In case we haven't beaten the abortion horse to death yet

[rusmeister]

Off to work now, so I'll have to read later. Bear in mind, though, that, while you said, "I'll do my best to explain my understandings and connect you to sources...", and I said, "I'd be interested in hearing your understanding...", you are not explaining your understandings.

I know - but that IS what I understand and saves me at least (edit) 90 minutes of typing.

What I would add to all of that is that if a person approaches the issue from the starting assumption that there is a battle between the sexes, that men are trying to (and always have tried to) domineer women, and the most important thing is power and equality of the same kind and on the same terms, and nothing is more important than this, they won't see anything else. No explanation of any sort would ever satisfy them, because their first assumptions won't accept it.

[rusmeister]

When you say "guilt inculcated into me", I again see assumptions based on your knowledge of the western theology you were familiar with that I myself do not and cannot espouse.

That may be what you see, but that's not what I mean.

Hi again, Ali,
You may not mean it, but that's what I see. You'd have to be familiar with Eastern assumptions about Christianity and be able to compare them to what you yourself experienced in order to be able to see that the assumptions ARE based on Western Christianity as you know it. Certainly, some of the things you say as blanket expressions about Christianity are N/A to Eastern Christianity.

When you send a little kid to church, he/she picks up on a lot of stuff. Part of what kids pick up is "you're gonna go to Hell if you do X," but another part is the warm, fuzzy, coming-home feeling of being with your parents, who love you. It's what dukkha's talking about when he says he can no longer agree with the Catholic Church's teachings but he misses the ceremonial stuff. It's spiritual comfort food. (It's also part of the reason why Wicca uses the same basic format for its rituals as the Christian Church uses for its services -- because that's the format that the creators of ceremonial magick were familiar with, and Wicca inherited it.)

Here I would largely agree. Certainly the children experiences church in the context of family, hopefully in love as well, and that would certainly be a positive connection to church. Of course, when you say, "you're gonna go to Hell if you do X," you are expressing precisely what we don't express. That is part of the western juridical approach, which started with formulas that developed in the Roman West over centuries prior to the Reformation, and its interpretations were retained by the so-called Reformers even as they were rejecting the forms. Thus, the western "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" was possible, something not possible in Orthodoxy.

The church does this deliberately, of course. It's concerned with kids' immortal souls, sure. But it also wants to get 'em young. It wants them to feel like they're missing something if they don't go to church, and to feel like they've "come home" whenever they do go back.

You couldn't help but pick up on this, rus. No matter how you eventually felt about your parents' religious persuasion, you were programmed to *want* to go back to church. And I misspoke before; it wasn't just because of guilt, but also because you perceived church as a safe haven.

Again, agreed - although my father was not a believer and did not participate in church or much of my childhood. However, it's beginning to sound like the framing of a sinister plot. Any organization, be it family, school or church, is going to want to teach children the things it perceives to be most important while they are young. It is the logical thing to do.

In my own case, I got along fine (as it seemed to me) without faith as an adult for 20 years, and it was intellect/reason - Lewis and Schmemann, to be specific, and not fuzzy sentimental feelings about my past - that led me back. Indeed, it led me to reject the faith of my childhood and all of that familiar stuff - the hymns, practices, etc that could have been sentimentally driven, and led me into something rather alien to that childhood experience.

So yes, I do recognize the impact of indoctrination, but think that my own case is evidence that it does not necessarily have to be the driving factor.

I was raised as far outside the church as it's possible to be in this allegedly Judeo-Christian nation. Dad was brought up Catholic but turned atheist in his 20s. Mom wasn't much of anything. I never went to *any* church 'til friends in grade school invited me. I wasn't baptized Episcopal 'til I was in my late 30s (obviously it didn't take ).

So when you try to say that I haven't pursued an adult understanding of Christianity, you're wrong.

What I *do* have, in abundance, is an outsider's view of the Christian faith. The Big Picture, if you will. And I just don't see the Truth there that you profess to see. What I see -- when I get past the people on all the different branches shouting that their interpretation of The Book is the Real Truth -- what I see at the root of the tree is a whole lot of concepts that just don't feel right to me. I do not sense Truth in them. And no amount of "talking to experts" is going to change that for me -- it just feels like those experts are trying to sell me a product that I have no use for.

