GENESSA -- AN ESSAY ABOUT RIGHTS AND FREEDOMS BY LADY G!
Why I Believe In Other People's Right to Do Stuff I Might or Might Not Do (Including But Not Limited to Really Dumb or Bad Stuff)
by Gail M Feldman
I hold opinions that make some people mad. That's okay; some people make me mad too, though not usually by having opinions. Forcing their opinions, often religion-based, into law, which should be secular, tends to bug me. Here are some issues upon which those buggers (sorry, couldn't resist) and I tend to disagree:
Abortion
Nobody is in favor of abortion. Nobody. Everyone would rather not have an abortion or perform an abortion. Nobody jumps up and down and says "Oh goodie, give me an abortion!" or "Oh joy, I get to terminate another pregnancy today." What some people are in favor of, and I count myself among these folks, is a woman's right to have an abortion, and a doctor's right to make sure she doesn't have it by sticking a coat hanger into her vagina. Yes, it's that simple. Here is why it doesn't seem simple:
Some people consider abortion to be murder. (I cannot refrain from mentioning here that an awful lot of those same people don't consider the death penalty to be murder. I further indulge the same urge by mentioning that I don't get that.) The only way, of course, in which abortion can be considered murder is if a fetus is considered a person. A fetus is not a viable person outside its mother's body until at least... hold on, now, what do we mean by "viable"? Do we mean "able to survive outside the mother's body without life support," "able to survive outside the mother's body but damaged to the extent that it will almost certainly not be a functional human being in the usual sense" (and what sense is that)? or perhaps does it mean "able to survive outside the mother's body as long as we keep a bunch of tubes and needles in it"? Viability has been pegged as low as 22 weeks, and that threshhold is much disputed, but as it is the minimum, let's go with that for now, since people who think I'm full of crap will want to set this age as low as possible. Let's indulge them. (Fair's fair.) But let's also indulge Planned Parenthood, whose definition of viability ("Viability is a medical, not a legal term," it notes) seems reasonable to me (this is partial; for a more involved discussion of viability, and statistics about when most abortions are performed, see http://www.ppacca.org/site/pp.asp?c=kuJYJeO4F&b=139571):
A fetus is viable when it reaches an "anatomical threshold" when critical organs, such as the lungs and kidneys, can sustain independent life. Until the air sacs are mature enough to permit gases to pass into and out of the bloodstream, which is extremely unlikely until at least 23 weeks gestation (from last menstrual period), a fetus cannot be sustained even with a respirator, which can force air into the lungs but cannot pass gas from the lungs into the bloodstream.
(Planned Parenthood also points out that ROE V. WADE specifies that viability, while having guidelines, is determined case by case.)
Apart from the question of viability is the question of the ability of the fetus to perceive pain. Nerve endings appear in a fetus as early as seven weeks into gestation but they do not become meaningful in terms of pain perception until at least 12-16 weeks in, and possibly as long as 22-25 weeks. Ninety-nine percent of all abortions are performed in the first trimester, a good half quite early on in that trimester.
Those who would argue with the seeming reasonability of the above do so on one basis: religion. As (at least in the United States) there is, theoretically, separation between church and state, there must not be laws passed regarding what a person may or may not do, or must do or may refrain from doing, based on what someone's religion says is right, since not everyone has the same religion, or even any religion. Eliminate religion and you have no medical, political, philosophical or other argument left beyond "Well, I don't like it," which, if I ruled the world, would allow me to eliminate celery from all menus. Comparing abortion to celery? Nope! But "I don't like it" is no kind of reason to control what other people do with their bodies, and there is no scientific basis for considering abortion, as it is practised by law these days, murder.
