ARE YOU PRO-LIFE OR PRO-HUMAN?
Life or Death and Who Makes the Decision?
I hope the title caught your attention. When I hear a news story about Pro-Life demonstrations, the death of an individual(s) in a mass shooting, a bombing, a Stand My Ground issue, or the cutbacks in various programs in which conservative politicians say the program costs too much or the continuation of the program will make recipients lazy, unproductive or a burden on society. I cringe. Life is precious for everyone - even though in my mind there are some I would like to see in a state of well you know or can guess– it is only my opinion. So the question becomes, why do members of Pro-Life groups select certain persons or group and decide who will have a chance to live or die? Why don’t they speak up when a heinous crime is committed and a person is dead or disenfranchised? Americans on the edge of society may experience times when the lack of a resource endangers their life.
When did it become ok to take someone’s life by determining their time of death? To say you are God or God’s representative makes you believe you are given the right to determine who lives and who dies? This idea of supposedly protecting life is what makes me angry and sad. Let me preface this by saying I am Pro-Life but I am also Pro-Choice. The decision to have an abortion has to be the most difficult decision a woman will make in her life. I don’t support abortion except in cases of rape, incest, and certain health issues a woman may have before or during her pregnancy. But who am I to tell a woman what health care choices, legislated by government or pro-life groups, she is limited to? I don’t and neither does any man, any pro-life group, any state legislator, or the Federal Government. It is the not the purview of anyone else. It is the right of all women to decide what is in their best interest.
Pro-Life groups are fighting to bestow “personhood” to a fetus or even an egg through legislation on the state and federal level. I am not a doctor or a scientist who studies the female body to determine the exact moment life begins, but neither does anyone else without a degree in medicine, biology, or chemistry. Even with research the question of when life begins, remains elusive.
After child is born, the thought process for conservatives and pro-life groups is you are on your own and what happens to you after birth is your business. I am offended by this idea. I am now questioning, when does an unborn fetus gain personhood protections but a living person does not have the same protections? Who decides what person or group has the RIGHT TO LIFE as well as the “right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”? When does the question of life or death become selective and who makes that decision? No one has a right to decide for you.
Every day we see instances where a person who has been injured or shot or is affected by the defunding of a public program – food stamps, health care, gun control, immigration - where your fate to have life or death is determined by a conservative or a religious leader or a for-profit or a non-profit group. Is their thumbs turned up or turned down? In the past 30 years or so the decision of life and death is decided by someone other than you. This could be a legislator in a state capital or in Washington DC who believe he/she knows what is best for you. You have now graduated to the status of an amoeba.
You no longer have the right to make a decision for yourself. Someone else does. For example this could be someone with a gun who uses the Stand Your Ground law to murder or injure an innocent victim, because he/she "felt threatened". In this situation a man or woman has committed a social faux pas by texting in a movie theater. A 71 year old man tells you to stop. The man texting throws popcorn at the gunslinger and the gunslinger shoots you because he “felt threatened”. In this instance and others the incident becomes increasingly violent. The escalation of the violence may be overblown or out of control, so someone with a weapon decides you must die or at least be injured. Your RIGHT TO LIFE is over.
The Federal Government defunds the Food Stamp program or Social Security or Medicare or any number of public programs and decides your fate. Do your children starve to death? Do you live on the street at seventy five years of age? Do you die because an insurance company or a conservative says you are not entitled to health care? The decision is out of your hands. Your RIGHT TO LIFE is over.
Texas State Senator Wendy Davis gave a speech about what right to life meant to her at the University of Texas’ Brownsville campus. She said “I am pro-life.” She went on to make her point when she remarked: “I care about the life of every child; every child that goes to bed hungry, every child that goes to bed without a proper education, every child that goes to bed without being able to be a part of the Texas dream, every woman and man who worry about their children’s future and their ability to provide for that future. I care about life and I have a record of fighting for people above all else."
She was vilified by the corporate press and conservatives for saying she has a heart. She made a powerful personal statement based on her understanding of what pro-life means by co-opting radical religious right and conservative groups definition of life and expanded it, making it her own to make her point. She is Pro-Human. She is and should be a hero to every sane, educated American who knows right from wrong. She put the right to live back in the individual’s hands. Your RIGHT TO LIFE is now yours.
Libertarians believe in the doctrine of free will and the ability of the individual to make decisions for himself without intervention from others. Libertarianism includes emphasis on the primacy of individual liberty, political freedom, and voluntary association. A group which believes you should mind your own business not your neighbors. The definition, which includes any notations or references directly from the Wikipedia website, begins:
“In the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, libertarianism is defined as the moral view that agents initially fully own themselves and have certain moral powers to acquire property rights in external things.[16] Libertarian philosopher Roderick Long defines libertarianism as "any political position that advocates a radical redistribution of power from the coercive state to voluntary associations of free individuals", whether "voluntary association" takes the form of the free market or of communal co-operatives.[17] In the United States, the term libertarianism is often used as a synonym for combined economic and cultural liberalism while outside that country there is a strong tendency to associate libertarianism with anarchism “
- fundamentally meaning me, me, me not you, you, you or us or we.
Unfortunately, the philosophy of libertarianism discounts any decision not based on individualism. The idea of individualism has become so ingrained in conservative and fundamental religious circles, that it is dogma. Why are libertarians not uniting to stop or remove government involvement in right to life decisions? They will say ”it is my personal business not yours and your personal business is not mine”. But in pro-life groups, religious institutions, the Republican Party, and other organizations, the definition of right to life or death is being decided by another person or interested party. We have lost our right to define life or death for ourselves. Conservatives select who will live – the unborn fetus, the wealthy, the libertarian, the Republican - and also selects who will struggle and possibly die – the poor, the working and middle class, minorities, women, gays and lesbians, and prison inmates. Your personal RIGHT TO LIFE decision is over. These concerned parties are anti-human and pro-death.
To summarize I ask, are you the one who selects who lives and dies? Are you pro-life or pro-human? Look in the mirror to see who is choosing you fate. If it’s not you, you’re up the creek without a paddle so be very afraid.