It's all about the talk...
...but the walk is what gets you there.
I was listening to Talk of the Nation today on NPR. They were discussing the first Supreme Court trial in five years to address an abortion issue: the case involving a young New Hampshire woman and parental notification laws. The guests on the show were surprisingly one-sided (all in favor of notification laws), and I was mostly disappointed in the discussion overall.
One of the guests began a tangential discussion with the gross misstatement that most dysfunctional families already have some aspect of government oversight in place, therefore making it easier for pregnant young women in dysfunctional families to get help. (?!)
It gets better.
The other guest stated that younger generations are becoming less tolerant of abortion than the boomers are. But she couldn't back that statement up with citations. People who toss inflamatory (and incorrect) information onto the airwaves ought to be held accountable. Our buddy Karl Rove would have a lot of explaining to do.
But then someone called in. She was a young woman who had had an abortion. She had told her conservative parents beforehand, and had received (albeit reluctant) compassion and support for her decision. She made the argument that what is missing from the mad, fiery depths of abortion debate is compassion for women who find themselves with an unplanned (and perhaps unwanted) pregnancy. Anti-choicers can go on and on about the sanctity of life, but they miss the point when they don't take the woman's life into account in their arguments.
I agree completely. Like most difficulties progressives have these days, this is yet another example of framing the issue. Why hasn't more been done to paint anti-choice activists as discompassionate? Why are we still so apologetic? Furthermore, why are we still following their lead by using terms like "pro-life" and "partial birth abortion" (instead of "anti-choice" and "dilation and extraction")? And why does a woman still "get pregnant" when her man should carry half the responsibility for getting her there?
Framing, people. It's all about framing. Read "Don't Think of an Elephant" by George Lakoff and get to talking to the people around you. The conservatives have been doing it for years and they're way, way ahead of us.
I was listening to Talk of the Nation today on NPR. They were discussing the first Supreme Court trial in five years to address an abortion issue: the case involving a young New Hampshire woman and parental notification laws. The guests on the show were surprisingly one-sided (all in favor of notification laws), and I was mostly disappointed in the discussion overall.
One of the guests began a tangential discussion with the gross misstatement that most dysfunctional families already have some aspect of government oversight in place, therefore making it easier for pregnant young women in dysfunctional families to get help. (?!)
It gets better.
The other guest stated that younger generations are becoming less tolerant of abortion than the boomers are. But she couldn't back that statement up with citations. People who toss inflamatory (and incorrect) information onto the airwaves ought to be held accountable. Our buddy Karl Rove would have a lot of explaining to do.
But then someone called in. She was a young woman who had had an abortion. She had told her conservative parents beforehand, and had received (albeit reluctant) compassion and support for her decision. She made the argument that what is missing from the mad, fiery depths of abortion debate is compassion for women who find themselves with an unplanned (and perhaps unwanted) pregnancy. Anti-choicers can go on and on about the sanctity of life, but they miss the point when they don't take the woman's life into account in their arguments.
I agree completely. Like most difficulties progressives have these days, this is yet another example of framing the issue. Why hasn't more been done to paint anti-choice activists as discompassionate? Why are we still so apologetic? Furthermore, why are we still following their lead by using terms like "pro-life" and "partial birth abortion" (instead of "anti-choice" and "dilation and extraction")? And why does a woman still "get pregnant" when her man should carry half the responsibility for getting her there?
Framing, people. It's all about framing. Read "Don't Think of an Elephant" by George Lakoff and get to talking to the people around you. The conservatives have been doing it for years and they're way, way ahead of us.
posted by Jackie at 8:07 PM
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