The hypocrisy of pro-life/pro gun

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   Nathanvilleposted 3 years ago

   I’ll not get involved in the gun debate because that is something peculiar to America, but I do find the discussion on Abortion of interest.
   
   Abortion was originally made illegal in the UK in 1861 under the ‘Offences Against the Person Act 1861’, but that law was repealed in England, Scotland and Wales, making abortion legal in England, Scotland and Wales in the ‘Abortion Act of 1967’.
   
   However, in Ireland (the only part of the UK that is highly religious) the Catholics have long been anti-abortion; so Abortion didn’t finally become legal in the Republic of Ireland (southern Ireland) until 2018, following a Referendum in favour of abortion; and abortion didn’t finally become legal in Northern Ireland until October 2019, when the UK took matters into their own hands and passed the laws from Westminster (London) because the DUP (Democratic Unionist Party)(Northern Ireland Catholic Party) refused to convene the Northern Ireland Parliament to deal with the matter because of a spat that they had with the Sinn Fein (Protestant Party) over political sleaze e.g. Sinn Fein accused the DUP of corruption in Government funding of a ‘Renewable Energy’ project in Northern Ireland. 
   
   As part of the Northern Ireland 1998 Peace Agreement a ‘Power sharing’ Parliament was set up in Northern Ireland whereby both Catholics and Protestants have to work together in order for the Parliament to sit and pass laws.  The Northern Ireland Parliament collapsed, and was suspended in January 2017 after Sinn Fein made accusations against the DUP Party for making personal financial gain in a ‘Green’ Government funded project; and it didn’t finally sit again until January 2020 when both sides made up.
   
   However, in the Autumn of 2019 the UK Government, putting pressure on the Northern Ireland Government to reconvene, threatened the DUP Party that if they didn’t agree to reconvening the Northern Ireland Parliament before the end of 2019 that the UK Government would exercise it’s legal right to run Northern Ireland from the Westminster UK Parliament in London, and that one of the provisions it was putting on the statue books, unless stopped by DUP was a pro-abortion law, to bring Northern Ireland in line with the rest of the UK.
   
   So, in Northern Ireland abortion does not constitute a criminal offence after sections of the Offences against the Person Act 1861 were repealed in October 2019.
   
   The DUP Party, being a devote Catholic and hard right-wing political party is very anti-abortion, so it was a real threat to them, but they called the UK Government’s bluff and lost e.g. the UK Parliament carried out its threat and passed the pro-abortion laws in Northern Ireland, as well as legalising gay marriages in Northern Ireland to bring it in line with the rest of the UK.  Again being a hard-right political party with very strict Catholic beliefs Gay Marriages is something the DUP party would never had allowed if they’d made up their difference with Sinn Fein and reconvened the Northern Irish Parliament before the end of 2019.  So DUP have only got themselves to blame.
   
   Abortion in the Republic of Ireland (southern Ireland) is regulated by the Health (Regulation of Termination of Pregnancy) Act 2018. Abortion is permitted in the Republic of Ireland during the first twelve weeks of pregnancy, and later in cases where the pregnant woman's life or health is at risk, or in the cases of a fatal foetal abnormality.
   
   But like Northern Ireland, the people in the Republic of Ireland are very religious, and mostly Catholic, so the road to legalising abortion hasn’t been an easy one.
   
   In the Republic of Ireland the 1st Referendum in 1983, was in support of ‘pro-life’ (giving the unborn child equal right to life) e.g. strengthening the anti-abortion law.  That referendum was 66.9% in favour, and 33.1% against.
   
   Then the Referendum in the Republic of Ireland in 2018 was for permitting the legislation of abortion, and that referendum was 66.4% in favour, and 33.6% against – A complete reversal to public opinion 35 years earlier?
   
   I gather from recent news that the road to abortion in the USA hasn’t been an easy one either; although I’m not totally clear on what the current status is in America, nor on what public opinion is?

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      Fayetteville Fayeposted 3 years agoin reply to this

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         wildernessposted 3 years agoin reply to this

         I wouldn't call 40% of the population a "fringe minority".  While it is true that the fringe minorities often try to control the majority, a bigger problem is that the majority often simply runs roughshod over the minority without regard to their wishes or thoughts.
         
