piisalie has commented here before, but not under that same handle. Anyway, here is where we are right now.
Rhology
@piisalie $350 mil is only "absurdly small" if u r numb 2 what money like that rly means. It's not small. Would u like a $350 mil gift card?
Rhology
@piisalie Wrt "war", you'll have to be more specific. Which war?
Rhology
@piisalie Since PP is clearly OK with aiding major crimes like sex trafficking minors, "but they do good!" arguments don't interest me much.
1) piisalie @Rhology my point is, if you defund PP, it would spike, if not double or worsen the ab rate.
2) piisalie @Rhology They are not aiding in sex crimes, they first provide services to help. Didn't Jesus help prostitutes?
3) piisalie @Rhology that argument only makes sense if you are numb to what the fed budget is, or are unable to grasp large numbers.
4) piisalie @Rhology Any war that involves killing of innocents.
See what I mean? I'd like to continue here by responding to each. I've numbered them to keep them straight.
1) Defunding the largest abortion provider in the USA, thus driving up their costs (since they wouldn't be getting all those gov't subsidies) would raise the abortion rate?
a. What about all those ppl who like to remind us that PP is all about contraception and raising awareness? Wouldn't PP have to constrict, tighten its belt, in order to continue to offer its most important services, while trimming the fat? Or is it that, contrary to what we keep hearing from the PP apologists, abortions really are their stock and trade and their favorite activity? What happened to safe, legal, and rare? As far as I can tell, they and their ilk are only interested in the "legal" part of that triumvirate. So, if they stopped funding contraception and all that stuff and focused on abortions, seems to me that the blame would rest squarely on their shoulders, not on the shoulders of those calling for reform.
b. How does that work, economically speaking, if PP were indeed to cut its abortion offerings or raise the price? Does piisalie expect new abortuaries to spring up overnight to provide the spike he's warning of?
2) Clearly piisalie hasn't watched the videos and is thus just dealing in ignorance now. He truly needs to educate himself.
Yes, Jesus helped prostitutes. I admit I missed the part in His ministry where He aided and abetted those who were exploiting children as sex slaves, pimping out their sexual services for money, so it would be great if piisalie could point it out to me. Any translation of the Bible will suffice.
Also, he did not respond to my counterargument. Just b/c PP does some good things does not mean they should not be held accountable for the very bad things they've been shown to be doing and willing to do. I'd like to ask piisalie to consider that almost never is anyone wholly evil. Does he think Charles Manson never petted a dog or watered a plant or something? Something, yet that doesn't stop us from making decisions about whether ppl/groups are sufficiently evil to stop supporting them. I don't know if anyone would argue that aiding and abetting the sex trafficking of minors is not a big deal.
Rather, supporters of PP argue that that's not really how it went down. I think they're kidding themselves - the ppl on the vids said what they said, and why else fire some of the employees if they did everything like they were supposed to?
3) piisalie accuses me of losing sight of how small $350 million is, which is approximately how much PP received in taxpayer money last year. Since the new proposed US budget is over $3 trillion, how much difference does $350 million make?
It's amazing to hear liberals talk like that. I don't even know what to say, except to marvel at piisalie's amazing economic ignorance.
4) piisalie asked me earlier: @Rhology What of war? We have spent orders of magnitude more on war, do you oppose that?
Is piisalie aware of any war that does not involve killing innocents? What does that mean? This enforced brevity is one of Twitter's weaknesses, so hopefully piisalie can flesh out what he means in more detail here. Deliberately targeting innocents? Collateral damage, accidental involvement of innocents? How does he define innocent? Is whether innocents get caught in the crossfire sometimes his only measure of whether a war is justifiable?
120 characters? You're not convincing me to sign up for twitter. I guess it teaches you to write wtht vwls.
ReplyDeleteNice post btw.
Thank you for making me out to look like a moron. I usually do quite a job of this myself, however it is nice to have help every now and then.
ReplyDeleteI guess you accidentally left out all of the statistics you and I posted supporting our positions. I has also become apparent that you have trouble debating without resorting to sarcasm and personal attacks.
One of the attacks was focused on my ability to perceive large numbers. This is true, everyone has this difficulty. We are simply not akin to perceiving much larger than what we can count with our hands. You exemplified this very point when you rounded the budget to $3 trillion. It is actually $3.69 trillion. $0.69t = $690b // $690b is aprox 1971*$350m You just rounded out 1971 times the amount we spend on Planned Parenthood as a whole, thats not the amount they spend on abortions (something closer to $10 million, you rounded that out something like 6900 times).
For the second part, I would like to apologize for ever starting the discussion in the first place. It has become abundantly clear we have two completely different world views resulting in debates that are quite counter-productive. I have only a short time to be alive, and I would prefer to spend it writing about things that I actually care about, and spending time with my children.
ReplyDeleteSo I'll leave you by reposting my stats, you may make of it what thou will. Have a great day!
According to the budget documents you linked:
PP prevented unwanted pregnancies for 3.889 million. The ab's they provided were only about a tenth of that or 3% of their budget spending.
Aprox 20% of unwanted pregnancies end in abortion.
http://bit.ly/h8D2Of
What will happen if we suddenly the 3.889 million people who don't want a child pregnant? Well the abortion rate would rise, which would be counterproductive to your goals. Is Planned Parenthood perfect? No, but nothing is. Demanding reform would be a much more pragmatic means of making your point and actually getting something done in my humble opinion.
piisalie,
ReplyDeleteWell, making you look like a moron wasn't my intention. :-) I hope you can understand that.
But it was my intention to make your arguments look bad, b/c they are. But it's very important to quote ppl correctly.
I didn't "leave out" anything in particular. I told ppl where to find you, I linked to your profile. Your accusation is not fair.
As for your stats, PP obviously lies to cover up felonies. Doesn't surprise me they'd lie to cover up their involvement in abortion, which is legal.
Here, take a look.
Finally, you are still just really missing the boat on this money and numbers thing. $350 million is a lot of money. Do you really have no concept of how in trouble this country is, fiscally speaking? Do you think the nat'l gov't can keep running a huge deficit annually, unto perpetuity? Wake up.
Well, if you want to apologise, I accept, but I don't believe you wronged me. True, we have diff views, but I hope to change your mind. Failing that, I hope to show others why your view is incorrect and indeed awful. The latter we have accomplished. The former I still pray for.
ReplyDeleteYour naked assertion about abortions rising fails to take many things into acct. If there were fewer providers, how would the number of abortions rise? What about the issues I brought up in the post? Why do you think that 3.889 million MORE ppl would end up pregnant? Is there no other way to get a condom? Do none of these ppl have any disposable income? You've gotta think about these things a little more deeply than the NARAL talking points, piisalie.