Abortion has always been a contentious issue. Personally, I am on the pro-choice side. I believe that everyone should have a choice, especially with women are pregnant through sexual assault. The majority of the pro-choice arguments make sense. Abortion is legalized in many parts of the US and Canada; however, it is still a sensitive subject amongst citizens, especially some Christian groups. Examples of such groups can be found at : http://www.prolife.com/ and http://www.campaignlifecoalition.com/index.php?p=Home. However, there is an ironic part to the Christian pro-life campaigns. Firstly, there has been an distinct violent tone in many protests at abortion clinics. Although there has been insults thrown at both sides, from a Christian perspective, violence does not seem very Christian. However, as we have studied the class, the violence in Christian traditions have been misconstrued or misinterpreted to become a norm in society. An example of an anti-abortion supporter using Christian traditions for the wrong reason: http://www.rickross.com/reference/a-abortion/a-abortion2.html. What I find the most ironic about the pro-life Christian movement is their argument of protecting family values. I fail to see how a child born out of wedlock is an ideal Christian family value. A prime example of this is Sarah Palin. Although she is pro-life and supports abstinence, a look at a family situation can show us how ironic this viewpoint is. Her daughter, Bristol Palin was pregnant as a teen, and even though the child's dad was supportive during the pregnancy, they have now had a highly publicized bust-up, and now the child is raised in a single parent home (Not sure how often Bristol Palin is around her child as she is currently doing a stint on Dancing with the Stars). So much for family values and abstinence.
I completely agree that abortion is quite a controversial issue. Unlike yourself, I am however on the pro life side. By being pro life, I believe abortions are wrong and to me an abortion is the murder of a child. With this in mind, understand that my justification against abortion is because of the life of the child, when the safety of the mother is not at risk. Despite of the idea that there are only two common views on abortion (pro choice and pro life), I’d argue that there are many different ways individuals portray and express these opinions.
ReplyDeleteYou wrote about the irony of pro life views, and one of the examples you used were of particular Christian pro life campaigns that use violence. I agree that this does show irony with their beliefs, but I don’t think that you can correlate all pro life beliefs to the violence that some Christian campaigns portray. Many others, myself included, would be against personal violent actions or attacks towards abortion clinics. That being said, I think I would have the freedom to belief the abortion is wrong, reasons which I haven’t gotten into here.
The last thing I would like to ask is about what you considered the most ironic about pro life Christian movement. You mentioned that they are big on protecting family values, however I do not really see this, and would just question what would make you say that they withhold family values and how they do this. That being said, your example plays an effective role in showing what you said.
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