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All other things equal, ceteris paribus doesn't make for a very good argument

One of the more profound insights I've found in the writing of Pope John Paul II, though of course the idea does not originate with him, is that the things that we choose to do always end up changing who we are. This is a profound truth about the human person. Sin brings us closer to Hell because it makes us more the kind of person who will ultimately be at home in Hell. Good works, done out of our own free will with the help of grace, bring us closer to the Beatific Vision because they make us more the kind of person who is close to God. What we choose to do changes us.

A lot of argumentation in the blogosphere, though - particularly political argumentation - tacitly assumes that this is not the case. The notion seems to be that if I vote for a medical cannibal like John McCain or Barack Obama, having decided to do so as a choice of the lesser of two evils, that making that choice does not mean that I will do anything else differently: I will be the same person and do all the same things subsequently whether I vote for a cannibal or not.

But this is obviously not the case. It is not the case for an individual, whose effect on the election is literally negligible. And it is not the case when we aggregate individuals. Five million people who are unwilling to vote for a cannibal are a different kind of group from five million who are willing to vote for a cannibal. Refusing to pull the lever for the least bad viable option is in the end far more powerful on an individual basis than pulling the lever for the least bad viable option, because pulling the lever or refusing to pull the lever changes what kind of person you are. And what is true on an individual basis is true in the aggregate.

"If everyone did it the pro-life cause would lose" is simply false, because it rests on the unspoken assumption that all else remains the same. But all else never remains the same; and most especially we don't remain the same.

(Cross-posted)

Comments (80)

I rather feel the following is more apt: "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

You are either against an Obaman FOCA Pro-Abortion Administration or you aren't.

Dr. Liccione at Sacramentum Vitae rightly put it:

We know why hell doesn't like Sarah Palin and John McCain: they are against legal abortion, and the latter in particular has been turned by bitter experience into a servant of God. Now the role of hell in opposing them is unmistakable, for those with eyes to see.

LINK:
Hell & Sarah Palin


Orthodox Anglican commentator (formerly an priest in TEC), Dr. Alice C. Linsey, put it best:

You are right, Mike. Abortion is the litmus test for judging who should lead. The same forces that seek to destroy life peddle other life-destroying practices: homosex, pornography, incest, etc. and leaders who don't hold the line on abortion will be hell's instruments to set such practices a "liberal" policy.

Opting out because no available choice suits you will not prepare your soul for Heaven.

That's my way of saying Aristocles is right.

Dr. Bauman: Thanks. I am greatly humbled & honored at the same time!

Zippy: Incidentally, could you remove my e-mail address which was posted in haste? Thanks.

I haven't had time to read it all the way through, Zippy, but it's lookin' good so far. And ceteris is almost never paribus. This is true everywhere, even in less serious matters.

Opting out because no available choice suits you will not prepare your soul for Heaven.

Yes, but to be fair, voting for someone who we know supports embryonic stem cell research won't either.

I've been reading these posts and the back-and-forth exchange for a while now and I still don't know what to do. I'm very uneasy with McCain and, of course, the fear of what Obama will unleash has a stranglehold on most of us, myself included. In reality, though, I'm just looking for a reason to vote for McCain instead of Keyes. I want a reason that won't make me feel like a Republican tool and that will alleviate the "frog-in-boiling-water" feeling. Does the line really end at surgical abortion? Nothing else?

I was at a conference where a pro-life doctor from Britain gave a talk about embryonic stem-cell research. He said that we have to confront this issue now while it's still in its infancy, rather than later when it'll be entrenched and that much harder to end.

What to do? What to do...

We put not our trust in princes, but stand on the Solid Rock, against which neither the tyranny of the Crescent nor the blank negations of Liberalism shall prevail.

Mulder:

Mind you, the below is in addition to Obama's sworn presidential signing of the FOCA.

“While McCain supports public funding, he opposes the purposeful creation of human embryos for destruction, he supports funding adult stem cell research and opposes both forms of human cloning.

That’s a contrast to the position pro-abortion presidential candidate Barack Obama takes — as he has said he would use an executive order to mandate funding for the grisly research as soon as he takes office.”

LINK:
LIFE NEWS

McCain wouldn't need an executive order. Neither wd. Obama. The Democrat-controlled Congress cd. pass it with a simple majority and have it signed by President McCain or President Obama. No problem. If McCain's going to veto such legislation, he might do us all a favor by telling us now and telling us why. But he won't. He's sitting on the fence to try to get votes from both sides.

And please note, there are lots of so-called "leftover" IVF embryos out there to experiment on. McCain just distracts all our attention to the intentional creation of embryos for research, when he's vociferously supported research on "leftovers." You know how we Americans hate waste...

All the more reason, Lydia, why we should simply welcome the Horrors of Obama's "No-Holds-Barred" Pro-Abortion Presidency, no?

After all, what's the difference between 4,000 abortions/day and potentially twice that under such an administration?

Again, folks here are ironically treating the significant additional number of such deaths that would be performed and funded under Obama's FOCA as something other than what it should be -- all because the one who opposes that Pro-Abort agenda is not as Godly as we all would certainly have liked him to be.

In any case, those additional number of innocent lives are what's at stake here and not some self-righteous assertion of one's elevated sense of nobility.

...all because the one who opposes that Pro-Abort agenda is not as Godly as we all would certainly have liked him to be...

I would not personally characterize being a long-term vociferous advocate of federally funded medical cannibalism as "... not as Godly as we all would certainly have liked him to be...". In fact I'd go so far as to suggest that there is just a wee bit of confirmation bias in that way of putting it.

Beyond parading Palin around as a cultural totem, some brief, passing references in the convention speeches and the standard platform language, there is very little to suggest a McCain Administration will do much to advance the pro-life cause within the general culture. I fear in another 4 years we'll simply be content to read about the adventures of Palin's grandchild in the Naval Observatory nursery.

Zippy,

This is a fairly good point, but I think Lydia's was stronger in weighing the long-term cost of corrupting your cause. For one thing, you seem to be placing too much emphasis on how a vote is supposed to change the individual voter. I am not so certain that it is necessary for there to be such a change, especially if there is not a large emotional investment in the candidate. Although a vote can be reflective of a person's willingness to surrender their values, it isn't required to be.

