Check Your Privilege

[Farm Boy]

Again, I think you are missing my point, the problem is not so much the priests, as it is the church leadership enabling them and helping those priests out who do sexually molest kids.

The uncles you speak of have no higher authority to turn to, to protect them. Priests do.

You don't need a higher authority to be protected. You only need the people around you. What the higher authority offers, semi uniquely in this instance, is the promise of self policing to make them better than the general population and a creed that kinda sorta obligates them to.

 

[abradley]

I don't think you understand what I am getting at. It's not the rates that are the problem, really, but rather that a global organization, representing literally billions, is enabling child molesters, and has for decades in the past, and who knows how long before that.

That the rates overall might be comparable to "the norm" is beside the point - the point is that church leadership has been enabling this for quite a while. Like, actively helping these people by moving them around and making sure they don't get caught.

One child getting sexually molested by their uncle is an entirely different story. If that uncle belonged to let's say the U.S. federal government, an organization representing 350 million (or whatever), and that organization was enabling him and helping him out, moving him from state to state so that he can continue molesting without getting caught or arrested.. Do you see how that would be a much much bigger problem and cause for worry? ANd in this case it is an organization literally representing billions, and not "just" 350 million.

The church blew it, hopefully it learned it's lesson.

When you get down to it, what do we know about it, IIRC all we know is some priests did it and some people in authority covered it up. A few names and that's about all.

Do you know of a thorough secular investigation that took it all the way to the top? I don't.

I would think there would be articles galore citing facts if it was actually being covered up in high places.

There are to many people like Hitchens who would love nothing better then to state facts rather than generalities.

 

[warpus]

Unfortunately the only lesson they seem to have learned is "We need to be more careful next time"

I haven't seen anything from the church that their stance has changed, nor have I ever heard of them handing over a priest to the cops. But granted, I could be wrong.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

The difference is, I listen to the people who have. You don't.

a) You don't know who I listen to. The fact that you always talk of "women" and "minorities" as homogenous groups who all think the same thing just illustrates that there must be a whole swathe of people who you don't listen to either. Plus you seem to be using "listen to" as a synonym for "do not question".

b) "Do not think for yourself and instead just accept as gospel what other people tell you" is a really, really bad argument.

First, that's how many actually happen, not how many could potentially happen if women had all the access required.

You need to demonstrate that there is more demand than these clinics can cater for. It goes back to what I was saying about capacity vs demand. You need to show that the clinics do not have the capacity for the demand that exists, or at least that they are running at are close to capacity, which may at least indicate that there is a greater demand.

Second, they aren't spread evenly across all states, as population is not distributed in this way.

I didn't say spread evenly across all states, I said spread evenly with population. I'm pretty sure population is distributed evenly with respect to population.

Third, there are over 12 million women in Texas. Can you tell me which ones will need an abortion in a given year? Of course not. Medical services need to be available to everyone who might need them. With 2 abortion clinics in Texas remaining, that leaves each one responsible for providing abortion services to 6 million women. That doesn't mean that all 6 million will use the service, but that the service provider is responsible for meeting the needs of those 6 million women.

People don't build hospitals with enough capacity to cope if every single person in their area got sick and needed treatment all at the same time. This would be extremely inefficient and most likely not possible at all. Similarly there is no point building a clinic that can cope with 6 million women a year if you know that it will only need to treat 50,000. In fact that's the beauty of having such a large number as 12 million - while it's pretty much impossible to predict the circumstances of any particular women, it's more than possible to quite accurately predict the trends of such a large group as a whole.

Fourth, even if there was enough staff and services physically capable of handling the demand, proximity is another huge factor. You wouldn't say that a single colossal hospital complex in Kansas, capable of handling 300 million patients, was adequately covering the entire United States for its health care needs, would you?

Abortion isn't an emergency procedure that requires rapid response and rapid transit to the hospital. Nor is it an ongoing condition that requires regular treatment over an extended period. As these two criteria are the main reasons for having local hospitals then it isn't a fair comparison.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

You're totally right. You, as a man, know women's issues and needs better than women do. Because they're totally incapable and unqualified to figure that out themselves. Whereas you, by virtue of being a man, not only are blessed with the knowledge but also the right to deliver it to them over their own protests!

 

[Ryika]

Manfred Belheim brought forward some arguments that, at least on the surface, seem to be good rebuttals to the claims made by Cheezy the Wiz, the masses are now waiting for his response to the points that were laid out by Manfred Belheim. It was a decent fight so far, with hard-hitting punches on both sides and... - oh, there he goes, Cheezy the Wiz brings his argument! It's.. oh... oh, no! He tries to counter the arguments by using identity politics, claiming that his arguments can't possibly be right because Manfred Belheim is a man! Apparently we did not realize how much Manfred Belheim had backed him into the corner, left him with no answers left desperately trying to stay in the ring, but of course - as expected the referee see through that tactic immediately - Cheezy the Wiz... got disqualified!

