Okay.
I sort of alluded to this next question.
The third audience question today is, David does a middle ground on abortion exist?
I heard you mentioned on the Joe Rogan program that you can't include any crazy idea in the
discussion, but is there a middle ground on the issue of abortion?
There is a middle ground on the issue of abortion only when you've narrowed the conversation
in a pretty significant way.
And what I mean by that is if your position is abortion is murder and it should be illegal,
I don't know how you find a middle ground with that person that has any kind of legal
abortion.
I mean the fundamentals of how different political factions see abortion as an issue.
A unfortunately prevent productive dialogue.
And a lot of ways, my view is that this shouldn't even be a discussion.
There are lots of legal medical procedures that if we see a video of may be repelling
in some way.
This for me includes, you know, I don't want to watch a heart bypass.
I don't think it should be illegal.
Doesn't mean I want to watch abortions, but that doesn't mean those should be illegal.
However, if you are brought to the table with someone who says any abortion is murder because
um, you know, one day after conception that is a person, I don't know how you actually
find a middle ground there.
Now I do think that what's really different about abortion than many other issues is the
outcome that the left and right at least claim to want.
And I believe do want is actually the same.
The left and right both don't want abortions.
So, so when you talk to the right, they don't want abortion to be legal or accessible because
they believe that it is murder.
When you talk to people on the left, they don't want abortions to be necessary and they
want to reduce the number with sex education and contraceptives and so on and so forth.
But they do believe that abortion should be legal and safe.
That's why it's been so interesting to see the resistance from the right to say, hey,
you know what?
The left actually does share the goal of reducing the number of abortions.
Empirical studies tell us how to do it and it's with safe, uh, and, and legal, uh, safe
and full and inexpensive access to birth control as well as comprehensive sex education.
They don't want that in.
A lot of this relates to what George Lakoff describes as strict father morality where
it doesn't fit into the moral framework of many on the right that you would be able to
have recreational, non procreative sex outside of a marriage and have a tool that prevents
pregnancy.
There's too many on the right who for moral reasons believe that sex should be two different
degrees between married heterosexual couples for the purposes of procreation.
And if you do choose to have a sex outside of marriage, then you don't deserve, it's
not right morally to have a way to prevent a pregnancy because that would be chaos.
And we know sort of all of the other beliefs that come with that.
Um, so the, the, the last thing I'll say on this is the right has very successfully actually
manage the issue of abortion despite the fact that over time the average position in the
United States on abortion has moved towards, I believe it should be legal in most cases,
more than half of the country.
And I believe that when the right continues to have these extreme positions sprinkled
in, at least any abortion should be illegal.
These marches for life, right to life marches where it gets completely wacky.
I mean really, really wacky speeches and crazy crazy stuff.
They pull the Overton window to the right and may benefit from this.
That's the reality.
It puts the pro choice contingent on having to defend even abortion being being legal
rather than getting to the real issues of providing contraception to people, sex, education,
et cetera.
So unfortunately the Wright has succeeded partially because they have used extreme positions
to pull the debate to the right, partially because their framing is really simple.
Abortion is murder and we shouldn't do it.
Where's the position on the left is not abortions all the time.
No matter what.
It's yes, we would like to reduce abortions, but you have to take into consideration, uh,
all of these other factors, et Cetera, et cetera.
And George Lakoff has written a lot about that as well.
Uh, send me your thoughts.
Is there something that we could call a middle ground on abortion when one side of the debate
believes that any abortion is birth murder, they should all be against the law and all
sorts of different people should be punished, whether it's the doctors, the mothers, or
whoever else.
Let me know what you think.
We've got a great bonus show coming up for you today.
Become a member or a patron to get instant access to the bonus.
So otherwise I will be back with you the new show on Monday