To provide a personal example, I stopped giving monetary support to the Obama campaign after his FISA betrayal. What I have been supporting instead are organizations and causes that will lobby with a more narrow focus. Even if I pull the lever for Obama, which I may not since I don't live in a swing state, I would certainly not consider myself beholden to his agenda. If he misinterprets my vote that way, as a blank check to manipulate those who support him, that is a reflection of his character and not mine. On the other hand, if I have every reason to suspect he will try to manipulate his supporters by virtue of a "mandate" or whatnot, I should refrain from voting.

Btw, I hope everyone is reading Larison lately. He advocates a protest vote against the last eight years of GOP misrule and the corruption of the conservative brand. He is also providing intelligent criticism of the Palin selection, instead of Sullivan's hysterics.

Zippy:

First off, thanks for resolving my e-mail faux pas.

Second, as to the above, I don't know about you, but going back to the quote:

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

If a person did not effectively oppose Obama with a vote against him, then I don't know how such a person would be able to say s/he was NOT responsible (however indirectly) for the realization of a significant number of additional abortions (and, therefore, the additional deaths of innocents) that occured under Obama's FOCA.

What I see wrong here, ironically, is treating these additional deaths as nothing other than a commodity that can be sacrificed for the sake of one's own self-righteousness.

"For one thing, you seem to be placing too much emphasis on how a vote is supposed to change the individual voter."

Voting (or not voting) is a moral action that shapes not only the polity, but first and foremost, the individual voter. Viewing at as transaction of little significance, is one of the ways we got into this mess.

aristocles says,

If a person did not effectively oppose Obama with a vote against him, then I don't know how such a person would be able to say s/he was NOT responsible (however indirectly) for the realization of a significant number of additional abortions (and, therefore, the additional deaths of innocents) that occured under Obama's FOCA.

aristocles, if I vote for a third party candidate like Baldwin, am I complicit in an Obama victory, and by extension, an increase in abortions? My conscience would bother me if I were to vote for McCain.

Gintas,

You seem to have missed the word "effectively".

To vote for a 3rd Party candidate with no chance of winning whatsoever does not, in any way, defeat Obama; it merely helps him.

The question you should ask yourself is:

"Do I believe that the significant number of deaths that occurs under Obama's FOCA the actual deaths of innocent children or is it merely a commodity that can be sacrificed in exchange for my sense of self-righteousness?"

aristocles, as much as you are opposed to Obama I am equally opposed to McCain. It would be simply ridiculous for anyone to say that I have to vote for Obama or else I have allowed McCain (indirectly) to invade more Middle Eastern countries.

Kevin, it only "shapes" the voter if he has an overstated view of what his vote means or if he believes he has no other recourse. Zippy's argument depends upon it being a transaction of little significance, since an individual vote never decides a major election. I am agreeing with him, treat your vote as something of little significance, nothing more.

To vote for a 3rd Party candidate with no chance of winning whatsoever does not, in any way, defeat Obama; it merely helps him.
So voting for Obama is a sin, plain and simple. Well, I couldn't in good conscience vote for him. Voting for McCain is, in my view, a sin, too, because I would have to be willing to violate my conscience to do it. A willingness to violate my conscience is surely a sin before God. I think I can sleep at night voting for Baldwin.

What say you, aristocles: should I sin that good may result?

It is entirely possible, and under my control, that after being forced into deciding between a lesser cannibal and a greater cannibal, I could be so upset at being given only such a poor choice that I spend the time between votes working to change the circumstances that led to such a poor choice. Hence, such a vote can stimulate me for the better -- if I let it.

Contra Zippy, and just as possible, someone could claim that choosing not to vote changes me by encouraging subsequent apathy about the whole political system.

But there simply isn't any necessary correlation with the choice of how to vote, and one's behavior between votes. It depends on the circumstances. All I get out of Zippy's argument is one warning among other possible warnings: but no conclusion.

Step2:

aristocles, as much as you are opposed to Obama I am equally opposed to McCain. It would be simply ridiculous for anyone to say that I have to vote for Obama or else I have allowed McCain (indirectly) to invade more Middle Eastern countries.

Your analogy fails since, among other things, FOCA is not some hypothetical absurdity as the latter you propose (namely, ...I have allowed McCain (indirectly) to invade more Middle Eastern countries.); it is a reality that Obama's whole Pro-Abortion Agenda is set to do from the very beginning.


"The first thing I'd do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Act," Obama said in his July speech to abortion advocates worried about the increase of pro-life legislation at the state level.

The Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA) is legislation Obama has co-sponsored along with 18 other senators that would annihilate every single state law limiting or regulating abortion, including the federal ban on partial birth abortion.

The 2007 version of FOCA proposed: "It is the policy of the United States that every woman has the fundamental right to choose to bear a child, to terminate a pregnancy prior to fetal viability, or to terminate a pregnancy after fetal viability when necessary to protect the life or health of the woman."

Obama made his remarks in a question-and-answer session after delivering a speech crystallizing for abortion advocates his deep-seated abortion philosophy and his belief that federal legislation will break pro-life resistance and end the national debate on abortion. (see transcript: http://lauraetch.googlepages.com/barackobamabeforeplannedpar...)

"I am absolutely convinced that culture wars are so nineties; their days are growing dark, it is time to turn the page," Obama said in July. "We want a new day here in America. We're tired about arguing about the same ole' stuff. And I am convinced we can win that argument."

Besides making abortion on demand a "fundamental right" throughout the United States, FOCA would effectively nullify informed consent laws, waiting periods, health safety regulations for abortion clinics, etc.

Furthermore, medical professionals and institutions that refused abortions also would lose legal protections. FOCA would expose individuals, organizations, and governments - including federal, state, and local government agencies - to costly civil actions for purported violations of the act.

SOURCE: http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2008/jun/08061010.html

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

Like any good saying, this is ambiguous. Is the "doing nothing" the "not voting" or the "not rejecting the compromises which keep making things worse"?

Would the three hours spent waiting in line to vote for McCain be better spent penning and distributing a good leaflet, or (to be quietest) spent in prayer?

