Posts by Grant Dexter
Last ←Newer Page 1 2 3 4 5 Older→ First
-
That "judge not lest ye be judged" quote from the book of Matthew doesn't mean "nobody can ever judge other people". It does stress, however, that your first duty, before you can judge other people, is to judge yourself, to check your motives, and to examine what you yourself would do or feel if placed in exactly the same situation. Hence my question "Who are you?". It's a serious question.
Linger. I am happy that you do not ascribe to the "judge not" blanket. Given that you understand Matthew then perhaps you might apply some other passages to understand why I stand in opposition to abortion.
-
Do you know what an ectopic pregnancy is? That's one situation I can think of that sometimes results in exactly that scenario, and is still a significant cause of maternal death.
What scenario? That the baby has to be delivered in order to save the mother? If you wanted to show an example of what I was saying you could have just said so. Did you also know that attempts have been made to relocate the baby to the right place in order to try and save him? Such procedures have not been successful yet, but perhaps in the future they will be.
At no point in an ectopic pregnancy is the doctor required to stop and kill the baby. It is tragic, but sometimes difficult things need to be done.
Another counter-example is a person known to me, who, after hormone treatment associate with IVF, suffered a severe hormonal reaction that could only be stopped by abortion or miscarriage of the embryo (she miscarried, which was very sad, but saved her life). (Note I use your definition of "baby" here, which I also don't agree with, but no matter).
I don't mind what terminology you use. I understand what you are talking about when you say foetus or blastocyst.
I notice again that throughout this tragedy there was no point at which someone was required to end the life of the baby. The whole point I am making revolves around intent. In a devastating situation such as either of these the baby is a victim of our broken world, illness and deformation. In both of these situations such tragedy is bad enough without associating the intent of the medical teams and the parents with the staff and parents who want to terminate a life because the mother wants to keep her job.
One is deliberately ending a life without justification. One is a tragic necessity. I hope you have the wisdom to agree with my analysis and perhaps even express it better than I can.
You seem to be very confident over things you clearly don't know a lot about. You don't seem to be able to deal with any other definitions than the ones you propose. You don't seem to be able to actually argue, only to repeat assertion after assertion. And your hectoring is actively off-putting. My feeling that your views are stupid and inhumane is only strengthened by the way you make your case for them.
And you'd be wrong. :shrug:
I wouldn't worry about it. I've been wrong before as well.
-
Judging by your surname, you share the same British heritage as many of us, and you ought to know that at various times in the British Isles the poorest people have had neither work, nor charity, nor food, nor any prospect but starvation while the rich ate.
I know that you paint a picture in order to evoke sympathy. I know there are poor people. It's not a crime to have little money. It's not a crime to do some hard work. It is a crime to steal.
Would you steal to feed your children?
No. They'd go hungry till I found help or an honest income. Would you teach your kids to be criminals just because they didn't have much food for the week?
Would that be wrong if there were no alternative? It seems that your approach is simply to claim that there are always alternatives, but I just don't believe that. I don't even need to point to hypotheticals. We live in a world right now where some societies are organised sufficiently unjustly that property rights don't have fundamental moral force.
And these people are, what, dying off in their thousands, I take it?
-
Should I pick on this for being weasel fors, or a circular definition. It's both really.
Murder is defined as unjustified killing. Go read a dictionary or something if you don't have anything useful to contribute.
I wonder whether it indicates a genuine confusion of thought or a lack of honesty in debate?
Neither in my case. Both in yours.
In any case, I'l cheerfully ad that I think that murder can and should include deaths that result from deliberate actions that could reasonably be forseen to result in death(s), even if the intent to kill anyone isn't there. I think everyone involved in the decision not to fix the Ford Pinto, for example, ought to have been banged up.
So, guess what, I don't agree, either.That's because you can't see the difference between negligence and murder. Guess what? The fact that you are angry about Pinto's does not make your opinion on what should happen to the designers correct. It just makes you a bad judge of a situation.
