Pam and Amanda have some great posts up today on the anti-contraception position of the anti-choicers and the importance of red herrings in conservative discourse.
People often feel shocked and bewildered when they hear about people who supposedly want both fewer abortions and no contraception at the same time. What a total contradiction, right? Well, yes, it is, because human nature clearly favors fucking, and it will occur no matter what. But if you don’t accept that for whatever reason, it can seem much more consistent than you’d think.
1) Abortion is the murder of an innocent
2) Murder of innocents is never okay
3) Therefore, anything that could cause the murder of innocents is wrong
4) No contraception is 100% effective
5) People think sex using contraception is safe
6) Therefore, people are more likely to have sex with access to contraception
7) So if there is no contraception, fewer people will have sex
That means there will be fewer abortions
If you believe that more people have sex because of contraception, and that some of those people wind up having to have abortions, then contraception must be banned because it sometimes results in people who otherwise wouldn’t bump uglies having to murder an innocent. Thus, abstinence is the only way to avoid ever having to kill womb angels.
The developers of this ideology usually don’t believe in the sanctity of womb angels; their motives are usually much more sinister, as I discussed yesterday. But many of their misguided acoloytes do buy into it, and even if they’re subconsciously using it as a shield for a deeper hatred of women, they can be really vocal about it.
My writing and the writing/reading of most of you is probably devoted to debunking any or all of the points above. The “logic” is rife with incorrect assumptions and poor conclusions. But I feel it’s important to remember how these people think. As Amanda points out, when we get enraged over their stupidity (guilty as charged!), it can sometimes be misinterpreted by the ‘nuts as a win for them. Remembering the shaky wingnut/fundie thought process helps us cooly poke more holes in their swiss cheese worldview.
The “logic” is rife with incorrect assumptions and poor conclusions.
It would make a lot more sense if they worded it as, “If there’s no contraception, people will be afraid to fuck, and then we won’t have to feel like we’re the only ones not getting any.”
Of course, people weren’t fucking when no contraception was available, right?
BULLSHIT.
I am Romanian. We had 20 years of a ban on abortion and contraceptives, and people still fucked, and women still aborted.
Why isn’t anyone digging up the movies about teh Romanian orphans living on teh streets that flooded the Tvs in the nineties, and put a title on them: “This is what a ban on abortion leade to!!”
Mayb it is because there is no such thing as a pro life movement, just an anti woman movement? Because moitherhood is slavery for women and these people only like the women as slaves?
Mayb it is because there is no such thing as a pro life movement, just an anti woman movement?
Exactly so. Pro-life inherently means anti-woman, no matter how the morons try to dress it up.
Motherhood doesn’t have to be slavery. But it’s a lot more likely to be a joyful, positive experience for a woman if she actually WANTS to have children. When a woman in these modern days of effective birth control and legal abortion gets pregnant on purpose, or gets pregnant by accident and decides to continue the pregnancy, that would suggest that she is happy to become a mother. She’s a lot likelier to do a good job of raising her kids if she actually LIKES them, instead of viewing them as unfortunately inevitable byproducts of ever having sex.
But it’s a lot more likely to be a joyful, positive experience for a woman if she actually WANTS to have children.
Which is the entire point. Women aren’t supposed to like childbirth and motherhood. It’s supposed to be their punishment for being female.
I wonder if it ever occurs to woman-haters that women might just choose to be with them and have their children if they’re not forced to. Or are they so convinced of their crushing inferiority that they’re not even going to consider that possibility?
Junk, I don’t think they really give a flying fuck, pretending to be offended seems to be taught in wingnut school as part of their “debating” arsenal.
(‘Course they are really debating, more like “masterdebating”…)
The wingnut positions on abortion, contraception and sexual mores boil down to this:
If I let her choose where and when to have sex, she might not choose me.