If I convinced two likely Obama voters to come over and party with me instead of voting, but nonetheless I did not vote McCain, would that be doing nothing?


Also, does FOCA have a chance of passing? Some Dem congressmen I saw speak at the DNC, albeit members of the impotent Democrats for Life, thought it was far too radical to succeed, as did their pro-choice congressman friend.

I, for one, will continue to come here everyday for the next two months just to see how many different ways the "vote McCain/not vote McCain" argument can be restated and augmented. Seriously, you guys are starting to get really creative and it's glorious to watch!

If Zippy is, as I take him habitually to be, seriously concerned for the health of his soul and of his country, then it seems to me he ought to find the most effective way of producing good and of resisting evil, in this case political good and evil.

Almost never will politics in a fallen world offer us clear cut choices. That's not the world in which God has placed us and expects us to follow Him. Almost always we're presented with policies and politicians that are a mixed bag. From among them we must make our best choices, even when none of the choices is one we prefer, all other things being equal. As Christians, we are required to make political judgment calls on the basis of a complex and often uncertain moral calculus. That uncertainty itself drives us back to God and others for guidance (which is good for our souls).

Determine as best you can wherein lies the greatest good, and do it, however incomplete and unsatisfying it might be or feel. In an election, that means casting a vote for the person and policy most likely to yield the greatest good and to stymie the greatest evil. In my view as a Christian and a conservative, that means taking Bill Buckley's sage advice and voting for the rightmost VIABLE candidate. I wish it were Alan Keyes. It is not. It is John McCain.

But declining to vote because you consider every option, even the best ones, beneath your elevated standards is not a matter of piety but of arrogance.

I wish I cd. take a poll:

If my negative votes idea were on the table, how many people now arguing for voting for McCain would instead use their one vote simply to vote against Obama? How many people now planning to sit out, vote third party, write-in, or something like that would instead cast a negative vote against Obama?

I would cast a negative vote against Obama.

But declining to vote because you consider every option, even the best ones, beneath your elevated standards is not a matter of piety but of arrogance.

I think it is ridiculous to suggest that refusing to vote for someone who has consistently supported government funded wholesale medical cannibalism of tiny living human beings is "arrogance" because of (presumably unrealistically) "elevated standards". Indeed, I think such a suggestion makes manifest what throwing one's electoral support behind a medical cannibal can do.

Dr. Bauman said: "Determine as best you can wherein lies the greatest good...In an election, that means casting a vote for the person and policy most likely to yield the greatest good and to stymie the greatest evil."


I hereby confer Dr. Bauman with an honorary "Catholic" status! ;^)


Here's a quote from the Bishop's (USCCB)Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship:

"When all candidates hold a position in favor of an intrinsic evil, the conscientious voter faces a dilemma. The voter may decide to take the extraordinary step of not voting for any candidate or, after careful deliberation, may decide to vote for the candidate deemed less likely to advance such a morally flawed position and more likely to pursue other authentic human good."


Given McCain/Palin's anti-abortion stand as compared with Obama/Biden's viscious Pro-Abort platform; the former is the more sane alternative.

To vote for a 3rd Party candidate with no chance of winning whatsoever does not, in any way, defeat Obama; it merely helps him.

This assumes that I owe my vote to McCain.

The only way casting my vote for Chuck Baldwin--an act that adds exactly zero votes to the total number of votes cast for Obama--could be seen as helping Obama would be if one assumes that I am in some way taking a vote away from McCain. But since I can take from McCain neither that which he does not possess nor that which I do not owe him, and since McCain does not possess my vote unless I actually cast it for him, the only conclusion I can draw is that I owe McCain my vote.

I would like an explanation of what kind of relationship exists between myself and John McCain that would cause justice to demand that my vote go to him and him alone.

Thank you, Brendon. It's _so_ nice to have someone else make that argument about owing votes. It's almost as good as watching one's husband do a job one usually does oneself. Like, "Cool! I don't have to do that this time!"

Anybody else wanna say he'd cast a purely negative vote if he could? Just think how it could unite all of us. The McCain and anti-McCain conservatives here could agree on something.

Step2 says,

This is a fairly good point, but I think Lydia's was stronger in weighing the long-term cost of corrupting your cause. For one thing, you seem to be placing too much emphasis on how a vote is supposed to change the individual voter. I am not so certain that it is necessary for there to be such a change, especially if there is not a large emotional investment in the candidate. Although a vote can be reflective of a person's willingness to surrender their values, it isn't required to be.

I think my and Zippy's arguments are complementary. One of the questions I asked and never got an answer to in one of the earlier arguments about this was, "If you vote for John McCain now, and he signs a bill to extend federal funding for ESCR, what will you do?" In other words, if you vote for him knowing full-well he's going to do something you oppose, you are highly unlikely to refuse to vote for him the next time around or to vote for someone else (if McCain ends up being only a one-term president voluntarily, which still seems to me unlikely) who takes that same stance. After all, you went into it with your eyes open. So what does that mean? It means you've pragmatically abandoned that issue. And McCain, of course, knows this. He needn't feel he has a mandate in order to know that he won't be punished by conservatives in any way for signing an ESCR bill. They took the risk knowing what they were doing. So I think the effect of shutting up interest group lobbies is to some extent an emergent effect from the effects upon individuals. After all, individuals run those interest groups, too. If McCain does that and, say, NRLC doesn't scream and yell, it will be individuals who will have decided.

But Zippy's point has a flip side, and a more hopeful one: If a whole lot of conservatives said, "Enough is enough," all else would also not be equal. We'd have a different country, a different set of people, and a different voting bloc (speaking cynically) for the politicians to court more assiduously next time around than they have heretofore.

Negative Obama.

Step2,
"...it only "shapes" the voter if he has an overstated view of what his vote means or if he believes he has no other recourse."

The amount of time spent on this subject supports the contention that our vote is an expression of our interior life and therefore, not insignificant.
It also reveals an unspoken resistance to one of the worst fictions put forth by our de-Christianized culture. The one that holds the individual to be impotent in the face of too many threatening, inexorable forces. This notion is designed to recruit us into a culture of narcissistic amusements and leave us naked before Leviathan. Fight the feeling.

