I had two abortions when I was young and foolish, and at some point I met both children-that-could-have-been, not in real life but oh definitely real, in the spirit. They sprang up in my mind the way they would have been, could have been. Then only I understood that THEY wanted to live, no matter how. It was ME who thought I couldn't give them a good life. Only then did I understand how unbelievably precious life is, whatever way it is lived, and how sacred, and what gruesome superficiality I had treated it with. So this experience burdened but also deepened my soul. (Thereafter by the grace of God I had two beautiful, healthy children and now I am a granny of seven. Amazing.) I still am pro-choice. But I do believe we should change our ways in the whole area of sexuality, physicality, and death, for that matter.
For me, this sentence says it all: "When our society fully reorganizes itself around service to life on every level, the abortion issue will slip into insignificance."
Beautiful, touching and so deeply resonate. If I may say so, I also noticed that the REAL issues are actually those that are unspoken and unconscious, those that are "behind" the overt arguments conclusions and convictions of each "side". In my experience and understanding, the REAL issues that drive the devotees of each side are almost always the ones that are unspoken of and unacknowledged, psychologically hidden and unconscious.
As one small example of that, that really opened my eyes to what is ACTUALLY going on beneath the surface slogans - when i dived beneath the surface together with a friend (who defines herself as being in the anti-abortion/pro-life camp), as we peeled back the layers and dived deeper than the surface arguments, we more and more came to see the real (unspoken) inner psychological forces that were driving the outward conclusions she reached and the political position she took. We discovered that behind the slogans of caring for life and having compassion for the unborn, there was ACTUALLY huge amounts of very deep anger - rage actually - and literally a desire to PUNISH those who lead a life/lifestyle which she was taught to think of as "wrong" (or immoral). We discovered that behind the surface pious words of caring for life and compassion there was ACTUALLY incredible hostility and desire to "teach a lesson" to those who don't follow "the righteous ways" and who don't subscribe to her belief system, and to IMPOSE on the "immoral ones" the kind of lifestyle that she was taught is moral and right.
It was fadcinating to realize how, even though just a few months earlier she was rallying against what she called tyranny (and I was fully with her on that), and yet now, as we peeled the surface layers and got to the very root of where the motivations are springing from, we discovered (behind her cries against tyranny) her own ACTUAL desire to be powerful tyrant who gets to impose the "right way" on others and punish those who behave "wrong".. it was quite a shock to her as well..
And it actually goes deeper than that, becasue we discovered that the rage and hostility and desire to punish were actually not the final stop and there was an even deeper layer "behind" them, of very deep pain and sorrow, of deep feeling of woundedness, of abandoned, unloved and unheard orphans/parts, shut away at the deepest dungeons of the psyche (which then rose to the surface in the form of profound rage and wanting to punish those who have hurt them).
The same is true for the other "side" as well, it seems to me. Unconscious/unspoken firces are driving both "sides", IMHO.
There is a lot more to this but I think I'll stop here :-)
Just saying all of this in order to express my deep resonance with what you bring to light Charles, that the REAL issues driving our conclusions and convictions are ACTUALLY the ones not spoken about, that many of us are perhaps even unware of..
PS. I highly recommend the work of Scott Kiloby (The Kiloby Inquiries) for anyone interested in discovering what's really underneath our surface convictions, opinions and beliefs. I am not affiliated with it, just think it a very skillful and effective means of revealing our deeper truths, that I know of..
In this day and age it is refreshing to find someone who will allow us to simply ask questions. We should all be asking questions. When did the world become so polarized? I just want to love others. ALL others, on every ¨side¨ and I don´t want to feel like I have to choose a side to have friends so I have been gravitating towards those who are willing to make love the priority, as hippy dippy as that sounds as I read it in my head. And I am trying to just love ppl where they are at and let it be. I want peace, you know?
This essay is a work of art Charles. Every paragraph is eminently quotable and filled with meaning. I salute you as the skilled wordsmith that you are.
This is a great essay. This is exactly how I approach things too. Even when people are wrong, they are usually wrong for comprehensible and even noble reasons, and they sure will not be swayed if you do not recognize this. Mostly, we do in fact share values where we imagine that we do not.
On the specific issue of Roe vs Wade (thank you for the footnote), you elide the most important distinction though, and this is a bit unfortunate. I don't think the state should be forcing this either, but this is mostly a discussion about the legitimate role of the state in enforcing public morality, and this comes down to whether you consider it murder or not, because if you do, not many people don't think the state does not have a legitimate role there, and if you do not, then not many people think it does.
