011-100411.full#aff-1

While I agree that abortion in the first two trimesters should remain legal, I think there's good arguments to be made for highly discouraging the practice at the very least during that time, and good reason to bar it legally after the first two trimesters:

Pro-life atheists insist that a human life has intrinsic value, even though they don't believe in God.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2008/11/28/no-god-and-no-abortions.html

Hitchens on abortion:

So, I do differ with Singer. I'd rather see all the dogs and pigs on this planet destroyed than to see one innocent human child killed. So, how's that for atheist morality?

It's not the atheism or theism that's the issue here. Most people have built in morals, except for psychopaths and sociopaths, and people who've spent far too much time in the morally & culturally relativistic sewer of academia.

Sam Harris quote:

“For nearly a century, the moral relativism of science has given faith-based religion--that great engine of ignorance and bigotry--a nearly uncontested claim to being the only universal framework for moral wisdom. As a result, the most powerful societies on early spend their time debating issues like gay marriage when they should be focused on problems like nuclear proliferation, genocide, energy security, climate change, poverty, and failing schools.”

 and another from Harris:

"...the consequences of moral relativism have been disastrous. And science's failure to address the most important questions in human life has made it seem like little more than an incubator for technology. It has also given faith-based religion -- that great engine of ignorance and bigotry -- a nearly uncontested claim to being the only source of moral wisdom. This has been bad for everyone. What is more, it has been unnecessary -- because we can speak about the well-being of conscious creatures rationally, and in the context of science. I think it is time we tried."

 -------------------------

1-8-12 addendum:

Video commentary added:

And another blog post:


atheist morality: response to Peter Singer, Moshe Averick: after birth abortions, infanticide, and human rights
http://jonathanshome.blogspot.com/2013/01/atheist-morality-response-to-peter.html