But Zippy's point has a flip side, and a more hopeful one: If a whole lot of conservatives said, "Enough is enough," all else would also not be equal. We'd have a different country, a different set of people, and a different voting bloc (speaking cynically) for the politicians to court more assiduously next time around than they have heretofore.
Exactly. It is precisely this that most who oppose my argument deny. Even to support the tactical argument they simply have to view this very election as a thing which takes place in complete isolation from everything else that happens; as an "all else remains the same" proposition. But that obviously is not so.

I would probably vote "negative Obama", but I'm still thinking through the implications of the proposal.

"Negative" is pretty thin stuff for a unifying principle and we'd soon be reading about "Christian Nihilists" as an organized socio-political force. I vote the proposal be sent back to committee and instead we fight the culture of death, root and stem, in all of its manifestations.

I pretty much got my vote going to Chris Bell, the founder of Good Counsel Homes and husband of Joan Andrews Bell, a peerless Witness for life.

I could just as easily assert that with McCain's hot head and impulsive nature, we are highly likely to get into multiple disastrous wars, and in those wars a number of people equal to or greater than the (hypothetical) number of increased abortions resulting from an Obama AbortionFest will be killed.

And that's in addition to the damage to families having their husbands and fathers away from home so long. These McCain wars will definitely be anti-family.

And if someone wants to maintain that I should vote for McCain in violation of my conscience and thereby sin, well, you may do that, but it is not Christian.

Gintas,
The "multiple disastrous wars" that you affirm are "highly likely" to arise from McCain's hot head are imaginary. No group of advisers to the president, no group of senators, of representatives, or of generals, will roll over and play dead just because the president is in a bad mood. To what historical precedent would you point in order to say that McCain, the military man from a military family, would not listen to his generals simply because he was angry? By the same token, the number of war casualties caused by hot-headedness is also imaginary, especially since we have never seen a hot-headed war or counted the casualties from one.

Put differently, you're simply making things up. Will you point us to even one war in American history caused by a president's hot head, much less "multiple disastrous wars"? What was the body count, so that we can see for ourselves if the casualties of hot-head war offset the number of deaths by abortion? Give us historical facts, Gintas, not your insulting speculations. American history provides not one example of the wars you slanderously imagine and attribute to McCain, much less "multiple disastrous" examples.

But the number of deaths by abortion is not imaginary. We've been counting them for more than 30 years. We know what to expect.

In other words, if we do not distinguish between mental bogeys and reality, we are indeed committing a sin of the intellect, of which we ought to repent. That moral failure prevents us from effectively resisting the real -- not imaginary -- evil that arises from an Obama presidency.

Why can't you guys just come out and say it? "Voting for anyone but McCain is a sin."

Dr. Bauman and Aristocles:

I have a bit of a problem here, though I am sympathetic to your positions. We know that McCain endorses the federal funding of embryo destructive research. To borrow terms from Hadley Arkes, he would elevate the destruction of "left over" embryos to a public good and involve us all in the process. We also know that Obama supports both federal funding of embryo destructive research and the eradication of all Executive restraints on abortion and funding of abortions. We all agree that Obama is worse, but you seem a bit cavalier on this point in minimizing how truly awful McCain's position is. Do we believe that embryonic human beings are persons under the 14th Amendment? If so, your position amounts to this; we are morally obligated to vote for McCain because he is likely to endorse policy that kills fewer people than Obama. That is not a great argument. If we all take a step back and say that good men and women disagree what a vote constitutes and what our moral obligations are in this situation that is fine, but to act like there is NO moral basis for NOT supporting a person who is the probably the lesser of two evils, but is certainly committed to doing evil seems a stronger argument than I am comfortable making.

Zippy:

Is your argument that principled "not voting" will create a more principled people and this will strengthen those people to make stronger moral stands which will result in greater moral advancement than an incrementalist approach. If so, do you foresee that this tactic would make things worse before they begin to get better? My reservation would be that this is a calculation we are making with the lives of others and I fail to see how this approach would not necessarily sacrifice 'others' before it would begin to turn the corner. Or are you under the impression that we have about maxed out how bad it can get for unborn human beings around here?

If so, do you foresee that this tactic would make things worse before they begin to get better?
That is certainly a possibility. In fact it is a possibility no matter what we do.
My reservation would be that this is a calculation we are making with the lives of others and I fail to see how this approach would not necessarily sacrifice 'others' before it would begin to turn the corner.
That isn't my argument though. My argument is that it is simply wrong - morally wrong as an individual - to vote for either McCain or Obama, because doing so clearly involves deliberate cooperation with grave evil without a proportionate reason, and therefore fails double-effect.

It is often retorted, as a kind of Kantian counterargument, that if everyone acted on my understanding that pro-lifers would simply be conceding defeat. In response I point out that the "all other things equal" assumption built into this criticism is simply false. If everyone thought and acted as I recommend that would make a much greater difference than if everyone voted for McCain.

In no case do I assert the utilitarian argument that we ought to trade off these lives for those lives. That it may appear to be the case is a function of my opponents' utilitarian arguments against my position; arguments which rest on an unstated and manifestly false ceteris paribus assumption.

But my argument against voting for McCain or Obama is not a utilitarian argument. It is a moral argument.

Zippy,

Thank you for the clarification.

Jay

Jay Watts & Brendon,

Obama essentially promises:

"Once I become President, I will make certain more babies are killed!"

Certainly, those who helped bring such a man into power would seem culpable as would any accessory to murder; the question becomes: are those, who basically did nothing to prevent such a tragic event, equally culpable?

I don't know about both of you but I, on the other hand, feel that those multitudes of innocents who will die under Obama's Pro-Abort administration deserve a voice; to prevent their deaths is the very Call of Justice.

Why can't you guys just come out and say it? "Voting for anyone but McCain is a sin."

I'll use the gentle approach: Read both Lydia and Zippy's posts--they have been saying they are not voting for McCain at this time and gave arguments why. These aren't random drive-by combox posters, they are contributers to this blog. I would suggest reading and interacting with their points rather than tossing out you-are-all-in-the-tank-for-McCain.