In any case, I share that footnoted view largely, but I do not support Roe vs Wade, and I am not an exception, because there are lots of people (at least amongst legal commentators) who support abortion rights but oppose Roe vs Wade. Roe vs Wade asserts that the federal government has powers which it does not have, and as such it undermines the balance of powers foreseen in the US constitution, which I think is a very wholesome and healthy one, because it avoids overconcentration of power in the hands of any single authority. For me, this point about the constitution is much more important than the point about abortion. Abolishing Roe vs Wade does not make abortion illegal anywhere, it just leaves the decision to the States. There are also other arguments which could be made under the Constitution than the argument which underpins Roe v Wade, and the Constitution could be amended if you really think the federal layer should take a position on that. But as long as Roe v Wade stands, the federal govt can intervene in a whole host of issues which are none of its business. That's not OK.
Great points. I am very pro life but I am also opposed to making abortions especially in the first two trimesters against the law. Why? Because they will happen anyway and a very bad situation will be made worse. Those who can afford to will travel to where they can obtain a safe abortion. Those who can not afford to will obtain unsafe abortions.
I think that both sides of this issue are locked into paradigms that don't make sense. The abortion industry (yes it is an industry) tries to portray abortion as no big deal and denies the very real experiences of many women who later regret the decision to have an abortion. Some are so pro abortion that they were opposed to the 'Born Alive Act' that would have required medical care to a baby born alive due to a failed late term abortion. (Yes that does happen. There is an Abortion Survivors Network made of of people who survived an attempt to abort them).
As for the traditional pro life people there has been more of a focus on making laws which keeps the debate at the level of controling or not controling people's bodies. It keeps the discussion political rather than ethical. There are exceptions. There are pro life groups that help pregnant women.
So I'm very pro life but also opposed to criminalizing abortion. I'd rather see abortions steadily decrease through education and information much like OUI's have decreased due to public awareness.
I think the biggest thing for me is that everyone that I have ever known, everyone that I've ever held, everyone that I've ever loved, and every stranger that I meet was once a fetus. When people talk with me about abortion the whole piece about controling other people's bodies is swept off the table. That opens it up to a different kind of discussion.
“abortion and gun control, both issues with two very distinct sides.”
Duality will be the death of humanity. It’s not about two sides, it’s about a spectrum of beliefs. And there are other hard hitting questions that need to be postulated such as, who stands to benefit from the business of abortions and gun regulations? What are the long term effects of regulation on these issues? What has history taught us about these issues? Those questions will help some groups of people find themselves along the spectrum more than questions about the value for life.
Thank you for the reminders that we can choose to opt out of the artificial choices we are so often given in the common narrative. I've been reading "The Essential Herman Kahn - in defense of thinking" and the first chapter describes his challenge as he wrote in the 1960s and 70s about nuclear war and how often he was chastised for discussing the topic in public. Thought is often strangely uncomfortable and therefore punished.
I am excited to be exploring frameworks with as much vigor and interest as solutions. I am also excited to be able to support heartfelt spaces wherein curiosity and generosity can be evoked and honored.
I was in a group recently where we were talking about how exciting the new 3d wet printing tech was and how we could build wonderful communities that could solve all kinds of problems. the general chatter was how quickly and effectively we could get as many houses as needed built to solve housing issues.
Ironically while having this conversation i was actually sitting in an earth house that got built by a 1000 hands, 2 months of very physical labour, which however was labour that also included the elderly and children. (gleefully) The very act of raising my earth house out of the ground with my community was the very thing that built community.
far too often we work from within our wonderful and clever minds, and so little is done in these conversations to promote heart to heart consul, preferably under a linden tree as was done in ages past.
As much I am a fan of tech and am using it (gleefully) right now i am a bigger fan of understanding and getting curious about the framework wherein the solutions or problems arise.
i love the "prison garden" concept ... the metaphor as a whole is great, but that phrase really triggers the imagination ... what if that was the standard practice in prisons? what if the cultivation of growth was standard practice, on a very literal level?
beyond that little tangent, this post was fantastic :) and a great simple reminder to practice when observing "the current thing" : what is being omitted from the present conversation?
Speaking of changing the terms of the debate: Does anyone know Terry Pratchett's little story about whether the glass is half empty or half full? His character takes a look at the glass and says "That's not my glass! My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!"
Yes the culture wars, right now over abortion and guns, reveal pretty clearly our level of evolution as a species. Not accepting the frame/terms of the debate, stepping outside the box, is a prerequisite for any new possibilities to arise.
For me, a lot of the issue revolves around when the woman makes the decision that she doesn't want to carry this child to term. She must know within the first two or maximum three months, right? Otherwise, in my books, it's too late to abort. ... I think. It's a tough call, for sure, but ultimately it must be the woman's choice.