-
Grant, you don't know me at all, although you feel you have the right to judge me. I'm not callous. But the situation, about which you know almost nothing, was not simple. I suspect situations like that are never simple. What I don't understand is why you feel compelled to judge at all.
My response was based on what I do know. You claim to be unconcerned either way about your past and have no qualms about sharing it with total strangers. I would consider your past to be very sensitive and would never discuss it.
I judge because I am alive. Why do you consider people capable of not judging?
-
One at a time, huh?
Jackie:
Depends on the circumstances, as others have so eloquently pointed out. I'm intolerant of the people who kill in cold blood. I'm not intolerant of those who kill in selfdefence.
Who, in their right mind, would call self defense murder?
I'm intolerant of those who deliberately cheat time and time again. I'm not intolerant of people who have unhappy domestic situations and seek the right person to live their lives with, while they are still in a relationship.
If you consider your state of happiness good enough reason to disintegrate a family then I don't think there's much we will agree on. I have high standards for my relationships. I do not expect people to walk out of a relationship because they are not happy.
If, as I suspect, your use of unhappiness was a euphemism for abuse then we find good reasons why the relationship should end. We never find justification for adultery.
Not that I haven't seen people try...
I'm intolerant of people who steal others' livelihoods and celebrate it. I'm tolerant of those who are hungry and in need, and the only way they can live is by nicking stuff.
Stealing is never the only way to survive. People have voices for a reason. They have bodies so they can work. Any effort a person might go to in order to gain a meal would be far more properly directed in trying to find a job.
I'm intolerant of people who live their lives with deceit and dishonesty every day, in order to aggrandise themselves. I'm very tolerant of people telling little white lies to spare others' feelings.
The standard I quoted was, "Do not commit perjury". There should be no law against lies unless they are to a judge.
All very grey, isn't it? Life's like that. Well, for me, anyway. I feel sorry for people who are so black and white that they hold others and themselves to such excruciatingly high standards. It must be very hard to be so perfect.
I'm not perfect. But you're right. There are a whole range of different situations that require good judgment in order to distinguish. If a man kills another man then good judgment is required to say if that was murder or self defense. If a man sleeps with a woman then good judgment is required to say if that act was legal or not. If a man takes what is not his then good judgment is required to determine how he should pay. And if a man lies to a judge then good judgment is required to determine truth in the case.
Unfortunately the word judge seems to be considered more vulgar than certain other forms of language these days...
-
It's tragic that you can be so callous about a thing so sensitive, Emma. My reaction to you would be to tell you how inappropriate you actions are and why.
Kyle, are you prepared to blame your bank robbery on a tooth fairy in court? :)
-
There is never a reason to kill a baby. Any medical procedure required to save the life of the mother can be done by delivering the baby. At no point is the doctor required to stop and kill the baby.
-
Jesus?
Oh. So you think Linger is a Christian? Whatever gave you that idea?
Do you know who Jesus was talking to when he said, "Do not judge"?
Do you know who He was talking to when He said, "Judge rightly"?
-
Russell. Are you only here to disagree with everything I say? Doesn't that take a lot of unnecessary effort?
When I say, "Do not murder" I define it in the obvious way. I define murder as intentional and wrongful killing of another person. If the laws of men do not uphold this standard then I will still live by it. If you want to disagree with me on do not murder you are required to say that murder is sometimes justified. Calling murder justified strips the word of all its meaning. Murder is unjustified killing so justified murder is an oxymoron.
When I say, "Do not commit adultery" that is a completely separate issue. Why do you need to make an issue of how it relates to murder? If you agree with me feel free to say so.
When you say, "steal away" you are encouraging irresponsibility. I say that if one is hungry then he should work. It is never wrong to not steal and there is never the necessity to do so.
When you say "we lie .. every day" that does not mean we are justified in lying to a judge. Nor does it even mean we are justified in lying.
What is with Kiwis and the argument that bad things are done so we are justified in doing them too..?