Inspired by this post.

A great blog post over at Secular Pro-Life by Roni Cairns:

How is it pro-woman to say that we must be allowed to kill our children in order to be successful, to be “equal citizens,” to avoid being “inferior” or “subhuman”? That there is a human within my uterus does not make me less of a human, does not reduce me to such a state that I cannot accomplish anything, that I cannot think or vote, does not “ruin my life.” Those who believe pregnant women are inferior do women a serious disservice.

As a woman, I neither need nor want the right to kill humans to be equal as a human being. I am a woman. I am strong. I am capable. I am not inferior. And I don’t need the right to kill to be equal.

Some of the comments that follow the post are interesting as well:

It is misogynist to say women need abortion to be equal to men. It assumes that women aren’t equal to men already. It also holds male sexuality to be the standard against which women just don’t measure up.

Initially Mr. Trudeau said that existing Liberal MPs could vote their conscience on pro-life bills. That commitment has now been rescinded.

Mr. Trudeau now requires all his MPs to support a woman’s “right” to end the life of her child.

Flip. Flop. Flip. Flop.

Mr. Trudeau seemed to indicate that the Charter protected the “right” to gendercide. He and his party seemed to change their position once they learned the Canadian Medical Association condemned gendercide.

Flip. Flop. Flip. Flop.

Mr. Trudeau supports Charter values, which include conscience rights.

Mr. Trudeau strips the conscience rights of all his MPs, male and female, when it comes to abortion.

Flip. Flop. Flip. Flop.

Perhaps he’ll change his position tomorrow and become pro-life?

Flop.

Mary Wagner is free today, after two years in jail.

A random thought of the day.

Yesterday it was “long freestyle” night at my swim club. This means what you think it means. We swim front crawl, for a long time. I asked the coach to give me pointers on my stroke to make it less boring. He correctly identified that my right arm “crosses over” too much; and I don’t stretch out as much on the right hand side. Therefore, my stroke there is not terribly fluid.

My left hand side is fine.

This is because about two years ago, probably on another long freestyle night, I got a sharp, shooting pain in my left shoulder. Couldn’t keep swimming. My coach told me at the time it’s because of a crossover, which causes some muscles to work that shouldn’t have to. The only way to keep the pain at bay was to swim correctly. Which I now do, but only on the left.

No pain on the right hand side meant I never corrected the right hand side. It is a lot harder to correct without the pain, because I just have to think about it, and it feels unnatural to me.

There’s a lesson in there, somewhere.

Deep thoughts from the deep end, with Andrea.

I remember studying the words of this song in high school. Seemed to me we were learning that it’s about the end of civilization. It’s cooler when Leonard Cohen sings about that, as contrasted with a radical religious right winger ranting. (Wow, that’s a lot of “r”s.)

Fave line:

Looks like freedom but it feels like death
It’s something in between, I guess
It’s closing time

Enjoy.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-0lV5qs1Qw]

I kind of hesitate to link to this, for a bunch of reasons. But I decided I would because I’ve been thinking about the sexual revolution a lot lately and this fits right in.

You have two extremes in discussion of sexual ethics. On one end you have what I’ll call the Judeo-Christian sexual ethic: No sex before marriage, sex is only meaningful within marriage and sex is, in its nature, procreative. Even if it isn’t always, it’s understood that this a reasonable outcome. On the other side you have those who advocate sex is a purely physical thing, that there ought not be broader connections drawn in, that sex is always fine, provided it is consensual. And it ought not be procreative, until and unless you decide it should be.

Those are the basic distinctions on the edges. There are all manner of people who file in between these two extreme positions, but understanding the fringe helps to understand the world we are living in, which has moved away from the Judeo-Christian vision.

Truly, you can be pro-life. That’s an acceptable position even in Canada, even today. But you cannot be in favour of the Judeo-Christian sexual ethic. There is nothing so wildly unpopular.

At the same time, there is nothing so wildly unfulfilling as the other extreme for increasing numbers of people.

This discussion was spurred on by watching the video below.

[youtube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7oeSAOZwdk#t=134]

Today, two different people sent me an email with that wording as the subject line. Word for word.

Why? Because Justin Trudeau again raised the issue of abortion, which furthers our national dialogue. So “yay” I guess.

Today’s latest is that,

“I don’t know that there’s anyone in this country that is in favour of abortions. But what I am very much in favour of is a woman’s right to make that determination on her own, in consultation with the medical community, in consultation with whoever she chooses to consult,” Trudeau said.

“It is not for a room full of predominantly male legislators to take away those rights from women.”

Mike Schouten over at We Need a Law had a good response:

“Is the Liberal leader suggesting that if we elect more female legislators than Canadians can expect abortion bills to begin flowing through Parliament?” questioned Schouten. “What about other areas of law, like prostitution? Can a ‘room full of predominantly male legislators’ decide to protect vulnerable female prostitutes?”

“If we adopted Mr. Trudeau’s logic then maybe we should reverse the 1988 Supreme Court decision which struck down the abortion law at the time. After all, six of the seven justices on the bench at the time were men,” continued Schouten.

And here’s an excerpt from a piece I wrote last year, but my argument remains the same:

Lastly, he argued that since he doesn’t have a uterus, he cannot form an opinion on abortion and that this position isn’t a cop-out, but a fact. He’s wrong. It’s a total cop-out.

I’m not a woman who has suffered abuse, but I have an opinion on domestic abuse. I’m not a man, but I have an opinion on funding for prostate cancer research. I’m not a slave, but I have an opinion on human trafficking. I’m not a soldier or live in a war zone, but I have an opinion on Canadian military engagement. I’m not an Aboriginal person, but I have an opinion on the Idle No More movement.

Perhaps he believes that he must have first-hand knowledge of every human experience before he can form an opinion, but this seems like an odd, if not impossible, position for a national media editor to take. And I can assure him that the rest of the society doesn’t function that way. We form opinions and vote accordingly, even though we haven’t walked a mile in every Canadian’s shoes.

That statement is a cop-out and weak one. Of course citizens and heck, politicians who vote on legislation that affect Canadians of all stripes, can have opinions on a variety of issues. It’s just the way the world works. It’s just the way politics work.

The Canadian Medical Association points out in their article entitled, “Canadians want end-of-life care brought out of the shadows – CMA seeks to bring finding of national dialogue to Supreme Court of Canada“ that:

— MPs from all three parties voted unanimously to pass a resolution urging creation of a panCanadian strategy on palliative care.

“This was a very positive development for palliative care,” Dr. Francescutti said.  “We had been concerned that assisted death was sucking up all the attention from the crying need for palliative care in this country, and we raised this concern with a lot of MPs.”

The national dialogue focused on three main issues: advance care directives, palliative care, and physician-assisted dying.

To the provocative title of this article, I say, if they want euthanasia “brought out of the shadows” why is it cloaked in euphemisms like “terminal palliative sedation” and “medical aid in dying”?  Has it occurred to them that crimes like homicide are usually performed “in the shadows” and ought not to be brought out except to prosecute the perpetrators?

Newman Centre, Toronto. June 21st, 7 pm. Daniel Gilman and Jonathan Van Maren talk about “Rescuing our campuses from rape culture, porn and abortion.”

More info at the following Facebook link–but mark your calendar because this is an event worth going to!

Sometimes I have the image of all of us drowning–myself included–in a deluge of bad information, hyper sexualized images, magazines with unrealistic and stupid expectations of women (which today, are largely created by women, so sad).

So events like this are the life preserver… This is not about being religious or conservative or traditional or any of that. This is about all of us thriving–more than surviving–where we have been taught falsehoods about love, sex and relationship. It is time to come out from under.