I had two abortions when I was young and foolish, and at some point I met both children-that-could-have-been, not in real life but oh definitely real, in the spirit. They sprang up in my mind the way they would have been, could have been. Then only I understood that THEY wanted to live, no matter how. It was ME who thought I couldn't give them a good life. Only then did I understand how unbelievably precious life is, whatever way it is lived, and how sacred, and what gruesome superficiality I had treated it with. So this experience burdened but also deepened my soul. (Thereafter by the grace of God I had two beautiful, healthy children and now I am a granny of seven. Amazing.) I still am pro-choice. But I do believe we should change our ways in the whole area of sexuality, physicality, and death, for that matter.
For me, this sentence says it all: "When our society fully reorganizes itself around service to life on every level, the abortion issue will slip into insignificance."
Beautiful, touching and so deeply resonate. If I may say so, I also noticed that the REAL issues are actually those that are unspoken and unconscious, those that are "behind" the overt arguments conclusions and convictions of each "side". In my experience and understanding, the REAL issues that drive the devotees of each side are almost always the ones that are unspoken of and unacknowledged, psychologically hidden and unconscious.
As one small example of that, that really opened my eyes to what is ACTUALLY going on beneath the surface slogans - when i dived beneath the surface together with a friend (who defines herself as being in the anti-abortion/pro-life camp), as we peeled back the layers and dived deeper than the surface arguments, we more and more came to see the real (unspoken) inner psychological forces that were driving the outward conclusions she reached and the political position she took. We discovered that behind the slogans of caring for life and having compassion for the unborn, there was ACTUALLY huge amounts of very deep anger - rage actually - and literally a desire to PUNISH those who lead a life/lifestyle which she was taught to think of as "wrong" (or immoral). We discovered that behind the surface pious words of caring for life and compassion there was ACTUALLY incredible hostility and desire to "teach a lesson" to those who don't follow "the righteous ways" and who don't subscribe to her belief system, and to IMPOSE on the "immoral ones" the kind of lifestyle that she was taught is moral and right.
It was fadcinating to realize how, even though just a few months earlier she was rallying against what she called tyranny (and I was fully with her on that), and yet now, as we peeled the surface layers and got to the very root of where the motivations are springing from, we discovered (behind her cries against tyranny) her own ACTUAL desire to be powerful tyrant who gets to impose the "right way" on others and punish those who behave "wrong".. it was quite a shock to her as well..
And it actually goes deeper than that, becasue we discovered that the rage and hostility and desire to punish were actually not the final stop and there was an even deeper layer "behind" them, of very deep pain and sorrow, of deep feeling of woundedness, of abandoned, unloved and unheard orphans/parts, shut away at the deepest dungeons of the psyche (which then rose to the surface in the form of profound rage and wanting to punish those who have hurt them).
The same is true for the other "side" as well, it seems to me. Unconscious/unspoken firces are driving both "sides", IMHO.
There is a lot more to this but I think I'll stop here :-)
Just saying all of this in order to express my deep resonance with what you bring to light Charles, that the REAL issues driving our conclusions and convictions are ACTUALLY the ones not spoken about, that many of us are perhaps even unware of..
PS. I highly recommend the work of Scott Kiloby (The Kiloby Inquiries) for anyone interested in discovering what's really underneath our surface convictions, opinions and beliefs. I am not affiliated with it, just think it a very skillful and effective means of revealing our deeper truths, that I know of..
In this day and age it is refreshing to find someone who will allow us to simply ask questions. We should all be asking questions. When did the world become so polarized? I just want to love others. ALL others, on every ¨side¨ and I don´t want to feel like I have to choose a side to have friends so I have been gravitating towards those who are willing to make love the priority, as hippy dippy as that sounds as I read it in my head. And I am trying to just love ppl where they are at and let it be. I want peace, you know?
This essay is a work of art Charles. Every paragraph is eminently quotable and filled with meaning. I salute you as the skilled wordsmith that you are.
This is a great essay. This is exactly how I approach things too. Even when people are wrong, they are usually wrong for comprehensible and even noble reasons, and they sure will not be swayed if you do not recognize this. Mostly, we do in fact share values where we imagine that we do not.
On the specific issue of Roe vs Wade (thank you for the footnote), you elide the most important distinction though, and this is a bit unfortunate. I don't think the state should be forcing this either, but this is mostly a discussion about the legitimate role of the state in enforcing public morality, and this comes down to whether you consider it murder or not, because if you do, not many people don't think the state does not have a legitimate role there, and if you do not, then not many people think it does.