I suppose I could hedge my bets and join a church -- even, hey, the Orthodox Church! -- just in case there really is a Hell and everything else they say is also true. But then I wouldn't be true to my own beliefs. And if I am not true to myself, then I am truly lost.

I apologize if you got me as saying that you hadn't pursued an adult understanding. I was already aware that you had. I merely think that understanding - and all understandings born of the Protestant reformation (a misnomer if there ever was one) - to be far shallower than the one I have found. I think, for example, that the ideas of hell in the West - the ones you are familiar with - are primitive and that unbelievers rightly reject them.

Here's a 9-minute podcast I listened to on the bus this last week that would help illustrate that:
ancientfaith.com/podcasts/carlton/hell_a_modest_proposal

(I hope this post is coherent. I got interrupted approximately 873 times while I was composing it...)

Sounds familiar. In my case, 4 kids and a wife'll do it.

[Fist and Faith]

Here I would largely agree. Certainly the children experiences church in the context of family, hopefully in love as well, and that would certainly be a positive connection to church. Of course, when you say, "you're gonna go to Hell if you do X," you are expressing precisely what we don't express. That is part of the western juridical approach, which started with formulas that developed in the Roman West over centuries prior to the Reformation, and its interpretations were retained by the so-called Reformers even as they were rejecting the forms. Thus, the western "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" was possible, something not possible in Orthodoxy.

From what I was told, the Jehovah's Witnesses agree with you.

In my own case, I got along fine (as it seemed to me) without faith as an adult for 20 years, and it was intellect/reason - Lewis and Schmemann, to be specific, and not fuzzy sentimental feelings about my past - that led me back. Indeed, it led me to reject the faith of my childhood and all of that familiar stuff - the hymns, practices, etc that could have been sentimentally driven, and led me into something rather alien to that childhood experience.

So yes, I do recognize the impact of indoctrination, but think that my own case is evidence that it does not necessarily have to be the driving factor.

As I've said once or twice before, you were never "fine without faith." Everything you've said tells us that you always needed it, and were always looking for it. You didn't know what for a long time, but you always felt empty, and were always looking. There was a void in you. Alcohol was an attempt to dull the pain of that void. The men's group was an attempt to fill that void. Repeatedly going to a priest you did not agree with was another attempt to fill the void. Eventually, he presented his faith in a way that resonated with your intellect/reason.

[rusmeister]

Here I would largely agree. Certainly the children experiences church in the context of family, hopefully in love as well, and that would certainly be a positive connection to church. Of course, when you say, "you're gonna go to Hell if you do X," you are expressing precisely what we don't express. That is part of the western juridical approach, which started with formulas that developed in the Roman West over centuries prior to the Reformation, and its interpretations were retained by the so-called Reformers even as they were rejecting the forms. Thus, the western "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" was possible, something not possible in Orthodoxy.

From what I was told, the Jehovah's Witnesses agree with you.

In my own case, I got along fine (as it seemed to me) without faith as an adult for 20 years, and it was intellect/reason - Lewis and Schmemann, to be specific, and not fuzzy sentimental feelings about my past - that led me back. Indeed, it led me to reject the faith of my childhood and all of that familiar stuff - the hymns, practices, etc that could have been sentimentally driven, and led me into something rather alien to that childhood experience.

So yes, I do recognize the impact of indoctrination, but think that my own case is evidence that it does not necessarily have to be the driving factor.

As I've said once or twice before, you were never "fine without faith." Everything you've said tells us that you always needed it, and were always looking for it. You didn't know what for a long time, but you always felt empty, and were always looking. There was a void in you. Alcohol was an attempt to dull the pain of that void. The men's group was an attempt to fill that void. Repeatedly going to a priest you did not agree with was another attempt to fill the void. Eventually, he presented his faith in a way that resonated with your intellect/reason.

I think that's true. But the salient point is that I did not perceive a void. I thought I was fine without faith. I think the same could be conjectured about anyone who does not perceive a need for faith. If you are not aware of a need, then you won't think that you need it. If you aren't aware that you have cancer, then you won't think you need chemotherapy. Of course, maybe you don't actually have cancer. But isn't periodic examination recommended?