 

[Flying Pig]

Abortion isn't an emergency procedure that requires rapid response and rapid transit to the hospital. Nor is it an ongoing condition that requires regular treatment over an extended period. As these two criteria are the main reasons for having local hospitals then it isn't a fair comparison.

Not really. You want local healthcare facilities so that people can get minor issues - minor injuries such as a speck in the eye from metalwork gone wrong, for example, or a broken wrist from a nasty fall - sorted out without causing massive queues at a distant centre with much better things to do, or can obtain everyday advice and medication even if they don't have the time or resources to travel a long distance. British healthcare is essentially organised in spiders' webs, with major surgery and pretty much anything ending in -ology happening in city hospitals, and local hospitals and health centres mostly existing for triage, A&E and dispensing medication.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Not really. You want local healthcare facilities so that people can get minor issues - minor injuries such as a speck in the eye from metalwork gone wrong, for example, or a broken wrist from a nasty fall - sorted out without causing massive queues at a distant centre with much better things to do, or can obtain everyday advice and medication even if they don't have the time or resources to travel a long distance. British healthcare is essentially organised in spiders' webs, with major surgery and pretty much anything ending in -ology happening in city hospitals, and local hospitals and health centres mostly existing for triage, A&E and dispensing medication.

Well... isn't that kind of what I said? A&E & triage are the "emergency procedure/rapid response" part of what I said, and dispensing medication certainly fits into the "ongoing treatment over a regular period" part of what I said, although admittedly it doesn't have to be ongoing. But even thought hospitals obviously contain pharmacies and dispense medication, I wouldn't say this is where most people would go for it unless it coincided with treatment they were having there. Most people would get it from a local chemist associated with a Doctor's surgery.

But anyway, this doesn't really detract from the main point of what I was saying which is that abortion isn't an emergency or an ongoing procedure and so it isn't (necessarily) fair to compare the geographic distribution of clinics specifically for that with more general medical facilities.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

It's.. oh... oh, no! He tries to counter the arguments by using identity politics, claiming that his arguments can't possibly be right because Manfred Belheim is a man!

If only it had been even as generous as that. At least "you're not qualified to have an opinion on this as a man" would have been an honest argument, even if one I would have no truck with. Instead it was closer to libel than anything else, whilst simultaneously not answering any of my points. Not exactly surprising, but disappointing nonetheless.

 

[Flying Pig]

Well... isn't that kind of what I said? A&E & triage are the "emergency procedure/rapid response" part of what I said, and dispensing medication certainly fits into the "ongoing treatment over a regular period" part of what I said, although admittedly it doesn't have to be ongoing. But even thought hospitals obviously contain pharmacies and dispense medication, I wouldn't say this is where most people would go for it unless it coincided with treatment they were having there. Most people would get it from a local chemist associated with a Doctor's surgery.

But anyway, this doesn't really detract from the main point of what I was saying which is that abortion isn't an emergency or an ongoing procedure and so it isn't (necessarily) fair to compare the geographic distribution of clinics specifically for that with more general medical facilities.

I thought you had in mind the sort of thing which involves people arriving on ambulances or being rushed into surgery, which isn't usually what happens in small hospitals. Usually it's people who can sit happily in the waiting room for an hour, before receiving a not-too-complicated diagnosis and treatment. If you're having a heart attack or major bleeding, you don't want to be in one of those. The defining factor seems to be the presence of specialists: you have a lot of generalists at the small-town hospitals, but rarely specialists - think cardiologists, oncologists, radiologists and so on. With that in mind, I suspect our model would put nearly all abortions in the city hospitals - still within half an hour's mad dash in an ambulance, but a fair distance from a lot of people.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Well to be fair my main point was just that it was an apples/oranges comparison to compare abortion clinics with general medical facilities and hospitals. Maybe I shouldn't have been quite so specific with my "two main reasons" if I wasn't going to go into it properly and just stuck at the general level instead.

 

[Cheezy the Wiz]

It has nothing to do with identity politics and everything to do with situation. Manfred isn't a woman, doesn't have to deal with this stuff, and can't possess a better understanding of any of those things than women can. That's a simple fact. So yeah, given the choice between lectur-y man who thinks he knows better than women, and women talking about their own situations, I'm going to choose the women. Because I'm not a chauvinist who talks over women and mansplains their own issues to them and what is and is not a problem for them.

