Because I have this problem where I can't just leave well enough alone, I sometimes read the Twitter feeds and blogs of people who are basically targets of my disdain otherwise, which is, frankly, not healthy. To be fair, they said stupid things first; I just read them and get inordinately (perhaps even FROTHILY) pissy.
Thankfully, I am not blazing new ground here - the classic Fire Joe Morgan blog set this kind of template for us years ago, and I'm just following in their giant bitchy footsteps. Also I spend a lot of time on Deadspin. A LOT OF TIME. Anyway, that's what gave me the inspiration to stop getting mad... and start getting (selectively) snarky.
Someone I've known for a number of years has, inexplicably, been caught in the foul-smelling winds of the current faux-servative movement that has sprung up with a vengeance in the years since the 2008 election. And hell, good for that person, if that person were, in any true sense of the word, "creative" about their approach to the whole "parroting the narrative of one particularly loud sector of the shithole that is the current American political system" -
BUT -
This person is not. This person IS a college graduate, which, at the moment, makes them higher-status than me (not everyone can pull off the "eight-or-so-years plan" with the kind of flair I bring to the table, y'all), and perhaps as a result, I would expect slightly better writing/reasoning from them, but as you'll see, this is not the case.
What IS the case is that the following piece you'll read (and have dissected by yours truly) is pretty well indicative of the self-congratulatory attitude that the more vocal wing of the "People's Liberation Front of the Non-Coffee Hot Beverage Variety" has adopted as their de rigueur method of approaching anything they disagree with other people on. Look, I appreciate being a dick just as much as anyone here - but do one of two things whilst taking this approach:
1) Be funny
2) Be accurate
If you can't do one or the other (or both, if you're feeling ambitious), then what's the point?
*wanking motion*
Ah, yes, that.
Anyway, I originally submitted a response because this person claimed that, quote, "if you take serious issue with any of my points on here, please direct them to the comments section on this post, and I will be sure to reply to you as soon as possible. I am always up for a debate on abortion, all I ask is that it be done on the proper forum." So I did, but it turns out that it's one of those things where the blog owner has to approve the comment, which is HIGHLY convenient when there's a chance that someone might take the things you say at their face value... and call you out on them. Once I realized that my little fit of comment-rage wasn't going to have a shot at seeing the light of day, I done brung it over yonder.
Here's the source piece (for the sake of veracity) - and my response begins below...
Pro-Life: not because the church told me to be, but because biology, ethics, and a little algebra led me there.
"Pro-Life: I am TOTALLY not justifying my religious beliefs that I don't want held to any sort of reasonable scrutiny so these are my reasons that I came up with after the fact."
Any legitimate biology book and doctor will tell you that human life begins at conception.
Ah, yes, beginning with the ol' "No true Scotsman" fallacy. Good start. Because any disagreement here could not POSSIBLY be legitimate.
When the sperm penetrates the egg, new life is formed,
Aside from the already-living cells that this mixture contains. OMG ITS CELLULAR INCEPTION (also, HAHA, "penetrates")
which is an undeniable fact. It’s not alien life; it’s not zebra life; and it’s not polar bear life. Nothing can possibly come from that “blob of cells” besides a human. Ergo: human. life. period.
Nothing, except miscarriages, those too - which, to be clear, we don't hold pregnant women liable for negligence when those occur, do we? To say nothing of the fact that proper terms for these human precursors (i.e., cytoblast, zygote, fetus) existed before the abortion "debate" ever did, and I doubt that was merely some elaborate maneuvering of a liberal conspiracy of Communist Satan-worshiping doctors.
We'll skip the ethics section, because this entire section cannot stand on its own and is predicated by the previous section, so let's skip to conveniently-mis-explained math analogy:
This is an asymptote. (Dear math geniuses, please avert your eyes while I attempt to explain this. It won’t be pretty.) See how the curved line goes seems to slope down, but never quite touches the X-axis? Theoretically, this line will continue to slope downward infinitely, NEVER touching the X-axis. (editor's note: this is the picture that author used, for reference.)
And theoretically, it will also continue to slope upwards continuously, never touching the Y-axis, either, which must mean... *GASP* NONE OF US IS REALLY HUMAN HOLY BALLS THIS IS ALL AN ILLUSION MATRIX MATRIX WHERE IS NEO
To be fair, you said that this would be not completely accurate, math-wise, and that's fine - however, if you're gonna make an analogy, stick to analogies that don't have holes in them. You yourself said:
Now in my head, I think of the X-axis as the point of conception of human life.[...]Pro-lifers can all agree that the asymptote will NEVER touch the X-axis, no matter how much pro-choicers want it to.
Okay, so in keeping with your analogy, if the X-axis is the "point of conception," but said asymptote never touches it... waitaminute, does that mean that conception never occurs? And furthermore, doesn't that mean that you're REALLY saying that pro-lifers don't WANT it to touch the X-axis, i.e., for conception not to occur, and pro-choicers DO want it to occur? Hmmm... I'm getting some mixed messages here.
Math hint: honestly, what you were looking for in that particular analogy [and, in your defense, you were thinking along the right lines, just the wrong shape] is a curve that emerges quickly, cleanly, and firmly from the X-axis and ne'er comes the closer to it - so here are two suggestions:
1 - an exponential curve - pros: it can [roughly] be made to pass through near [but not at!] the origin (0,0) and never touch the X-axis after that; cons: if you want to get technical, prior to the origin it's getting all sorts of intimate [and then less so, in a -y fashion] with the X-axis, but I suppose we can just attribute that to like, pre-ejaculatory/pre-follicular-burst/pre-puberty/pre-birthOHGODHALLOFMIRRORSINCEPTIONAGAIN
2 - a cubed root curve, where x is >= 0 would also work, assuming you're willing to revise your "point of conception" to the Y-axis [side note: axes aren't points - they're lines, but now we're just being pedantic] and, again, ignore the shenanigans occurring to the "south" and "west" of the origin that still exist but are tragically forgotten... just like all the wasted sperm and eggs that never go on to create a human life [I'd like to put a number to this, but the best I can do is like something that's 40% of the ~105 billion humans [[estimated]] multiplied by 180 million [[average number of sperm per ejaculatory emission]] and frankly I tried to punch that into my calculator and it pulled a knife on me and backed slowly out of the room, but call it a BIG NUMBER] but it'd at least fit the analogy you're trying to make I guess?
You cannot undo conception. Our solution? Don’t draw the graph in the first place; i.e. don’t get pregnant!
BUT THE LINE NEVER STARTS AND NEVER ENDS IT IS INFINITE AND THIS IS WHY WE DO NOT USE TORTURED MATHEMATICAL ANALOGIES
Now, doesn’t this make us sound just a little naive when we use terms like “blob of cells”?
Hey, you know what's naive? Forcefully shoving analogies into places they aren't designed to go.
But so yo', that's a reply.
1 comment:
Bahahahaha! Love you.
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