Phillip Ellis Jackson, writing for the Intellectual Conservative, sends a link to his lengthy controversial article on moral relativism. Here's an excerpt:
The moral relativism of the Left can take us to some pretty strange places where Right and Wrong lose all meaning. Except, that is, when it comes to condemning George W. Bush and other Evil Republicans while giving a pass to terrorism and abortion.3.7 From slavery to abortion and terrorism
Both terrorism and elective abortion rationalize their behavior in much the same way that southern plantation owners did during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
They exist by denying basic human rights, but take this denial to the next level. The logic of terrorism and abortion requires that the perpetrator completely deny the humanity of the thing being killed. In neither case is a human life being taken, because in both cases terrorists and abortionists have rationalized away its human qualities, and therefore its basic rights. This is why Islamo-fascists teach that Jews are no better than animals, and believe that Infidels are not “innocent” human beings. And it explains why a woman aborting her child must look at her baby as an “undifferentiated tissue mass” or a “Right to Choose,” instead of as a developing human being. In both cases arbitrary criteria is used to deny a person’s humanity, and because of this the seeds of their own destruction have been sewn as well. Terrorism cannot survive without fear; and eventually fear is conquered. Abortion cannot survive without ignorance; and eventually ignorance is replaced with knowledge.
What allows both terrorism and abortion to exist today is a deliberate effort to ignore, pervert, or rationalize-away our common moral code in the name of expediency and self-interest. We look at world consensus to justify our actions, ignoring the fact this consensus is made up of personal self-interests and is not based on a common moral value. We seek a legal justification for action or inaction through the United Nations, without first asking whether a core moral issue is at stake. There is nothing inherently wrong with either consensus or global cooperation. But unlike our system of laws and government – which was built on the principles embodied in the Declaration of Independence — world opinion and world government has no such similar base.
Mouthing a concern for human rights is not the same thing as recognizing that those rights derive from God, not man. The fact that a country has the word “Republic” or “Democratic” in its name does not therefore make it truly democratic, or insure that it will operate as a republic. It is only when we move beyond mere words and begin to look at actions and intentions that we discover the truth of a matter.Read the restWhat has allowed elective abortion to supplant slavery as a national indignation is a combination of the factors I addressed above — self-interest, rationalization, hidden agendas — but something else too. Those who took the “moral high ground” in sparking this debate had their own set of vested interests and hidden agendas. Beginning with prayer in public schools and other public institutions, they took key provisions of the Declaration of Independence and substituted their own religious preferences for “God” so that paying homage to “Jesus,” not following a God-given moral code, became the focus of their efforts.
Because of this approach, moral Relativists were able to seize the debate and frame their core issues in a deceitful way. Since Religion A claims to speak for God, and the Constitution forbids the state to establish an official religion, then both Religion A and the God it speaks for must be completely removed from the secular world. This logic prevailed because the Constitution is not the Declaration of Independence, and drawing inspiration and support from God is not the same thing as making laws that reflect God’s rules as expressed by a particular religion. It didn’t matter if what Christians believed perfectly matched 95% of the beliefs of every other religion. The Constitution, though inspired by God-given rights, was still man’s law. And man’s law did not permit the establishment of an official state religion.
By hijacking God and linking Him to a battle to promote their values, not only did the Christian community lose their fight, it allowed the notion of “God” — the basis for their claim — to be wiped out with it. This then led to an even more determined fight to infuse “politics with religion.” Relativists became even more relative to prevent their opponent’s success, and as the Relativists carried the fight to its relativistic extreme, atrocities like abortion on demand became the law of the land.
This, ultimately, explains why a concept like abortion could take hold and flourish in a society that condemns human right abuses, and even passes laws against cruelty to animals, but it will allow a healthy 20-year old developing child to be killed without the same level of due process it demands for suspected mass murders and captured terrorists.
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