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Is there a pro life Atheist on this site who refuses to vote for Dems because of abortion?
I listen to Atheists on this site tell us how they value life and how they are good people. Why do you suppose Christians posess the simple humanity of protecting our most innocent unborn babies, while Atheists will support no restriction abortions when they vote for Democrats.
Democrats refuse to pass the GOP compromise lesgislation that would limit abortions to 20 weeks unless extreme cases.
There is no more important an issue than the taking of innocent life. So I ask every Atheist, are you truy prolife and would you never vote for a pro abortion politician.
There are so few atheists who have the simple humanity of pro life, one must concede that faith in God gives people the most basic of humanity and compassion for those who can not speak out on their own behalf. These unborn babies can't vote so therefore Democrats give them no rights.
Please don't waste our time speaking of early trimester abortions. When you vote for Democrats, you are supporting no restriction abortions of viable late term babies.
Why is it that atheists lack this simple common sense humanity?
Probably not. Views on abortion tend to split pretty neatly along party lines, in part because both parties have made it a partisan issue to galvanize their respective bases. To anyone who thinks that the unborn are living humans, the pro-abortion position seems inconsistent with claims of valuing life. Of course, the trouble is that those who claim to value life and support legalized abortion generally do not define life that way.
Seeming hypocrisy isn't a unique issue for pro-abortion people. There are also plenty of anti-abortion people who defend who support capital punishment, wars, etc. But as with the case of pro-abortion people, I don't think this is inconsistent either because these people are weighing competing values, rights, and outcomes relative to one another (justice, deterrence to protect life, war to protect life, etc.).
It's not really productive to take the superficial, general positions on abortion and infer an inconsistency since the only way this works is by completely ignoring the nuanced contexts of this and other issues. This doesn't get at the main point of disagreement anyways, which is how people define life differently and why.
Please don't compare wars and capital punishment to purposely taking innocent life.
The death penalty involves murderers who deserve to be put to death. Spare me the very few innocent people who were convicted of murder. That is another topic.
We are talking about abortion, the one issue of purposely taking innocent lives.
War never purposely takes innocent lives, but rather tries to kill our enemies who would kill us if given the chance.
This is no superficial position when speaking to even viable late term abortions.
The only person on this planet who would try to say a baby a few days or weeks or months from birth is not a living human being, is a person lacking in the basic humanity that all mankind should possess.
The fact that so many Atheists do not possess this simple humanity says a lot about God and those who put their faith in him.
I realize that over 80% of Americans identify as Christians, but the majority of these people could not care less about what God would think of killing Babies that he says he already knows in the womb. To me, these are false Christians.
I'll grant that war and capital punishment are imperfect parallels to abortion, but I think they still have relevance here. Any reasonable person knows that supporting war or capital punishment necessarily means that some innocent people will die. The death of innocent people is a clear and direct consequence of supporting these policies, and anyone aware of this must be equivocating on the right to life to some degree. I also do not share your intuition that the right to life is less sacred than a right to retribution, but discussing that isn't necessary to my point (although I would be interested in hearing your thoughts).
I think you've overlooked a significant part of my argument, namely that those who support legal abortion hold their own beliefs about when and how the right to life is valued. Ignore the particular details for the moment, if you will. Under situation P both yourself and those you disagree with believe that it is acceptable for the right to life to be violated for reasons x, y, etc. Reintroducing context, you find it acceptable the right to life to be violated if the person is not innocent. A pro-abortion person finds it acceptable when they do not define life the way you do, when the mother's life is in danger, when choice over one's body is in question, or a host of other possible reasons.
I am not saying they are correct or that you are wrong. What I am saying is that neither is necessarily hypocritical just because they seem to be on the surface. I don't think most people who support abortion are particularly inhumane because even if they are wrong they genuinely do not mean to do wrong, and that intentionality seems to matter to you too. I believe that thinking about them in a way that strips them of their humanity shows a certain lack of compassion and good will (as it also does when abortion advocates villainize abortion opponents). It just isn't productive.
