Emotional Arguments and Abortion

Just a couple of weeks after praying for God to hurl a curse down upon me, only to offer what seemed to be a heartfelt apology, a reader joins in on Dale Courtney's blog, accusing me of senseless emotionalism in my pursuit and defense of truth -- or something; I was too upset to grasp it, I guess. Mine is a charitable interpretation, of course, and this gentleman may want to correct it before anyone becomes unsure of how he feels about me. I won't use his name here, and I do wish he'd re-think his impulsive outbursts, but his comments illustrate to me how emotional and uncharitable the abortion debate has become. Anyway, Courtney's Right-Mind blog yesterday took me to task for my Vision 2020 post suggesting that it was wrong to call Barack Obama someone who "favors infanticide." Dale didn't think much of my response.

Whereas Dale only refers to me as "Moscow's most famous evangelical" before he excoriates me (and, going out on a limb here, I'm guessing no flattery was intended), the other man prefers to join in with his mocking assertion that, golly, Dale should just let it go, because facts don't matter to "Mrs. Mix." It seems, he says, that I'm able only to muster emotional arguments -- the kind that Dale has often referred to as "breathless" and "mixed up," if not hysterical.

I'm beginning to think these guys don't like me.

There is a wee bit of irony in someone who very recently spewed a curse on me, only to immediately beg my forgiveness (which he already had), snidely commenting on my alleged propensity for thought-deficient, emotional outbursts, and I wish that just once he would be willing to talk with me in person. The invitation has been extended a zillion times, as it has been to other Kirkers Who Hate Keely, and it never seems to come about. But he's entitled to his emotional outbursts, and so here's the gist of my Vision 2020 post yesterday that precipitated it.

I did mention, as I also have on this blog, that I'm opposed to abortion and believe the unborn child to be a person known and loved by God, and I also said I thought it was wrong to call Obama a fan of "infanticide." Sorry, but even at my most hysterical, I don't see a contradiction here. I don't think that the most liberal pro-choice advocate can truly be said to be wildly exultant about the death of unborn children. I think reason suggests we conclude that such a person doesn't believe the fetus to be a person; it's only reckless emotionalism that brings us to presume evil in their intentions. Screaming "murderer" at pro-choice politicians, clinic operators, and desperate pregnant women seems not only unloving, un-Christlike, and unnecessary, but probably not real effective -- if we're thinking rationally.

So while many good people are not convinced that the fetus is a person, deserving of rights and protection, other moral distinctions of personhood are glaringly obvious, which hasn't necessarily prevented Christians from committing horrendous violence against the subject of "person or not?" debates. Specifically, while no sane human being genuinely doubted the personhood and full humanity of African slaves, many kidnapped and enslaved them anyway, often doing so with nary a thought of the inconsistency of faith in Christ and participation in and benefit from the Southern institution of slavery. The personhood of an eight-week-old embryo isn't real obvious; the personhood of a human slave is. I find it beyond comprehension that one can assert that the one questioning the former is automatically a fan of murderers, steeped in evil, while at the same time defending and embracing the one assured of the latter, who, knowing his slave to be fully human, debases, beats, and kills him anyway.

But that's just me. And you know how I get.