On Jehovah's Witnesses, so what? The important point is that what is de rigeur in nearly all of the Christian West is not in the Christian East - and it is that Western tradition which has affected so many of us and led us to reject it - one of the most common properly-rejected notions being the idea of eternal punishment - as punishment - for breaking some rules (out of ignorance, even). Thus, saying that one was a Catholic, or Episcopalian, and therefore one knows everything they need to know about Christianity really doesn't get them off of the hook AFAIC. The reasons generally given for rejecting Christian faith - such as Dukkha or others give - are usually ones I myself agree with - and the faith I have found doesn't teach those things - and sometimes even THEIR faith doesn't actually teach those things - so their reasons are nullified in my eyes as a result. Studying the history of Christianity and the Church really cleared up a lot for me and made obvious what had been a big inexplicable mess in the divisions in Christianity.

[Fist and Faith]

On Jehovah's Witnesses, so what?

Nothing. I just thought I'd mention it.

As I've said once or twice before, you were never "fine without faith." Everything you've said tells us that you always needed it, and were always looking for it. You didn't know what for a long time, but you always felt empty, and were always looking. There was a void in you. Alcohol was an attempt to dull the pain of that void. The men's group was an attempt to fill that void. Repeatedly going to a priest you did not agree with was another attempt to fill the void. Eventually, he presented his faith in a way that resonated with your intellect/reason.

I think that's true. But the salient point is that I did not perceive a void. I thought I was fine without faith. I think the same could be conjectured about anyone who does not perceive a need for faith. If you are not aware of a need, then you won't think that you need it. If you aren't aware that you have cancer, then you won't think you need chemotherapy. Of course, maybe you don't actually have cancer. But isn't periodic examination recommended?

Yes, many people who do not perceive a need for faith actually have one. Which do and which don't are sometimes easy to spot from outside. Sometimes not. Of course, there's no reason to believe that everyone has a need for faith. Lots of people don't have cancer.

[rusmeister]

I think it's useless arguing - so I won't - but this is a sample of why I've said that there can be no compromise - that, like with slavery, the nation must become all one thing or the other, not half-and-half.

www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/a ... 06219.html

It's notable that they do not offer the Catholic explanations as to why they believe that direct action must never be taken against life at any stage, and so the article paints the Catholic position as being (heartlessly and unreasonably)one that would let the mother die (senselessly) on the assumption that the unborn baby is not equally worth fighting for and saving. As soon as one sees the baby as being of no less value than the mother, then the Catholic position becomes sensible and the charges against it as unreasonable.

Even this excerpt from the diocese that the article effectively excoriates (by its choice of sources, if nothing else) would show this:

For any health care institution to identify itself as Catholic, its members must make a commitment to
protect life at all stages, from conception until natural death. At no time may a doctor or any medical
professional take the direct action against the life of a vulnerable child.

www.arizonacatholic.org/statements/
thebishopshour.org/2010/12/23/the-bishop-the-hospital-and-the-diocese-of-phoenix/ (A broadcast stating and explaining the Catholic position when the Post is obviously not going to do so)

Anyway, like with same-sex marriage, our nation - and I now believe all of the western world and most of the rest of it is going to become all one thing or the other, and the other view will be persecuted. There is no room for compromise (as you, Fist, and some others seem to imagine). This is just one example of many of the ACLU working to crush the Catholic stand (and thereby the traditional Christian stand in general).

At least try to understand the other side's position as they themselves present it!

[Prebe]

As soon as one sees the baby as being of no less value than the mother, then the Catholic position becomes sensible and the charges against it as unreasonable.

Two things:
1: I don't think an unborn baby under any circumstances is of equal value to the grown up woman carrying it. And frankly, I find it disturbing that someone would save an unborn childs life at the cost of the mother, which could become the consequence of that reasoning.

2: Ascribing individual value to the woman and the baby inside her is pricipally wrong and a rhetorical trick as long as they are still one physical unit.

[Rawedge Rim]

As soon as one sees the baby as being of no less value than the mother, then the Catholic position becomes sensible and the charges against it as unreasonable.

Two things:
1: I don't think an unborn baby under any circumstances is of equal value to the grown up woman carrying it. And frankly, I find it disturbing that someone would save an unborn childs life at the cost of the mother, which could become the consequence of that reasoning.

2: Ascribing individual value to the woman and the baby inside her is pricipally wrong and a rhetorical trick as long as they are still one physical unit.