I'm also not sure how strong a conclusion you can draw about (the Christian) God and those who believe in him, since there are also a significant proportion of Christians who support legalized abortion (which you recognize). Whether they are false Christians or not does not alter the fact that they nevertheless believe in the same God you do, no matter that they fall short of his code (and don't all people?). If belief in God alone is not sufficient for being a good person, then I think that casts some doubt on whether disbelief or non-belief is sufficient to make someone a bad person.
I appreciate the respectful discussion, by the way.
I told you not to bring up the rare innocent people being executed. That's another subject! If you bring up life of mother abortions again, I will ignore you! FOR THE BILLIONTH TIME, NO ONE IS DENYING THOSE ABORTIONS!
Let me use your own words, and replace a few of them to show you how sickiening it is to hear people try to excuse away inhumanity towards our most innocent.
You said with a few changes.....
"I think you've overlooked a significant part of my argument, namely that those who support legal slavery hold their own beliefs about when and how the right to life of slaves is valued. Ignore the particular details for the moment, if you will. Under situation P both yourself and those you disagree with believe that it is acceptable for the right to life to be violated for reasons x, y, etc. Reintroducing context, you find it acceptable the right to life to be violated if the person is not innocent. A pro-slavery person finds it acceptable when they do not define life the way you do, when the slave owners money is at risk, when choice over a slave's body is in question, or a host of other possible reasons.
I am not saying they are correct or that you are wrong. What I am saying is that neither is necessarily hypocritical just because they seem to be on the surface. I don't think most people who support slavery are particularly inhumane because even if they are wrong they genuinely do not mean to do wrong, and that intentionality seems to matter to you too. I believe that thinking about them in a way that strips them of their humanity shows a certain lack of compassion and good will (as it also does when slavery advocates villainize slavery opponents). It just isn't productive."
I know you told me not to talk about war or capital punishment, but I didn't find your ultimatum persuasive. I think I gave you a decent explanation as to why I feel those examples are relevant. I'd like to hear your response to that analysis, but it doesn't seem likely as you're so opposed to even considering them (which is another parallel with abortion advocates who refuse to see your point about their inconsistencies because they don't find them comparable).
I don't think you told me directly that life of mother abortions weren't at contest, and I honestly wasn't paying much attention to chatter outside our immediate exchange. I won't bring that up again since it obviously isn't relevant.
I think your substitution of slavery for abortion is a clever move, and one that most people would find persuasive since there is broad moral consensus around slavery. That makes your counter a bit dis-analogous, though, since that sort of consensus doesn't exist around abortion. Personally, I'm fine accepting the comparison anyways since I think my argument holds no matter what you want to substitute in for abortion. This is because to me morality is not absolute, which it is to you (and I suspect we're at an impasse here). So I would not say people were bad for having practiced slavery before, although it also isn't something I'd want to see happen. And I would not say people are bad for practicing abortion, even if I did think abortion were wrong. I do not think this approach means we have to accept what anyone does because we're equally entitled to advance our own values, but I do think it is a more compassionate approach.
The point I always try to make to pro abortion people, is that they would NEVER vote for a KKK member or a person who supported slavery. But these same people will vote for a Democrat Party that supports even no restriction abortions for any reason up to birth, even though they claim not to support aborting viable babies.
The GOP allows extreme case late term abortions, so therefore the Democrat Party supports late term abortion of viable healthy babies for any reason.
They lack the simple intellect to see their double standard when it comes to voting for people who would support slavery versus voting for people who support no restriction abortions.
I believe they are not that stupid so therefore they refuse to admit their tunnel vision outrage of only certain issues.
The Black vote and women vote is everything to the Democrat Party, so therefore we see their priorities, but why would Americans support their inhumanity to viable babies.
What I have been trying to get at, though, is that for them it isn't a double standard because they generally have an altogether different definition of life. From their perspective, we're not even talking about a human life so comparing it to slavery wouldn't be coherent to them. Maybe this makes them misguided, but I think you're right that they're not stupid and I also don't think it's because they have outraged tunnel vision (though they often do). I think it comes down to a very simple and very significant difference in how they define life. I haven't seen a persuasive argument from either pro- or anti-abortion people to prefer their definition.
