quote:The problem begins with finding a direction that everyone feels comfortable working on. Most religious groups won't support any type of birth control, and mosr non-religious people ooften consider that to be the best place to start....
Kwea, well, we can find SOMETHING to work together on, I hope. If not, then everyone should just concede the truth of what I said in my first post and kill this thread right now!!!
j/k. Seriously, though I think there have got to be positive things we can work together on. And those things that are "too far" for some folks to agree on, they can duck out or start their own coalitions. =============================
Tres, I don't know what to say. You must not have read my earlier posts or the responses to them (back around pages 4-6, I think.
I should've just stayed out of this thread entirely. Sheesh!
Anyway, I have a problem with waiting until we change the nature of the debate. I seriously believe we'll still be talking about "legalize it or make it illegal" 10 years from now. I don't see "progress" in any direction on this.
Meanwhile, people are still having abortions for reasons that were avoidable (like the person dkw mentioned). I think people of all points on the spectrum on the "legal/illegal" issue can still come together to do something positive.
And I think we need to.
And maybe in the process we'll learn to have constructive dialog on the other issues surrounding pregnancy, sex, child rearing, etc.
I just can't give in to the thought that we're just going to stay at loggerheads on this issue.
Or that we have to "change society" first before we can reduce the number of abortions.
Oh well.
This thread really has become too labor intensive to be of interest anymore.
If anyone is seriously interested in working on anything like a coalition of moderates, maybe we can have some offline discussions. As I told Dag, I'm not really looking to lead this, but I would be interested in being involved if there's any one who wants to.
Maybe someone knows of an organization already doing something along these lines that we could check out?
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posted
Bob, if you really want to work on this issue, I can plug you in to a few organizations. I think it’s the kind of thing that has to be done locally though, and Hatrackers are too spread out for direct action. Coalitions are good, but we’re not likely to be forming an effective one online. Posts: 9866 | Registered: Apr 2002
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posted
I hope so too, Bob. I actually think that Tres had a few good points in his last post, even though he still insists on re-defining the label...and I doubt that will ever take hold.
But I can be sure that when I enter a debate like this I make sure that I let people know that I am pro-choice but not pro-abortion...meaning that I don't think abortions are the best solution to the problem.
That won't matter to most people who think about this issue as a black and white situation, but I rely care about those people's opinion anyway.
I DO think that it is the people in the middle who will have to do this, as the issues is too polarizing for a lot of people. We will have to be pretty thick-skinned too, because a lot of people who share our stance on the rights of women to have/not have abortions will see this coalition as a bunch of people who are merely placating the other side.....
But I think that in the long run it is people like that, who are willing to work together despite their difference, who will make a difference....and are already doing so.
My parents said to me that the way to make real, lasting changes in perception is person to person, not cause to cause....cause to cause is too impartial, and it becomes too easy to demonize the other side of the issue, too easy to forget their faces and names...that their sons and daughters play soccer with yours, and you have cookouts with them on Sundays.
When you realize that they are more like you than different, it becomes a lot harder to justify hatred, and harder to paint them as the enemy.
That is what they tried to teach us...not in so many words, but by th way they treat other people from all walks of life.
That type of respect is what will make something like your ideas work in the long run.
quote:Anyway, I have a problem with waiting until we change the nature of the debate. I seriously believe we'll still be talking about "legalize it or make it illegal" 10 years from now. I don't see "progress" in any direction on this.
I didn't intend to say we should wait. I'm just saying that the first step is to convince the people that moderates from both sides need to work together, and I think that is impossible unless the people can be convinced to look at the abortion contraversy in a different manner. If the debate is going to change someone must ACT to change it.
This is not an impossible task - it is a task a good ad campaign might be able to achieve, I think. But I have never seen any sort of broad effort to do so from the center. The advertising and promotion I have seen all tends to point people towards the extremes.
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posted
Having read the first four or five pages and the last one...
I would suggest that this organization should state as a core principle a position of neutrality on all laws regulating or bills attempting to regulate abortion in either direction.
A good policy might be one banning officers and/or those who speak for the organization from publically expressing opinions about any law concerning abortion.
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quote: A good policy might be one banning officers and/or those who speak for the organization from publically expressing opinions about any law concerning abortion.