Frankly, the mother of an unborn child in many circumstance may disagree with you, and as far as nature is concerned, the baby is more important. Nature only demands that your genes get passed on to the next generation, not that one has to survive the process.

[Prebe]

Nature "demands" that you die if you get cancer. Nature "demands" that you die if you can't feed yourself and have no family.

Do you have any idea how disgusting (and misogynous) that argument is in a civilised society?

If you had to pop a baby through your urethra, I'm sure you'd be happy that someone had decided that the baby was ""more important", and that "nature demanded it".

No, this is not an emoticon I use often, but for the benefit of you:

[Rawedge Rim]

Nature "demands" that you die if you get cancer. Nature "demands" that you die if you can't feed yourself and have no family.

Do you have any idea how disgusting (and misogynous) that argument is in a civilised society?

If you had to pop a baby through your urethra, I'm sure you'd be happy that someone had decided that the baby was ""more important", and that "nature demanded it".

No, this is not an emoticon I use often, but for the benefit of you:

This is why you take great care when engaging in activities that are designed to create a baby. Yes the mother is important. I'll even grant you that the mother's life is slightly more important than the unborn baby. The mother's comfort and emotional stability is not more important than the unborn babies life.

[sindatur]

Prebe, I believe RR has a good point, true it wasn't presented well, but, a good point nonetheless.

Many women would choose to save their unborn baby at the risk of their own life, especially if they know they could never have a chance at having another baby. Would you allow that choice? Personally, if I was a woman and pregnant, and knew it was my last chance to have a baby, I'm not sure I could choose my own life at the cost of the baby's.

[aliantha]

The ex and I agreed, early in our marriage, that if there was a choice between me or the unborn kid, that the doctors should save me. (And btw, *he* initiated the discussion and proposed that solution -- it wasn't me trying to save my own @ss. ) But that was our own decision. I'm not suggesting it should be anyone else's.

I'm less inclined to focus on "which life to save?" and more inclined to focus on the impossible situation in which this places the medical professionals who serve at Catholic hospitals. Talk about a dilemma. They've taken two oaths -- the Hippocratic and, I would presume, one to God/Catholicism -- that are in direct contradiction in this case. My heart goes out to anyone caught in such a situation.

[rusmeister]

As soon as one sees the baby as being of no less value than the mother, then the Catholic position becomes sensible and the charges against it as unreasonable.

Two things:
1: I don't think an unborn baby under any circumstances is of equal value to the grown up woman carrying it. And frankly, I find it disturbing that someone would save an unborn childs life at the cost of the mother, which could become the consequence of that reasoning.

2: Ascribing individual value to the woman and the baby inside her is pricipally wrong and a rhetorical trick as long as they are still one physical unit.

That's why we can't even argue.
Your view fundamentally cannot understand ours. Debating as long as that is the case is like arguing apples and oranges.

[rusmeister]

The ex and I agreed, early in our marriage, that if there was a choice between me or the unborn kid, that the doctors should save me. (And btw, *he* initiated the discussion and proposed that solution -- it wasn't me trying to save my own @ss. ) But that was our own decision. I'm not suggesting it should be anyone else's.

I'm less inclined to focus on "which life to save?" and more inclined to focus on the impossible situation in which this places the medical professionals who serve at Catholic hospitals. Talk about a dilemma. They've taken two oaths -- the Hippocratic and, I would presume, one to God/Catholicism -- that are in direct contradiction in this case. My heart goes out to anyone caught in such a situation.

There IS NO CONTRADICTION for the Catholic!!!
They do what they can for both. They may do no harm to both. Death is not necessarily evil, but murder IS damnable.

Like I said, it's a failure to understand the (traditional) Christian position.
Until you understand it, there's nothing to argue.

No one is being asked to agree before they understand. First understand, and then we can talk about agreeing or disagreeing.

[Fist and Faith]

I really don't see the problem with that article. A Catholic hospital did something the Catholic Church does not allow. Therefore, the Catholic Church kicked the hospital out of the... whatever the right word is. Flock? Organization? That's well within the rights of the Church.

[Fist and Faith]

The ex and I agreed, early in our marriage, that if there was a choice between me or the unborn kid, that the doctors should save me. (And btw, *he* initiated the discussion and proposed that solution -- it wasn't me trying to save my own @ss. ) But that was our own decision. I'm not suggesting it should be anyone else's.