The Dems of course cater to their voting blocks, and tailor their platforms accordingly. But that's not unique to them; it's a pretty predictable outcome of any partisan system, really.
Honestly, if someone took me as a slave I would fault myself for not having situated myself so that that wouldn't be possible. I would then either resign myself to it if it weren't terrible or else immediately begin figuring on how to liberate myself if it were so intolerable that risking death seemed sensible. I wouldn't be outraged over it, and I wouldn't whine over it. What good would that do me?
I know this seems crazy to most people, but it's the only position that makes sense to me. I've never heard a convincing argument for a single absolute morality, and the manner in which people behave has made a compelling case for me to believe in will to power theory.
I can't just stop believing this, just as you can't just stop believing in your God. We would both need a reason to do that, and our reasons are not likely to persuade the other. I don't think this is what most debate or discussion is about; I regard it more as an opportunity to understand the other person.
May I ask why you think that? I have a guess, but I don't wish to presume. Personally, I find debating anyone with whom I disagree to at least be interesting. I'm curious as to why you don't, not that you owe that explanation.
Why do you think this is the case, though? From my perspective, there are as many moral values as there are people. Perhaps you are correct that there is an absolute morality from God, but it doesn't seem like anyone really knows that that is and I don't know how we could possibly understand what it is. I don't think this is an unintelligent concern to have, since it seems borne out by the sheer diversity of moral belief.
It also seems like debating someone like myself who doesn't share your belief in common sense humanity values might help you better understand why you yourself do hold that belief, since you then have to try to explain it to someone else. Maybe your experience is different, but I typically find I understand my own ideas better when I am forced to defend them against someone else's skepticism. Or, at the very least, I gain an understanding about where that person is coming from that I didn't have before. Is that not your experience?
Let me use your own words, and replace a few of them to show you how sickiening it is to hear people try to excuse away inhumanity towards our most innocent.
Why is the life of the mother more important than the life of the baby?
The life of mother is not more important than the life of Baby. If there must be a choice between the two, the mother and doctor must make that agonizing decison.
How can you say that? The baby is completely innocent. He doesn't know hes killing his mother. The mother knew the risks of having a baby and now you want to let her kill it? You must be a democrat.
Nope I dont support all abortion. You know nothing about me. What is clear though, and what you democrats continue to deny, is that you support killing babies in circumstances you feel it justified. Disgusting.
You can say what you like. You are pro-choice. You know what being pro life is? It means NEVER allowing one individual to kill another innocent individual. No matter what the circumstances. End of.
Unless you cant read, you know full well what I hate about Liberals. THEY SUPPORT EVEN NO RESTRICTION ABORTIONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That is all I need to know!
I'm sure Hiter had some good qualities as well. WHO CARES! THEY SUPPORT INHUMANITY TO INNOCENT PEOPLE.
If you elect a person who supports no restriction abortion for any reason, YOU ARE SUPPORTING IT AS WELL! If you would vote for a Democrat, you are the people keeping no restriction abortions legal. I'm sick of spending time debating such denial!
Quit spewing such garbage of how you only support abortions for medical reasons. Republicans also support life of mother abortion and other extreme case abortions.
Like I said, single issue voting is a major problem for this country, and I want to add that there is a gowing movement of prolife liberals. Go to democratsforlife.org for proof.
Like I said, the one issue of killing viable babies for any reason is supported by people like you when voting for this extremist democrat party.
I would accept there were prolife liberals if they refused to vote for no restriction abortion Democrats. But they elect the very people who keep the holacaust of viable babies continuing.
Would you vote for a KKK member if you agreed with his other policies or would you not vote for him because of the one issue of racism?
If you were a German, would you have voted for the nazi party if you agreed with them on other issues except for the one issue of killing jews?
We are through here. You refused to answer if you would vote for a KKK memeber or a nazi if those one issues of racism and killing Jews were the only area they were wrong.
Like I said, you are a phoney when it comes to abortion and saving lives of viable babies who are aborted for any reason.