Human Sacrifice

On Friday, April 26 (2013), I heard two very different topics on the radio that have caused me to think about them along one theme. The first that I will address was on NPR’s Science Friday and involved the potentiality of a one-way manned space flight to Mars.

When discussing a one-way journey to the red planet, the host of Science Friday seemed surprised that people would be willing to be part of such a dangerous venture, and in a joking manner questioned the sanity of such people. And yet, I do believe he truly did not understand why people would volunteer for such a mission. I think the failure to understand this part of human nature – a willingness to undergo personal sacrifice in the name of adventure, exploration, scientific research, etc. that might lead to physical and mental discomfort, negative health effects, bodily injury, or death – may confound a certain political mindset that increasingly appears to want to make our lives safer. Mankind must push the limits of our boundaries: at a personal level through sports and adventure or at a national level like our (former) space program. It is persevering through difficult circumstances that man comes to understand who he is and what is important to him, and this is especially true if one has decided to voluntarily undergo hardship. This is why people are drawn to a one-way trip to Mars: not because they are psychologically unstable misfits, but because they endeavor to demonstrate the best traits that humanity has to offer. This is the kind of sacrifice the best among us is willing to make so the rest of us can reap the benefits of their efforts…or at least enviously cheer them on.

The other kind of human sacrifice is not self-sacrifice but a sacrificial offering. 
In a speech on Friday, April 26, at Planned Parenthood – coinciding with the ongoing murder trial of abortion doctor Hermit Gosnell – President Obama promised to continue fighting for “women’s health” and ended his talk with “God bless Planned Parenthood”. When earlier questioned by the media regarding the abortion trial, the president and his spokesman on different occasions said that they will not comment on an ongoing trial. That never stopped Mr. Obama on other occasions, but in this particular case he and the major media outlets were in lockstep as the latter initially would not cover the trial at all: not before they were shamed into it for a brief period of time before the Boston marathon bombings consumed all the news. To my knowledge, all major women’s groups that support abortion have not only not condemned Kermit Gosnell and his clinic of horrors but have not even acknowledged the trial. This might be disturbing, but it’s not surprising. These are the same players who did not come to the aid of blind Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng, who fought against China’s forced abortion policy, when he escaped house arrest and found refuge in the U.S. embassy. This was not a man railing against a “woman’s right to choose” but against a government’s ‘right’ to forcibly kill unborn children the women wanted. Nevertheless, not a peep from Planned Parenthood or NOW about these abuses against women. Again, this makes sense in light of the Gosnell trial as it demonstrates so much clearer that the ghost of racist Margaret Sanger is alive and well. As she so directly put it:

"More children from the fit, less from the unfit -- that is the chief aim of birth control."  "We do not want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten the idea out if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members."

Are not these pro-abortion groups dominated by white middle and upper class women? Does this help explain how the racism that emanated from Planned Parenthood’s founder is causing these women to look the other way when Kermit Gosnell caused the death of at least one minority woman, spread sexually transmitted diseases via unsanitized equipment among others, ‘serviced’ Asian and black women in filthy conditions while the white girls were ushered into the only clean office, and many other crimes or offenses that don’t even include infanticide and illegal late-term abortions?

Perhaps, and even though there would doubtlessly be a large outcry and sanctions if the government of, say, Denmark, were forcibly aborting children, it seems to me that racism per se is probably not the strongest motivator for most of the pro-abortion crowd. That motivation falls under another reason (mentioned below).

Unlike self-sacrifice, sacrificial offerings are not inherently goal directed. Aristotle, and many who have followed him up to our present day, believed that everything in nature is directed toward a purpose or goal. The Philosopher (as he is called), did not invoke divine providence - or God – as the cause of these goals (but others - like Thomas Aquinas - did) but believed that they are somehow innate. Much in science seems to bear this out, but I don’t have to look beyond our own understanding of human nature to know that this is true for our species. It is just this quality that leads us to climb mountains, to plunge to the depths of the sea, and to book a one-way ticket to Mars. It also causes us to engage in hunger strikes to end injustices, and to willingness to die for God. Man takes the risks and reaps the rewards, or the suffering, for his self-sacrifice. Not so for sacrificial offerings. The genetically programmed ‘goal’ of every unborn child is to develop to the point that he can survive outside his mother’s womb in the alien atmosphere to which he is born, and to continue to develop thereafter. The natural goal of the mother is to ensure the well-being of her child: whether in the womb or not. Our natural inclinations, or goals, can be disrupted in a number of ways, including mental illness. However, there is no better way than propaganda and coercion to abandon inherent traits; particularly in the name of being tolerant and open-minded. Government is the institution best able to coerce due to its power and resources, and if propaganda won’t do it force will. However, force doesn’t change minds even if it changes behavior. The more the voices in positions of power and influence and the more time they have the more successful will be their results. When the leaders of Planned Parenthood and other secular institutions speak about women’s rights they are operating from an Orwellian playbook: they often mean the opposite of what they want you to believe (or at least the end result is the opposite). There is nothing right about not supporting brave critics of forced abortions. There is nothing right about women dying from ‘legal’ botched abortions. There is nothing right about women contacting venereal diseases in abortion clinics. There is nothing right about killing infants born alive after botched abortions. And there is nothing right about Planned Parenthood’s history of racism.

I have been calling abortion a sacrificial offering in contrast to an offering of self-sacrifice. If this is true, to who or what are children being sacrificed to? For Western societies it is clear that it is to the god of personal license. There appears to be no higher good in unrestrained secular societies than the pursuit of ever expanding individual “rights”. Personal license does not recognize authority over them, but do demand that the state create and enforce their special liberties. Freedom to do what we want, when we want, and without personal cost is the ultimate (and unsustainable) goal. But these contrived goals are very different from inherent goals. Those who self-sacrifice put themselves at risk, but those who perform sacrificial offerings engage in the destruction of others.

For non-Western societies who accept Western aide or are otherwise influenced by the West, the main reason for sacrificial offerings is for the god of population control. Of course this is not what the people are told, and there are doubtlessly many enthusiastic proponents of abortion who actually think it is about empowering women, but they are not the direct heirs of Margaret Sanger. Good ends can never come from evil means, and for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear let them carefully analyze the machinery of Planned Parenthood and see their actions through the rhetoric.  

“God Bless Planned Parenthood”?

If He does, I’m becoming an atheist.