BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: akenaton
Date: 29 Jan 16 - 07:07 AM

This thread was started with the intention of attacking religion.
This new epidemic is dreadful, as is the attempt to use it to demonise people of faith.

The important thing is to find an antidote to the disease before it spreads across the globe.

As far as I understand it is not spread by any sort of behaviour, but by an insect, so a study of demographics is going to be of no use in halting it.

The question of whether or not to abort all babies with this condition is very complicated indeed and not to used as a battering ram to make political points.

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Jan 16 - 05:46 AM

All right, Joe. Let's be a little more explicit then. I somehow can't see all the Catholics (and many other Christians - OK, Thompson?) in the Americas suddenly campaigning for a reversal in all those illiberal anti-abortion laws in order to help what could be thousands of women carrying severely disabled babies. The campaigning will be done by someone else and there will be the dragging of feet and the invocation of God's will. Donald Trump will blame the Mexicans for bringing the virus to the US. Sorry about the cynicism. If I'm wrong, there will be mucho consuming of sombreros in my house.

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Thompson
Date: 29 Jan 16 - 03:58 AM

Keeping a count of how many posts on abortion are by known men and how many by known women ;)

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 29 Jan 16 - 02:44 AM

Joe Offer: "Address issues, not stereotypes."

They do that...and then accuse OTHERS of being bigots!!!
....without recognizing their own tactics!!

GfS

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Joe Offer
Date: 29 Jan 16 - 02:16 AM

...women will know they're doomed to spend their lives cleaning up after children with half a brain if they do what their local shaman says.

People are going to put two and two together and realize that Jesus is the god of the zombie apocalypse.

There's an awful lot of Catholicity in the Americas, even in the more liberal countries. Can't see that being much help.

You know, some people can discuss issues without putting labels on people and assuming all people with that label will act the same. It makes for far more fruitful discussion when people discuss issues, not labels.

Many Catholics and Christians and many who practice Shamanism, have thinking different from what the above statements would lead one to believe. And if one wishes to accomplish something among people of various cultures and belief systems, that is possible only if one acknowledges and respects those cultures and belief systems. Address issues, not stereotypes.

-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Thompson
Date: 29 Jan 16 - 02:15 AM

"Catholicity" isn't the only opponent to abortion. Evangelical Protestants are equally foaming about it. You should read some of the comments in the nexus between Unionists in Northern Ireland and TeaPartyists in Middle America. Here's the new leader of Northern Ireland, Arlene Foster.

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Jan 16 - 08:24 PM

"Devastating". My eyesight is deteriating. I'd better see the opticologist tomorrow.

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Jan 16 - 08:21 PM

Well we heard last week that this disease is likely to spread rapidly to the US. The first thought in my cynical little mind was that that explains why we're getting wall-to-wall, panic-stricken mass coverage. I seem to recall that the devasting spread of HIV in Africa got drip-drip coverage at best. Still, if money gets ploughed into fighting this disease, I suppose that some good will come out of it. It's hard to know what can be done in those countries dominated by anti-abortion cults if the worst happens. There's an awful lot of Catholicity in the Americas, even in the more liberal countries. Can't see that being much help.

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Greg F.
Date: 28 Jan 16 - 08:08 PM

No, Donald Trump is the god of the zombie apocalypse.

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Jack Campin
Date: 28 Jan 16 - 07:29 PM

The pictures in the media of microcephalic babies make them look sorta cute and cuddly albeit weird. They may not stay that way, or end up like the entertaining pinheads in "Freaks", either. I had a summer job as a student looking after permanently institutionalized mental patients. We had two severe microcephalics, both totally mute and with no understanding of anything said or gestured to them. One of them spent most of his time trying to destroy the building with his teeth, in the course of which he'd managed to rip off a strip of solid wood windowsill as thick as a broomstick and a few feet long. The other had had his front teeth removed after he'd tried to bite a paraplegic kid's penis off and nearly succeeded.

Multiply that thousands of times from the combined effects of virus and religion and imagine how a mother with access to only Third World resources might deal with it.

People are going to put two and two together and realize that Jesus is the god of the zombie apocalypse.

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 28 Jan 16 - 05:24 PM

Good point Jack

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Jan 16 - 12:39 PM

npr blicky

Subject: RE: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Jan 16 - 12:23 PM

I heard something on NPR about this... apparently the virus is active in places where most pregnancies are unplanned and where women have no options to terminate (the program said interrupt, but no, it's terminate) an unwanted pregnancy.
Yikes.
Nothing I know of in local media because I am not local.

Subject: BS: Zika vs anti-abortion cults
From: Jack Campin
Date: 28 Jan 16 - 10:17 AM

I haven't seen this angle mentioned. But given the likely global impact of the Zika virus:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-35427493

there is an impending clash between women and the state in places like Nicaragua where an anti-abortionist cult controls the government. Tens of thousands of women will know they're doomed to spend their lives cleaning up after children with half a brain if they do what their local shaman says.

Any pointers in local media to how this will play out?