Certainly, those who helped bring such a man into power would seem culpable as would any accessory to murder; the question becomes: are those, who basically did nothing to prevent such a tragic event, equally culpable?

But I see no evidence that, "Not voting for McCain," is equivalent with, "Doing nothing to oppose the election of Obama."

Materially speaking, not voting for any candidate or voting for any candidate other than Obama is equivalent to opposing him. Doing either of these things denies Obama a resource that would help him win, viz. one's vote.

Formally speaking, choosing either of the aforementioned choices because one rejects Obama as a fitting President is equivalent to opposing him. Doing either for this particular reason is to formally set one's will in opposition to an Obama Presidency.

I am opposed to an Obama Presidency. I do not believe that he is morally fit to be a state Senator, let alone a United States Senator. And he is certainly not morally fit to be the President of the United States.

When I vote for the President in November I will probably vote for Chuck Baldwin. I will do so in part because I reject Obama, his policies, his party and its platform as being in any way morally fit to lead my country. My vote will thus be both formally and materially opposed to Obama becoming the President of the United States. In what possible way could it be said that I will have done "nothing to prevent" an Obama Presidency?

Brendon,

All good points.

However, by virtue of your opinions, beliefs, etc. are already ab initio opposed to Obama; therefore, this does not actually take away from the current pool of individuals who, by the same virtue, are for Obama.

This is the reason I made sure to include the word "effectively" in my original statement, which Gintas attempted to address in another comment.

While it may, in a sense, deprive Obama a vote generally speaking; it does not necessarily defeat Obama.

Simply put, an efficacious vote against Obama (i.e., one which would effectively prevent his ascension to the presidency) is one that goes toward his opposition that has the best chance of defeating him.

Ironically, the very reason why one should favor the latter route is due to the very difference between the 2 candidates -- in the USCCB words:

"...vote for the candidate deemed less likely to advance such a morally flawed position and more likely to pursue other authentic human good."

To me, preventing the very enlargement & expansion of the Holocaust that will occur under a fierce Pro-Abort administration under Obama entailing the deaths of multitudes of additional innocents (I believe more than anything, they deserve a "voice" in this Election and I refuse to consign them ever so callously to their deaths by mere self-righteous rhetoric alone), the irresolvable resolute appointment of Pro-Abort Justices to the Supreme Court by Obama preventing any future restrictions on abortions after the manner of PBA and even promoting judicial decisions towards further proliferation of even greater travesties, among other things an Obaman administration is likely to do, would seem to warrant such an act.

Of the four viable candidates for major office in the November election -- McCain and Palin, Obama and Biden -- the most consistently pro-life candidate is Palin. The second most consistently pro-life candidate is McCain. They are together on one ticket, and they are up against the more consistently pro-death ticket. One of those two tickets -- the more pro-life or the more pro-death -- is going to win. You can bank on it. There's going to be either a Republican or a Democrat in the White House, whether we like it or not. That being so, as Christians, we are morally obligated to vote efficaciously so as to keep the pro-death ticket out of office.

Obviously, in the upcoming election you will not prevent the more pro-death ticket from winning by declining to vote. Just as obviously, you will not prevent the more pro-death ticket from winning by voting for a ticket that cannot win. You can prevent the pro-death ticket from winning only by voting for the one ticket capable of defeating them.

Gee, Scott, you thought I was addressing Zippy? Lydia? !!!

Anyway, Zippy I understand your point quite clearly now. Mr. Baumann and aristocles associate not voting for McCain with a sin. We must vote for McCain, violating our consciences, so that some greater good may obtain (a hypothetically lower abortion rate). Somehow our willingness to violate our consciences won't degrade us in any way.

You know what, Zippy? If we hardened our consciences enough, I can think of some fast ways to cut the abortion rate, enough to please even Mr. Baumann and aristocles.

Gintas,

We must vote for McCain, violating our consciences, so that some greater good may obtain (a hypothetically lower abortion rate).

Make sure you tell yourself that every nite when Obama wins and the so-called hypothetical (i.e., the substantial multiplication of abortions) actually happens. It's not as if Obama explicitly swore on several occasions what he would do for his Pro-Abort constituency as well as the fact that he would deliver on his Pro-abort promises.

I will not violate my conscience and allow the additional multitudes to be sacrificed on account of people's petty self-righteousness. Believe it or not, those deaths are real and not tenuous as some conspiracy-theory invasion based merely on hearsay.

This conversation seems to boil down to:

"Voting for any non-Obama candidate other than McCain is a failure to oppose Obama. This is because you owe McCain your vote."

"Why do I owe McCain my vote?"

"You owe McCain your vote because voting in any other way would be a failure to oppose Obama."

"But that isn't true because..."

"It is true. This is because you owe McCain your vote."

I do not find that very convincing.

In a discussion over at the Chronicles website, Scott Richert noted that politicians, like particles in physics, do not simply have positions. They also have directional velocity. McCain may have better positions than Obama, but as far as I can tell he is moving in the same direction, albeit with less velocity. I though it was the duty of conservatives to stand athwart history yelling, "Stop!" not, "Slower!"

Continually voting for the politicians who will move us leftward more slowly does not have the consequence of stopping our move leftward. But it does have the consequence of causing us to become more inclined to accept leftward movements as long as they don't happen at too great a velocity. This may leave us with better short-term consequences, but its long-term result is the voluntary corruption of our own moral sense.

That's the whole point of the Hegelian mambo. So forgive me if I sit this dance out.

I will not violate my conscience...

How noble that you tell everyone else to violate theirs. For heaven's sake, do you really think Zippy, of all people, wrote this post in the hopes that Obama would win?

Brendon,
Your summary of the pro-McCain argument is not one that I, as a Pro-McCain voter, actually recognize. Perhaps I missed it, but I don't recall anyone arguing in that fashion.

Brendon,

This conversation seems to boil down to:

"Voting for any non-Obama candidate other than McCain is a failure to oppose Obama. This is because you owe McCain your vote."

"Why do I owe McCain my vote?"

"You owe McCain your vote because voting in any other way would be a failure to oppose Obama."


You left out the huge chunk about the fact that the only way Obama can be effectively opposed is by casting a vote for his opposition that has the greatest chance of defeating him.