For the record, I once suspected that I might be pregnant. Being unmarried, being ill with systemic lupus erythematosus, which does not guarantee death for either a pregnant woman or her offspring, but which certainly raises critical issues for both and can very well be a death sentence for one, the other or both. I would have been within my rights to attempt to ensure my survival (and avoid the heartbreak of miscarriage or stillbirth) by opting to abort. Furthermore, the erstwhile father of the theoretical child wanted me to have an abortion, as he couldn't bear the idea of his having a child living apart from him (we had no plans to stay together, we were in Japan, his native country, and I planned, one day, to leave Japan). And even furthermore, I did not want children. Even so, I would have taken the very real risk of carrying the child to term, and keeping him or her, as well. That's just me. I would never presume to say what I decided for myself was right or wrong for anyone else, even were I a lawmaker.
Childlessness
In an overpopulated world in which women are no longer presumed to be, pardon the cliché, perpetually barefoot and pregnant, to be seen and not heard (like the children they are also presumed to be), at home only in the kitchen and the bedroom, it makes sense that some couples will choose to procreate, some will not, and some will be conflisted. Certain folks promote something they call "family values," which in fact are not valuable to everyone and certainly are not valuable to society as a whole (and some of them don't even have anything to do with families). A family can be what you make of it. A couple can be a family. Consenting adults of any gender in any number can be a family, albeit not legally, and there are pros and cons to polygamy too (one con is the fact that it generally ends up being a megalomaniac male married to more than one subservient female, and another is that the purpose is to enhance and hasten procreation... a sport that really is counterproductive in an overpopulated world in which women... wait, didn't I say that already?)
I myself have chosen to be childfree, despite the decision I think I would have made had I actually found myself with child. Nothing is carved in stone. For my personal reasoning and situation, best see my essay GUILTY, GUILTY, GUILTY, and realize that while every individual is unique, I am probably not the only person in the known universes who has at least some of the stated reasons for not giving birth to and/or raising a child. I will mention, in addition, that to drive an automobile (an activity that in 2002 resulted in 45,100 deaths in the United States alone) one must study, practice, and pass a practical exam and a written one as well. Where is the test that precedes the equally dangerous activity of childrearing? It is not only for the welfare of the prospective nonparents that nonparenting may be the sanest option; birth comes with no guarantees, and kids who are created as a spontaneous gift to their parents, the way such parents may gift the kids with puppies -- without considering the responsibilities, never mind the love -- can end up neglected or abused. I'm not saying they necessarily will; lots of folks have kids without planning to do so, and love the heck out of them, and raise them to be fine citizens. I am only pointing out that if those who have a choice should make it wisely.
Well, okay, that is not all I wish to point out. I also wish to point out that the abovementioned choices are really nobody's business and "So when are you two gonna have kids?" gets old after a while. "It's your duty to bring as many brats into the world as possible or God is gonna kill you" starts out old.
Prostitution
Unlike abortion, which I consider to be a necessary evil, I do not find prostitution necessary. It is evil, to me, only in the sense that it objectifies human beings, which is not a good way to view or treat the species to which I happen to belong. However, people have (or should have) the right to do stuff I think is dumb or bad, and stuff that involves mutual concent and does no physical harm. We need better education to dissuade people from objectifying one another, and we need more parental involvement in a child's upbringing, to help children 1. realize that sex is something for which they are likely not emotionally prepared and for which at any rate not legally able to give content, and 2. understand that sex as a commodity does objectify human beings and therefore is not a healthy definition of sex. Again, if you get into the "sinful" aspect of it, then you have to choose a religion in order to define "sin" and we're not allowed to do that, nor should we be. Even if you acknowledge that prostitution is "sinful," it is, ideally, still outside the government's scope to criminalize it. Indeed, legalizing prostitution would likely go far toward stopping the plague of sexually-transmitted disease that affects the innocent as well as the guilty, including but not limited to the AIDS pandemic. Legal activities can be regulated (and taxed -- and the taxes could go toward aforementioned education, or medical research); illegal ones cannot.
