All Posts – Page 451

The debate is back… (just not here)

April 7, 2008 by Brigitte Pellerin Leave a Comment

Interesting piece in the Los Angeles Times about the resurgence of abortion as a public debate in Italy and Spain (funny they don’t mention Britain – I guess it didn’t fit in given that it’s not a Roman Catholic country).

In Italy and Spain, two of Europe’s most predominantly Roman Catholic countries, opponents of abortion are finding new ways to challenge laws and use the issue to influence national elections, a generation after most citizens thought the issue was resolved.

Spurred on by the church, antiabortion activists have staged demonstrations and circulated petitions, gathering thousands of names. On the other side of the debate, thousands of women have turned out in demonstrations to demand that laws allowing the termination of pregnancy be protected.

When it came to power four years ago, Spain’s socialist government made liberal social reform a hallmark of its administration and promised legislation to expand access to abortion.

But by the time it ran for reelection last month, it had dropped abortion from its platform as Spanish bishops all but directed citizens to vote against candidates who didn’t oppose it.

In the campaign for Italian elections next Sunday, abortion has emerged unexpectedly as a major issue. One particularly vocal political figure, a conservative newspaper editor and former government minister, is running for parliament on a single point: ending abortion.

Children and happiness, continued

April 7, 2008 by Andrea Mrozek Leave a Comment

The book is called Gross National Happiness. Read more about it in The Economist here. Some snippets:

Even if children are irksome now, they lend meaning to life in the long term. And the kind of people who are happy are also more likely to have children.

Not exactly a resounding endorsement, but I’ll take it. But the article actually makes the point that conservatives are happier than liberals:

…the data show that American conservatives have been consistently happier than liberals for at least 35 years. This is not because they are richer; they are not. Mr Brooks thinks three factors are important. Conservatives are twice as likely as liberals to be married and twice as likely to attend church every week. Married, religious people are more likely than secular singles to be happy. They are also more likely to have children, which makes Mr Brooks confident that the next generation will be at least as happy as the current one.

Church, marriage and children make you happy? I thought they make you embittered, tired and fanatical. I’ll have to get at his primary sources.

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Tanya adds: Oh, you know what they say! Those conservatives need to put on a happy face, lie to themselves and everyone else, to make everyone believe they are happier. It’s the secret code. I’m playing devil’s advocate, obviously. But, lo and behold, that is what they say! Look at the very first comment about the article:

By emoting an air of real or put-on happiness, [conservatives] are more likely to keep themselves in, and even sell to others, a sense of stability as things are now thus promoting their cause.

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Rebecca adds: It all depends how you define happiness. The definitions I like are the Aristotelian one, which can be boiled down to “happiness is living a life you can be proud of” or moral self-approval, and also John McCain’s:

I discovered that nothing is more liberating in life than to fight for a cause that encompasses you, but is not defined by your existence alone. And that has made all the difference, my friends, all the difference in the world.

A life that includes building a family, and preparing your living arrows to go out and make the world a better place, of putting the well-being of your children, family and community ahead of your own transient wants and desires, provides for many of us moral self-approval and also a cause greater than ourselves. If this is what you want out of life, I think it’s a safe bet that children will increase your happiness.

By contrast, for many people today “happiness” is essentially a synonym for hedonism, and is pursued by avoiding anything that might bring even a moment’s discomfort or self-sacrifice. If you define happiness as “never feeling sad, tired, foregoing a pleasure or taking on a burden,” then parenthood might not be your cup of tea.

New comments page up

April 7, 2008 by Andrea Mrozek Leave a Comment

Read the new comments for this week, here. Some good ones–really thoughtful letters about the repression of freedom of speech at the University of Calgary, also about this new thing (to me but apparently to no one else) called tokophobia. All letters are much appreciated (merci beaucoup).

