The Humble Libertarian original

This dissenting comment left on my libertarian pro-life argument post was so good I had to share it: "What you miss - what you call evasive - is the fact that the fetus lives inside and is entirely dependent on the woman. So, even if the fetus does have rights, this is a clear case of a conflict of rights. Now, it's pretty clear that if we care about equality, we have to address the fact that women can have children. That can be a wonderful thing when you want it, but an oppressive experience otherwise. And this is where the conflict occurs. If you protect the rights of a fetus, you deny women a significant amount of freedom to choose the life she wants to live. This is why science won't help us here. If a fetus is fully a life and endowed with all rights, that just makes the resolution even harder. That's also why it is ridiculous to call it murder. I can't think of anywhere else in the world where you can find such a similar conflict of rights. The thing is,...

Doctors back euthanasia in severe dementia case : 'A 64-year-old woman suffering from severe senile dementia has become the first person in the Netherlands to be given euthanasia even though she could no longer express her wish to die, the Volkskrant reports on Wednesday. Euthanasia is legal in the Netherlands under strict conditions. For example, the patient must be suffering unbearable pain and the doctor must be convinced the patient is making an informed choice. The woman was a long-time supporter of euthanasia but became unable to make this clear as the disease progressed. Nevertheless, a medical committee approved her right to die, the paper says. The case has serious implications for Dutch euthanasia law because it means patients who are no longer able to state their wish can still be helped to die, Constance de Vries, who acts as a second opinion doctor for euthanasia cases, told the paper. The woman, who died in March, left a written statement when she was fully ...

Following a decision by the Obama Administration's Department of Health and Human Services to require insurance companies to cover abortion pills under ObamaCare, Ron Paul immediately released a statement blasting the Obama Administration for violating the conscience of individual Americans: "The Obama administration’s decision to mandate coverage of birth control and morning-after pills is payback to Planned Parenthood and big pharmaceutical companies for their support of Obamacare. This mandate violates the conscience of millions of pro-life Americans. In Congress, I have introduced H.R. 1099, the Taxpayer Freedom of Conscience Act, which removes all federal funding for domestic and international family planning. As President, I plan to defund Obamacare and all federal programs that use tax money taken from the American people to promote abortion. I pledge also to veto any bill with funding for Planned Parenthood or any other international family planning regimes....

Here at T H L we have been discussing the abortion issue very frequently of late, so I want to turn your attention to an excellent blog post by T H L co-founder and former contributor, Ben Bryan at his new philosophical blog: Casting Out Callicles . (Ben is a philosopher by trade, in addition to his background in political science. I highly recommend you subscribe to and read his enlightening work.) In a recent article, Ben outlines the fundamental questions of the abortion controversy and explains why the typical labels we use for "both sides" are inaccurate (in addition to being unnecessarily accusatory)...

The Tim Tebow ad really brought the abortion issue to the forefront of the American conversation over the past couple weeks. The "pro-choice" lobby showed everyone its true colors by finding that ad outrageous. Why wouldn't they be happy that a woman made a choice? Why wouldn't they appreciate that Tim Tebow was the result of that choice? They are pro- choice , right? Perhaps the ones that had a fit over the Tim Tebow ad are really just pro- abortion ? Grant Davies over at What We Think and Why had another epiphany about the pro-choice lobby in America while watching the Planned Parenthood response to the Tebow ad: For his part, Joyner explains; "My daughter will always be my little girl." He goes on to say; "But I am proud everyday as I watch her grow up to be her own person, a smart, confident young woman. I trust her to take care of herself. We celebrate families by supporting our mothers, by supporting our daughters. By trusting women." Exc...

A reader wrote in to point out this article : Two former professional athletes are calling for the "respect of women's choices" in response to the upcoming Super Bowl advertisement featuring the pro-life birth story of college football standout Tim Tebow... In a statement accompanying the video, Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards said Tebow's story was "compelling," but added that every woman must be able to make important medical decisions for herself and her family. "The Tebow story underlines what Planned Parenthood has learned from the millions of women doctors and nurses at its health centers have cared for over nearly a century," Richards' statement read. "Women take decisions about their health very seriously. They consider their doctors’ advice, they talk with their loved ones and people they trust, including religious leaders, and they carefully weigh all considerations before making the best decision for themselves and ...

Skyler Collins asked for my thoughts on this article about "evictionism" -which concedes the pro-life position that a fetus is entitled to rights (i.e. we must not kill them), but also concedes the pro-choice argument that women have a right to their own bodies. The evictionist compromise then, is that a woman cannot kill her fetus, but she can evict it if the doctor does so in a "gentle manner" that is simply intended to remove the fetus rather than to kill it. A central component of this theory is that fetal viability occurs earlier and earlier as technology advances, allowing us to respect the woman's right to choose while simultaneously respecting the baby's right to life. Here is a video in which the theory's foremost proponent Walter Block , explains and defends eviction: Criticisms of Evictionism Here's what I told Skyler: I think subjecting a child to the danger inherent in something like "gentle eviction" is tantamoun...

Let's set the record straight on George Tiller's murder and the reaction of the pro-life movement to it. I contend that the pro-life movement is overwhelmingly peaceful and composed mostly of peace-loving, life-loving, non-violent members who wouldn't even consider using violence to spread their message and who abhor so-called "pro-life" activists who take it upon themselves to shoot abortionist doctors. I also like to use the pro-life movement as a shining example of a movement that does a fantastic job of policing its members and issuing clear, unequivocal condemnations of militant fringe members. All popular political movements have to deal with fringe elements that they are not so proud of, and who do harm to their message and cause by mingling it with hatred, lies, fear-mongering, strange conspiracy theories, or even militancy. Some groups handle it better than others by making it clear where they stand and by going out of their way to distance themselves fro...

A while back I posted the remarkable statistic that Abortion Is The #1 Killer of Black Americans . I want to highlight a part of the debate that took place in the comment thread of that post regarding "a woman's right to choose." One libertarian left this comment : To be against abortion is to deny self-ownership (of the woman over her own body) and is therefore unlibertarian. The "humanness" of the embryo/fetus is irrelevant to the question. Either we have sovereignty over our own bodies or we do not, period. How can you, as a "libertarian", tell a woman who has been a victim of rape and become pregnant, that she has no right to decide what remains inside her body? And I want you to read my response : I agree that human beings have sovereignty over their own bodies and a right to be free from coercion. In the case of rape, it is the rapist who has violated that right by putting the fetus there, not the government which then must act to protect the f...