In the final analysis (it is worth considering), what makes sex prostitution is not whether it occurs among more than two people, or what gender the people happen to be, or whether it happens often, or whether it happens with varying partners, or where it happens. The only thing that makes sex prostitution is whether or not it was paid for, and compensation doesn't always mean money. A good many marriages, by that definition, involve prostitution: a woman has sex in exchange for being cared for, and a name and legitimacy for her children. This is not true of all marriages but it has traditionally been true and still is, for many. Shall we outlaw marriage, since it is more often than not a form of prostitution? It's a nice thought, but no, that would be just as much a violation of human rights as the outlawing of prostitution already is.
Gay Marriage
Love is very difficult to find. When consenting adults of the same species (and I may wish to expand this definition if we ever do find life on other planets) find love, who has the right to say it's the wrong kind of love?
Well, people have offered up the following reasons why they, themselves, and/or their churches, have such a right:
Homosexuality is unnatural.
Well, it's not. Homosexuality is found in many species, particularly (but not limited to) resulting from local overpopulation. Oddly enough, nobody ever told any of those other species they were sinning. Our female dog sometimes humps our cats when they're in heat. Everyone seems to enjoy the experience and so far nobody has been struck by lightning.
The institution of marriage is sacred.
Well, somebody doesn't know their history! The institution of marriage has, throughout most of recorded history, been a secular, financial one, usually involving the combining of households and/or businesses, and had little to do with sex or love. Arranged marriages, designed for mutual material advantage without regard to the feelings of the couple-to-be, were until recently the norm. Churches tried to control marriage and always had a finger in that particular pie, but it was first and foremost a secular institution. Only when the industrial revolution changed both the mobility and the independence of employment of the lower and middle classes did marriage become more about sex and love, and more the concern of the folks about to be joined than that of their respective/mutual households and communities. What is sacred about that and whatever are we trying to protect?
Marriage is between one man and one woman. Period.
Well, what period? And what continent? This simply isn't true for anyone but the most ignorant and ethnocentric of folks.
God doesn't like it.
Which God? Your God? Maybe my God does. Again, you can't force your religion on other people (oh, I know it has occasionally succeeded, but it shouldn't!) but let us for one wild moment pretend that everyone on earth believes in your particular god and your particular bible. Let us turn to the tale of Sodom and Gomorrah, from Genesis, Chapter 19. Short version: Angels come, in male human form, to warn Lot and his family about impending doom for their seriously sinful town and its sister city. Lot welcomes them cordially, which is the right thing to do and rather the point of the story. The townsfolk gather at his door and demand that the strangers be presented to them so that they can be known, meaning (we assume) sexually. Modern interpretation: the townsfolk were sinful because they were men wanting to have sex with other men. Problem with that: 1. the implication is that if the angels were female, raping them would be okay, and 2. it ignores the fact that the real issue is rape, which is, to put it mildly, darned unfriendly. Huddie Ledbetter might have called it a "Bou'gois Town." Note: God seems to give complete approval to Lot's offering up his virgin daughters to the rowdy crowd, which offer they eschew, leaving the virgins undeflowered, for reasons not made clear but which we can assume have more to do with xenophobia than with sexual preference, and God also turns a blind eye when the virgin daughters, perhaps disappointed by that outcome, despoil themselves by raping their dad, admittedly under the rather serious, if false, impression that the three of them are the last remaining humans on Earth and have a duty to repopulate that beleaguered planet. (This assumption does, of course, mean they do not trust God, who promised Noah, some time back, not to do that anymore.) Confused? Then let us turn to the story of Onan, which is in Genesis, Chapter 38:
1 And it came to pass at that time, that Judah went down from his brethren, and turned in to a certain Adullamite, whose name was Hirah. 2 And Judah saw there a daughter of a certain Canaanite whose name was Shua; and he took her, and went in unto her. 3 And she conceived, and bore a son; and he called his name Er. 4 And she conceived again, and bore a son; and she called his name Onan. 5 And she yet again bore a son, and called his name Shelah; and he was at Chezib, when she bore him. 6 And Judah took a wife for Er his first-born, and her name was Tamar. 7 And Er, Judah's first-born, was wicked in the sight of the LORD; and the LORD slew him. 8 And Judah said unto Onan: 'Go in unto thy brother's wife, and perform the duty of a husband's brother unto her, and raise up seed to thy brother.' 9 And Onan knew that the seed would not be his; and it came to pass when he went in unto his brother's wife, that he spilled it on the ground, lest he should give seed to his brother. 10 And the thing which he did was evil in the sight of the LORD; and He slew him also.
