CNN recently reported that on Thursday (1/5/23), the South Carolina state Supreme Court ruled in a 3-2 decision that the state’s six-week ban on abortion violates the state’s constitution.
YAY! (Would that more of the courts ruled similarly!)
One of the dissenting justices penned, “Abortion presents an important moral and policy issue.” He added that “legislature, not this court, should determine matters of policy.” (Of course he would say that since “legislature” is the one that banned the procedure.)
In any case, his remark got me to thinking. “Moral” is defined as “concerned with principles of right and wrong or conforming to standards of behavior and character based on those principles.” The question that automatically comes to my mind is … who (or what) defines those “principles of right and wrong”?
A large segment of the population (I think most of you know who I mean) would naturally point to “God.” However, since there are those who dispute such an entity, does it not seem more logical that such principles be defined by majority rule?
(Oh the horrors of it! The conservatives might actually lose a few of their battles!)
There’s little doubt the struggle related to WOMEN and their ABORTION RIGHTS will continue on into future generations. Hopefully, one of those generations will enable a nationwide ruling that allows women to choose what happens to their own bodies and prevents others from intervening.
*****************************************
Image by Venita Oberholster from Pixabay
Nan's Notebook 
Kudos to the South Carolina Supreme Court. As for morals, in my mind they are attached to religion(s), and therefore I say I have no morals. What I have are personal guidelines, well thought out, and always with a corollary attached: no two events or situations are exaxtly the same — therefore each must be decided on its own merits as known at the time the event or situation is occurring.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Great news!
who (or what) defines those “principles of right and wrong”?
The facts do. In this instance, those facts are found only in foetal development.
LikeLiked by 3 people
Dipshits in Disarray ~ the xians don’t give a fig about abortion, never did; it’s always been a crucible to beat The Other with. Now the Gestapo Court has overturned Dobbs and effectively ended a right that has existed fifty years the dipshits don’t have crucible to beat The Other with. Though focused on contraception, they’re flailing, things didn’t turn out as planned.
This is why they’re beating up tranny kids and drag queens …
LikeLiked by 5 people
it’s actually worse, more cynical, than that. The whole point of the right to life movement was to develop a rallying cry against the new voters enabled by the Civil Rights Act. Prior to that, it was aCatholic issue only.
LikeLike
I’m curious what this justice would think if we were to do a word substitution on “abortion” with “gun ownership” in his dissent. “Gun ownership presents an important moral and policy issue…. Legislature, not this court, should determine matters of policy.”
There are a lot of other potential substitutions which the courts have been prepared to wade into that are potentially “policy” issues, yet have had no problems. Potentially everything is a policy issue, so why even have courts? Let’s leave everything as a matter to legislatures, and ignore reasonable interpretations of constitutions. Or better yet, legislatures can do whatever they want, including make new rules that they don’t need elections – they simply decide who is best for government whenever they want, and the consent of the government be damned.
Special pleading is always nice to see.
LikeLiked by 2 people
HA! Yes indeed, the word substitution puts things in an entirely different perspective, doesn’t it? Of course, this issue isn’t totally resolved. As the article states, it’s merely a temporary injunction. There’s little doubt it will be overruled when all is said and done. 😠
LikeLike
Every society, everyone and every situation has some form of moral. It is essentially the more or less ethical evaluation of actions and inaction as either beneficial, or harmful. We as a social species base the idea of benefit and harm somewhere between the single individual and other individuals with whom we form the society, but there is a bigger picture where everything affects everything.
It is hard, making the guesswork of what follows, because there are often so many variables involved. To dumb it down, generations of people have come up with values, principles, rules and laws. To dumb it down further many of those are not based on facts, but “because-I-say-so” reasoning, in essence authoritarianism. A lot of immature parents use it, when they are too busy, tired, or ignorant to explain the morals of an issue to their children. This creates a regress of moral, by creating further generations of immature parents, who get comfort from authoritarian dictates, from their leaders, or gods. They feel safer in their moral bets, when they do not have the understading of facts, but think they can remove responsibility to the authoritarity.
Abortion is an easy pick for a political tool for anyone, who would prefer to protect their own priviledge by making social morals to remain an obscure issue, since this is where the emergence of an individual is in the process. The rights of the individual can easily be mixed by emotional appeals to a “baby” being killed, when in fact we are talking about a fetus, or a zygote and in most cases just the possibly fertilized egg cell, all the while the individual does not even exist yet.
Religious claims about the individual “soul” appearing at the moment of conception should not play a role, because they do not apply to individuals who do not share those beliefs, nor can be based on reality. Furthermore, it should be obvious, that the claim about the opinion of the Christian god on abortion is an afterthought (and an excuse to step on the rights of the women in question, who may not be even seen as actual individuals, or fully fledged members of the society, but as some harlots in need of punishment- in having to take care of the potential baby – for having enjoyed sex), since the god of this particular religion has not taken a stand on the issue in the so called “scripture”.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Your second paragraph sums things up quite well.
Thanks, once again, for your thoughtful input.
LikeLike
While this bodes well for humanity, it is but a snowflake in a blizzard. They, the nuts on the far right everywhere, are passing bills, laws, to restrict or ban abortion in many states.
…and we ain’t got much help with SCOTUS. They are the fuckers that started the landslide.
LikeLiked by 2 people
They are the fuckers that started the landslide. INDEED!!
LikeLike
if I believed in god(dess), this would make me think maybe there is one (or more)… great post
LikeLiked by 1 person