It seems you're making the same mistake here as cml750 did. Anti-abortion advocates believe abortions result in the death of human beings. Do you really think they must be indifferent to the well-being of the children who are not aborted if they think it's bad to kill them?
How did I change the subject when you posted the following. I argue that they are babies. I am on the fence about execution however I think it should be a no-brainer that killing a "fetus" is killing a baby. Being pro-choice(supporting a woman's right to kill her fetus) yet believing a criminal who has gone through the legal system and is sentenced to death should not be killed is the ultimate hypocrisy to me. At least the criminals get a trail. The baby is sentenced to death by a jury of one.
I'm not making a mistake. On one hand conservatives preach keeping government out of people's lives and on the other hand they'd use government to force women to carry unwanted pregnancies to term or try to define civil marriage or try to indoctrinate children into religion, etc. The anti-abortion side has a variety of beliefs. Some believe abortion is murder, some believe abortion is okay except in the case of incest or rape, some believe it's okay in the 1st tri-mester, and so on. What all of that has in common is to restrict the reproductive rights of women. Conservatives are on the frontlines of cutting programs like head start, like CHIPs, like child care for underprivileged, like education and free lunches for the underprivileged. If they cared as much for the child that has been born as they do for the unborn child then abortion wouldn't be much of an issue in this country because it would be a far less necessary solution for women in bad situations.
You argue that they are babies, but who cares what you argue? You can't take your view and put it on other people, then call them hypocrites for having that view. They don't believe they are babies, so you can't call them hypocrites for being ok with the killing of babies. They aren't ok with that. Do you see what I'm saying?
I actually think you really are making the same mistake. Civil marriage and religion are different issues, but conservatives are pretty consistent when it comes to killing innocent humans. They're against murder as it's generally defined, and against killing what they consider to be unborn humans. There's no hypocrisy there. They're pretty much always in favor of government getting involved when it comes to making killing innocent humans illegal. You might not consider fetuses to be fully human, but they do, so their position is consistent. They're also not against caring for the children that are born to difficult circumstances. Do you think conservatives just don't care about those kids? Of course they do, they just have different beliefs about which solutions are most effective or best for society overall. You're taking your beliefs, that CHIPs, child care for the underprivileged, education and free lunches for the underprivileged, etc are essential to caring for those kids, and placing it on the other person. But conservatives don't belief those programs are best for the children and society at large, so it's not an indifference to those children's needs, it's a difference of opinion on how to serve them. And that's not hypocritical.
For it not to be hypocritical, imo, Conservatives would have to quantify their alternative to things like CHIPs, child care for the underprivileged, education and free lunches for the underprivileged in order to say, "Hey! We've found something else that would help poor and needy children, and it helps them in great numbers without the government!" Just saying, "That's not the government's job, it's charity's" will fall on deaf ears because no charity in existence has handled the amount of responsibilities the government placed on itself out of legal or political will. Until Conservatives acknowledge donations are not enough, that more needs to be done, then they can't claim that there are legitimate 1:1 alternatives to the programs that they "ideologically oppose".
The lack of such quantification is valid reasoning for why they are wrong, but it doesn't make them hypocrites. Those are two different questions. I'm not saying you can't argue that one side is right and the other side is wrong, but I think the claims that either side is hypocritical, especially as it relates to death penalty positions versus abortions positions, just isn't valid.
An embryo though by definition doesn't have a beating heart and barely any differentiation of cell types. If you are basing being alive on a beating heart consider that most of the human brain could be removed and the heart can continue to beat. A person's heart can be stopped for several minutes and still live and with artificial resuscitation continue living indefinitely. As far as preemies many of those who consider themselves pro-choice are for restrictions beyond the first trimester. For a soul yes you are correct that is a religious question but last time I checked the First and Fourteenth Amendment still applies regarding establishment of a religion and personhood under the Constitution doesn't mention a soul as being a proof or requirement. Anyway this is a huge derail of an already controversial topic. If you want to debate abortion why not start another thread or even better revive one of the many other threads about abortion.
Civil marriage, religion in this context, and abortion are all the same issue. It's people trying to promote their conservative values through government intervention. Conservatives are hardly consistent when it comes to protecting innocent civilians. Conservatives, especially neocons, rarely meet a war they don't like first of all. Second of all, innocent people are convicted and put to death in this country all the time. I've never heard the issue be a part of any conservative agenda, ever. The only civil rights conservatives have demonstrated they're concerned with are the rights of white kids not to lose their seats at UT in favor of non-white kids. We're discussing this issue from different paradigms. You want to get into a grandiose discussion about when life begins, how you define a human being, and so forth. I'm saying it doesn't matter because as long as that tissue, fetus, whatever you want to call it, is part of a woman's body then it's her right to choose. When it comes to the question of abortion, I feel that question is best answered by the woman who has that unborn child inside of her. The person who will be most responsible for raising that child. Yes, I feel conservatives don't give a rats ass about kids and the poor and the elderly and the underprivileged and minorities. And I've come to that conclusion by simply looking at the legislation they promote and prioritize over the wellbeing of those groups. Maybe conservatives should read the whole Constitution and not just recite the amendments they like. We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justiceinsure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
I always imagine, what if I was one of those innocent guys wrongly accused? At least if I had life in prison, I'd have a chance that my innocence was proven. If I was sentenced to death, there's no chance. Sounds fine in principle but its hard to say yes when I think of it that way, and I can't help but think of it that way.
I agree with the death penalty when someone kills someone else just because I believe why keep someone alive eating up my tax dollars when took someone else's life. I think eye for an eye is a good rule. I also think that rapists should be castrated, but that's a whole different argument. That said the death penalty opens up a huge can of worms if you kill the wrong person (falsely convict someone). But overall I think I support it. I think the law should allow the person who is hurt OR if the person is killed find the person's loved ones (closest family), and let them decide what to do with the criminal if he is convicted. I think if a loved one got murdered there would be no better justice than me being able to pick the punishment for the person who took his/her life.
Yea I said that too, but it isn't much better for those people to serve 20+ years in prison then get free, that sounds pretty awful too.
I really do agree with you in principle on a lot of these things (and I really don't want to talk about where life begins, especially in this thread ), but I also really do believe abortion is different than those other issues. I will even acknowledge that like those other issues, the positions of many conservatives on the subject of abortion are based on religious dogma, which provides a poor justification when used on its own. But that's not the sole justification for being anti-abortion, and it's important to be aware of and respect the other justification. If someone really believes a fetus is a human being, of course they are going to want to restrict when that fetus can be killed. So while I understand your frustration over the other issues, I think that logically trying to claim hypocrisy with respect to abortion, especially when compared to the death penalty, just doesn't work. You can argue they're wrong, but it's important to understand why they believe what they believe and not claim hypocrisy based on what you think is correct.
I'm actually vice versa. Opposed in principle, in that I think a society that collectively chooses not to kill is a little more enlightened or unselfish. But I accept it in application, because without it some communities in some parts of America would kill suspected criminals without any civility, compassion or judicial process.
I agree with having a death penalty but I dont agree with life in prison .. Plus I think there should be no prison's just rehab and mental centers
I'm not quite sure I follow your reasoning here. You say you support the death penalty but are concerned about people wrongly convicted and then say 20+ years in prison is awful. Are you saying that it would be better to execute them than have them serve 20+ years only to find out that later the person was wrongfully convicted in the first place?
Are you saying that without a death penalty people will take up vigilante justice? I don't have the statistics off hand but I don't think that a lot of vigilantism broke out when the death penalty was illegal in the 1970's.