That's a little bit convoluted and there are some missing parts, such as exactly what Er did that was so wicked, how Onan knew the seed wouldn't be his, and what that meant exactly. This leaves an awful lot to interpretation. Was Tamar already pregnant by Er, and is that what Onan meant thinking the seed wouldn't be his (in other words, his seed wouldn't take because Er's got there first)? Or was Judah asking him to impregnate Tamar in honor of Er (why honor someone God slew for being wicked? Was that not wicked of Judah to ask of Onan?) or... or... well it's convoluted. I don't know how anyone can tell exactly what's going on here, much less definitively say God was mad that Onan spilled his seed because spilling seed is intrinsically bad; maybe it was bad in this case because Onan wasn't obeying his father, or maybe God hadn't gotten over the unnamed wickedness of Er and was taking it out on Onan. It seems a stretch to say homoxexuality is sinful because God didn't like one thing that one guy did under a rather unusual circumstance. You can argue that it's an allegory but the people who interpret this passage to justify their homophobia generally do not see the bible as allegory. It's cherrypicking, my friends, plain and simple. You can't have it both ways. Either the bible is to be taken literally and this is an isolated incident, or it's not to be taken literally and this is an allegory that nonetheless isn't clear. At any rate, you still have to force everyone else to believe your religion, which is a no-no, in order to translate sin into crime.
"I don't like it."
Fine. Don't do it!
Marijuana
Ever see "Reefer Madness"? Now there's a good reason to legalize marijuana right there: the government has lied to us so much about the danger, or lack thereof, of this substance, that hardly anyone knows whom to believe anymore. However, I do believe my own experiences. I enjoyed marijuana in college and for a while beyond college, and I can tell you with absolute confidence that it is not a physically addictive substance. I have seen plenty of folks grow emotionally dependent upon it; these people drink when they can't get grass, and some of them decided they liked cocaine, an absolutely vile substance, better than grass. (Grass makes people sleepy, dreamy, hungry, thoughtful, sometimes spiritual, sometimes just goofy. Cocaine makes people mean, illogical, addicted and broke.) I don't know anyone who got involved in hard drugs as a result of smoking marijuana. People get involved in hard drugs as a result of needing something other than their own misery to which to become addicted. Harsh? Okay, I know there are sometimes extenuating circumstances. A family member (or friend, or pimp) gets someone hooked, or some tragedy snowballs in that direction. Marjuana never made me or anyone I know crave a bigger fix or a higher high. In fact, addictive drugs get their users on an escalating pattern because the users' bodies become inured to the effects and require a larher amount to achieve the same high... eventually needing immense quantities just not to be sick, much less to feel anything pleasant. A pothead, on the other hand, needs less and less to achieve the same high. It gets better and better. This is the opposite of physical addiction!
Now is it a good or a bad thing to alter one's consciousness? That's not the question. The question is, does anyone have the right to make that decision for another person, providing there is no public safety issue. I think you know by now how I feel about it. There have been zero deaths caused by marijuana itself; if there have been traffic deaths, then driving under the influence should certainly be a crime. (We might think about cell phone use, or the application of mascara in the same light.) Compare the number "zero" with alcohol-related deaths, or for that matter tobacco-related deaths, and not just of the ingester. (And no, this is not a plea for prohibition; we all know how well that worked. In fact it works the same way with marijuana: the only connection marijuana has ever had with hard drugs is its illegality, which places its production and distribution in the hands of criminals, who can, of course, make much more money selling addictive drugs than poor old maryjane. Had the 18th Amendment not been pushed past President Wilson's veto, alcohol would never have become the nearly exclusive domain, as it was for the duration -- 14 long years -- of the Mafia, which might not have become as powerful in the United States as they then became and even now remains. (And had antebellum Virginians and the Carolinians planted their fields with marijuana instead of tobacco, we'd be complaining about the tax on pot and chain-smokers would be doing time; were marijuana regulated now, the consumer would be more likely to get product not "dusted" with angel dust or even worse, some possibly addictive, elements.)