The “freedom” of hormonal contraception

April 6, 2008 by Tanya Zaleski Leave a Comment

Pro-lifers are commonly criticized for not getting behind contraception initiatives. While personally, I have no religious opposition to the use of contraception, the claim that it is the salve to high unintended pregnancy statistics irks me. Aside for the fact that 54% of abortion seekers claim to have been using some form of contraception at the moment of conception, hormonal birth-control methods especially come with their fair share of dark, shadowy problems. Here’s one example:

For years, Johnson & Johnson obscured evidence that its popular Ortho Evra birth control patch delivered much more estrogen than standard birth control pills, potentially increasing the risk of blood clots and strokes…

But because the Food and Drug Administration approved the patch, the company is arguing in court that it cannot be sued by women who claim that they were injured by the product — even though its old label inaccurately described the amount of estrogen it released…

More than 3,000 women and their families have sued Johnson & Johnson, asserting that users of the Ortho Evra patch suffered heart attacks, strokes and, in 40 cases, death. From 2002 to 2006, the food and drug agency received reports of at least 50 deaths associated with the drug…

The F.D.A. did not warn the public of the potential risks until November 2005 — six years after the company’s own study showed the high estrogen releases.

Pro-abortion feminists are all too eager to talk about the sexual freedom these hormonal infusions provide. I guess I’m the sort of feminist who would rather think about a woman’s overall best interests in matters of health and well-being. So sue me.

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UPDATE, mid-afternoon: After reading this article again, I decided to call a friend of mine who is on the patch. We had recently been discussing the role of birth control in her life and relationship.

“You’re kidding!” she gasped, “and it was going so well with the patch, I thought.” Like many women, she’d struggled in the past with many forms of contraception with mediocre to very unfavorable results; weight gain, acne, allergies, cramping, decreased libido, you name it.

Her stunned silence was followed by, “But I can’t get pregnant now. I have no choice.”

Ah, the ‘freedom’ of hormonal contraception. Ain’t it grand!

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Brigitte wonders: You know what I don’t get? Is the number of women who are extremely careful about what they eat, who spend small fortunes on organic, “chemical-free” food and whatnot (as though all chemicals were bad – we’d sure look funny without H2O…), but who don’t hesitate one-third of a second before pumping their bodies full of hormones.

“I care not for a man’s religion…”

April 5, 2008 by Brigitte Pellerin Leave a Comment

Abraham Lincoln once said: “I care not for a man’s religion whose dog and cat are not the better for it.” I wonder what he would have said about religious fundamentalists who are suspected of abusing young girls and marrying them to older relatives. Probably not something nice.

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Update, Sunday morning: The situation is not getting any better. Standoff continues at Texas polygamist compound…

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Rebecca agrees: Polygamy and forced marriage are fundamentally incompatible with the ideals of a civilized society. It’s a good thing that the only group guilty of this in North America and Europe is a fringe offshoot of the Church of Latter Saints. We’d never tolerate this in our midst, surely.

Right?
Or maybe we would.

Index that

April 5, 2008 by Véronique Bergeron Leave a Comment

This article from last Saturday’s National Post must be one of the most shallow analyses of parenthood and reproduction I’ve ever read. And I’ve read a lot. One notable excerpt made me laugh out loud:

Why are people choosing to have fewer children? After all, voluntary childlessness seems to violate the Darwinian premise that our genes predispose us, like all other creatures, to try to reproduce.

I don’t think we can be faulted for failing to try to reproduce. As the mother of inquisitive children, I can tell you that copulation is everywhere. Our problem is not the trying. The actual reproduction that results from all the trying, well, uh, that’s another story.

That being said, this article made me take stock of my own happiness index. Being five times a mother, I figured I should know. Maybe this made me reflect because I was particularly grouchy that day. Because reward, when it comes to parenting, is something we feel more than something we know. It is both inanely obvious and impossible to describe. It chews us up and spits us out and makes us grateful for the ride. It is like nothing else, which probably explains why conventional happiness indexes miss it all together.

The contentment that comes from being a parent is not physical – although those newborns sure smell good – nor is it emotional. In fact, the emotions it triggers can be downright negative: may the person who has never felt exasperation after repeating the same simple instruction a gazillion time – don’t jump on the couch, leave your brother alone, when the baby cries it means he doesn’t like it, the cat is not supposed to make that noise – cast the first stone, but it sure won’t be me! The contentment that comes from being a parent is a contentment of the heart, a sense that we are partakers in something much bigger than ourselves, a feeling that we are given a mission we can’t refuse. It also pushes us to limits we didn’t know we had. Limits of patience, yes. But also limits of self-sacrifice, love and tolerance. When my first child was born, I thought I could never love anyone else that much. Until the second one came along. And the third. By the fourth, I had learned one of life’s most valuable lessons: each additional child doesn’t take away from the mother love-pie, it’s the pie that gets bigger.