I'm less inclined to focus on "which life to save?" and more inclined to focus on the impossible situation in which this places the medical professionals who serve at Catholic hospitals. Talk about a dilemma. They've taken two oaths -- the Hippocratic and, I would presume, one to God/Catholicism -- that are in direct contradiction in this case. My heart goes out to anyone caught in such a situation.

There IS NO CONTRADICTION for the Catholic!!!
They do what they can for both. They may do no harm to both. Death is not necessarily evil, but murder IS damnable.

Like I said, it's a failure to understand the (traditional) Christian position.
Until you understand it, there's nothing to argue.

No one is being asked to agree before they understand. First understand, and then we can talk about agreeing or disagreeing.

Perhaps what ali is calling a contradiction is this:
There are times when it is certain that both mother and unborn child WILL die. There's no way to save both. But the mother WOULD live if the unborn child is killed before they both die. So what to do? Watch them both die? The child will die either way. Many of us believe the right thing is saving one, rather than losing both, even if saving one means actively killing one, rather than passively watching both die.

[aliantha]

The ex and I agreed, early in our marriage, that if there was a choice between me or the unborn kid, that the doctors should save me. (And btw, *he* initiated the discussion and proposed that solution -- it wasn't me trying to save my own @ss. ) But that was our own decision. I'm not suggesting it should be anyone else's.

I'm less inclined to focus on "which life to save?" and more inclined to focus on the impossible situation in which this places the medical professionals who serve at Catholic hospitals. Talk about a dilemma. They've taken two oaths -- the Hippocratic and, I would presume, one to God/Catholicism -- that are in direct contradiction in this case. My heart goes out to anyone caught in such a situation.

There IS NO CONTRADICTION for the Catholic!!!
They do what they can for both. They may do no harm to both. Death is not necessarily evil, but murder IS damnable.

Like I said, it's a failure to understand the (traditional) Christian position.
Until you understand it, there's nothing to argue.

No one is being asked to agree before they understand. First understand, and then we can talk about agreeing or disagreeing.

Perhaps what ali is calling a contradiction is this:
There are times when it is certain that both mother and unborn child WILL die. There's no way to save both. But the mother WOULD live if the unborn child is killed before they both die. So what to do? Watch them both die? The child will die either way. Many of us believe the right thing is saving one, rather than losing both, even if saving one means actively killing one, rather than passively watching both die.

That's exactly what I meant. Thanks, Fist.

There can certainly be cases in which one must die to save the life of the other. What does a devout physician do in that case -- provide palliative care while God sorts it out? That would seem to me to be a violation of the Hippocratic oath.

Sure, if the doctor "interferes," he or she is disallowing God from performing the miracle (if a miracle there is to be) of somehow saving both lives. But maybe the doctor himself/herself is the mechanism of the miracle God has provided in this case.

And it seems to me that refusing to save a life is in direct violation of the oath to "do no harm" -- especially if, as in Fist's scenario, the fetus will die either way.

[Prebe]

Sindatur: Sure there are women who would chose the babies life over their own. As with so many other things, it should be their CHOICE. Just like choosing their own life over the babies.

As Ali said:

But that was our own decision. I'm not suggesting it should be anyone else's.

In the event that the woman is unable to make the choice, I absolutely think that the doctor choosing to save the child should be prosecuted.

Or, if you will, choosing NOT to kill the baby if that would save the mother should be punished. The last rephrasing is to spare me the accusation of euphemisms.

And RR, I was refering to "the life" of the child and mother as in "not being dead". A very either/or discussion, which I belive is what Rus inititated by talking about "the value of a childs life". So you can leave "the comfort of the spoiled mother" and the "engaging in child risking activity" arguments out of this particular principal discussion.

There are times when it is certain that both mother and unborn child WILL die. There's no way to save both.

I'm guessing that Rus will use the Jedi mind-trick on that one, just as Jehovas Witnesses claim that transfusions can't save lives.

[rusmeister]

The ex and I agreed, early in our marriage, that if there was a choice between me or the unborn kid, that the doctors should save me. (And btw, *he* initiated the discussion and proposed that solution -- it wasn't me trying to save my own @ss. ) But that was our own decision. I'm not suggesting it should be anyone else's.