I recognize what you and Step2 are saying; however, as far as drawing the line in the sand, but must that necessarily entail the willingness to sacrifice the thousands of innocent lives that will happen under an Obama win as well as the long-term consequences of a Pro-Abort majority on the Supreme Court?

That's the moral dilemma for me. And that is why I brought up the quote from the USCCB.

Mr. Bauman,

Your summary of the pro-McCain argument is not one that I, as a Pro-McCain voter, actually recognize. Perhaps I missed it, but I don't recall anyone arguing in that fashion.

It certainly seemed accurate to me. To cite the following as examples:

aristocles:

To vote for a 3rd Party candidate with no chance of winning whatsoever does not, in any way, defeat Obama; it merely helps him.

me:

This assumes that I owe my vote to McCain.

aristocles (emphasis mine):

Certainly, those who helped bring such a man into power would seem culpable as would any accessory to murder; the question becomes: are those, who basically did nothing to prevent such a tragic event, equally culpable?

me:

But I see no evidence that, "Not voting for McCain," is equivalent with, "Doing nothing to oppose the election of Obama."

Yourself:

Obviously, in the upcoming election you will not prevent the more pro-death ticket from winning by declining to vote. Just as obviously, you will not prevent the more pro-death ticket from winning by voting for a ticket that cannot win. You can prevent the pro-death ticket from winning only by voting for the one ticket capable of defeating them.

aristocles' statement, to which I initially responded, laid out the position that I would be failing to oppose Obama if I did not vote for McCain. This assumed I in some way took a vote away from McCain, which necessarily assumes that I owe him my vote. I asked for some demonstration of this.

aristocles responded with a statement that put forward the position that I owe McCain my vote because voting any other way would be a failure to oppose Obama. I responded by pointing out exactly why I believed that statement was untrue.

In a later comment, the one I have quoted, you make a statement equivalent to the one by aristocles to which I first responded, one which boils down to my owing McCain my vote because to vote in any other way would be to fail to oppose Obama. The content and positioning of that comment within this discussion made it appear to be a response to my argument that it was false to say that voting for a non-Obama candidate other than McCain is equivalent to not opposing Obama. I apologize if I was mistaken.

I suppose one could argue that I have ignored the qualification about effectiveness. And I have. This is because I do not view the question of effectiveness as the most important part of my decision.

Questions of effectiveness are nothing but questions of consequences. Questions of consequences are subordinate to questions of the act in itself, to questions of the end intended by so acting, and to questions of the act as a proportional means towards some other intended end. If an act is immoral for one or more of these reasons, discussions of consequences are no longer relevant to the discussion of the morality of the act.

I believe McCains' position of embryonic stem cell research--as well as his positions on the use of military force, the proper power of the Presidency, and the proper role of the Federal government--make voting for him fail to be a proportional means towards achieving my desired end of a justly ordered polity under the rule of law. As such, arguing about consequences cannot change my decision, since it was made at a level of moral reasoning prior to the examination of consequences.

Brendon,

You have reduced the arguments to such extent it is bereft of all the substantial elements they originally contained.

It is quite evident by your egregiously biased reductionism that you have no interest in pursuing the matter in fairness. G'Day.

Aristocles:

I understand that you think your argument has not received a fair hearing, since in your view if it did everyone would immediately embrace it. Otherwise your constant mantra of the same points over and over and over again in every thread would make little sense. But you needn't accuse other commenters of arguing in bad faith. I don't think you argue in bad faith, even though I do think your own argument is egregiously reductionist and that you relentlessly ignore the substance of what has been said by anyone who does not simply submit to your mantra.

Zippy,

My apologies, if that is the impression I left.

None need not embrace the argument; they need only answer the questions that issued.

However, one thing is clear: everybody here seem to be doing what their own conscience dictates.

If only those Pro-Obama did, perhaps this discussion and my reasons for arguing thus would not happen in the first place.

I know you'll agree, Zippy, that when you summarize an opponent's views, that your summary ought to be well enough done that your opponent actually recognizes his own views in your summary. You yourself have often complained that others were putting words in your mouth, and rightly so. When Aristocles and I read Brendon's summary, we both cried "foul" because our arguments were nothing at all like his reductionistic distortions.

Further, Aristocles never said that his views did not receive a fair hearing in this or in other threads. He said that Brendon radically distorted them.

But if, however, you yourself think that Brendon's caricature is even moderately up close to the facts as a summary, then Aristocles would be absolutely right to make the complaint he did not make, because then his views never did get a fair hearing.

Michael:

I guess I should have been specific that my objection was to A's phrase "... that you [Brendon] have no interest in pursuing the matter in fairness".

Further, Aristocles never said that his views did not receive a fair hearing in this or in other threads.

Quite right. That is my surmise, not a summary or paraphrase of anything he said, and I could be entirely wrong about it. Its just the impression with which the repetition has left me.

My own (additional) impression, though it could be wrong, is that we all understand each other pretty well at this point; and just bloody disagree. FWIW, I have a great deal of sympathy for where those who disagree with me on this are coming from. I just think they are wrong; and I have the impression that the disagreement stems (no pun intended) in part from not having fully embraced the fact that embryos are persons every bit as much as the victims of infanticide and euthanasia are persons.

I expect that many of us might have difficulty voting for a candidate who (for example) made a habit of regularly torturing a puppy to death in public. Yet despite the fact that ESCR is infinitely more grave, we accept it -- some commentators on other blogs going so far as to greet McCain's relentless support of it with a big "so what?" -- because we can hide the reality from ourselves. And because of the stakes in the game, the false sense that a tactical win will do good despite what achieving it does to us, we do hide it from ourselves.

Zippy,
Agreed.

I understand that the killing of embryos that don't look like babies doesn't have the same visceral effect upon us when we think about it as the ripping apart of older unborn human beings. That may make people who support surgical abortion guilty to the nth power, because they are violating not only reality and reason but also what ought to be their own human, God-given internal braking system of emotion. But in this day and age, there is absolutely no excuse for someone in McCain's position not to know what he is talking about in the case of ESCR.

Lydia,
You're quite right, and still he's the best option we have at the moment.