         Lest there be misunderstanding, I am firmly in the "pro-choice" camp on abortion although I do make an effort to understand the complaints and reasoning of the other side.

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            Credence2posted 3 years agoin reply to this

            How do we "accommodate" the minority with forfeiting the rights of the majority?

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               Fayetteville Fayeposted 3 years agoin reply to this

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                  Credence2posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                  Example: Biden won, how do you "compromise" with the minority whose candidate lost?
                  
                  So much like cutting an infant in two to compromise with either of two mothers who both claim that the child belongs to them

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                     Fayetteville Fayeposted 3 years agoin reply to this

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                        Credence2posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                        The problem with that, Faye is that we have vehemently different views on what is "best for the child".
                        
                        We all think that we work for what is best for our country. Trump and the Right have one vision, while I and much of the Left have another. What is different now, is that the differences are so great that it is questionable that the two can ever meet.
                        
                        In today's political climate the idea that there is more that unites us than divides us may well be just a comforting homily from a past America.
                        
                        And I won't deny that there are forces involved in the division and are associated with and stand to gain from the division. But how do you hold wealth and associated power accountable in a society that virtually worships it?

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                           Sharlee01posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                           All you have said rings sadly true.  It would seem things could become worse before better.

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                              Credence2posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                              I surely hate to be the one bearing bad tidings.
                              
                              But prior to January 6th, when have we ever had the Capital attacked because certain people did not like the outcome of a presidential election?
                              This is totally unprecedented throughout US history.

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                                 wildernessposted 3 years agoin reply to this

                                 Bigger question is when have we ever had the Capital attacked, and the answer was given elsewhere in the forum.  It has been attacked several times because people were unhappy with what Congress was doing, including a bombing inside the building.

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               GA Andersonposted 3 years agoin reply to this

               Assuming you meant "without," the solution is simple and at hand. Follow our Constitution and the laws passed under its authority. We have minority and majority protections in place. And I think they are working.
               
               GA

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                  Credence2posted 3 years agoin reply to this

                  I am for that, but obviously that has not been enough....

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         Nathanvilleposted 3 years agoin reply to this

         Thanks for your feedback.  I find it interesting in your comments to wilderness that in the USA it’s the Protestants who are anti-abortion; whereas in Northern Ireland it’s predominantly the Protestants who are pro-abortion and it’s the Catholics who are generally anti-abortion!

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            Fayetteville Fayeposted 3 years agoin reply to this

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               Nathanvilleposted 3 years agoin reply to this

               Thanks, it's been an enlightening read.

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   Valeantposted 3 years ago

   I understand Faye's point.  In one case, there are laws being passed to protect a life, even an unborn life.  On the other hand, we are seeing school shootings in most years and no legislative action taken to save those lives.
   
   And this scenario is not about illegal guns being obtained.  It's about legally bought firearms continuing to find their way into the hands of children and then into schools.  I'm all for Second Amendment rights, but to say that the political answer to these unnecessary deaths is to issue more thoughts and prayers, while an unborn fetus is legislated does seem to belie the hypocrisy of pro-life arguments.
   
   Especially as many of those same people make the body autonomy argument for vaccines and masks, while then ignoring that same principle in regards to a woman's body during pregnancy.  As well as the total omission of the physical and emotional damage, and sometimes fatal cases, caused to the women who chose to get abortions despite laws banning them.

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   Credence2posted 3 years ago

   Mike and Wilderness, you consider your diversionary tactics as clever? On the contrary, they are quite transparent and found not to "hold water" under any serious evaluation.
   
   Take a look at this chart of intentional homicides in the different countries, the US has a rate 5 times that of Britain and while I am pleasantly surprised that our stars don't compare with those horrendous ones of South America, for example, we are still far more homicidal than Great Britain as a whole.
   
   https://www.factcheck.org/2018/06/is-il … ess-crime/
   
   https://www.factcheck.org/2018/06/is-il … ess-crime/
   
   Mike, you want to pick on urban areas? London is a pretty good sized place, the last time I checked. I am sure that the city has rough patches and gangs, yet still its homicide rates are below that of 30 American cities of comparable or smaller population. It does not matter whether its AK-47s or pea shooters.
   
   Let's see the slight of hand you employ this time to explain that little contradiction?

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