I'm less inclined to focus on "which life to save?" and more inclined to focus on the impossible situation in which this places the medical professionals who serve at Catholic hospitals. Talk about a dilemma. They've taken two oaths -- the Hippocratic and, I would presume, one to God/Catholicism -- that are in direct contradiction in this case. My heart goes out to anyone caught in such a situation.

There IS NO CONTRADICTION for the Catholic!!!
They do what they can for both. They may do no harm to both. Death is not necessarily evil, but murder IS damnable.

Like I said, it's a failure to understand the (traditional) Christian position.
Until you understand it, there's nothing to argue.

No one is being asked to agree before they understand. First understand, and then we can talk about agreeing or disagreeing.

Perhaps what ali is calling a contradiction is this:
There are times when it is certain that both mother and unborn child WILL die. There's no way to save both. But the mother WOULD live if the unborn child is killed before they both die. So what to do? Watch them both die? The child will die either way. Many of us believe the right thing is saving one, rather than losing both, even if saving one means actively killing one, rather than passively watching both die.

This response also responds to what Ali and Prebe have said (as much as it can be responded to)

Fist, what's the point of saying what everyone already knows? We are thoroughly aware that you do not believe the things Catholics believe.

I had already said this:

There IS NO CONTRADICTION for the Catholic!!!

I'll change the emphasis to:

There is no contradiction FOR THE CATHOLIC!!!

What I think is that people are not thoroughly aware of what Catholics do believe. They know they believe that the baby is human - that it is actually a baby. They know little to none of the philosophy that stands behind that idea - and so, the belief is summarily dismissed. (Of course, many Catholics are also unfamiliar with that philosophy. It depends on the degree to which someone educates themselves on their faith and whether they hold it as important and impacting all aspects of our lives.)

Like I said, arguing is futile. But maybe it can be communicated that you cannot create a world where toleration of abortion can stand side-by-side with intoleration of abortion. You can't. That's the contradiction in philosophies that think they can get everyone to just "live in peace" - because they do so by discounting what the various people's believe as unimportant, while really simply working to impose their own view. My point here was that the UCLA will NOT let Catholics be Catholic, whatever fine words any of you may say about your worldviews. A real war with real consequences is taking place in the real world; I see it to be a spiritual one.

If only you really ever stated the position of intelligent Catholicism/Orthodoxy, instead of merely stating your own position, then I might be convinced that you DO understand. If you did, you would understand that in that view, the consequences of killing the baby are far more terrible than the temporal tragedy of watching someone die - something we must all do someday anyway. I never see any evidence of understanding of that. It's always shock and horror that a mother may die and that's all.

The Catholic doctor is NOT caught in a contradiction. They may be witnessing a tragedy, but they know that doing an evil act will be destructive for the doctor and mother (never mind the baby). So we would sympathize with a tragic situation, but not with a decision to to evil - to get out of one aspect of that tragedy by committing something worse than the tragedy. (The knowledge that doctor, mother and baby are all eternal beings also transforms how one views these situations.)
As to the idea of killing someone because he will die anyway - there is all the difference in the world to the believer between killing someone and watching them die. In the one, you have committed evil - in the other you do not. From the believer's view evil is categorically unjustifiable for the sake of good ends.

The futilility of all these discussions... If we do not have a firm grasp on the other's POV, we must always talk past, rather than to, each other.

One of the many intelligent sources if you ever wanted to learn the best of what you're arguing against (note I said 'if'):
www.amazon.com/Sacred-Gift-Life-Christi ... 0881411833

[Fist and Faith]

None of us have said we don't understand the Catholic POV. Just because I don't believe what the Catholic believes, doesn't mean I don't understand it. Just because you don't believe what I believe, doesn't mean you don't understand it. We just disagree with each other. And we're stating our POV, just as surely as you're stating yours. I don't know how this makes you in any way superior in this discussion.

To **OUR** POV, in the scenario we're discussing, it is a contradiction to claim to revere human life, then to watch two die when you know it is possible to save one, even though the only way is to kill the other.

You must understand that, then we can talk about agreeing or disagreeing.

But there's not much to talk about, is there. We disagree with each other. We're not going to embrace your POV, and you're not going to embrace ours. Why do you post things you know we don't agree with, then get so worked up when we don't agree with it? What did expect? We disagree about most every aspect of existence.