Grateful Thoughts

I quit drinking before the beer snob was a common character around town.  All it takes is seeing some beer snob comments to know that in today's bar scene, I'd either quickly get beaten to death, or arrested for starting fights.  

The Epitome of the Strawman Argument

That is when you argue as if someone said something he did not. Often it starts with a real quote, then goes off into arguing with imaginary constructs which do not strictly (or loosely) follow the thought in dispute.

Another blogger took great umbrage at my position against government involvement in abortion. I never said I condone or like abortion. But I don't believe government needs to control anyone or anything who/that was formed and still dwells inside of someone else.

The "across the board" suggestion below does not constitute a valid argument.

The insulting, superior, zealot tone does get under my skin. And some of your conclusions are patently absurd.

Here's the post:

http://wrdeatr.blogspot.com/2013/10/mtm-variation.html

I'm pasting it below, or go to the link above.

No need to address the psychoanalysis.

It is a straw man argument and an attack based on a strawman psychological work-up.

Your use of propaganda technique is masterful.

Parts quoted from my post are in italics. It's a call and response set up. My quote, then the comment.

Here it is:
"No matter how abhorrent you find it, taking up the anti-abortion crusade is somewhat suicidal, but it takes foresight to realize this."
* Takes even more foresight to recognize that when millions of babies are aborted, there's a collective suicide happening right there.
I don't think suicide is the right word.  

"If your example is worth much, then others may be influenced to do it your way. Forced behavior is not always the best approach."*

Let's apply that principle across the board, shall we? Let's no longer stigmatize, prosecute or punish murderers, rapists, pedophiles, crooked IRS agents, lying presidents, etc. Let those who don't believe in those behaviors simply "provide a good example."

Wow, have you noticed how well that works in the history of man? So effectively that the abusers end up slaughtering off (either literally or in some slightly less terminal way, i.e. no promotion; or firing; or blackballing; or gulaging, etc.) those who provide the good example.

Which is why we have so many abusers of various stripes in power on various levels, all the way from your office supervisor to the guy in the Black House. "Might makes right." Survival of the most vicious. SOB's rule.

Darwinism at its "best."

And hey, speaking of which, if we start presuming we know whose life is worthy of being allowed to come to term and whose is not, that opens the door to all kinds of arbitrary weeding out, doesn't it? All those who, say, are libertarians: all their unborn infants would be forcibly terminated (assuming they hadn't already done us the favor of voluntarily annihilating their offspring in the womb). We can't, after all, tolerate a bunch of seditionists proliferating (no pun intended) and opposing our Nanny State agenda, can we. Man must after all maintain his glorious ascent up the evolutionary ladder (Teilhardism, our salvation, amen).

Perhaps there exists a concealed explanation for certain people's insistence that abortion should not be outlawed, a deep-structure motivation if you will: might they harbor a subconscious wish that their mother had aborted them? Might their "laissez-faireism" in regards to prenatal infanticide actually constitute a camouflaged retroactive death wish?

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*It's conceivable that this sort of "rationale" might come across a smidgeon less disingenuous if those who advocate it weren't the types whose promiscuity is so often at fault for the abortion being deemed "necessary" in the first place

.OK.  If we now decide to represent the rights of the unborn (we, being people in which the unborn does not dwell), let's arrest women for child abuse if their habits and diets are not deemed the most healthy and optimal for the unborn child.  Should obese or frail women be cited for failure to provide the ideal home for the unborn?  Maybe it is not our business.  You can make it yours.   I wouldn't voluntarily spend any money to control people regarding their misguided, or not misguided, conception and fetus management.   

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