Top Abortion Law Firm Says Government Funded Abortion is a Human Right
By Susan Yoshihara, Ph.D.
(NEW YORK – C-FAM) A top abortion-rights law firm recently released its conclusion that the last decade of international legal trends indicate that abortion is not only an international human right, but that government funding is part of that right. They claim that the “vicious” health care debate in the United States over abortion funding shows that the U.S. is flouting international law.

In “Reproductive Rights at the Start of the 21st Century: Global Progress, Yet Backpedaling on Gains in U.S.,” the Center for Reproductive Rights (CRR) argues that “funding for abortion services has increasingly been recognized as a necessary tool for ensuring access to a fundamental human right.”

C-fam.org

We need to shout from the rooftops! True woman’s health is making sure her body, including her fertility system, does what it is designed to do. True woman’s freedom is the ability to choose to enjoy her sexuality within the context of marriage and family love so that she is not used as an object of pleasure and so that her sexuality fulfills the purpose of its power: to create family love.

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• Government has overstepped its bounds, once again meddling in affairs that should be left to market forces?

No

• the law puts undue burden on small business who now have to pay a higher premium to insure their employees?

No

• the law does not do enough to help children born deaf or severely hard of hearing?

Nope, not that either

So what is the complaint? It comes from Audism Free America:

The notion that being deaf is an affliction and an abomination which alienates one from society and leaves (one) dependent and isolated is a myth,” the petition states. “We do not wish for your state to be mislabeled as promoting eugenics and linguistic and cultural genocide.

Taken from “Ear-implant law draws dissent“, Wisconsin Rapids Daily Tribune.

What this petition seems to be saying is that deafness is not a disability but just another part of cultural diversity. Therefore, to mandate a procedure that could enable children who are deaf or severely hard of hearing to hear more is like trying to bleach African-American skin white so that African Americans can fit into a white culture better.

Such a ridiculous statement has its roots in modernism, the philosophy that truth is created by personal experience and perception. Modernism celebrates diversity, not because every human person has innate dignity, but because every individual has his own truth. In the case of the petition from Audism Free America, modernism is saying, “Who are you to call deafness a disability. From our perspective, deafness is normal and hearing is an abomination.” Yes, I have heard some proponents of “deaf culture” take the argument that far.

The problem with Audism free America’s position is that deafness is a disorder. Human nature includes the five senses as a normative and universal constituent. In other words, the senses make up part of what it means to be human, and a diminishment of the senses is a diminishment of something that a human person should have (however not a diminishment of their humanity or dignity). Therefore, deafness is a disability based on the standard of human health. Modernism does not believe in disability because it does not believe in a universal standard of human life or of human health.

The problem comes in how we look at disabilities. We tend to look at people with obvious and severe disabilities and say they are disabled and we are not. I have been around severely disabled people all of my life, and I have learned that there is no “they” and “us.” Fallen human nature is fallen for all of us. Disability is not a matter of having one or not having one, but a matter of degree and of kind. People who are disabled in one area of life are also extremely able in other areas of life. The term “disabled” becomes a problem only when we let it define a specific segment of the human family.

One can see the same line of thought in the homosexuality movement. The Church calls same-sex attraction “disordered” because it is opposed to the universal human purpose of sexuality. Modernists see this as an insult that alienates a specific segment of the population. However, the Church realizes that every person’s sexuality is disordered to one degree or another, so calling same-sex attraction disordered is actually a statement of solidarity, not one of divisiveness. Again, modernists rankle because they do not believe that a standard for “normal” sexuality even exists.

I had friends in high school and college who were deaf and hard of hearing, and I learned sign language in the course of our friendship. One of these friends had been brought up in the “deaf world” and had a difficult time relating to the “hearing.” The others tried very hard to interact with everybody, and counted a number of the “hearing” among their friends, even those who did not learn sign language. It was not the deafness that isolated them. In the case of my one friend, it was his desire to see his deafness as something that set him apart and his consequent unwillingness to form relationships with those who would not share his unique “culture.” He had implicitly bought the lie of modernism.

In the end, the petition from Audism Free America isolates deaf people from the rest of us by accentuating the differences rather than acknowledging the fact and universal nature of disability. And their modernist bent would keep children from getting help to overcome their disability. That is just not acceptable.

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One of the themes that Start Trek often plays with (in all of its generations) is that of alternate universes. These are some of the only episodes that I really can’t stomach. The reason I find them unpalatable is that they quite starkly show the futility of life without true self-determination. In the parallel universe theory, we all exist in an infinite number of universes. Every time we make a major choice in life, various realities are created in which we follow each choice. In Star Trek there is an alternate universe wherein the Federation is a warring, conquering alliance and the Enterprise crew are all self-serving (and sometimes downright evil), power-hungry, back-stabbing pirates.

Another theme that I cannot enjoy is that of time travel. Though not quite as bad as parallel universes, time travel also tends to do the same thing to free will. In time travel theory, any particular place in time has a past that created it and a future that it is creating. However, there is no solid anchor in time that might be considered the “true” time. Somebody could go back in time, make even a small change, and change our current timeline even to the point that we never existed. In many science fiction shows, multiple timelines are created through the manipulation of events and the “real” reality becomes uncertain or even lost. Some shows even bring up the quandary – which timeline has the right to exist?

Parallel universe theory and time travel theory (both only literary “theories” as far as I know) are a post-modernist’s dream. Modernism believe that truth is so complex that it is only knowable through multiple (even contradictory) perspectives to the next level. Post-modernism takes this belief to the next level to wonder if truth even exists at all. Post-modernism does not even believe in the solid existence of the self, but believes that the “self” is only a confluence of ideas that just happened to come together without any real reason or justification (in fact, post-modernists even believe that the idea of the “self” is created by social powers in order to keep track of us and influence us). Imagine if I were to suddenly discover that the person I considered myself to be – the sum total of the choices that I have made in my life – was just one possible “me” among many. My self-identity suddenly has no real meaning. I truly am just an accidental confluence of events. I am just one of many possible confluences that make up other “selfs.” All of these “selfs” have just as much claim on my identity and personhood as I do – that is to say, none at all. Time travel would really work the same way. My past self is just as real as my present self, as is my future self. Which “self” can truly claim my real identity?

Mind boggling? Hey! That’s science fiction for ya! Gotta love it. The comforting fact is that such a “reality” is only truly possible in fiction. There is absolutely no indication that parallel universes exist or that time travel is possible. There is absolutely no proof that modernism and post-modernism are right. In fact, they are completely untenable philosophies that only enjoy popularity by the intellectual elite because they “stick it to the man” in that old-fashioned, 60′s and 70′s sort of rebellious way.

To me, these episodes of Start Trek point out the ridiculousness of post-modernism by their very attempt to get us comfortable with the ideas of time travel and parallel universes. I take comfort in knowing that my personhood is truly mine, and that I am loved as a person by the author of all Truth.

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