Guess that's just "PC gone mad" to some people. And those people should reflect long and hard about just who they think they're helping with an attitude like that.

 

[Ryika]

You're not a woman either and you're not representing all women, at best you're representing the women you've spoken to, and these women aren't automatically right just because they're more affected by the issue. People have opinions that are unrealistic, people have opinions that are selfish and people have opinions that are driven by false information.

In fact, listening to only the people who are or may be affected by something is a silly thing to do, because resources are not endless, so there's always a ratio of cost and benefit that needs to be juggled. People who are affected by something will always push towards as much benefit as possible, while being prone to ignoring the influx in cost.

Aside from that nothing that he has said was based on anything that requires "personal experience", the facts surrounding the issue are openly visible to anyone and can therefore be discussed by everyone.

 

[useless]

It has nothing to do with identity politics and everything to do with situation. Manfred isn't a woman, doesn't have to deal with this stuff, and can't possess a better understanding of any of those things than women can. That's a simple fact. So yeah, given the choice between lectur-y man who thinks he knows better than women, and women talking about their own situations, I'm going to choose the women. Because I'm not a chauvinist who talks over women and mansplains their own issues to them and what is and is not a problem for them.

Guess that's just "PC gone mad" to some people. And those people should reflect long and hard about just who they think they're helping with an attitude like that.

This is why manfred's opinion is less valid than say, an actual woman, who has had to go through the entire debacle that is accessing an abortion in her state, but i await the inevitable "Oh you're bigoted/misandrist" for pointing this out.

 

[Flying Pig]

There's something in Ryika's sentiment, I think: to take it to extremes, presumably you don't extend these people's authority so far that you'd smile and nod if they said that access to abortion was the biggest problem in daily life, and that the best solution to that would be to call in the military to start providing abortions. So there's a point at which you can disagree even from a position of inexperience: particularly if we're talking about the importance of a problem relative to other problems, you can expect people with a personal stake in it to have a bit of an inflated view. Ask an admiral what the most important use of the government's budget is, then ask a teacher.

 

[NovaKart]

I'd also ask if male feminists would back down from arguing in favor of abortion when discussing it with those women who are against abortion because they are women.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

It has nothing to do with identity politics and everything to do with situation. Manfred isn't a woman, doesn't have to deal with this stuff, and can't possess a better understanding of any of those things than women can. That's a simple fact. So yeah, given the choice between lectur-y man who thinks he knows better than women, and women talking about their own situations, I'm going to choose the women. Because I'm not a chauvinist who talks over women and mansplains their own issues to them and what is and is not a problem for them.

Guess that's just "PC gone mad" to some people. And those people should reflect long and hard about just who they think they're helping with an attitude like that.

It's funny you say all that because the only one of us who is talking on behalf of women is you, not me (you regularly seem to think you're a spokesman for all sorts of groups actually). I don't quite see how you can see me arguing with your logic/reasoning about numbers and statistics as "telling women what to do" or "talking over women". I think there is some serious logical disconnect going on in your brain.

And as I said it IS disappointing because, up until that point, I felt like we were having a reasonable discussion for the first time ever. You also obviously know more than me about the specifics of abortion services in the US, so I was also trying to learn something. However, because I point out (what I see as) logical flaws in your reasoning, suddenly you start singing the theme tune to Two and a Half Men at me in lieu of a logical response. So yes, disappointing.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

You're not a woman either and you're not representing all women, at best you're representing the women you've spoken to, and these women aren't automatically right just because they're more affected by the issue.

While I totally agree with this, you're totally missing the point that I wasn't disagreeing with him about the opinions of women he's spoken to, or claims to speak for, I was disagreeing with him about his own reasoning regarding the numbers and the unfair comparison between abortion services and general medical services. I haven't passed comment on anything any women have said, I haven't told any women what they should think, and I haven't claimed to speak on behalf of anyone but myself. Cheezy is entirely misdirecting the discussion into who has more right to speak on behalf of women when it was never about that at all. Don't play into his hands.

 

[Farm Boy]

I'd also ask if male feminists would back down from arguing in favor of abortion when discussing it with those women who are against abortion because they are women.

Pro-life women, presumably, are merely reflecting the patriarchy. So when you discount them you're not actually discounting them, you're discounting their subversion by men. Or something.

 

[Manfred Belheim]

Pro-life women, presumably, are merely reflecting the patriarchy. So when you discount them you're not actually discounting them, you're discounting their subversion by men. Or something.

They'd never say such a thing. That would be denying those women a voice and their own agency, which is precisely the kind of thing they're dead against.