It is interesting to note that no known bible mentions marijuana directly, one way or the other.
Capital Punishment
I am as vengeful as the next person, and am not above wanting another human being dead. Before I was born, my father wanted to strangle Hitler with his bare hands (he never got the chance); I have looked into Charles Manson's eyes and thought, this person should not exist. It is for this reason, among others, that I am against the death penalty. I do not have the right to act on those feelings and wishes, nor did my father, nor do you and nor does any body of government, for the government is just a bunch of folks who work for us, on our behalves (pardon me while I choke myself laughing, but that's the theory, anyway) and if we may not murder, then they may not, either.
Apart from that, there is the itsy bitsy little fact that of the first 40 death row prisoners whose DNA was finally, after a great legal struggle, tested against evidence used to convict them, fully 18 of them were proven innocent, by those tests, of those ctimes of which they were convicted, and the convictions were overturned and the sentences set aside (which is really sweet after a couple of decades of each sentence had already been served, and lives ruined for nothing). Is it actually okay for nearly half of the folks we off to be innocent, just so we can dispatch the baddies? (Oh, I know some of you are thinking, well, these guys are probably guilty of something, even if not the crimes for which they were about to die; to hell with them! To this I respond: "Prove it!")
Yet another reason for not killing even the worst criminals is that it actually costs more to kill them than to keep them. But forget money; think about crime prevention. Anyone who can count knows that would-be capital crime such as murder, is down where there is no death penalty, and up where the death penalty exists. Why should this be? Some attribute it to a death wish on the part of some of the offenders; in light of what scientists are now learning about the most violent criminals, which is that they are lacking in certain perceptions, including normal fear, and tend to need more and more stimulation just to feel alive, I think perhaps the threat of the death penalty ups the risk factor, and therefore the thrill factor, much the way a high risk thrills a gambler. Whatever the reason may be, and whether we ever know for sure or not, the numbers don't lie. The death penalty does not prevent violent crime, and in fact might possibly encourage it.
Prayer in Public Schools
Forget separation of church and state for the moment; everyone else seems to have forgotten it already. Let me ask you this: who gets to decide which religion's prayer is said in public schools?
Let me ask something else of those of you who say (snidely, I can't help thinking) that any child who doesn't wish to participate in an official prayer in school doesn't have to. Have you ever heard of peer pressure? What generally happens to any child who chooses (or has his or her parent choose for that child) to be different?
No one has forbidden anyone to pray, anywhere, including in public schools. What should be forbidden is a child's having to choose between his or her own beliefs and his or her own personal comfort or even safety. In addition, a prayer's being led by a teacher (or being official in any way, shape or form) gives it powerful credence which may go against the beliefs of the child or his or her family. Oddly, the same folks who bring you prayer in public school despite its possible invasion of your consciousness are outraged at the teaching of evolution on that very basis -- that it conflicts with their personal beliefs -- despite the fact that religion is faith-based and science is observable, measurable and real no matter how strongly the ostrich community denies it. Despite its common name, evolution is not a theory (nor is it a religion), and as a scientific fact it belongs in all schools, right along with algebra and spelling -- although apparently spelling is being taught even more hesitantly than evolution.
So if you want to pray, go ahead and pray. Just don't subject innocent, easily influenced children to it unless you are ready to admit you're trying to teach them to believe in your religion, which you must not do in public schools... ah, there's that pesky separation of church and state again.
Would you like to respond to the original (shorter) version of this essay (or even to this expanded version)? (Be nice! You don't have to agree with what I've written but calling names doesn't exactly lend credence to anyone's position.) Respond to the appropriate post (you'll see it1) in my RANDOM RAMBLINGS.
