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In reply to the discussion: How can one claim to be progressive while being pro-life? [View all]ColemanMaskell
(783 posts)provide life-saving medical treatments to the indigent, or set up rescue patrols to save drowning refugees, or anything life-affirming at all, right? You just mean that if a woman's life is endangered by a pregnancy, nobody should be allowed to save her, and she should just passively accept death, leaving her existing children, if any, motherless? Do I understand the meaning of "Pro-Life" correctly here -- sort of an Orwellian 1984-style inversion of meaning?
So, then, yeah, that doesn't sound too progressive. Probably the answer to "How could they" has to be "ignorance", then, if such a person really is good-hearted and progressive in other ways. People fall for propaganda when they don't have access to solid information. A naive person might have never heard of hydrocephalus, ectopic pregnancy, rheumatic fever, or any of the other myriad life-threatening conditions that can kill pregnant women. They might know nothing about crippling birth defects that cause infants to suffer and die. They probably never stopped to wonder why the propagandists claiming deep concern for unborn children seem to have no feelings of concern at all for the well-being of anyone beyond the instant of birth.
If someone is naive and not too bright, such a person might fall for all manner of nonsense. That is why advertising is all around us. That is how pseudo-religious demagogues get money and power selling lies to naive victims (Christian, Muslim, any religion can fall prey to this misguidance). That is how the worst examples of humanity can seize control of governments even when there is voting. Evil people peddle lies for personal gain, and there are usually plenty of naive, well-meaning people who fall for their cleverly spun webs of lies. Indeed, someone "progressive" -- someone who is innately good-hearted -- if they also are not too bright, such people are more easily deceived, because being good-hearted themselves, they do not realize how very evil and manipulative some others can be. The idea that a bad element in society is using anti-abortion laws entirely for the purpose of keeping women under control -- such an idea simply would not occur to a naive good-hearted person, and if the idea is pointed out to them, they might find it far-fetched and unlikely, unless it is explained to them very well. That is "how".
Don't call it "Pro-Life". It is anything but. It is a stance that seeks to suck the life force out of us all. The terminology "Pro-Life" is a classic case of the "Big Lie". The accurate terminology would be "Anti-Abortion".