"But in this day and age, there is absolutely no excuse for someone in McCain's position not to know..." what the essence and effects of modern warfare are. McCain saw the carnage and destruction wrought by war up close. Yet, beyond some references to peace in his acceptance speech, his record since the early 90's should give every Christian pause.

In an age of abstraction it is easy to reduce human embroyos to the status of pods offering medicinal benefits. Such a fiction poses no problem for those who, when counting the costs of war, speak of collateral damage.


Kevin,
Is war ever necessary?

If so, is it now, or has it ever been, possible to fight a war without collateral damage?

Michael,
The culture of death is built on lies that permeate and alter our daily existence. Collateral damage is a handy euphemism designed to obscure the truth; innocent human beings are being killed.

As for the necessity of war, quite a few conditions have to be met. No recent "conflicts" come to mind as having met those conditions.

Zippy,

I have the impression that the disagreement stems (no pun intended) in part from not having fully embraced the fact that embryos are persons every bit as much as the victims of infanticide and euthanasia are persons.

I can't believe after all the conversations we've had, you would have this "additional" impression.

I can assure you, as with your other impression, it is equally wrong.

Rather than re-visit the whole matter again for another time, I can't judge McCain on what he might do as President (ironically, it was you who also said something similar at your blog), but on what Obama will do when he's President.

BIG DIFFERENCE.

The same forces that seek to destroy life peddle other life-destroying practices: homosex, pornography, incest, etc.

Is homosex (what a lovely Clockwork Orange-ism) being called literally life-destroying, or is that a poetic description?

If the former, how is homosex any more life-destroying than celibacy?

Phil.
Nobody dies from celibacy. But the practices commonly associated with homosexuality can, and have, killed countless persons. It's been a terrible tragedy.

You haven't heard?

Michael,

So, in your interpretation, when homosexual sex is linked to the "culture of death," that is specifically referring to AIDS?

I was led to believe that the term had a more nuanced meaning than that; otherwise why would some folks apply it to contraception, which can reduce the HIV infection rate in a population significantly?

Phil,
(Before I say anything else, I want to say that however this might sound, I mean to be speaking respectfully and compassionately./MB)

Here's what I meant in the entry above: Homosexual conduct is linked to the culture of death simply because so many thousands of people have, literally, died from it. It's been a mass killer. I have friends who lost their lives to it. I want that killing to end.

While such conduct (in my view) ought not be criminalized, a culture of life cannot endorse it and cannot put it on the same level as heterosexual conduct, or accord it the same dignity and protections. The political and cultural left, generally those same folks who promote the culture of death in things like abortion, stem cell research, and euthanasia, strive toward the same end here -- to mainstream deadly conduct. So much of what the left advocates and practices leads directly to dead people.

If I didn't care about homosexual persons, I wouldn't care much about this issue. But it turns out to be life and death, and I don't want my friends dead.

But I would not link homosexual conduct to the culture of death simply because homosexual conduct cannot produce life. Celibacy cannot produce life, and I do not link celibacy to the culture of death, either. Not producing life is quite different from producing death.

Michael,
Respectfully, I don't think it's quite accurate to say that people have "died from homosexual conduct." Certainly, many individuals engage in homosexual conduct and live to a ripe old age. Your locution leaves out the actual cause of death.

After an outbreak of e. coli infections, you wouldn't say that a dozen people have "died from eating lettuce." Nor would that be reason to say that eating lettuce is deadly conduct.

However, my question wasn't exactly about your personal use of the phrase; I was curious about how you interpret the use of the phrase in the quote above (and more generally, how do you interpret the phrase when it is used in the common parlance?)

I think if you read the quote above from Dr. Alice C. Linsey, it's pretty clear that she's not listing "homosex" under the category of "culture of death" because it causes death. She also lists "pornography," which has not been known to cause many physical deaths at all.

Perhaps aristocles, who quoted the passage, could provide their interpretation: what links "homosex, pornography, and incest" as life-destroying practices?

Phil,
You're exactly right: we agree that HIV kills, and not, strictly speaking, homosexual conduct. That's correct, and I wasn't intentionally trying to suppress that tragic fact by an ideologically motivated circumlocution. But I assume we also agree that one of the most effective ways to spread HIV, though by no means the only way, is by homosexual conduct.

Yes, indeed, some homosexuals, just like some heterosexuals, live to a good old age. For that fact we all are justifiably grateful. We are grateful because we value our friends and their lives. But still the death issue remains: Some conduct more clearly, directly, and frequently leads to death than do others. Because I value human life, I want to hinder the march of death to which some kinds of conduct leave us more vulnerable. For that reason, I support cultural and legal standards that sanction and endorse some kinds of conduct more highly than others. For that reason, I do not support a cultural or legal equivalency among all lifestyles. Just as we might well work to stop the spread of HIV caused by the use of contaminated needles, or HIV spread by contaminated blood used in transfusions, we might also work to hinder its spread by other means as well -- and for exactly the same reason. I would say that one compassionate way to do that is for a culture to decline granting to all lifestyles the same level of sanction, dignity, and support.

As for how others employ the language of life and death, I can say only that I am not in full agreement with the way it sometimes is employed, even by those on my side of the fence. It sounds at the moment like you and I agree on that as well. Like you, I don't see how pornography leads to death. I think some current uses of the language of life and death are morally, tactically, and philosophically indefensible. I hope I have not used it in that way. But if you think I have, then I'd be more than happy to hear your take on it.

Homosexual acts and pornography are important firmaments within the culture of death.

Each replaces the procreative, self-giving obtained through the divinely ordained complementariness of human sexuality, with a quest for pleasure selfishly closed to the transmission and creation of life.

If that is not life-denying and destructive, I'm not sure what is.

At the same time, those who heroically struggle with same-sex attraction or the diabolical addictiveness of porn are earning their crown in Heaven.

Because I value human life, I want to hinder the march of death to which some kinds of conduct leave us more vulnerable. For that reason, I support cultural and legal standards that sanction and endorse some kinds of conduct more highly than others.

Under this rubric, lesbian sex is to be supported the most, because it is least likely to lead to fatalities? Then heterosexual sex, and then gay male sex? Would that be a fair assessment of the logic?