And this is my unscientific observation: Parenthood makes me happy because I love. And the more I parent, the more I love. But the more I love, the more I suffer because loving children is not the same as loving ice cream. When they cry, I cry. When they fear, I fear. When they stumble and fall, I stumble and fall and then have nightmares about it. And as they grow and become more independent, I am torn between beaming with pride and collapsing in a heap because each step they take away from me is a step that separates me from a piece of my own heart. The heightened sensitivity that comes from being a parent has made me more aware of forms of happiness I would have otherwise ignored. And while each additional child makes me cry, fear and stumble more, children also make me more sensitive, loving and patient. Happier.

Happy-index that!

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Tanya is picturing Véronique breaking into song:

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6P2w5GkXmU]

Wouldn’t it be simpler to be more discriminating?

April 4, 2008 by Brigitte Pellerin Leave a Comment

An Australian MP wants women to sign sex contracts, in an effort to “combat false rape allegations”. The MP, Ann Bressington, explained that new proposed laws would “make it an offence to continue a sex act with a person after consent if they changed their mind” and that:

… “one-night stands” and casual relationships would become a “high-risk activity”. “Perhaps this parliament could devise a contract which men could carry around in their pocket, next to their condoms,” she said during a speech to Parliament.

“There could be a waiver should a man meet up with a woman who has had a couple of drinks before they engage in sexual intercourse.

“The contract may contain the name and address of the women, with her driver’s licence number, so that the man can see the signatures match, clauses that state that the woman has or has not been drinking or taking drugs – licit or illicit – and that she consents to foreplay.”

The proposed contract would also include details of the woman’s marital status, whether she has children and whether she consents to being taken to another location to engage in sexual activity.

On the romantic scale, this is pretty bad. But then again, I sympathize to some extent. There are apparently more than a few cases of women falsely accusing men of having raped them. Rape is a serious crime and it’s pretty disgusting to accuse someone of it who’s innocent. But as I reach back for my crusty old goat crown, I can’t help thinking that things would be a lot easier for folks of either gender if they were a little more discriminating in their choice of companion.

“It’s not ‘all about abortion'”

April 4, 2008 by Brigitte Pellerin Leave a Comment

A fine piece by Margaret Somerville in this morning’s Ottawa Citizen, debunking arguments against Bill C-484. Worth reading in its entirety, but if you only have time for a couple of paragraphs, it should be these two:

One pro-choice activist, Joyce Arthur, wrote recently that “when a pregnant woman is safe, so is her fetus.” In framing the issues that Bill C-484 is intended to address as being primarily, or even exclusively, one of the safety of pregnant women, Ms. Arthur is using a strategy adopted by pro-choice advocates to deal with one aspect of the bill that places them in a dilemma. In rejecting Bill C-484, they do not want to seem to be failing to empathize with pregnant women who are the victims of violence — indeed they strongly empathize — but they want to do that without in any way recognizing that a major part of the harm these women and their families suffer is the injury to or loss of the unborn child. In short, they do not want any recognition of the unborn child, or its worth and meaning to its family, realities that Bill C-484, if enacted, would affirm.

This strategy is employed because the pro-choice lobby bases its case that there should be no law governing abortion on the fiction that the fetus and woman are one “person.” They object to Bill C-484 because it contradicts that fiction in recognizing that there are two victims of a crime, although in doing so it does not affect the present law on abortion — indeed, for greater certainty, it expressly states that it does not do so. (As an aside, the need to rely on a fiction to justify abortion is a very weak stance ethically.)

From the horse’s mouth

April 3, 2008 by Tanya Zaleski Leave a Comment

Ken Epp has addressed some concerns the pro-abortion side, namely Joyce Arthur, has for his bill, Bill C-484, here.

I think that if Ms. Arthur would debate what my bill actually says instead of basing her arguments on a misrepresentation, she would be advocating for C-484. How can she argue against protecting in law the unborn child which the pregnant woman has chosen to keep, and to provide criminal sanctions against any third party who would unilaterally take that choice and that anticipated new life away from her, without her consent, against her will and with violence?

Anyone?… Anyone?

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