In any case, I share that footnoted view largely, but I do not support Roe vs Wade, and I am not an exception, because there are lots of people (at least amongst legal commentators) who support abortion rights but oppose Roe vs Wade. Roe vs Wade asserts that the federal government has powers which it does not have, and as such it undermines the balance of powers foreseen in the US constitution, which I think is a very wholesome and healthy one, because it avoids overconcentration of power in the hands of any single authority. For me, this point about the constitution is much more important than the point about abortion. Abolishing Roe vs Wade does not make abortion illegal anywhere, it just leaves the decision to the States. There are also other arguments which could be made under the Constitution than the argument which underpins Roe v Wade, and the Constitution could be amended if you really think the federal layer should take a position on that. But as long as Roe v Wade stands, the federal govt can intervene in a whole host of issues which are none of its business. That's not OK.
Great points. I am very pro life but I am also opposed to making abortions especially in the first two trimesters against the law. Why? Because they will happen anyway and a very bad situation will be made worse. Those who can afford to will travel to where they can obtain a safe abortion. Those who can not afford to will obtain unsafe abortions.
I think that both sides of this issue are locked into paradigms that don't make sense. The abortion industry (yes it is an industry) tries to portray abortion as no big deal and denies the very real experiences of many women who later regret the decision to have an abortion. Some are so pro abortion that they were opposed to the 'Born Alive Act' that would have required medical care to a baby born alive due to a failed late term abortion. (Yes that does happen. There is an Abortion Survivors Network made of of people who survived an attempt to abort them).
As for the traditional pro life people there has been more of a focus on making laws which keeps the debate at the level of controling or not controling people's bodies. It keeps the discussion political rather than ethical. There are exceptions. There are pro life groups that help pregnant women.
So I'm very pro life but also opposed to criminalizing abortion. I'd rather see abortions steadily decrease through education and information much like OUI's have decreased due to public awareness.
I think the biggest thing for me is that everyone that I have ever known, everyone that I've ever held, everyone that I've ever loved, and every stranger that I meet was once a fetus. When people talk with me about abortion the whole piece about controling other people's bodies is swept off the table. That opens it up to a different kind of discussion.
“abortion and gun control, both issues with two very distinct sides.”
Duality will be the death of humanity. It’s not about two sides, it’s about a spectrum of beliefs. And there are other hard hitting questions that need to be postulated such as, who stands to benefit from the business of abortions and gun regulations? What are the long term effects of regulation on these issues? What has history taught us about these issues? Those questions will help some groups of people find themselves along the spectrum more than questions about the value for life.
Thank you for the reminders that we can choose to opt out of the artificial choices we are so often given in the common narrative. I've been reading "The Essential Herman Kahn - in defense of thinking" and the first chapter describes his challenge as he wrote in the 1960s and 70s about nuclear war and how often he was chastised for discussing the topic in public. Thought is often strangely uncomfortable and therefore punished.
I am excited to be exploring frameworks with as much vigor and interest as solutions. I am also excited to be able to support heartfelt spaces wherein curiosity and generosity can be evoked and honored.
I was in a group recently where we were talking about how exciting the new 3d wet printing tech was and how we could build wonderful communities that could solve all kinds of problems. the general chatter was how quickly and effectively we could get as many houses as needed built to solve housing issues.
Ironically while having this conversation i was actually sitting in an earth house that got built by a 1000 hands, 2 months of very physical labour, which however was labour that also included the elderly and children. (gleefully) The very act of raising my earth house out of the ground with my community was the very thing that built community.
far too often we work from within our wonderful and clever minds, and so little is done in these conversations to promote heart to heart consul, preferably under a linden tree as was done in ages past.
As much I am a fan of tech and am using it (gleefully) right now i am a bigger fan of understanding and getting curious about the framework wherein the solutions or problems arise.
Brilliant essay Charles - thankyou
i love the "prison garden" concept ... the metaphor as a whole is great, but that phrase really triggers the imagination ... what if that was the standard practice in prisons? what if the cultivation of growth was standard practice, on a very literal level?
beyond that little tangent, this post was fantastic :) and a great simple reminder to practice when observing "the current thing" : what is being omitted from the present conversation?
Speaking of changing the terms of the debate: Does anyone know Terry Pratchett's little story about whether the glass is half empty or half full? His character takes a look at the glass and says "That's not my glass! My glass was full! And it was a bigger glass!"
For a few minutes there I thought it was about which side we were on - Depp or Heard's.
three cheers for neutrality in information dissemination!
Yes the culture wars, right now over abortion and guns, reveal pretty clearly our level of evolution as a species. Not accepting the frame/terms of the debate, stepping outside the box, is a prerequisite for any new possibilities to arise.
For me, a lot of the issue revolves around when the woman makes the decision that she doesn't want to carry this child to term. She must know within the first two or maximum three months, right? Otherwise, in my books, it's too late to abort. ... I think. It's a tough call, for sure, but ultimately it must be the woman's choice.