Banning them from stating their opinion? Well, you can count me out then.
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Edit: I did put in "might". I think that if the names associated with a supposedly moderate organization expressed opinions on one side or the other, people on the opposite would feel the alliance was in name only. I could be wrong.
posted
MPH, why? I understand that you have a right to have your own opinion, but why would it be such a big thing to ask that you not speak in a public forum while holding office in a group like this?
You would still be free to hold whatever opinion you want, but you couldn't use this new group, made up of different opinions, to push for any legalization/delegalization, unless you were willing to give up the office. Even then you couldn't violate the nutrality of the group on those issues by claiming that you spoke with the groups sanction one way or another.
I also don't think that it would apply to people who were involved in the group but not holding office, as long as they didn't try and use the meetings for their own agendas.
Basically it would be saying that if you are in a position to speak for the whole group in public then you can't put out a message that the group as a whole doesn't agree on.
posted
I understand that you wouldn't want the senior officers going out and active campaigning for one side or the other.
There's a big difference between not speaking about it in public, and not being allowed to speak about it in public. That's just something that I wouldn't be willing to give up.
Everybody has an opinion about whether it should be outlawed or not. Pretending that you don't have an opinion doesn't make you more objective -- it just makes you more weasley.
edit: It wouldn't be a good idea for officers or spokesmen to go out spouting their opinion, but if they are outright asked "What is your personal opinion?", why shouldn't they be able to say "My personal opinion is that it should be [il]legal, but that doesn't really matter for what we are talking about here."?
posted
I deal with this issue constantly in a professional association of volunteers that I work in. There are some members who just don't "get it." They go into places and situations and express their opinion in the same presentation that they talk about the organization. It causes us (the organization) no end of embarrasment and sometimes outright hostility from our major backers.
We are addressing it by creating a policy, finally, that will say specifically that our organization does not endorse any xxx, etc. And we may go so far as to have to have disciplinary actions spelled out for those who REPEATEDLY aren't careful in how they present their views when talking about OUR organization.
It's a tough call. Most people are professional enough to know what's right and to make it clear when they are expressing a personal opinion. But there are always those who will use the name of an organization to give their own views some measure of authority.
Sadly, no matter how much we ask these people to behave themselves, they may continue to go too far because they feel as if they (the individual) are the organization. Some will eventually need to be kicked out (or smacked down).
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posted
That makes complete sense. Of course, there's a big difference between not using the name of the organization and not being allowed to speak your personal opinion in public.
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posted
And this is one of the most important points that we would have to clear up. If a person acts like he speaks for the group than most of the people he speaks to will believe that...and the end result may alienate the very people we are trying to reach.
I would say that the official position o this would be for the person to say that he cannot discuss it while giving a persentation, but that he would be willing to discuss it after, making it clear that he is NOT speaking for the group.
Another approch would be to send people out in pairs, one pro-life and one pro-choice, and making our diversity a selling point rather than a distraction. Neither would be able to speak about it during the presentation without the other mentioning his views as well, emphisising that we are working TOGETHER to achive some real results.
quote: I would say that the official position o this would be for the person to say that he cannot discuss it while giving a persentation, but that he would be willing to discuss it after, making it clear that he is NOT speaking for the group.
Something like this could work well.
quote: Another approch would be to send people out in pairs, one pro-life and one pro-choice, and making our diversity a selling point rather than a distraction. Neither would be able to speak about it during the presentation without the other mentioning his views as well, emphisising that we are working TOGETHER to achive some real results.
I don't like this idea -- isn't the point that it doesn't matter what your views on the legality of abortion is, you can still work work for the common cause? I don't like the idea of segregating according to beliefs within the organization -- Oh, you're pro-life, so you can't go to this function. We need a pro-choice person.
posted
I see your point, but that way each viewpoint would be representd.
Making it clear that we can and will work together well, and that anyone who is interested can join with us, provided they are willing to work side by side with people who have a different viewpoint on these issues.
How about just making sure that both sides are represented, but not limiting how many go anywhere? I just think it is important that people would see both sides working together in these issues...lots of groups CLAIM to be tolerant, but this way we would be able to show people we are, and that it works.
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