I'm reminded of the Mark Twain quotation, “The cat, having sat upon a hot stove lid, will not sit upon a hot stove lid again. But he won't sit upon a cold stove lid, either.”

Each replaces the procreative, self-giving obtained through the divinely ordained complementariness of human sexuality, with a quest for pleasure selfishly closed to the transmission and creation of life.

It sounds like being "closed to the transmission and creation of life" is one of the reasons you call the aforementioned nouns "life-denying and destructive."

Any reasonable person, regardless of religion, can see that any act that doesn't lead to a sperm fertilizing an egg is "closed to the transmission and creation of life." By that logic, playing video games, praying, and swimming are all pillars of the "culture of death." Celibacy, too, is closed to life.

Now, I'm not completely dense. I understand that certain sects of the Christian faith hold that the Divine has special purpose for our genitals, and so any act that involves our genitals that doesn't have the potential to result in a pregnancy is "closed to life," because they were supposed to be used to solely for that purpose. But that's a religious argument, requiring not just belief in the supernatural, but specific beliefs in the supernatural.

What I suggest is that conflating abortion, homosexuality, and pornography weakens your argument about abortion. I don't have to be the same religion as you--indeed, I don't even need to believe in God--to be able to believe that destroying an embryo causes the end of something that was unique and human. But I'm not going to buy that gay sex, or masturbation, or contraception is part of a "culture of death" unless I also hold some of the same, specific, supernatural beliefs that you do.

...so any act that involves our genitals that doesn't have the potential to result in a pregnancy is "closed to life,"...

A proposed clarification: the stated principle is somewhat stricter than the actual principle. I would phrase the actual principle "any sexual act which is not the kind of sexual act which at times, in the ordinary course of nature, leads to pregnancy".

I would affirm that ESCR is more grave matter, since it is the actual murder of actual persons. But I can't agree that homosex and the culture of death are completely unconnected. Particularly in the case of abortion, the very purpose of the act is a kind of retroactive contraception, that is, sex excluding the possibility of children. What unifies them is sex of a kind excluding the possibility of children.

On the other hand I tend to think that contraception is significantly more grave than homosex for this same reason. Homosex is akin to masturbation in gravity, though worse for the involvement of another person; whereas contraception is the direct gateway to abortion. So there is a sense in which the present pro life priorities w.r.t. homosex and contraception are inverted.

On the connection between homosexuality and the culture of death, I think the extremely odd article by Camille Paglia (who, as I understand it, is openly bisexual) is rather enlightening. (Kevin put a link to this article in my thread on Canadian reactions to the Palin nomination.) Her position is that Nature is trying to "push" us towards procreation, and that we have a right and possibly even a duty to resist this "fascism" (her word) on the part of nature.

Phil,
Yes, with regard to life and death -- and those were the categories guiding our discussion -- lesbianism is not as deadly as homosexuality. I think you'll agree.

Whether or not lesbianism is more or less moral than homosexuality, and whether or not, on grounds other than life and death, a virtuous society ought to treat them the same, is a different question.

Her position is that Nature is trying to "push" us towards procreation, and that we have a right and possibly even a duty to resist this "fascism" (her word) on the part of nature.
The free and equal new man, self created through reason and will, emancipated from the chains of history and nature, absolutely must be realized; no matter how many untermenschen, the incarnation of those chains, must die to make it happen.

"By that logic, playing video games, praying, and swimming are all pillars of the "culture of death."

Sex is not a recreational pastime, which might explain our differences here. Instead it is a great Gift in which we are allowed to find supernatural fulfillment in the sacred act of Creation. Anything that impedes, alters or denigrates that gift by circumventing the natural order is sinful.

"Celibacy, too, is closed to life."

No, it is a voluntary, sacrificial spiritual discipline that gives prayer a powerful physical form. The celibate reminds us of the profound obligations in our handling of the great gift placed in our care. In God's economy, the celibacy of the religious is life sustaining.

Those afflicted with sex attraction and remain chaste our powerful witnesses for life. All I can say, is may I be worthy of their sacrifice! Feel free to visit these heroic people; http://couragerc.net/

"I suggest is that conflating abortion, homosexuality, and pornography weakens your argument about abortion."

I'm not conflating, I am acknowledging that certain behaviors, practices and motives are linked and spring from the same obscure source. I do agree there exists a hierarchy of sin within the culture of death, but its ethos touches every aspect of our lives. Both porn and homosexual acts tend to reduce others as mere instruments of physical pleasure.

The culture of death wields more than physical destruction, for it is on the spiritual level that it is most lethal. And we are all vulnerable to its many snares and corruptions. No exceptions.

Instead it is a great Gift in which we are allowed to find supernatural fulfillment in the sacred act of Creation.
The culture of death wields more than physical destruction, for it is on the spiritual level that it is most lethal.

Would it be accurate, then, to say that in your estimation, the way that gay sex and masturbation contribute to the "culture of death" is a particular religious concept, which you yourself believe to be true?

I think you can make a convincing argument that abortion and other forms of destruction of developing humans are wrong without asking me to convert to your religion. I'm pretty convinced now that you can't make a good argument that gay sex is wrong without also asking me to convert to your religious beliefs.

From where I stand, celibacy and homosexuality produce the same number of new lives, and both stand on equal moral footing, at least in the abstract.

In most simplistic terms:

Celibacy, after the manner of St. Paul, is a pursuit of The Good whereas Homosexuality is a Depravity that seeks after The Bad!

Phil, Naturally, I think grace allows me to sometimes penetrate beyond surface appearances. So, I guess on the vital distinctions between celibacy and same-sex attraction, you are right in the abstract, but wrong in terms of concrete reality.

"I'm pretty convinced now that you can't make a good argument that gay sex is wrong without also asking me to convert to your religious beliefs."

I wouldn't attempt a non-Christian argument against gay sex, but looking at how the human body is designed, leads one to the conclusion that it is not normative. There is a substantial amount of literature regarding the various pathologies that come with "the life", confirmed on a much smaller scale by my own experiences with gay friends and acquaintances. I hope if you visit the Courage website you offer your thoughts.

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